1.
Eiffel Tower
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The Eiffel Tower is a wrought iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed, the Eiffel Tower is the most-visited paid monument in the world,6.91 million people ascended it in 2015. The tower is 324 metres tall, about the height as an 81-storey building. Its base is square, measuring 125 metres on each side, due to the addition of a broadcasting aerial at the top of the tower in 1957, it is now taller than the Chrysler Building by 5.2 metres. Excluding transmitters, the Eiffel Tower is the second-tallest structure in France after the Millau Viaduct, the tower has three levels for visitors, with restaurants on the first and second levels. The top levels upper platform is 276 m above the ground – the highest observation deck accessible to the public in the European Union, tickets can be purchased to ascend by stairs or lift to the first and second levels. The climb from ground level to the first level is over 300 steps, although there is a staircase to the top level, it is usually only accessible by lift. Eiffel openly acknowledged that inspiration for a tower came from the Latting Observatory built in New York City in 1853, sauvestre added decorative arches to the base of the tower, a glass pavilion to the first level, and other embellishments. Little progress was made until 1886, when Jules Grévy was re-elected as president of France and Édouard Lockroy was appointed as minister for trade. On 12 May, a commission was set up to examine Eiffels scheme and its rivals, which, after some debate about the exact location of the tower, a contract was signed on 8 January 1887. Eiffel was to all income from the commercial exploitation of the tower during the exhibition. He later established a company to manage the tower, putting up half the necessary capital himself. The proposed tower had been a subject of controversy, drawing criticism from those who did not believe it was feasible and these objections were an expression of a long-standing debate in France about the relationship between architecture and engineering. And for twenty years … we shall see stretching like a blot of ink the hateful shadow of the column of bolted sheet metal. Gustave Eiffel responded to criticisms by comparing his tower to the Egyptian pyramids. Will it not also be grandiose in its way, and why would something admirable in Egypt become hideous and ridiculous in Paris. Indeed, Garnier was a member of the Tower Commission that had examined the various proposals, some of the protesters changed their minds when the tower was built, others remained unconvinced. Guy de Maupassant supposedly ate lunch in the restaurant every day because it was the one place in Paris where the tower was not visible
2.
Paris
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Paris is the capital and most populous city of France. It has an area of 105 square kilometres and a population of 2,229,621 in 2013 within its administrative limits, the agglomeration has grown well beyond the citys administrative limits. By the 17th century, Paris was one of Europes major centres of finance, commerce, fashion, science, and the arts, and it retains that position still today. The aire urbaine de Paris, a measure of area, spans most of the Île-de-France region and has a population of 12,405,426. It is therefore the second largest metropolitan area in the European Union after London, the Metropole of Grand Paris was created in 2016, combining the commune and its nearest suburbs into a single area for economic and environmental co-operation. Grand Paris covers 814 square kilometres and has a population of 7 million persons, the Paris Region had a GDP of €624 billion in 2012, accounting for 30.0 percent of the GDP of France and ranking it as one of the wealthiest regions in Europe. The city is also a rail, highway, and air-transport hub served by two international airports, Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly. Opened in 1900, the subway system, the Paris Métro. It is the second busiest metro system in Europe after Moscow Metro, notably, Paris Gare du Nord is the busiest railway station in the world outside of Japan, with 262 millions passengers in 2015. In 2015, Paris received 22.2 million visitors, making it one of the top tourist destinations. The association football club Paris Saint-Germain and the rugby union club Stade Français are based in Paris, the 80, 000-seat Stade de France, built for the 1998 FIFA World Cup, is located just north of Paris in the neighbouring commune of Saint-Denis. Paris hosts the annual French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament on the red clay of Roland Garros, Paris hosted the 1900 and 1924 Summer Olympics and is bidding to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. The name Paris is derived from its inhabitants, the Celtic Parisii tribe. Thus, though written the same, the name is not related to the Paris of Greek mythology. In the 1860s, the boulevards and streets of Paris were illuminated by 56,000 gas lamps, since the late 19th century, Paris has also been known as Panam in French slang. Inhabitants are known in English as Parisians and in French as Parisiens and they are also pejoratively called Parigots. The Parisii, a sub-tribe of the Celtic Senones, inhabited the Paris area from around the middle of the 3rd century BC. One of the areas major north-south trade routes crossed the Seine on the île de la Cité, this place of land and water trade routes gradually became a town
3.
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
4.
Tokyo Skytree
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Tokyo Skytree is a broadcasting, restaurant, and observation tower in Sumida, Tokyo, Japan. Skytree was completed on 29 February 2012, with the opening to the public on 22 May 2012. The tower is the centrepiece of a commercial development funded by Tobu Railway. Trains stop at the adjacent Tokyo Skytree Station and nearby Oshiage Station, the complex is 7 km north-east of Tokyo Station. The base of the tower has a similar to a tripod, from a height of about 350 m and above, the towers structure is cylindrical to offer panoramic views of the river. There are observatories at 350 m, with a capacity of up to 2000 people, the upper observatory features a spiral, glass-covered skywalk in which visitors ascend the last 5 meters to the highest point at the upper platform. A section of flooring gives visitors a direct downward view of the streets below. The tower has seismic proofing, including a central shaft made of reinforced concrete, the main internal pillar is attached to the outer tower structure for the first 125 meters above ground. From there until 375 meters the pillar is attached to the frame with oil dampers. According to the designers, the dampers can absorb 50 percent of the energy from an earthquake, the exterior lattice is painted a colour officially called Skytree White. This is an original colour based on a white traditional Japanese colour called aijiro. The illumination design was published on 16 October 2009, two illumination patterns Iki sky blue and Miyabi purple will be used, alternating daily. The tower is illuminated using LEDs, from October to November 2007, suggestions were collected from the general public for the name to be given to the tower. On 19 March 2008, a committee chose six final candidate names, Tōkyō Sukaitsurī, Tōkyō Edo Tawā, Raijingu Tawā, Mirai Tawā, Yumemi Yagura, the official name was decided in a nationwide vote, and was announced on 10 June 2008 as Tokyo Skytree. The name received around 33,000 votes out of 110,000 cast, since the name was decided in Japanese, which has no spaces between words, it is not possible to say whether it was intended to be Tokyo Skytree or Tokyo Sky Tree. The official website states TOKYO SKYTREE as a trademark in English. English-language publications are divided between the two versions, the height of 634 m was selected to be easily remembered. The figures 6,3,4 stand for Musashi, an old name of the region where the Tokyo Skytree stands, Tokyo Skytree is used as a radio/television broadcast and communications tower
5.
