1.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
2.
Yvelines
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Yvelines is a French department in the region of Île-de-France. It inherited Seine-et-Oises official number of 78 and it gained the communes of Châteaufort and Toussus-le-Noble from the adjacent department of Essonne in 1969. Yvelines is bordered by the departments of Val-dOise on the north, Hauts-de-Seine on the east, Essonne on the southeast, Eure-et-Loir on the southwest, and Eure on the west. Two regional parks can be found in Yvelines, the parc of the Haute Vallée de Chevreuse, Yvelines is home to one of Frances best known golf courses, La Tuilerie-Bignon, in the village of Saint-Nom-la-Bretèche. In French, a man from the Yvelines is called Yvelinois, a woman is Yvelinoise
3.
Kilometre zero
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In many countries, Kilometre Zero or similar terms in other languages is a particular location, from which distances are traditionally measured. They were markers where drivers could set their odometers to follow directions in early guide books, a similar notion also exists for individual roads, and for individual cities. The most famous such marker of any part survives from ancient times is the Milliarium Aureum of the Roman Empire. Argentina marks Kilometre Zero with a monolith in Plaza Congreso in Buenos Aires. The work of the brothers Máximo and José Fioravanti, the structure was placed on the side of Plaza Lorea on October 2,1935. Highways in Australia are usually built and maintained by the states and territories, in the state of New South Wales, highway distances were traditionally measured from a sandstone obelisk in Macquarie Place in Sydney, designed by Francis Greenway in 1818. The obelisk lists the distances to locations in New South Wales at the time. For the railway, it is located at platform 1 of Sydney Central Station, the Byzantine Empire had an arched building, the Milion of Constantinople, as the starting-place for the measurement of distances for all the roads leading to the other cities. In the 1960s, some fragments were discovered and erected in its location, now in the district of Eminönü, Istanbul. The kilometre zero marker of the origin of the Trans-Canada Highway is located in St. Johns. Coordinates, 47°33′39. 78″N 52°42′44. 33″W Altitude,14.02 m The western origin of the Trans-Canada Highway in Victoria, Mile zero of the Trans Canada Trail is located adjacent to the Railway Coastal Museum in St. Johns, Newfoundland. Coordinates, 47°33′14. 0″N 52°42′50. 5″W Altitude,4.5 m Mile zero for the Alaska Highway is located in Dawson Creek, all national distances from Santiago originate at the Km.0 plaque, located at the Plaza de Armas main square in downtown Santiago. Chiles Autopista Central – Eje Norte-Sur has its Kilometre Zero at the intersection with the Alameda del Libertador Bernardo OHiggins, China Railways 0 km is located at the entrance to the Fengtai Yard on the Jingguang Line just outside Beijing. This point was historically the start of the line, the marker is a concrete marker. The kilometre zero point for highways is located at Tiananmen Square and it is marked with a plaque in the ground, with the four cardinal points, four animals, and Zero Point of Highways, China in English and Chinese. Cubas Kilometre Zero is located in its capital Havana in El Capitolio, embedded in the floor in the centre of the main hall is a replica 25 carat diamond, which marks Kilometre Zero for Cuba. It was replaced in El Capitolio by a replica in 1973, dR-1, DR-2, and DR-3 all depart from Kilometre Zero from Santo Domingos Parque de Independencia. Kilometre Zero in Egypt is located at the Attaba Square Post Office in 1st of Abdel Khaliq Sarwat Pasha Street, Cairo
4.
Seine
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The Seine is a 777-kilometre-long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Source-Seine,30 kilometres northwest of Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and it is navigable by ocean-going vessels as far as Rouen,120 kilometres from the sea. There are 37 bridges within Paris and dozens more spanning the river outside the city, examples in Paris include the Pont Alexandre III and Pont Neuf, the latter of which dates back to 1607. Outside the city, examples include the Pont de Normandie, one of the longest cable-stayed bridges in the world, the Seine rises in the commune of Source-Seine, about 30 kilometres northwest of Dijon. The source has been owned by the city of Paris since 1864, a number of closely associated small ditches or depressions provide the source waters, with an artificial grotto laid out to highlight and contain a deemed main source. The grotto includes a statue of a nymph, on the same site are the buried remains of a Gallo-Roman temple. Small statues of the dea Sequana Seine goddess and other ex voti found at the place are now exhibited in the Dijon archeological museum. The Seine is dredged and oceangoing vessels can dock at Rouen,120 kilometres from the sea, commercial riverboats can use the river from Bar-sur-Seine,560 kilometres to its mouth. At Paris, there are 37 bridges, the river is only 24 metres above sea level 446 kilometres from its mouth, making it slow flowing and thus easily navigable. The Seine Maritime,105.7 kilometres from the English Channel at Le Havre to Rouen, is the portion of the Seine used by ocean-going craft. The tidal section of the Seine Maritime is followed by a section with four large multiple locks until the mouth of the Oise at Conflans-Sainte-Honorine. Multiple locks at Bougival / Chatou and at Suresnes lift the vessels to the level of the river in Paris, upstream from Paris seven locks ensure navigation to Saint Mammès, where the Loing mouth is situated. Through an eighth lock the river Yonne is reached at Montereau-Fault-Yonne, from the mouth of the Yonne, larger ships can continue upstream to Nogent-sur-Seine. From there on, the river is only by small craft. All navigation ends abruptly at Marcilly-sur-Seine, where the ancient Canal de la Haute-Seine used to allow vessels to continue all the way to Troyes and this canal has been abandoned for many years. The average depth of the Seine today at Paris is about 9.5 metres. Until locks were installed to raise the level in the 1800s, the river was much shallower within the city most of the time, today the depth is tightly controlled and the entire width of the river between the built-up banks on either side is normally filled with water. The average flow of the river is low, only a few cubic metres per second
5.
