Brittany
Brittany is a cultural region in the northwest of France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica during the period of Roman occupation. It became an independent kingdom and a duchy before being united with the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province governed as if it were a separate nation under the crown. Brittany has been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain, it is bordered by the English Channel to the north, the Celtic Sea and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Bay of Biscay to the south. Its land area is 34,023 km². Brittany is the site of some of the world's oldest standing architecture, home to the Barnenez, the Tumulus Saint-Michel and others, which date to the early 5th millennium BC. Today, the historical province of Brittany is split among five French departments: Finistère in the west, Côtes-d'Armor in the north, Ille-et-Vilaine in the north east, Loire-Atlantique in the south east and Morbihan in the south on the Bay of Biscay. Since reorganisation in 1956, the modern administrative region of Brittany comprises only four of the five Breton departments, or 80% of historical Brittany.
The remaining area of old Brittany, the Loire-Atlantique department around Nantes, now forms part of the Pays de la Loire region. At the 2010 census, the population of historic Brittany was estimated to be 4,475,295. Of these, 71 % lived in the region of Brittany. In 2012, the largest metropolitan areas were Nantes and Brest. Brittany is the traditional homeland of the Breton people and is recognised by the Celtic League as one of the six Celtic nations, retaining a distinct cultural identity that reflects its history. A nationalist movement seeks greater autonomy within the French Republic; the word Brittany, along with its French and Gallo equivalents Bretagne and Bertaèyn, derive from the Latin Britannia, which means "Britons' land". This word had been used by the Romans since the 1st century to refer to Great Britain, more the Roman province of Britain; this word derives from a Greek word, Πρεττανικη or Βρεττανίαι, used by Pytheas, an explorer from Massalia who visited the British Islands around 320 BC.
The Greek word itself comes from the common Brythonic ethnonym reconstructed as *Pritanī, itself from Proto-Celtic *kʷritanoi. The Romans called Brittany Armorica, together with a quite indefinite region that extended along the English Channel coast from the Seine estuary to the Loire estuary, according to several sources, maybe along the Atlantic coast to the Garonne estuary; this term comes from a Gallic word, which means "close to the sea". Another name, was used until the 12th century, it means "wide and flat" or "to expand" and it gave the Welsh name for Brittany: Llydaw. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, many Britons settled in western Armorica, the region started to be called Britannia, although this name only replaced Armorica in the sixth century or by the end of the fifth. Authors like Geoffrey of Monmouth used the terms Britannia minor and Britannia major to distinguish Brittany from Britain. Breton-speaking people may pronounce the word Breizh in two different ways, according to their region of origin.
Breton can be divided into the dialect of Vannes. KLT speakers pronounce it and would write it Breiz, while the Vannetais speakers pronounce it and would write it Breih; the official spelling is a compromise with a z and an h together. In 1941, efforts to unify the dialects led to the creation of the so-called Breton zh, a standard which has never been accepted. On its side, Gallo language has never had a accepted writing system and several ones coexist. For instance, the name of the region in that language can be written Bertaèyn in ELG script, or Bertègn in MOGA, a couple of other scripts exist. Brittany has been inhabited by humans since the Lower Paleolithic; the first settlers were Neanderthals. This population was scarce and similar to the other Neanderthals found in the whole of Western Europe, their only original feature was a distinct culture, called "Colombanian". One of the oldest hearths in the world has been found in Finistère, it is 450,000 years old. Homo sapiens settled in Brittany around 35,000 years ago.
They replaced or absorbed the Neanderthals and developed local industries, similar to the Châtelperronian or to the Magdalenian. After the last glacial period, the warmer climate allowed the area to become wooded. At that time, Brittany was populated by large communities who started to change their lifestyles from a life of hunting and gathering, to become settled farmers. Agriculture was introduced during the 5th millennium BC by migrants from the east. However, the Neolithic Revolution in Brittany did not happen due to a radical change of population, but by slow immigration and exchange of skills. Neolithic Brittany is characterised by important megalithic production, it is sometimes designated as the "core area" of megalithic culture; the oldest monuments, were followed by princely tombs and stone rows. The Morbihan département, on the southern coast, comprises a large share of these structures, including the Carnac stones and the Broken Menhir of Er Grah in the Locmariaquer megaliths, the largest single stone erected by Neoli
ITV (TV network)
ITV is a British free-to-air television network with its headquarters in London, it was launched in 1955 as Independent Television under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to BBC Television, established in 1932. ITV is the oldest commercial network in the UK. Since the passing of the Broadcasting Act 1990, its legal name has been Channel 3, to distinguish it from the other analogue channels at the time, namely BBC 1, BBC 2 and Channel 4. In part, the number 3 was assigned because television sets would be tuned so that the regional ITV station would be on the third button, with the other stations being allocated to the number within their name. ITV is a network of television channels that operate regional television services as well as sharing programmes between each other to be displayed on the entire network. In recent years, several of these companies have merged, so the fifteen franchises are in the hands of two companies; the ITV network is to be distinguished from ITV plc, the company that resulted from the merger of Granada plc and Carlton Communications in 2004 and which holds the Channel 3 broadcasting licences in England, southern Scotland, the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands and Northern Ireland.
