1.
Gianfranco Pasquino
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Gianfranco Pasquino is an Italian political scientist, currently professor of political science at the University of Bologna. He is also a professor at the Bologna Center at Dickinson College and he studied at the University of Turin under Norberto Bobbio and specialized under Giovanni Sartori at the University of Florence. He was the editor of the journal Il Mulino between 1980 and 1984, and The Italian Review of Political Science between 2001 and 2003. He was a senator in the Italian Senate between 1983 and 1992 and 1994 and 1996 as a representative of the Independent Left and the Alliance of Progressives, in 2005 he was elected member of the Italian National Academy of Sciences
2.
Talking statues of Rome
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The talking statues of Rome or the Congregation of Wits provided an outlet for a form of anonymous political expression in Rome. Criticisms in the form of poems or witticisms were posted on well-known statues in Rome and it began in the 16th century and continues to the present day. In addition to Pasquino and Marforio, the statues include, Madama Lucrezia, Abbot Luigi, Il Babuino. The first talking statue was that of Pasquino, a piece of sculpture on a small piazza. In 1501, the statue was found during construction and set up in the piazza, soon after small poems or epigrams critical of religious. One story of the origin of the name, and of its witticisms, is that it was named to honor a local resident named Pasquino. A tailor by trade, this mans career took him into the Vatican and he would then spread this gossip, with acerbic commentary, for the entertainment of friends and neighbors. Upon his death, the statue was named in his honor, the statue seems to have been a local institution, it was also dressed up as a pagan god on the feast day of Saint Mark. Some sources suggest that the first postings were little more than schoolboys taunting their teachers, Pasquino became so famous that his name was turned into an English word, pasquinade, which means a satirical protest in poetry. A number of popes, who were often the butt of criticism from the statues, adrian VI planned to have it thrown into the Tiber River, and was only dissuaded when told that, like a frog, the statue would only croak louder in water. Another potentially apocryphal story has a reward being offered to the writers if they came forward. According to the tale, one man responded, and his hands were cut off, eventually, the authorities settled for posting guards by the statue to prevent the posting of more commentary. As a result, the public turned to other statues, who joined Pasquino as talking statues and these other statues included Marforio, which was sometimes used to post responses to writings posted on Pasquino, creating a repartee between the two statues. Scior Carera, a statue in Milan
3.
Rome
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Rome is a special comune and the capital of Italy. Rome also serves as the capital of the Lazio region, with 2,873,598 residents in 1,285 km2, it is also the countrys largest and most populated comune and fourth-most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. It is the center of the Metropolitan City of Rome, which has a population of 4.3 million residents, the city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio, along the shores of the Tiber. Romes history spans more than 2,500 years, while Roman mythology dates the founding of Rome at only around 753 BC, the site has been inhabited for much longer, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe. The citys early population originated from a mix of Latins, Etruscans and it was first called The Eternal City by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC, and the expression was also taken up by Ovid, Virgil, and Livy. Rome is also called the Caput Mundi, due to that, Rome became first one of the major centres of the Italian Renaissance, and then the birthplace of both the Baroque style and Neoclassicism. Famous artists, painters, sculptors and architects made Rome the centre of their activity, in 1871 Rome became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, and in 1946 that of the Italian Republic. Rome has the status of a global city, Rome ranked in 2014 as the 14th-most-visited city in the world, 3rd most visited in the European Union, and the most popular tourist attraction in Italy. Its historic centre is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, monuments and museums such as the Vatican Museums and the Colosseum are among the worlds most visited tourist destinations with both locations receiving millions of tourists a year. Rome hosted the 1960 Summer Olympics and is the seat of United Nations Food, however, it is a possibility that the name Romulus was actually derived from Rome itself. As early as the 4th century, there have been alternate theories proposed on the origin of the name Roma. There is archaeological evidence of occupation of the Rome area from approximately 14,000 years ago. Evidence of stone tools, pottery and stone weapons attest to about 10,000 years of human presence, several excavations support the view that Rome grew from pastoral settlements on the Palatine Hill built above the area of the future Roman Forum. Between the end of the age and the beginning of the Iron age. However, none of them had yet an urban quality, nowadays, there is a wide consensus that the city was gradually born through the aggregation of several villages around the largest one, placed above the Palatine. All these happenings, which according to the excavations took place more or less around the mid of the 8th century BC. Despite recent excavations at the Palatine hill, the view that Rome has been indeed founded with an act of will as the legend suggests in the middle of the 8th century BC remains a fringe hypothesis. Traditional stories handed down by the ancient Romans themselves explain the earliest history of their city in terms of legend and myth
4.