RER A
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RER line A is one of the five lines in the RER rapid transit system serving Paris, France. The line runs from the termini of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Cergy Le Haut and Poissy to the eastern termini of Boissy-Saint-Léger. It is formed from the connection of the Saint-Germain-en-Laye-Nanterre line in the west to the Vincennes – Boissy-St-Léger line in the east, two branches were added in the west, to Poissy and the new town of Cergy-Pontoise, and in the east to the new town of Marne-la-Vallée. The two latest extensions were to Cergy-Le Haut and Disneyland Paris, with more than one million passengers per workday, line A is the busiest Parisian RER and metro line. Ever-increasing traffic volume and the need to ward off imminent saturation have been factors in RATP. SACEM is still one of the most advanced traffic control systems, parisians have become used to the sight of a train pulling into a station as the one before it is just clearing the platform. Around the same time, RATP ordered a significant number of MI79/MI84 trains to remedy premature wear and tear on MS61 stock caused by over-utilization on Line A. Later in the 1980s, the need to relieve congestion on the segment of Line A was a key factor in selecting the route of the new. The same need governed the choice of the route of RER Line E in the early 1990s and is a factor in plans for that lines westward or south-westward extension. A new class of double-deck trains entered service in 1998, in part a product of RATPs belief that no further infrastructure improvement would relieve congestion on Line A. This was followed in 2011 by the MI09 double-decker stock, aimed at replacing the aging MI84, one simple solution to the congestion problem that has never been implemented is a change in the seating configuration in the trains. The RER is unusual among high-capacity urban train networks in its attachment to transverse seating, a change to longitudinal seating typically reduces the number of seats by 10% but increases standing room by 30%. The result is increased capacity and a less cramped ride for those without seats,14 December 1969, RATP buys the ligne de Vincennes from SNCF, connecting Bastille with Boissy-Saint-Léger in the east. A new 2. 5-km tunnel between Vincennes and Nation, which replaces Bastille as the terminus, length,17.5 km.21 February 1970, RATP buys the ligne de St-Germain from SNCF, connecting the Gare Saint-Lazare with Saint-Germain-en-Laye in the west. A new tunnel between La Défense and the Place de lÉtoile, which replaces St-Lazare as the terminus, shuttle service is operated La Défense – Étoile,4 km.23 November 1971, Tunnel opened Étoile – Auber,2 km. Shuttle service extended to operate La Défense – Auber,1 October 1972, Tunnel opened La Défense – Nanterre-Université,2 km. Shuttle service extended on the ligne de St-Germain to operate Saint-Germain – Auber, October 1973, New underground station, Nanterre-Préfecture, between La Défense and Nanterre-Université. 9 December 1977, The lines are connected by a 6-km tunnel, giving birth to the RER A line, two new stations, Châtelet-les Halles and Gare de Lyon
6.