With the exception of Northern Ireland, the ITV brand is the brand used by ITV plc for the Channel 3 service in these areas. In Northern Ireland, ITV plc uses the brand name UTV. STV Group plc uses the STV brand for its two franchises of northern Scotland; the origins of ITV lie in the passing of the Television Act 1954, designed to break the monopoly on television held by the BBC Television Service. The act created the Independent Television Authority to regulate the industry and to award franchises; the first six franchises were awarded in 1954 for London, the Midlands and the North of England, with separate franchises for Weekdays and Weekends. The first ITV network to launch was London's Associated-Rediffusion on 22 September 1955, with the Midlands and North services launching in February 1956 and May 1956 respectively. Following these launches, the ITA awarded more franchises until the whole country was covered by fourteen regional stations, all launched by 1962; the network has been modified several times through franchise reviews that have taken place in 1963, 1967, 1974, 1980 and 1991, during which broadcast regions have changed and service operators have been replaced.
Only one service operator has been declared bankrupt, WWN in 1963, with all other operators leaving the network as a result of a franchise review. Separate weekend franchises were removed in 1968 and over the years more services were added; the Broadcasting Act 1990 changed the nature of ITV. This criticised part of the review saw four operators replaced, the operators facing different annual payments to the Treasury: Central Television, for example, paid only £2000—despite holding a lucrative and large region—because it was unopposed, while Yorkshire Television paid £37.7 million for a region of the same size and status, owing to heavy competition. Following the 1993 changes, ITV as a network began to consolidate with several companies doing so to save money by ceasing the duplication of services present when they were all separate companies. By 2004, ITV was owned by five companies, of which two and Granada had become major players by owning between them all the franchises in England, the Scottish borders and the Isle of Man.
That same year, the two merged to form ITV plc with the only subsequent acquisitions being the takeover of Channel Television, the Channel Islands franchise, in 2011. and UTV, the franchise for Northern Ireland, in 2015. The ITV network is not owned or operated by one company, but by a number of licensees, which provide regional services while broadcasting programmes across the network. Since 2016, the fifteen licences are held by two companies, with the majority held by ITV Broadcasting Limited, part of ITV plc; the network is regulated by the media regulator Ofcom, responsible for awarding the broadcast licences. The last major review of the Channel 3 franchises was in 1991, with all operators' licences having been renewed between 1999 and 2002 and again from 2014 without a further contest. While this has been the longest period that the ITV Network has gone without a major review of its licence holders, Ofcom announced that it would split the Wales and West licence from 1 January 2014, creating a national licence for Wales and joining the newly separated West region to Westcountry Television, to form a new licence for the enlarged South West of England region.
All companies holding a licence were part of the non-profit body ITV Network Limited, which commissioned and scheduled network programming, with compliance handled by ITV plc and Channel Television. However, due to amalgamation of several of these companies since the creation of ITV Network Limited, it has been replaced by an affiliation system. Approved by Ofcom, this results in ITV plc commissioning and funding the network schedule, with STV and UTV paying a fee to broadcast it. All licensees have the right to opt out of network programming (except fo
Glaslyn
Glaslyn is a lake in the Snowdonia National Park in Gwynedd, north-west Wales. It is found at 600 metres above sea level in a cwm on the eastern flanks of Snowdon, it is a rough ellipse in shape, about 500 metres east–west and about 300 metres north–south, the Miners' Track runs along the northern shore. Glaslyn is the source of the Afon Glaslyn, the major river of Gwynedd, which runs east to the reservoir of Llyn Llydaw before turning south-west to reach the sea at Porthmadog. In Welsh folklore, Arthur had Bedivere throw his sword Excalibur into Glaslyn, where Arthur's body was placed in a boat to be carried away to Afallon. Arthur's men retreated to a cave on the slopes of Y Lliwedd, where they are said to sleep until such time as they are needed. Merlin is supposed to have hidden the golden throne of Britain among the cliffs north of Crib y Ddysgl when the Saxons invaded. Glaslyn was the final resting place of a water monster, known as an afanc, which had plagued the people of the Conwy valley.