Tokyo
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Tokyo, officially Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan and one of its 47 prefectures. The Greater Tokyo Area is the most populous area in the world. It is the seat of the Emperor of Japan and the Japanese government, Tokyo is in the Kantō region on the southeastern side of the main island Honshu and includes the Izu Islands and Ogasawara Islands. Formerly known as Edo, it has been the de facto seat of government since 1603 when Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu made the city his headquarters. It officially became the capital after Emperor Meiji moved his seat to the city from the old capital of Kyoto in 1868, Tokyo Metropolis was formed in 1943 from the merger of the former Tokyo Prefecture and the city of Tokyo. The Tokyo metropolitan government administers the 23 Special Wards of Tokyo, the metropolitan government also administers 39 municipalities in the western part of the prefecture and the two outlying island chains. The population of the wards is over 9 million people. The prefecture is part of the worlds most populous metropolitan area with upwards of 37.8 million people, the city hosts 51 of the Fortune Global 500 companies, the highest number of any city in the world. Tokyo ranked third in the International Financial Centres Development IndexEdit, the city is also home to various television networks such as Fuji TV, Tokyo MX, TV Tokyo, TV Asahi, Nippon Television, NHK and the Tokyo Broadcasting System. Tokyo ranked first in the Global Economic Power Index and fourth in the Global Cities Index. The city is considered a world city – as listed by the GaWCs 2008 inventory – and in 2014. In 2015, Tokyo was named the Most Liveable City in the world by the magazine Monocle, the Michelin Guide has awarded Tokyo by far the most Michelin stars of any city in the world. Tokyo ranked first in the world in the Safe Cities Index, the 2016 edition of QS Best Student Cities ranked Tokyo as the 3rd-best city in the world to be a university student. Tokyo hosted the 1964 Summer Olympics, the 1979 G-7 summit, the 1986 G-7 summit, and the 1993 G-7 summit, and will host the 2020 Summer Olympics, Tokyo was originally known as Edo, which means estuary. During the early Meiji period, the city was also called Tōkei, some surviving official English documents use the spelling Tokei. However, this pronunciation is now obsolete, the name Tokyo was first suggested in 1813 in the book Kondō Hisaku, written by Satō Nobuhiro. When Ōkubo Toshimichi proposed the renaming to the government during the Meiji Restoration, according to Oda Kanshi, Tokyo was originally a small fishing village named Edo, in what was formerly part of the old Musashi Province. Edo was first fortified by the Edo clan, in the twelfth century
6.
Japan
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Japan is a sovereign island nation in Eastern Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asia Mainland and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea, the kanji that make up Japans name mean sun origin. 日 can be read as ni and means sun while 本 can be read as hon, or pon, Japan is often referred to by the famous epithet Land of the Rising Sun in reference to its Japanese name. Japan is an archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands. The four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu and Shikoku, the country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions. Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one, the population of 127 million is the worlds tenth largest. Japanese people make up 98. 5% of Japans total population, approximately 9.1 million people live in the city of Tokyo, the capital of Japan. Archaeological research indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Paleolithic period, the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD. Influence from other regions, mainly China, followed by periods of isolation, from the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shoguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a period of isolation in the early 17th century. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan is a member of the UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the country has the worlds third-largest economy by nominal GDP and the worlds fourth-largest economy by purchasing power parity. It is also the worlds fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer, although Japan has officially renounced its right to declare war, it maintains a modern military with the worlds eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a country with a very high standard of living. Its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and the third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, in ancient China, Japan was called Wo 倭. It was mentioned in the third century Chinese historical text Records of the Three Kingdoms in the section for the Wei kingdom, Wa became disliked because it has the connotation of the character 矮, meaning dwarf. The 倭 kanji has been replaced with the homophone Wa, meaning harmony, the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, which is pronounced Nippon or Nihon and literally means the origin of the sun. The earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, at the start of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan introduced their country as Nihon
7.
Azadi Tower
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The Azadi Tower, formerly known as the Shahyad Tower, is a monument located at Azadi Square, in Tehran City, Iran. It is one of the symbols of Tehran, and marks the west entrance to the city and it was commissioned by Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran, to mark 2,500 years of the Persian Empire. After winning a competition, Hossein Amanat was tasked to design the tower and his ideas were based upon Islamic Iranian and Sassanid architecture, popular influences on the arts during the 1960s due to the Shahs White Revolution. Irans increasing wealth sparked modernization programs and sent the art industry into a renaissance-like period, in 1966, the architect Hossein Amanat won a competition to design the building. He combined elements of the architecture of Sassanid and Achaemenid eras with the post-Islamic Iranian architecture, during the 1960s, Iran became a major oil exporting country, using the newly found wealth, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi launched programs to modernize and industrialize the country. The field of art began to thrive during this time, Amanat said it was like a mini renaissance, Amanat told the BBC World Service in an interview that overall, the building starts from the base and moves up towards the sky. He states that he was inspired to design the tower in this way because he felt that Iran should be moving towards a higher level, Amanat proceeded to describe each section of the tower and what had influenced their design. The main vault is a Sasanid arch which represents the pre-Islamic period, the broken arch above it represents the Islamic period as it became a popular form of arch after Islam began to influence architecture. The network of ribs, which connects the arches together, shows the connection between pre-Islamic and post-Islamic Iran, the tower is part of the Azadi Cultural Complex, located in Tehrans Azadi Square in an area of about 50,000 m². There are several fountains around the base of the tower and a museum underground, built with white marble stone from the Isfahan Province, it includes eight thousand blocks of stone. The stones were all located and supplied by Ghanbar Rahimi, who was known for his extensive knowledge of quarries. According to Amanats website, computers were used to define its complex woven surfaces, the main contractor for the construction of the tower was the MAP Company, this was supervised by a renowned Iranian stonemason, Ghaffar Davarpanah Varnosfaderani. Amanat was impressed by the work of Ove Arup & Partners, especially their contributions towards the design and it was for this reason that he chose to contract them to assist in the structural design of the tower. Due to concerns of corrupt bureaucracy, he was required to sign contracts with “On condition of the approval of the Council of Celebrations. However, Amanat faced resistance from the head of the council, Boushehri, as well as several conservative and nationalistic Iranian engineers as he was turning to a British engineer for assistance. Despite the resistance, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi sided with Amanat, sending a letter to Bousherhri, telling him that “Amanat is the architect, leave him be, the main financing was provided by a group of five hundred Iranian industrialists. The inauguration of the tower took place on October 16,1971, however, it was not until January 14,1972 that the tower was open to the public. The monuments official name was decided before the announcement of the competition for the design in September 1966
8.