James II of England
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James II and VII was King of England and Ireland as James II and King of Scotland as James VII, from 6 February 1685 until he was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. He was the last Roman Catholic monarch of England, Scotland and Ireland, the second surviving son of Charles I, he ascended the throne upon the death of his brother, Charles II. Members of Britains Protestant political elite increasingly suspected him of being pro-French and pro-Catholic and he was replaced by his eldest, Protestant daughter Mary and her husband William of Orange. James made one attempt to recover his crowns from William. After the defeat of the Jacobite forces by the Williamites at the Battle of the Boyne in July 1690 and he lived out the rest of his life as a pretender at a court sponsored by his cousin and ally, King Louis XIV. James, the surviving son of King Charles I and his wife. Later that same year, he was baptised by William Laud and he was educated by private tutors, along with his brother, the future King Charles II, and the two sons of the Duke of Buckingham, George and Francis Villiers. At the age of three, James was appointed Lord High Admiral, the position was honorary, but would become a substantive office after the Restoration. He was designated Duke of York at birth, invested with the Order of the Garter in 1642, as the Kings disputes with the English Parliament grew into the English Civil War, James stayed in Oxford, a Royalist stronghold. When the city surrendered after the siege of Oxford in 1646, in 1648, he escaped from the Palace, aided by Joseph Bampfield, and from there he went to The Hague in disguise. When Charles I was executed by the rebels in 1649, monarchists proclaimed Jamess older brother as Charles II of England, Charles II was recognised as king by the Parliament of Scotland and the Parliament of Ireland, and was crowned King of Scotland at Scone in 1651. Although he was proclaimed King in Jersey, Charles was unable to secure the crown of England and consequently fled to France, like his brother, James sought refuge in France, serving in the French army under Turenne against the Fronde, and later against their Spanish allies. In the French army James had his first true experience of battle where, according to one observer, he ventures himself, in the meantime, Charles was attempting to reclaim his throne, but France, although hosting the exiles, had allied itself with Oliver Cromwell. In 1656, Charles turned instead to Spain – an enemy of France – for support, in consequence, James was expelled from France and forced to leave Turennes army. James quarrelled with his brother over the choice of Spain over France. In 1659, the French and Spanish made peace, James, doubtful of his brothers chances of regaining the throne, considered taking a Spanish offer to be an admiral in their navy. Ultimately, he declined the position, by the year the situation in England had changed. After Richard Cromwells resignation as Lord Protector in 1659 and the subsequent collapse of the Commonwealth in 1660, although James was the heir presumptive, it seemed unlikely that he would inherit the Crown, as Charles was still a young man capable of fathering children
7.
Glorious Revolution
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The crisis facing the king came to a head in 1688, with the birth of the kings son, James Francis Edward Stuart, on 10 June. This changed the line of succession by displacing the heiress presumptive with young James Francis Edward as heir apparent. The establishment of a Roman Catholic dynasty in the kingdoms now seemed likely, stadtholder William, the de facto head of state of the Dutch United Provinces, feared a Catholic Anglo–French alliance and had already been planning a military intervention in England. After consolidating political and financial support, William crossed the North Sea and English Channel with an invasion fleet in November 1688. After only two minor clashes between the two opposing armies in England, and anti-Catholic riots in several towns, Jamess regime collapsed, however, this was followed by the protracted Williamite War in Ireland and Dundees rising in Scotland. In Englands distant American colonies, the led to the collapse of the Dominion of New England. By threatening to withdraw his troops, William in February 1689 convinced a newly chosen Convention Parliament to make him, the Revolution permanently ended any chance of Catholicism becoming re-established in England. The Revolution led to limited tolerance for Nonconformist Protestants, although it would be some time before they had political rights. Internationally, the Revolution was related to the War of the Grand Alliance on mainland Europe and it has been seen as the last successful invasion of England. It ended all attempts by England in the Anglo-Dutch Wars of the 17th century to subdue the Dutch Republic by military force, the expression Glorious Revolution was first used by John Hampden in late 1689, and is an expression that is still used by the British Parliament. The Glorious Revolution is also termed the Bloodless Revolution, albeit inaccurately. Jamess greatest political problem was his Catholicism, which left him alienated from both parties in England. The low church Whigs had failed in their attempt to pass the Exclusion Bill to exclude James from the throne between 1679 and 1681, and Jamess supporters were the high church Anglican Tories. In Scotland, his supporters in the Parliament of Scotland stepped up attempts to force the Covenanters to renounce their faith, when James inherited the English throne in 1685, he had much support in the Loyal Parliament, which was composed mostly of Tories. His Catholicism was of concern to many, but the fact that he had no son, Jamess attempt to relax the Penal Laws alienated his natural supporters, however, because the Tories viewed this as tantamount to disestablishment of the Church of England. The majority of Irish people backed James II for this reason, by allying himself with the Catholics, Dissenters, and Nonconformists, James hoped to build a coalition that would advance Catholic emancipation. In May 1686, James decided to obtain from the English courts of the law a ruling that affirmed his power to dispense with Acts of Parliament. He dismissed judges who disagreed with him on this matter as well as the Solicitor General Heneage Finch, eleven out of the twelve judges ruled in favour of dispensing power
8.