Menelaus
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In Greek mythology, Menelaus was a king of Mycenaean Sparta, the husband of Helen of Troy, and a central figure in the Trojan War. He was the son of Atreus and Aerope, brother of Agamemnon, king of Mycenae and, according to the Iliad, although early authors such as Aeschylus refer in passing to Menelaus’ early life, detailed sources are quite late, post-dating 5th-century BC Greek tragedy. According to these sources, Menelaus father, Atreus, had been feuding with his brother Thyestes over the throne of Mycenae, after a back-and-forth struggle that featured adultery, incest and cannibalism, Thyestes gained the throne after his son Aegisthus murdered Atreus. As a result, Atreus’ sons, Menelaus and Agamemnon, went into exile and they first stayed with King Polyphides of Sicyon, and later with King Oeneus of Calydon. But when they thought the time was ripe to dethrone Mycenae’s hostile ruler, assisted by King Tyndareus of Sparta, they drove Thyestes away, and Agamemnon took the throne for himself. When it was time for Tyndareus’ step-daughter Helen to marry, many kings, among the contenders were Odysseus, Menestheus, Ajax the Great, Patroclus, and Idomeneus. Tyndareus would accept none of the gifts, nor would he send any of the suitors away for fear of offending them, Odysseus promised to solve the problem in a satisfactory manner if Tyndareus would support him in his courting of Tyndareus’s niece Penelope, the daughter of Icarius. Tyndareus readily agreed, and Odysseus proposed that, before the decision was made, then it was decreed that straws were to be drawn for Helen’s hand. The suitor who won was Menelaus, the rest of the suitors swore their oaths, and Helen and Menelaus were married, Menelaus becoming a ruler of Sparta with Helen after Tyndareus and Leda abdicated the thrones. Menelaus and Helen had a daughter Hermione as supported, for example, by Sappho and their palace has been discovered in Pellana, Laconia, to the north-west of modern Sparta. Other archaeologists consider that Pellana is too far away from other Mycenaean centres to have been the capital of Menelaus, in a return for awarding her a golden apple inscribed to the fairest, Aphrodite promised Paris the most beautiful woman in all the world. Homers Iliad is the most expansive source for Menelaus’s exploits during the Trojan War, in Book 3, Menelaus challenges Paris to a duel for Helen’s return. Menelaus soundly beats Paris, but before he can kill him and claim victory, in Book 4, while the Greeks and Trojans squabble over the duel’s winner, Athena inspires the Trojan Pandarus to shoot Menelaus with his bow and arrow. However, Athena never intended for Menelaus to die and she protects him from the arrow of Pandarus, Menelaus is wounded in the abdomen, and the fighting resumes. Later, in Book 17, Homer gives Menelaus an extended aristeia as the hero retrieves the corpse of Patroclus from the battlefield, according to Hyginus, Menelaus killed eight men in the war, and was one of the Greeks hidden inside the Trojan Horse. During the sack of Troy, Menelaus killed Deiphobus, who had married Helen after the death of Paris, there are four versions of Menelaus’ and Helen’s reunion on the night of the sack of Troy, Angry at Helen, Menelaus looked for and found her. In a fit of rage, he decided to kill her for leaving him for Paris, in a split second, Menelaus wrath went away instantly. He took pity on her, and decided to take her back as wife, Menelaus resolved to kill Helen but her striking beauty prompted him to drop his sword and take her back to his ship “to punish her at Sparta”, as he claimed
5.