They tempted the monster out of the water with a young girl, before securing it with chains and dragging it to Glaslyn. A large stone known as Maen Du'r Arddu, below Clogwyn Du'r Arddu, is supposed to have magical powers. Like several other sites in Wales, it is said that if two people spend the night there, one will become a great poet while the other will become insane. Llyn Coch in Cwm Clogwyn has been associated with the Tylwyth Teg, including a version of the fairy bride legend. RSPB Glaslyn Osprey Project
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, sometimes referred to as Britain, is a sovereign country located off the north-western coast of the European mainland. The United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland, many smaller islands. Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state, the Republic of Ireland. Apart from this land border, the United Kingdom is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, with the North Sea to the east, the English Channel to the south and the Celtic Sea to the south-west, giving it the 12th-longest coastline in the world; the Irish Sea lies between Great Ireland. With an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world, it is the 22nd-most populous country, with an estimated 66.0 million inhabitants in 2017. The UK is constitutional monarchy; the current monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 1952, making her the longest-serving current head of state.
The United Kingdom's capital and largest city is London, a global city and financial centre with an urban area population of 10.3 million. Other major urban areas in the UK include Greater Manchester, the West Midlands and West Yorkshire conurbations, Greater Glasgow and the Liverpool Built-up Area; the United Kingdom consists of four constituent countries: England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Their capitals are London, Edinburgh and Belfast, respectively. Apart from England, the countries have their own devolved governments, each with varying powers, but such power is delegated by the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which may enact laws unilaterally altering or abolishing devolution; the nearby Isle of Man, Bailiwick of Guernsey and Bailiwick of Jersey are not part of the UK, being Crown dependencies with the British Government responsible for defence and international representation. The medieval conquest and subsequent annexation of Wales by the Kingdom of England, followed by the union between England and Scotland in 1707 to form the Kingdom of Great Britain, the union in 1801 of Great Britain with the Kingdom of Ireland created the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. There are fourteen British Overseas Territories, the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, encompassed a quarter of the world's land mass and was the largest empire in history. British influence can be observed in the language and political systems of many of its former colonies; the United Kingdom is a developed country and has the world's fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest economy by purchasing power parity. It has a high-income economy and has a high Human Development Index rating, ranking 14th in the world, it was the world's first industrialised country and the world's foremost power during the 19th and early 20th centuries. The UK remains a great power, with considerable economic, military and political influence internationally, it is sixth in military expenditure in the world. It has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946.
It has been a leading member state of the European Union and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. The United Kingdom is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, the Council of Europe, the G7, the G20, NATO, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the World Trade Organization; the 1707 Acts of Union declared that the kingdoms of England and Scotland were "United into One Kingdom by the Name of Great Britain". The term "United Kingdom" has been used as a description for the former kingdom of Great Britain, although its official name from 1707 to 1800 was "Great Britain"; the Acts of Union 1800 united the kingdom of Great Britain and the kingdom of Ireland in 1801, forming the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Following the partition of Ireland and the independence of the Irish Free State in 1922, which left Northern Ireland as the only part of the island of Ireland within the United Kingdom, the name was changed to the "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland".
Although the United Kingdom is a sovereign country, Scotland and Northern Ireland are widely referred to as countries. The UK Prime Minister's website has used the phrase "countries within a country" to describe the United Kingdom; some statistical summaries, such as those for the twelve NUTS 1 regions of the United Kingdom refer to Scotland and Northern Ireland as "regions". Northern Ireland is referred to as a "province". With regard to Northern Ireland, the descriptive name used "can be controversial, with the choice revealing one's political preferences"; the term "Great Britain" conventionally refers to the island of Great Britain, or politically to England and Wales in combination. However, it is sometimes used as a loose synonym for the United Kingdom as a whole; the term "Britain" is used both as a synonym for Great Britain, as a synonym for the United Kingdom. Usage is mixed, with the BBC preferring to use Britain as shorthand only for Great Britain and the UK Government, while accepting that both terms refer to the United K
Snowdonia
Snowdonia is a mountainous region in northwestern Wales and a national park of 823 square miles in area. It was the first to be designated of the three national parks in Wales, in 1951, it contains the highest peaks in the United Kingdom outside of Scotland. The English name for the area derives from Snowdon, the highest mountain in Wales at 3560 ft. In Welsh, the area is named Eryri. A held belief is that the name is derived from eryr, thus means'the abode/land of eagles', but recent evidence is that it means Highlands, is related to the Latin oriri as leading Welsh scholar Sir Ifor Williams proved; the term Eryri first appeared in a manuscript in the 9th-century Historia Brittonum, in an account of the downfall of the semi-legendary 5th-century king Gwrtheyrn. In the Middle Ages the title Prince of Wales and Lord of Snowdonia was used by Llywelyn ap Gruffudd. Before the boundaries of the national park were designated, "Snowdonia" was used to refer to a smaller area, namely the upland area of northern Gwynedd centred on the Snowdon massif, whereas the national park covers an area more than twice that size extending far to the south into Meirionnydd.