French Revolution
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Through the Revolutionary Wars, it unleashed a wave of global conflicts that extended from the Caribbean to the Middle East. Historians widely regard the Revolution as one of the most important events in human history, the causes of the French Revolution are complex and are still debated among historians. Following the Seven Years War and the American Revolutionary War, the French government was deeply in debt, Years of bad harvests leading up to the Revolution also inflamed popular resentment of the privileges enjoyed by the clergy and the aristocracy. Demands for change were formulated in terms of Enlightenment ideals and contributed to the convocation of the Estates-General in May 1789, a central event of the first stage, in August 1789, was the abolition of feudalism and the old rules and privileges left over from the Ancien Régime. The next few years featured political struggles between various liberal assemblies and right-wing supporters of the intent on thwarting major reforms. The Republic was proclaimed in September 1792 after the French victory at Valmy, in a momentous event that led to international condemnation, Louis XVI was executed in January 1793. External threats closely shaped the course of the Revolution, internally, popular agitation radicalised the Revolution significantly, culminating in the rise of Maximilien Robespierre and the Jacobins. Large numbers of civilians were executed by revolutionary tribunals during the Terror, after the Thermidorian Reaction, an executive council known as the Directory assumed control of the French state in 1795. The rule of the Directory was characterised by suspended elections, debt repudiations, financial instability, persecutions against the Catholic clergy, dogged by charges of corruption, the Directory collapsed in a coup led by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1799. The modern era has unfolded in the shadow of the French Revolution, almost all future revolutionary movements looked back to the Revolution as their predecessor. The values and institutions of the Revolution dominate French politics to this day, the French Revolution differed from other revolutions in being not merely national, for it aimed at benefiting all humanity. Globally, the Revolution accelerated the rise of republics and democracies and it became the focal point for the development of all modern political ideologies, leading to the spread of liberalism, radicalism, nationalism, socialism, feminism, and secularism, among many others. The Revolution also witnessed the birth of total war by organising the resources of France, historians have pointed to many events and factors within the Ancien Régime that led to the Revolution. Over the course of the 18th century, there emerged what the philosopher Jürgen Habermas called the idea of the sphere in France. A perfect example would be the Palace of Versailles which was meant to overwhelm the senses of the visitor and convince one of the greatness of the French state and Louis XIV. Starting in the early 18th century saw the appearance of the sphere which was critical in that both sides were active. In France, the emergence of the public sphere outside of the control of the saw the shift from Versailles to Paris as the cultural capital of France. In the 1750s, during the querelle des bouffons over the question of the quality of Italian vs, in 1782, Louis-Sébastien Mercier wrote, The word court no longer inspires awe amongst us as in the time of Louis XIV
9.
Castle
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A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble. Usage of the term has varied over time and has applied to structures as diverse as hill forts. Over the approximately 900 years that castles were built, they took on a great many forms with different features, although some, such as curtain walls. A European innovation, castles originated in the 9th and 10th centuries, after the fall of the Carolingian Empire resulted in its territory being divided among individual lords and princes. Although their military origins are often emphasised in castle studies, the structures served as centres of administration. Many castles were built from earth and timber, but had their defences replaced later by stone. Early castles often exploited natural defences, lacking features such as towers and arrowslits, in the late 12th and early 13th centuries, a scientific approach to castle defence emerged. This led to the proliferation of towers, with an emphasis on flanking fire, many new castles were polygonal or relied on concentric defence – several stages of defence within each other that could all function at the same time to maximise the castles firepower. These changes in defence have been attributed to a mixture of castle technology from the Crusades, such as concentric fortification, not all the elements of castle architecture were military in nature, so that devices such as moats evolved from their original purpose of defence into symbols of power. Some grand castles had long winding approaches intended to impress and dominate their landscape, while castles continued to be built well into the 16th century, new techniques to deal with improved cannon fire made them uncomfortable and undesirable places to live. As a result, true castles went into decline and were replaced by artillery forts with no role in civil administration, and country houses that were indefensible. From the 18th century onwards, there was a renewed interest in castles with the construction of castles, part of a romantic revival of Gothic architecture. The word castle is derived from the Latin word castellum, which is a diminutive of the word castrum, meaning fortified place. The Old English castel, Old French castel or chastel, French château, Spanish castillo, Italian castello, the word castle was introduced into English shortly before the Norman Conquest to denote this type of building, which was then new to England. In its simplest terms, the definition of a castle accepted amongst academics is a fortified residence. Feudalism was the link between a lord and his vassal where, in return for service and the expectation of loyalty. Castles served a range of purposes, the most important of which were military, administrative, as well as defensive structures, castles were also offensive tools which could be used as a base of operations in enemy territory
Aschaffenburg, (Germany), since 1975
Temara, Morocco, since 1982
Ayr, South Ayrshire, Scotland since 1984
Winchester, Massachusetts, United States, since 1990
Konstancin-Jeziorna, Poland, since 1992
Nashik, India, since 2009
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Travel guide from Wikivoyage
Data from Wikidata