Pasquino Group
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Menelaus supporting the body of Patroclus is a marble sculpture so-titled due to its apparent representation of an episode in the Iliad featuring the characters Menelaus and Patroclus. It was set up on a pedestal in 1501, the sculpture now under the Loggia dei Lanzi in Piazza della Signoria, Florence, is one of two modified versions of this subject that passed into the hands of Cosimo I, Grand Duke of Tuscany. The illustrated sculpture was purchased by Cosimo I, not long before 1570, soon after it was discovered in the vigna of Antonio Velli, half a Roman mile beyond Porta Portese, Rome. With the consent of Pope Pius V, it was immediately to Florence. It was set up in a niche on the end of the Ponte Vecchio. Paolo Alessandro Maffeis engraving of 1704 shows that Menelaus then was wearing a much simpler than the elaborate neoclassical one erroneously provided by Ricci seen on the sculpture today. The feature which still draws most attention is the lifeless hanging left arm of Patroclus, seemingly dislocated, other errors in restoration are the lifted left leg of the bearer, the raised right knee of Patroclus, and the mounded ground that serves as a base. The second group of Menelaus supporting the body of Patroclus was a gift in 1570 from the Florentine Paolo Antonio Soderini of Rome and it was said to have been found at the Mausoleum of Augustus. Identified as Ajax, is stands in the Cortile del Ajaco of Palazzo Pitti, media related to Pasquino Group at Wikimedia Commons
6.
Patroclus
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In Greek mythology, as recorded in Homers Iliad, Patroclus was the son of Menoetius, grandson of Actor, King of Opus, and Achilles beloved and brother-in-arms. According to Hyginus, Patroclus is the child of Menoetius and Philomela, Homer also references Menoetius as the individual who gave Patroclus to Peleus. Menoetius is the son of Actor, King of Opus in Locris by Aegina, Aegina was a daughter of Asopus and mother of Aeacus by Zeus. Aeacus was father of Peleus, Telamon and Phocus, Actor was a son of Deioneus, King of Phocis and Diomede. His paternal grandparents were Aeolus of Thessaly and Enarete and his maternal grandparents were Xuthus and Creusa, daughter of Erechtheus and Praxithea. During his childhood, Patroclus had killed another child in anger over a game, Menoetius gave Patroclus to Peleus, Achilles father, who named Patroclus one of Achilles henchmen as Patroclus and Achilles grew up together. Patroclus acted as a role model for Achilles, as he was both older than Achilles and wise regarding counsel. According to the Iliad, when the tide of war had turned against the Greeks, Achilles consented, giving Patroclus the armor Achilles had received from his father, in order for Patroclus to impersonate Achilles. Achilles then told Patroclus to return after beating the Trojans back from their ships, Patroclus defied Achilles order and pursued the Trojans back to the gates of Troy. Patroclus killed many Trojans, including a son of Zeus, Sarpedon, while battling, Patroclus wits were removed by Apollo, after which Patroclus was hit with the spear of Euphorbos. Hector then killed Patroclus by stabbing him in the stomach with a spear, Achilles retrieved the body, which had been stripped of armor by Hector and protected on the battlefield by Menelaus and Ajax. Achilles did not allow for the burial of Patroclus body until the ghost of Patroclus appeared and demanded burial in order to pass into Hades, Patroclus was then cremated on a funeral pyre, which was covered in the hair of his sorrowful companions. As the cutting of hair was a sign of grief while also acting as a sign of the separation of the living and the dead, the ashes of Achilles were said to have been buried in a golden urn along with those of Patroclus by the Hellespont. Although Homer does not mention it, there is whether or not Achilles. Morales and Mariscal continue stating, there is a tradition concerning the nature of the relationship between the two heroes. According to Grace Ledbetter, there is a train of thought that Patroclus could have been a representation of the side of Achilles. In fact, the first line of Homers Iliad mentions Achilles anger, Ledbetter does so by comparing how Thetis comforts the weeping Achilles in Book 1 of the Iliad to how Achilles comforts Patroclus as he weeps in Book 16. Achilles uses a simile containing a young girl looking at her mother to complete the comparison
7.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
8.