Tehran
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Tehran is the capital of Iran and Tehran Province. It is ranked 29th in the world by the population of its metropolitan area, in the Classical era, part of the present-day city of Tehran was occupied by a Median city that in the Avesta occurs as Rhaga. It was destroyed by the Mongols in the early 13th century, the capital has been moved several times throughout the history, and Tehran is the 32nd national capital of Iran. The city was the seat of the Qajars and Pahlavis, the two last imperial dynasties of Iran. It is home to historical collections, such as the royal complexes of Golestan, Sadabad. Large scale demolition and rebuilding began in the 1920s, and Tehran has been a destination for the migrations from all over Iran since the 20th century. Tabiat Bridge, which was completed in 2014, is considered the third symbol of the city. There have been plans to relocate Irans capital from Tehran to another area, due mainly to air pollution, to date, no definitive plans have been approved. A2016 survey of 230 cities by consultant Mercer ranked Tehran 203rd for quality of living, according to the Global Destinations Cities Index in 2016, Tehran is among the top ten fastest growing destinations. The origin of the name Tehran is uncertain, the settlement of Tehran dates back over 7,000 years. The present-day city of Tehran was a suburb of an important Median city that was known as Rhaga in Old Persian, in the Avestas Videvdat, Rhaga is mentioned as the twelfth sacred place created by the Ohrmazd. In Old Persian inscriptions, Rhaga appears as a province and it was a major area for the Iranian tribes of Medes and Achaemenids. From Rhaga, Darius the Great sent reinforcements to his father Hystaspes, in some Middle Persian texts, Rhaga is given as the birthplace of Zoroaster, although modern historians generally place the birth of Zoroaster in Khorasan. Derived into Modern Persian as Rey, it now as a city located towards the southern end of the modern-day city of Tehran. Mount Damavand, the highest peak of Iran, which is located near Tehran, is an important location in Ferdowsis Shahname, the long Iranian epic poem that is based on the ancient epics of Iran. It appears in the epics as the birthplace of Manuchehr, the residence of Keyumars, the place where Freydun binds the dragon fiend Aži Dahāka, during the Sassanid era, in 641, Yazdgerd III issued his last appeal to the nation from Rey, before fleeing to Khorasan. Rey was dominated by the Parthian Mihran family, and Siyavakhsh—the son of Mihran the son of Bahram Chobin—who resisted the Muslim Invasion, because of this resistance, when the Arabs captured Rey, they ordered the town to be destroyed and ordered Farrukhzad to rebuild the town anew. In the 9th century, Tehran was a well known village, but less known than the city of Rey, the medieval writer Najm od Din Razi declared the population of Rey about 500,000 before the Mongol Invasion
9.
Iran
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Iran, also known as Persia, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, is a sovereign state in Western Asia. Comprising a land area of 1,648,195 km2, it is the second-largest country in the Middle East, with 82.8 million inhabitants, Iran is the worlds 17th-most-populous country. It is the country with both a Caspian Sea and an Indian Ocean coastline. The countrys central location in Eurasia and Western Asia, and its proximity to the Strait of Hormuz, Tehran is the countrys capital and largest city, as well as its leading economic and cultural center. Iran is the site of to one of the worlds oldest civilizations, the area was first unified by the Iranian Medes in 625 BC, who became the dominant cultural and political power in the region. The empire collapsed in 330 BC following the conquests of Alexander the Great, under the Sassanid Dynasty, Iran again became one of the leading powers in the world for the next four centuries. Beginning in 633 AD, Arabs conquered Iran and largely displaced the indigenous faiths of Manichaeism and Zoroastrianism by Islam, Iran became a major contributor to the Islamic Golden Age that followed, producing many influential scientists, scholars, artists, and thinkers. During the 18th century, Iran reached its greatest territorial extent since the Sassanid Empire, through the late 18th and 19th centuries, a series of conflicts with Russia led to significant territorial losses and the erosion of sovereignty. Popular unrest culminated in the Persian Constitutional Revolution of 1906, which established a monarchy and the countrys first legislative body. Following a coup instigated by the U. K. Growing dissent against foreign influence and political repression led to the 1979 Revolution, Irans rich cultural legacy is reflected in part by its 21 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the third-largest number in Asia and 11th-largest in the world. Iran is a member of the UN, ECO, NAM, OIC. Its political system is based on the 1979 Constitution which combines elements of a democracy with a theocracy governed by Islamic jurists under the concept of a Supreme Leadership. A multicultural country comprising numerous ethnic and linguistic groups, most inhabitants are Shia Muslims, the largest ethnic groups in Iran are the Persians, Azeris, Kurds and Lurs. Historically, Iran has been referred to as Persia by the West, due mainly to the writings of Greek historians who called Iran Persis, meaning land of the Persians. As the most extensive interactions the Ancient Greeks had with any outsider was with the Persians, however, Persis was originally referred to a region settled by Persians in the west shore of Lake Urmia, in the 9th century BC. The settlement was then shifted to the end of the Zagros Mountains. In 1935, Reza Shah requested the international community to refer to the country by its native name, opposition to the name change led to the reversal of the decision, and Professor Ehsan Yarshater, editor of Encyclopædia Iranica, propagated a move to use Persia and Iran interchangeably
10.
Iranian architecture
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Iranian architecture or Persian architecture is the architecture of Iran and parts of the rest of West Asia, the Caucasus and Central Asia. Its history dates back to at least 5,000 BCE with characteristic examples distributed over a vast area from Turkey and Iraq to Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, and from the Caucasus to Zanzibar. Persian buildings vary from peasant huts to tea houses and garden, in addition to historic gates, palaces, and mosques, the rapid growth of cities such as the capital, Tehran has brought about a wave of demolition and new construction. Iranian architecture displays great variety, both structural and aesthetic, from a variety of traditions and experience, without sudden innovations, and despite the repeated trauma of invasions and cultural shocks, it has achieved an individuality distinct from that of other Muslim countries. Traditionally, the guiding formative motif of Iranian architecture has been its cosmic symbolism by which man is brought into communication and participation with the powers of heaven. This theme has not only given unity and continuity to the architecture of Persia, according to Persian historian and archaeologist Arthur Pope, the supreme Iranian art, in the proper meaning of the word, has always been its architecture. The supremacy of architecture applies to both pre- and post-Islamic periods, traditional Persian architecture has maintained a continuity that, although temporarily distracted by internal political conflicts or foreign invasion, nonetheless has achieved an unmistakable style. In this architecture, there are no buildings, even garden pavilions have nobility and dignity. In expressiveness and communicativity, most Persian buildings are lucid - even eloquent, the combination of intensity and simplicity of form provides immediacy, while ornament and, often, subtle proportions reward sustained observation. g. g. Anahita Temple, Khorheh, Parthian era e. g. Hatra, the compounds at Nysa, Sassanid era e. g. Ghaleh Dokhtar. Chehelsotoon, Ali Qapu, Agha Bozorg Mosque, Kashan, Shah Mosque, available building materials dictate major forms in traditional Iranian architecture. This technique, used in Iran from ancient times, has never completely abandoned. The abundance of heavy plastic earth, in conjunction with a lime mortar, also facilitated the development. Certain design elements of Persian architecture have persisted throughout the history of Iran, the most striking are a marked feeling for scale and a discerning use of simple and massive forms. The consistency of decorative preferences, the high-arched portal set within a recess, columns with bracket capitals, through the ages these elements have recurred in completely different types of buildings, constructed for various programs and under the patronage of a long succession of rulers. Similarly, the dome on four arches, so characteristic of Sassanid times, is a still to be found in many cemeteries, the pre-Islamic styles draw on 3000 to 4000 years of architectural development from various civilizations of the Iranian plateau. Iran is recognized by UNESCO as being one of the cradles of civilization, each of the periods of Elamites, Achaemenids, Parthians and Sassanids were creators of great architecture that, over the ages, spread far and wide far to other cultures. Although Iran has suffered its share of destruction, including Alexander The Greats decision to burn Persepolis, the Achaemenids built on a grand scale
11.