This is apparent in books published prior to 1951, such as the classic travelogue Wild Wales by George Borrow and The Mountains of Snowdonia by H. Carr & G. Lister. F. J. North, as editor of the book Snowdonia, states "When the Committee delineated provisional boundaries, they included areas some distance beyond Snowdonia proper." The traditional Snowdonia thus includes the ranges of Snowdon and its satellites, the Glyderau, the Carneddau and the Moel Siabod group. It does not include the hills to the south of Maentwrog; as Eryri, this area has a unique place in Welsh history and culture. Snowdonia National Park was established in 1951 as the third national park in Britain, following the Peak District and the Lake District, it covers 827 square miles, has 37 miles of coastline. The Snowdonia National Park covers parts of the counties of Conwy; the park is governed by the Snowdonia National Park Authority, made up of local government and Welsh representatives, its main offices are at Penrhyndeudraeth.
Unlike national parks in other countries, Snowdonia are made up of both public and private lands under central planning authority. The makeup of land ownership at Snowdonia is as follows: More than 26,000 people live within the park. 58.6% of the population could speak Welsh in 2011. While most of the land is either open or mountainous land, there is a significant amount of agricultural activity within the park. Since the local government re-organisation of 1998, the park lies in the county of Gwynedd, in the county borough of Conwy, it is governed by the 18-member Snowdonia National Park Authority. Unusually, Snowdonia National Park has a hole in the middle, around the town of Blaenau Ffestiniog, a slate quarrying centre; this was deliberately excluded from the park when it was set up to allow the development of new light industry to replace the reduced slate industry. The Snowdonia Society is a registered charity formed in 1967, it is a voluntary group of people with an interest in its protection.
Amory Lovins led the successful 1970s opposition to stop Rio Tinto digging up the area for a massive mine. Research indicates that there were 3.67 million visitors to Snowdonia National Park in 2013, with 9.74 million tourist days spent in the park during that year. Total tourist expenditure was £433.6 million in 2013. Snowdonia may be divided into four areas: The northernmost area is the most popular with tourists, includes Moel Hebog, Mynydd Mawr and the Nantlle Ridge; these last three groups are the highest mountains in Wales, include all Wales' mountains higher than 3000 feet. The second area includes peaks such as Moel Siabod, the Moelwynion, the mountains around Blaenau Ffestiniog; the third area includes the Rhinogydd in the west as well as the Arenig and the Migneint, Rhobell Fawr. This area is not as popular with tourists as the other areas, due to its remoteness; the southernmost area includes Cadair Idris, the Tarren range, the Dyfi hills, the Aran group, including Aran Fawddwy, the highest mountain in the United Kingdom south of Snowdon.
The Berwyn range to the south east, has the western part of it in the park, but the highest summits to the east have been omitted. Many of the hikers in the area concentrate on Snowdon itself, it is regarded as a fine mountain, but at times gets crowded. The other high mountains with their boulder-strewn summits—as well as Tryfan, one of the few mountains in the UK south of Scotland whose ascent needs hands as well as feet—are very popular. However, there are some spectacular walks in Snowdonia on the lower mountains, they tend to be unfrequented. Among hikers' favourites are Y Garn along the ridge to Elidir Fawr.