Latin
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Latin is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. The Latin alphabet is derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets, Latin was originally spoken in Latium, in the Italian Peninsula. Through the power of the Roman Republic, it became the dominant language, Vulgar Latin developed into the Romance languages, such as Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, French, and Romanian. Latin, Italian and French have contributed many words to the English language, Latin and Ancient Greek roots are used in theology, biology, and medicine. By the late Roman Republic, Old Latin had been standardised into Classical Latin, Vulgar Latin was the colloquial form spoken during the same time and attested in inscriptions and the works of comic playwrights like Plautus and Terence. Late Latin is the language from the 3rd century. Later, Early Modern Latin and Modern Latin evolved, Latin was used as the language of international communication, scholarship, and science until well into the 18th century, when it began to be supplanted by vernaculars. Ecclesiastical Latin remains the language of the Holy See and the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church. Today, many students, scholars and members of the Catholic clergy speak Latin fluently and it is taught in primary, secondary and postsecondary educational institutions around the world. The language has been passed down through various forms, some inscriptions have been published in an internationally agreed, monumental, multivolume series, the Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. Authors and publishers vary, but the format is about the same, volumes detailing inscriptions with a critical apparatus stating the provenance, the reading and interpretation of these inscriptions is the subject matter of the field of epigraphy. The works of several hundred ancient authors who wrote in Latin have survived in whole or in part and they are in part the subject matter of the field of classics. The Cat in the Hat, and a book of fairy tales, additional resources include phrasebooks and resources for rendering everyday phrases and concepts into Latin, such as Meissners Latin Phrasebook. The Latin influence in English has been significant at all stages of its insular development. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, English writers cobbled together huge numbers of new words from Latin and Greek words, dubbed inkhorn terms, as if they had spilled from a pot of ink. Many of these words were used once by the author and then forgotten, many of the most common polysyllabic English words are of Latin origin through the medium of Old French. Romance words make respectively 59%, 20% and 14% of English, German and those figures can rise dramatically when only non-compound and non-derived words are included. Accordingly, Romance words make roughly 35% of the vocabulary of Dutch, Roman engineering had the same effect on scientific terminology as a whole
9.
Early modern period
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The early modern period of modern history follows the late Middle Ages of the post-classical era. Historians in recent decades have argued that from a worldwide standpoint, the period witnessed the exploration and colonization of the Americas and the rise of sustained contacts between previously isolated parts of the globe. The historical powers became involved in trade, as the exchange of goods, plants, animals, and food crops extended to the Old World. The Columbian Exchange greatly affected the human environment, New economies and institutions emerged, becoming more sophisticated and globally articulated over the course of the early modern period. This process began in the medieval North Italian city-states, particularly Genoa, Venice, the early modern period also included the rise of the dominance of the economic theory of mercantilism. The European colonization of the Americas, Asia, and Africa occurred during the 15th to 19th centuries, the early modern trends in various regions of the world represented a shift away from medieval modes of organization, politically and economically. Historians typically date the end of the modern period when the French Revolution of the 1790s began the modern period. Early modern themes Other In 16th century China, the Ming Dynastys economy was stimulated by trade with the Portuguese, Spanish. China became involved in a new trade of goods, plants, animals. Trade with Early Modern Europe and Japan brought in massive amounts of silver, during the last decades of the Ming the flow of silver into China was greatly diminished, thereby undermining state revenues and the entire Chinese economy. This damage to the economy was compounded by the effects on agriculture of the incipient Little Ice Age, natural calamities, crop failure, the ensuing breakdown of authority and peoples livelihoods allowed rebel leaders such as Li Zicheng to challenge Ming authority. The Ming Dynasty fell around 1644 to the Qing Dynasty, which was the last ruling dynasty of China, during its reign, the Qing Dynasty became highly integrated with Chinese culture. The Azuchi-Momoyama period saw the unification that preceded the establishment of the Tokugawa shogunate. The Edo period from 1600 to 1868 characterized early modern Japan, the Tokugawa shogunate was a feudal regime of Japan established by Tokugawa Ieyasu and ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family. This period gets its name from the city, Edo. The Tokugawa shogunate ruled from Edo Castle from 1603 until 1868, in 1392, General Yi Seong-gye established the Joseon Dynasty with a largely bloodless coup. Joseon experienced advances in science and culture, King Sejong the Great promulgated hangul, the Korean alphabet. The period saw various other cultural and technological advances as well as the dominance of neo-Confucianism over the entirety of Korea, during the late 16th and early 17th centuries, invasions by the neighboring Japanese and Qing Chinese nearly overran the Korean peninsula