Ancient Rome
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In its many centuries of existence, the Roman state evolved from a monarchy to a classical republic and then to an increasingly autocratic empire. Through conquest and assimilation, it came to dominate the Mediterranean region and then Western Europe, Asia Minor, North Africa and it is often grouped into classical antiquity together with ancient Greece, and their similar cultures and societies are known as the Greco-Roman world. Ancient Roman civilisation has contributed to modern government, law, politics, engineering, art, literature, architecture, technology, warfare, religion, language and society. Rome professionalised and expanded its military and created a system of government called res publica, the inspiration for modern republics such as the United States and France. By the end of the Republic, Rome had conquered the lands around the Mediterranean and beyond, its domain extended from the Atlantic to Arabia, the Roman Empire emerged with the end of the Republic and the dictatorship of Augustus Caesar. 721 years of Roman-Persian Wars started in 92 BC with their first war against Parthia and it would become the longest conflict in human history, and have major lasting effects and consequences for both empires. Under Trajan, the Empire reached its territorial peak, Republican mores and traditions started to decline during the imperial period, with civil wars becoming a prelude common to the rise of a new emperor. Splinter states, such as the Palmyrene Empire, would divide the Empire during the crisis of the 3rd century. Plagued by internal instability and attacked by various migrating peoples, the part of the empire broke up into independent kingdoms in the 5th century. This splintering is a landmark historians use to divide the ancient period of history from the pre-medieval Dark Ages of Europe. King Numitor was deposed from his throne by his brother, Amulius, while Numitors daughter, Rhea Silvia, because Rhea Silvia was raped and impregnated by Mars, the Roman god of war, the twins were considered half-divine. The new king, Amulius, feared Romulus and Remus would take back the throne, a she-wolf saved and raised them, and when they were old enough, they returned the throne of Alba Longa to Numitor. Romulus became the source of the citys name, in order to attract people to the city, Rome became a sanctuary for the indigent, exiled, and unwanted. This caused a problem for Rome, which had a large workforce but was bereft of women, Romulus traveled to the neighboring towns and tribes and attempted to secure marriage rights, but as Rome was so full of undesirables they all refused. Legend says that the Latins invited the Sabines to a festival and stole their unmarried maidens, leading to the integration of the Latins, after a long time in rough seas, they landed at the banks of the Tiber River. Not long after they landed, the men wanted to take to the sea again, one woman, named Roma, suggested that the women burn the ships out at sea to prevent them from leaving. At first, the men were angry with Roma, but they realized that they were in the ideal place to settle. They named the settlement after the woman who torched their ships, the Roman poet Virgil recounted this legend in his classical epic poem the Aeneid
12.
Reconstruction (architecture)
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Reconstruction is a term in architectural conservation whose precise meaning varies, depending on the context in which they are used. More broadly, such as under the ICOMOS Burra Charter, reconstruction means returning a damaged building to an earlier state by the introduction of new materials. It is related to the concepts of restoration and preservation. There may be reasons for the construction of a building or creation of a replica building or structure. A specifically well-known example is the rebuilding of the city center of Warsaw after 1945. The Old Town and the Royal Castle had been badly damaged already at the outset of World War II and it was systematically razed to the ground by German troops after the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. The reconstruction of Warsaws historic center and, e. g. the replica of the Stari Most built in Mostar have met with approval by UNESCO. Critics of reconstructed and replica buildings see them as a falsification of history, anthony in Fort Manoel Chapel of St. Roche on St. Michaels Counterguard Wignacourt Arch Plans are also being made for reconstructing the Birgu Clock Tower, which was destroyed in 1942
13.
Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes
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The Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes, or ORL, is a 550-kilometre-long section of the former external frontier of the Roman Empire between the rivers Rhine and Danube. It runs from Rheinbrohl to Eining on the Danube, the Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes is an archaeological site and, since 2005, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Together with the Lower Germanic Limes it forms part of the Limes Germanicus, the term limes originally meant border path or swathe in Latin. In Germany, Limes usually refers to the Rhaetian Limes and Upper Germanic Limes, both sections of limes are named after the adjacent Roman provinces of Raetia and Germania Superior. In the Roman limites we have, for the first time in history, clearly defined borders of a sovereign state that were visible on the ground to friend. Most of the Upper German-Rhaetian Limes did not follow rivers or mountain ranges and it includes the longest land border in the European section of the limes, interrupted for only a few kilometres, by a section that follows the River Main between Großkrotzenburg and Miltenberg. By contrast, elsewhere in Europe, the limes is largely defined by the rivers Rhine, the function of the Roman military frontiers has been increasingly discussed for some time. The latest research tends to view at least the Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes not as a military demarcation line. The limes, it is argued, was not really suitable for fending off systematic external attacks, thanks to a skillful economic policy, the Roman Empire extended its influence far to the northeast, beyond the frontier. Evidence of this are the border crossings which, although guarded by Roman soldiers, would have enabled a brisk trade. Attempts were occasionally made, to settle Roman legions beyond the limes or, more often. As a result, the Romanization of the population extended beyond the limes, interest in the limes as the remains of a site dating to the Roman period was rekindled in Germany at the time of the Renaissance and Renaissance humanism. This was bolstered by the rediscovery of the Germania and Annales of Tacitus in monastic libraries in the 15th, scholars like Simon Studion researched inscriptions and discovered forts. Studion led archaeological excavations of the Roman camp of Benningen on the Neckar section of the Neckar-Odenwald Limes, local limes commissions were established but were confined to small areas, for example, in the Grand Duchy of Hesse or Grand Duchy of Baden, due to the political situation. Johann Alexander Döderlein was the first person to record the course of the limes in the Eichstätt region, in 1723, he was the first to interpret the meaning of the limes correctly and published the first scholarly treatise about it in 1731. Only after the foundation of the German Empire could archaeologists begin to more precisely the route of the limes. As a result, they were able to make the first systematic excavations in the half of the 19th century. In 1892, the Imperial Limes Commission was established for this purpose in Berlin, under the direction of the ancient historian, the work of this commission is considered pioneering for reworking of Roman provincial history
14.