Robson Green
Robson Golightly Green is an English actor, singer and presenter. Green portrayed Fusilier Dave Tucker in Dr. Tony Hill in Wire in the Blood, he presented Extreme Fishing, Extreme Fishing Challenge, Tales from Northumberland, as well as playing hospital porter Jimmy Powell in BBC drama series Casualty. He plays Detective Inspector Geordie Keating on ITV's Grantchester, he was one half of the singing duo Jerome, who had several No. 1 singles in the 1990s. Robson Golightly Green was born on 18 December 1964 in Dilston Hospital in Hexham and grew up in Dudley, a small mining village near Cramlington, his father named Robson Green, was a miner, his mother Anne was a cleaner and shopkeeper. He was named in the Northeast tradition of naming the first son after family surnames: Robson was his paternal grandmother's maiden name, while his middle name, Golightly, is the surname of his maternal grandmother, Cissie Golightly, daughter of William Golightly, a miner and well-known trade union leader in the 1920s.
Green attended Dudley Middle Comprehensive School. After being inspired by jets flying overhead, he decided he wanted to join the Royal Air Force, at the age of 16, he joined the Air Training Corps, though he decided against a career in the RAF after two weeks at an officer training camp, he learned to play the guitar forming his first band, Solid State, in 1982. He spent one night a week at the Backworth Drama Centre, appeared in a series of productions at both school and Backworth. Green left school aged 16 with five O-levels, joined Swan Hunter's shipyard as a draughtsman. On one occasion, he tried his hand at professional boxing, he attended three boxing training sessions for the play Francie Nichol. After two years at Swan's, Green decided on a career in acting. After auditioning, he began training under the tutelage of artistic director Max Roberts, his previous director at Backworth. During his training, he continued his musical career, as a member of a successful local band, the Workie Tickets.
Growing up in Tyneside, Green was chosen to be the lead in a film made by Amber Films that narrated the contemporaneous social problems faced by working-class people in Thatcher's Britain. Each episode examined one aspect of living in a embittered environment; the soap opera gave Green his big break in film. It was followed by offers of work. Green first made his name as an actor in the BBC series Casualty, but after three series, moved to national prominence as fusilier Dave Tucker in the drama series Soldier Soldier. In 1995, one episode called for co-star Jerome Flynn to sing Unchained Melody. Subsequently, ITV was inundated by people wanting to buy the song and the pair were persuaded by Simon Cowell to release it as a single – a double A-side with White Cliffs of Dover, it stayed at No. 1 for seven weeks in the UK Singles Chart, selling more than 1.8 million copies and making it the best-selling single of the year and winning the duo the Music Week Awards in 1996 for best single and best album.
Subsequently, they had two No. 1 albums, all remakes of standards. The song gave Green the opportunity to sign a long-term deal with ITV to star in several of the network's dramas, including Touching Evil and Reckless. In 1996, he set up an independent production company, Coastal Productions, with business partner Sandra Jobling to give youngsters from the North East the opportunities he struggled for; the company has since produced or co-produced most of Green's television work, as well as local productions at the Theatre Royal in Newcastle upon Tyne. In 2002, Green starred as clinical psychologist Dr. Tony Hill in the crime drama Wire in the Blood. Green's production company has brought at least four new dramas to the small screen in recent years, including the massive ratings hit Christmas Lights; the success of this one-off drama led to a series being commissioned under the name Northern Lights, followed by a sequel called City Lights. Coastal produces drama series, including Hereafter starring showbiz couple Stephen Tompkinson and Dervla Kirwan.
In 1995, Green won the Smash Hits Poll Winner's Party award for Favourite TV Actor. In 1997, Green starred in the TV film, The Student Prince, no relation to either the Romberg operetta or the 1954 MGM film. In July 1998, Green received an honorary degree from the University of Northumbria and, in September 2006, he was voted by the UK general public at No. 35 in a poll of TV's greatest stars. In 2000, Green starred with James Bolam, Susan Jameson and Jamie Bell in the ITV drama Close and True. In 2001, he starred in the six-part ITV drama Take Me. In 2002, Green starred with Caroline Goodall in Mrs. Jones. In December 2002, he released his first solo album, Moment In Time, composed of cover versions. However, unlike his releases with Jerome Flynn, the album was a commercial failure, peaking at No. 49 in the UK. In 2003, Green starred in the ITV mini-series Unconditional Love and in the BBC television series Trust. In 2005, he starred in two series, Like Father Like Son, Rocket Man in which he played a widower trying to build a rocket to send his dead wife's ashes into space.
Green presents his own series Extreme Fishing with Robson Green and the spin-off Robson's Extreme Fishing Challenge, where he travels over the world investigating and participating in the sport, coining fishing catchphrases such as "get in" and "we're in". During 2009, while promoting the second series on BBC Breakfast, Green claimed that 90% of all coarse fish caught by anglers die; this caused an angry respon