Taunus
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The Taunus is a mountain range in Hesse, Germany located north of Frankfurt. The tallest peak in the range is Großer Feldberg at 878 m, other peaks are Kleiner Feldberg. The Taunus range spans the districts of Hochtaunuskreis, Main-Taunus, Rheingau-Taunus, Limburg-Weilburg, the range is known for its geothermal springs and mineral waters that formerly attracted members of the European aristocracy to its spa towns. The car line Ford Taunus is named after it and it is a relatively low range, with smooth, rounded mountains covered with forest. The Taunus is bounded by the valleys of the Rhine, Main and Lahn rivers, on the opposite side of the Rhine, The Taunus range is continued by the Hunsrück. For geographical, ecological and geological purposes the Taunus is divided in three parts, Pre-Taunus in the south, next to the cities of Frankfurt am Main and this section is mainly made up of old sedimentary rocks with phyllite, greenschist and muscovite. The rocks are often given a greenish hue by the presence of epidote, the central region of the range where the highest peaks are found. Its geological composition includes slates, quartzite and sandstones, back-Taunus at its northern end is the biggest part by area. The geological materials that compose it include greywacke, claystones and siltstones, the Taunus range originated during the Devonian period. Being the highest point in the range, it provides the scenario for the Feldbergrennen hillclimbing and rallying contests and it should not be confused with the Feldberg in the Black Forest Kleiner Feldberg, Hochtaunuskreis. It has an observatory on the summit and it has the remains of a late Iron Age hill fort near the summit. The Saalburg, a restored Roman castellum, now houses a museum, after the fall of the Limes, the Alamanni settled in the range and for this reason there are some Alemannic cemeteries in the southern foothills of the Taunus. This area of the Taunus became part of the Frankish confederation of Germanic tribes after the Battle of Tolbiac around 500 AD, in past centuries the Taunus became famous among aristocrats for its therapeutic hot springs. Certain towns in the area, such as Bad Homburg vor der Höhe with its Kurpark, have geothermal spas that were formerly renowned. By the 19th century the most famous spa towns in the area were Wiesbaden, Bad Homburg vor der Höhe, Bad Nauheim and Bad Soden am Taunus. Media related to Taunus at Wikimedia Commons There is literature about Taunus in the Hessian Bibliography Umweltatlas Hessen, → Natur und Landschaft → Die Naturräume Hessens bzw
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Germany
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Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe. It includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres, with about 82 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular destination in the world. Germanys capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while its largest conurbation is the Ruhr, other major cities include Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Leipzig. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity, a region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward, beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation, in 1871, Germany became a nation state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic, the establishment of the national socialist dictatorship in 1933 led to World War II and the Holocaust. After a period of Allied occupation, two German states were founded, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, in 1990, the country was reunified. In the 21st century, Germany is a power and has the worlds fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP. As a global leader in industrial and technological sectors, it is both the worlds third-largest exporter and importer of goods. Germany is a country with a very high standard of living sustained by a skilled. It upholds a social security and universal health system, environmental protection. Germany was a member of the European Economic Community in 1957. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999, Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. The national military expenditure is the 9th highest in the world, the English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz popular, derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- people, the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a mine in Schöningen where three 380, 000-year-old wooden javelins were unearthed
16.
Great Mosque of Kairouan
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The Great Mosque of Kairouan, also known as the Mosque of Uqba, is one of the most important mosques in Tunisia, situated in the UNESCO World Heritage town of Kairouan. The Great Mosque of Kairouan is one of the most impressive and largest Islamic monuments in North Africa and this vast space contains a hypostyle prayer hall, a huge marble-paved courtyard and a massive square minaret. In addition to its prestige, the Mosque of Uqba is one of the masterpieces of both architecture and Islamic art. Under the Aghlabids, huge works gave the mosque its present aspect, the fame of the Mosque of Uqba and of the other holy sites at Kairouan helped the city to develop and repopulate increasingly. The university, consisting of scholars who taught in the mosque, was a centre of both in Islamic thought and in the secular sciences. Its role can be compared to that of the University of Paris in the Middle Ages, with the decline of the city of Kairouan from the mid 11th century, the centre of intellectual thought moved to the University of Ez-Zitouna in Tunis. Located in the north-east of the medina of Kairouan, the mosque is in the district of Houmat al-Jami. This location corresponded originally to the heart of the fabric of the city founded by Uqba ibn Nafi. But because of the nature of the land, crossed by several tributaries of the wadis. Then there are the upheavals of Kairouan following Hilalians invasions in 449 AH, for all these reasons, the mosque is not any more situated in the center of the medina, and is thereby positioned on the extremity, near the walls. The building is a vast irregular quadrilateral, longer from the side than on the opposite side. It covers a area of 9000 m2. More than a role, the buttresses and towers full serve more to enhance the stability of the mosque built on a soil subject to compaction. At the foundation of Kairouan in 670, the Arab general and conqueror Uqba Ibn Nafi chose the site of his mosque in the center of the city, near the headquarters of the governor. Around 690, shortly after its construction, the mosque was destroyed during the occupation of Kairouan by the Berbers and it was rebuilt by the Ghassanid general Hasan ibn al-Numan in 703. In view of its expansion, he pulled down the mosque and it was under his auspices that the construction of the minaret began. In 774, a new reconstruction accompanied by modifications and embellishments took place under the direction of the Abbasid governor Yazid Ibn Hatim, under the rule of Aghlabid sovereigns, Kairouan was at its apogee, and the mosque profited from this period of stability and prosperity. In 836, Ziadet-Allah I reconstructed the mosque once more, this is when the acquired, at least in its entirety
17.
Kairouan
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Kairouan (Arabic, القيروان Qeirwān, also known as al-Qayrawan, is the capital of the Kairouan Governorate in Tunisia. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site, the city was founded by the Umayyads around 670. The holy Mosque of Uqba is situated in the city, in 2014, the city had about 186,653 inhabitants. The name (Arabic, القيروان Al-Qairuwân is an Arabic version, of the Persian word کاروان kârvân, meaning military/civilian camp (kâr, caravan, or resting place. Kairouan, the capital of Kairouan Governorate, lies south of Sousse,50 km from the east coast,75 km from Monastir and 184 km from Tunis, formerly, the city of Kamounia was located where Kairouan now stands. It had housed a Byzantine garrison before the Arab conquest, subsequently, there occurred a mass conversion of the Berbers to Islam. Kharijites or Islamic outsiders who formed an egalitarian and puritanical sect appeared and are present on the island of Djerba. In 745, Kharijite Berbers captured Kairouan, which was already at time a developed city with luxuriant gardens. Power struggles continued until Ibrahim ibn al-Aghlab recaptured Kairouan at the end of the 8th century, in 800 Caliph Harun ar-Rashid in Baghdad confirmed Ibrahim as Emir and hereditary ruler of Ifriqiya. Ibrahim ibn al-Aghlab founded the Aghlabid dynasty which ruled Ifriqiya between 800 and 909, the new Emirs embellished Kairouan and made it their capital. It soon became famous for its wealth and prosperity, reaching the levels of Basra and Kufa, the Aghlabites built the great mosque and established in it a university that was a centre of education both in Islamic thought and in the secular sciences. Its role can be compared to that of the University of Paris in the Middle Ages, in the 9th century, the city became a brilliant focus of Arab and Islamic cultures attracting scholars from all over the Islamic World. In that period Imam Sahnun and Asad ibn al-Furat made of Kairouan a temple of knowledge, the Aghlabids also built palaces, fortifications and fine waterworks of which only the pools remain. The Aghlabite also pacified the country and conquered Sicily in 827, in 893, through the mission of Abdullah al Mahdi, the Kutama Berbers from the west of the country started the movement of the Shiite Fatimids. The year 909 saw the overthrow of the Sunni Aghlabites who ruled Ifriqiya, governing again from Kairouan, the Zirids led the country through another artistic, commercial and agricultural heyday. Some 1,700 years of intermittent but continual progress was undone within a decade as in most part of the country the land was laid to waste for nearly two centuries. In the 13th century under the prosperous Hafsids dynasty that ruled Ifriqiya and it is only under the Husainid Dynasty that Kairouan started to find an honorable place in the country and throughout the Islamic world. In 1881, Kairouan was taken by the French, after which non-Muslims were allowed access to the city, the community disbanded in 1270 CE when the Hafsids forbade non-Muslims from living in the city, the remaining Jews were forced to convert to Islam or to leave
18.
Tunisia
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Tunisia, officially the Republic of Tunisia is the northernmost country in Africa, covering 165,000 square kilometres. Its northernmost point, Cape Angela, is the northernmost point on the African continent and it is bordered by Algeria to the west and southwest, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Tunisias population was estimated to be just under 11 million in 2014, Tunisias name is derived from its capital city, Tunis, which is located on Tunisias northeast coast. Geographically, Tunisia contains the end of the Atlas Mountains. Much of the rest of the land is fertile soil. Tunisia is a unitary semi-presidential representative democratic republic and it is considered to be the only full democracy in the Arab World. It has a human development index. In addition, Tunisia is also a state of the United Nations. Close relations with Europe – in particular with France and with Italy – have been forged through economic cooperation, privatisation, in ancient times, Tunisia was primarily inhabited by Berbers. Phoenician immigration began in the 12th century BC, these immigrants founded Carthage, a major mercantile power and a military rival of the Roman Republic, Carthage was defeated by the Romans in 146 BC. The Romans, who would occupy Tunisia for most of the eight hundred years, introduced Christianity. After several attempts starting in 647, the Arabs conquered the whole of Tunisia by 697, the Ottomans held sway for over three hundred years. The French colonization of Tunisia occurred in 1881, Tunisia gained independence with Habib Bourguiba and declared the Tunisian Republic in 1957. In 2011, the Tunisian Revolution resulted in the overthrow of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the country voted for parliament again on 26 October 2014, and for President on 23 November 2014. The word Tunisia is derived from Tunis, an urban hub. The present form of the name, with its Latinate suffix -ia, the French derivative Tunisie was adopted in some European languages with slight modifications, introducing a distinctive name to designate the country. Other languages remained untouched, such as the Russian Туни́с and Spanish Túnez, in this case, the same name is used for both country and city, as with the Arabic تونس, and only by context can one tell the difference. The name Tunis can be attributed to different origins and it is generally associated with the Berber root ⵜⵏⵙ, transcribed tns, which means to lay down or encampment
19.
Guyed mast
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A guyed mast is a tall thin vertical structure that depends on guy lines for stability. The mast itself has the strength to support its own weight, but does not have the shear strength to stand unsupported. Guy lines are diagonal tensioned cables attached to the ground, usually spaced at equal angles about the base, to resist lateral forces such as wind loads. Guyed masts are used for radio antennas. The mast can either support aerials mounted at its top, or the structure itself can function as an antenna. In the latter case, the mast needs to be insulated from the ground, guyed radio masts are typically tall enough that they require several sets of guy lines,2 to 4, attached at different heights on the mast, to prevent them from buckling. An exception was the Blaw-Knox tower, widely used during the 1930s, sailing masts, the masts that support the sails on sailboats, are also typically guyed masts. Guyed masts are also used for meteorological measurements at certain heights above ground level. Sometimes they are used as pylons, although their usage in agricultural areas is problematic because anchor foundations handicaps ploughing, a partially guyed tower is a structure consisting of a guyed mast on top of a freestanding tower. The guys may be anchored to the top of the freestanding structure, a famous tower of this type is the Gerbrandy Tower. An example of the type is a utility pole at the end of a power line where the line ends or angles off in another direction. The pole requires guys in only one direction to support the lateral load of the power line in the other direction. The tallest guyed mast in the world is currently the 2,063 ft KVLY-TV mast near Blanchard, North Dakota, list of masts for examples of guyed mast structures. Radio masts and towers Partially guyed tower Additionally guyed tower Guy line
20.
Guy-wire
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A guy-wire, guy-line, or guy-rope, also known as simply a guy, is a tensioned cable designed to add stability to a free-standing structure. They are used commonly in ship masts, radio masts, wind turbines, utility poles, fire service extension ladders used in church raises, a thin vertical mast supported by guy wires is called a guyed mast. Structures that support antennas are frequently of a construction and are called towers. One end of the guy is attached to the structure, and they are installed radially, usually at equal angles about the structure, in trios and quads. As the tower leans a bit due to the force, the increased guy tension is resolved into a compression force in the tower or mast. For example, antenna masts are often held up by three guy-wires at 120° angles, conductive guy cables for radio antenna masts may disturb the radiation pattern of the antenna, so their electrical characteristics must be included in the design. The guys supporting a sailboat mast are called standing rigging and in modern boats are stainless steel wire rope, guys are rigged to the bow and stern, usually as a single guy. Lateral guys attach to chain plates port and starboard attached to the hull, multiple guys are usually installed with spreaders to help keep the mast straight. Temporary guys are used on a sailboat, a fore-guy is a term for a line attached to. On a modern sloop-rigged sailboat with a spinnaker, the spinnaker pole is the spar most commonly controlled by one or more guys. Guys are particularly needed on dead-end poles, where a straight section of wire line ends. The lower end where the cable enters the ground is often encased in a length of yellow plastic reflector to make it more visible, in urban areas where the ground area around the pole is restricted, a variation called a sidewalk guy is often used. In this type the guy line extends diagonally from the top of the pole to a horizontal spar brace extending out from the middle of the pole, and from this it continues vertically to the ground. Thus the bottom part of the guy is vertical and does not obstruct headroom, an alternative to guy-wires sometimes used on dead-end poles is a push-brace pole, a second pole set at an angle in the ground which butts diagonally against the side of the vertical pole. Electromagnetic fields from the antennas complicate the design of guys that support mast antennas, conductive metal guy-wires whose lengths are near to quarter wavelength multiples of the transmitted frequency can distort the radiation pattern of the antenna. This also applies to guy wires of neighboring masts or metal structures situated nearby, to prevent this, each guy wire is divided by strain insulators into multiple sections, each segment non-resonant at the transmitted wavelength. Cylindrical or egg-shaped porcelain Johnny ball insulators are usually used, non-conductive guys of Kevlar fiber or extruded fiberglass rod are frequently used to not disturb the radiation pattern of the antennas. The strength and low stretch properties of Kevlar fiber approaches that of steel, however, Kevlar is very susceptible to ultraviolet degradation so it is enclosed in a UV resistant plastic sheath
21.
Building
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A building or edifice is a structure with a roof and walls standing more or less permanently in one place, such as a house or factory. To better understand the term building compare the list of nonbuilding structures, Buildings serve several needs of society – primarily as shelter from weather, security, living space, privacy, to store belongings, and to comfortably live and work. A building as a shelter represents a division of the human habitat. Ever since the first cave paintings, buildings have become objects or canvasses of much artistic expression. In recent years, interest in planning and building practices has also become an intentional part of the design process of many new buildings. The word building is both a noun and a verb also an adverb, the structure itself and the act of making it. As a noun, a building is a structure that has a roof and walls and stands more or less permanently in one place, there was a building on the corner. In the broadest interpretation a fence or wall is a building, however, the word structure is used more broadly than building including natural and man-made formations and does not necessarily have walls. Structure is more likely to be used for a fence, as a verb, building is the act of construction. Structural height in technical usage is the height to the highest architectural detail on building from street-level, depending on how they are classified, spires and masts may or may not be included in this height. Spires and masts used as antennas are not generally included, the definition of a low-rise vs. a high-rise building is a matter of debate, but generally three storeys or less is considered low-rise. A report by Shinichi Fujimura of a shelter built 500000 years ago is doubtful since Fujimura was later found to have faked many of his findings. Supposed remains of huts found at the Terra Amata site in Nice purportedly dating from 200000 to 400000 years ago have also called into question. There is clear evidence of homebuilding from around 18000 BC, Buildings became common during the Neolithic. Single-family residential buildings are most often called houses or homes, residential buildings containing more than one dwelling unit are called a duplex, apartment building to differentiate them from individual houses. A condominium is an apartment that the occupant owns rather than rents, houses which were built as a single dwelling may later be divided into apartments or bedsitters, they may also be converted to another use e. g. an office or a shop. Building types may range from huts to multimillion-dollar high-rise apartment blocks able to house thousands of people, increasing settlement density in buildings is usually a response to high ground prices resulting from many people wanting to live close to work or similar attractors. Other common building materials are brick, concrete or combinations of either of these with stone, also if the residents are in need of special care such as a nursing home, orphanage or prison, or in group housing like barracks or dormitories
22.
Height
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Height is the measure of vertical distance, either how tall something is, or how high up it is. For example The height of the building is 50 m or The height of the airplane is 10,000 m, when used to describe how high something like an airplane or mountain peak is from sea level, height is more often called altitude. Height is measured along the axis between a specified point and another. English high is derived from Old English hēah, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *xauxa-z, the derived noun height, also the obsolete forms heighth and highth, is from Old English híehþo, later héahþu, as it were from Proto-Germanic *xaux-iþa. In elementary models of space, height may indicate the third dimension, height is normal to the plane formed by the length and width. Height is also used as a name for more abstract definitions. Although height is relative to a plane of reference, most measurements of height in the world are based upon a zero surface. Both altitude and elevation, two synonyms for height, are defined as the position of a point above the mean sea level. One can extend the surface under the continents, naively. In practice, the sea level under a continent has to be computed from gravity measurements, instead of using the sea level, geodesists often prefer to define height from the surface of a reference ellipsoid, see Geodetic system, vertical datum. Defining the height of geographic landmarks becomes a question of reference, in aviation terminology, the terms height, altitude, and elevation are not synonyms. Usually, the altitude of an aircraft is measured from sea level, Elevation is also measured from sea level, but is most often regarded as a property of the ground. Thus, elevation plus height can equal altitude, but the term altitude has several meanings in aviation, Human height is one of the areas of study within anthropometry. While height variations within a population are largely genetic, height variations between populations are mostly environmental, the United Nations uses height to monitor changes in the nutrition of developing nations. In human populations, average height can distill down complex data about the birth, upbringing, social class, diet. Acrophobia Centimetre–gram–second system of units Chinese units of measurement Elevation Human height Imperial units International System of Units United States customary units
23.
Clock towers
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Clock towers are a specific type of building which houses a turret clock and has one or more clock faces on the upper exterior walls. Many clock towers are freestanding structures but they can also adjoin or be located on top of another building, Clock towers are a common sight in many parts of the world with some being iconic buildings. One example is the Elizabeth Tower in London, there are many structures which may have clocks or clock faces attached to them and some structures have had clocks added to an existing structure. According to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat a building is defined as a building if at least fifty percent of its height is made up of plates containing habitable floor area. Structures that do not meet this criterion, are defined as towers, not all clocks on buildings therefore make the building into a clock tower. The mechanism inside the tower is known as a turret clock and it often marks the hour by sounding large bells or chimes, sometimes playing simple musical phrases or tunes. Although clock towers are today mostly admired for their aesthetics, they served an important purpose. Before the middle of the century, most people did not have watches. The first clocks didnt have faces, but were solely striking clocks and they were therefore placed in towers so the bells would be audible for a long distance. Clock towers were placed near the centres of towns and were often the tallest structures there, as clock towers became more common, the designers realized that a dial on the outside of the tower would allow the townspeople to read the time whenever they wanted. The use of clock towers dates back to the antiquity, the earliest clock tower was the Tower of the Winds in Athens which featured eight sundials. In its interior, there was also a clock, driven by water coming down from the Acropolis. In Song China, a clock tower was designed by Su Song and erected at Kaifeng in 1088. In England, a clock was put up in a tower, the medieval precursor to Big Ben, at Westminster, in 1288. Al-Jazari constructed a clock and described it in his Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices in 1206. It was about 3.3 metres high, and had multiple functions alongside timekeeping, line synchronous tower clocks were introduced in the United States in the 1920s. Some clock towers have become famous landmarks, the Allen-Bradley Clock Tower in Milwaukee, Wisconsin has the largest four faced clock in the world, with clock diameter 40 ft 3 1⁄2 in, it is 283 ft tall. The Elizabeth Tower has the largest chiming clock in the world, the tallest freestanding clock tower in the world is the Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower at the University of Birmingham in Birmingham, United Kingdom
24.
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
25.
Telecommunication
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Telecommunication is the transmission of signs, signals, messages, writings, images and sounds or intelligence of any nature by wire, radio, optical or other electromagnetic systems. Telecommunication occurs when the exchange of information between communication participants includes the use of technology and it is transmitted either electrically over physical media, such as cables, or via electromagnetic radiation. Such transmission paths are divided into communication channels which afford the advantages of multiplexing. The term is used in its plural form, telecommunications. Early means of communicating over a distance included visual signals, such as beacons, smoke signals, semaphore telegraphs, signal flags, other examples of pre-modern long-distance communication included audio messages such as coded drumbeats, lung-blown horns, and loud whistles. Zworykin, John Logie Baird and Philo Farnsworth, the word telecommunication is a compound of the Greek prefix tele, meaning distant, far off, or afar, and the Latin communicare, meaning to share. Its modern use is adapted from the French, because its use was recorded in 1904 by the French engineer. Communication was first used as an English word in the late 14th century, in the Middle Ages, chains of beacons were commonly used on hilltops as a means of relaying a signal. Beacon chains suffered the drawback that they could pass a single bit of information. One notable instance of their use was during the Spanish Armada, in 1792, Claude Chappe, a French engineer, built the first fixed visual telegraphy system between Lille and Paris. However semaphore suffered from the need for skilled operators and expensive towers at intervals of ten to thirty kilometres, as a result of competition from the electrical telegraph, the last commercial line was abandoned in 1880. Homing pigeons have occasionally used throughout history by different cultures. Pigeon post is thought to have Persians roots and was used by the Romans to aid their military, frontinus said that Julius Caesar used pigeons as messengers in his conquest of Gaul. The Greeks also conveyed the names of the victors at the Olympic Games to various cities using homing pigeons, in the early 19th century, the Dutch government used the system in Java and Sumatra. And in 1849, Paul Julius Reuter started a service to fly stock prices between Aachen and Brussels, a service that operated for a year until the gap in the telegraph link was closed. Sir Charles Wheatstone and Sir William Fothergill Cooke invented the telegraph in 1837. Also, the first commercial electrical telegraph is purported to have constructed by Wheatstone and Cooke. Both inventors viewed their device as an improvement to the electromagnetic telegraph not as a new device, samuel Morse independently developed a version of the electrical telegraph that he unsuccessfully demonstrated on 2 September 1837
26.
Old English
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Old English or Anglo-Saxon is the earliest historical form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers probably in the mid 5th century, Old English developed from a set of Anglo-Frisian or North Sea Germanic dialects originally spoken by Germanic tribes traditionally known as the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. As the Anglo-Saxons became dominant in England, their language replaced the languages of Roman Britain, Common Brittonic, a Celtic language, Old English had four main dialects, associated with particular Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Mercian, Northumbrian, Kentish and West Saxon. It was West Saxon that formed the basis for the standard of the later Old English period, although the dominant forms of Middle. The speech of eastern and northern parts of England was subject to strong Old Norse influence due to Scandinavian rule, Old English is one of the West Germanic languages, and its closest relatives are Old Frisian and Old Saxon. Like other old Germanic languages, it is different from Modern English. Old English grammar is similar to that of modern German, nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and verbs have many inflectional endings and forms. The oldest Old English inscriptions were using a runic system. Old English was not static, and its usage covered a period of 700 years, from the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain in the 5th century to the late 11th century, some time after the Norman invasion. While indicating that the establishment of dates is a process, Albert Baugh dates Old English from 450 to 1150, a period of full inflections. Perhaps around 85 per cent of Old English words are no longer in use, Old English is a West Germanic language, developing out of Ingvaeonic dialects from the 5th century. It came to be spoken over most of the territory of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which became the Kingdom of England and this included most of present-day England, as well as part of what is now southeastern Scotland, which for several centuries belonged to the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria. Other parts of the island – Wales and most of Scotland – continued to use Celtic languages, Norse was also widely spoken in the parts of England which fell under Danish law. Anglo-Saxon literacy developed after Christianisation in the late 7th century, the oldest surviving text of Old English literature is Cædmons Hymn, composed between 658 and 680. There is a corpus of runic inscriptions from the 5th to 7th centuries. The Old English Latin alphabet was introduced around the 9th century, with the unification of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms by Alfred the Great in the later 9th century, the language of government and literature became standardised around the West Saxon dialect. In Old English, typical of the development of literature, poetry arose before prose, a later literary standard, dating from the later 10th century, arose under the influence of Bishop Æthelwold of Winchester, and was followed by such writers as the prolific Ælfric of Eynsham. This form of the language is known as the Winchester standard and it is considered to represent the classical form of Old English
27.
Old French
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Old French was the Gallo-Romance dialect continuum spoken from the 9th century to the 14th century. In the 14th century, these came to be collectively known as the langues doïl. The mid-14th century is taken as the period to Middle French. The areal of Old French in contemporary terms corresponded to the parts of the Kingdom of France, Upper Burgundy. As part of the emerging Gallo-Romance dialect continuum, the langues doïl were contrasted with the langue doc, in these examples, we notice a clear consequence of bilingualism, that sometimes even changed the first syllable of the Latin words. Pope estimated that perhaps still 15% of the vocabulary of modern French derives from Germanic sources, at the third Council of Tours in 813, priests were ordered to preach in the vernacular language, since the common people could no longer understand formal Latin. The second-oldest document in Old French is the Eulalia sequence, which is important for reconstruction of Old French pronunciation due to its consistent spelling. The Capetians langue doïl, the forerunner of modern standard French, did not begin to become the common speech of all of France, however, until after the French Revolution. In the Late Middle Ages, the Old French dialects diverged into a number of distinct langues doïl, during the Early Modern period, French now becomes established as the official language of the Kingdom of France throughout the realm, also including the langue doc-speaking territories in the south. Old French gives way to Middle French in the mid-14th century, the earliest extant French literary texts date from the ninth century, but very few texts before the 11th century have survived. The first literary works written in Old French were saints lives, the Canticle of Saint Eulalie, written in the second half of the 9th century, is generally accepted as the first such text. The first of these is the area of the chansons de geste. More than one hundred chansons de geste have survived in three hundred manuscripts. The oldest and most celebrated of the chansons de geste is The Song of Roland, a fourth grouping, not listed by Bertrand, is the Crusade cycle, dealing with the First Crusade and its immediate aftermath. Jean Bodels other two categories—the Matter of Rome and the Matter of Britain—concern the French romance or roman, around a hundred verse romances survive from the period 1150–1220. From around 1200 on, the tendency was increasingly to write the romances in prose, the most important romance of the 13th century is the Romance of the Rose which breaks considerably from the conventions of the chivalric adventure story. The Occitan or Provençal poets were called troubadours, from the word trobar to find, lyric poets in Old French are called trouvères. By the late 13th century, the tradition in France had begun to develop in ways that differed significantly from the troubadour poets
28.
Illyrian language
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The Illyrian languages are part of the Indo-European language family. The relation of the Illyrian languages to other Indo-European languages—ancient and modern—is poorly understood due to the paucity of data and is still being examined, a grouping of Illyrian with the Messapian language has been proposed for about a century, but remains an unproven hypothesis. The theory is based on sources, archaeology and onomastics. Messapian material culture bears a number of similarities to Illyrian material culture, Some Messapian anthroponyms have close Illyrian equivalents. A grouping of Illyrian with the Venetic language and Liburnian language, once spoken in northeastern Italy, the consensus now is that Illyrian was quite distinct from Venetic and Liburnian. The relation between Venetic and Illyrian was later discredited and they are no longer considered closely related and they also point to other toponyms including Osseriates derived from /*eghero/ or Birziminium from PIE /*bherǵh/ or Asamum from PIE /*aḱ-mo/. For example, Vescleves has been explained as PIE *wesu-ḱlewes, also, the name Acrabanus as a compound name has been compared with Ancient Greek /akros/ with no signs of palatalization, or Clausal has been related to /*klew/. However, it has shown that even in Albanian and Balto-Slavic. Even the name Gentius or Genthius does not help to solve the problem since we have two Illyrian forms Genthius and Zanatis. If Gentius or Genthius derives from *ǵen- this is proof of a Centum language, another problem related to the name Gentius is that nowadays it cannot be stated surely if the initial /g/ of the sources was a palatovelar or a labiovelar. However, the insufficiency of this theory is that so far there is no certainty as to the historical or etymological development of either ardhja/hardhi or Ardiaioi, as with many other words. Bindo/Bindus, an Illyrian deity from Bihać, Bosnia and Herzegovina, cf. Alb. bind to convince or to make believe, bilia daughter, cf. Alb. bijë, dial. I madh big, great mantía bramblebush, Old and dial, Alb. mandë berry, mulberry Ragusa-Ragusium grape, cf. Proto-Alb. Ragusha rhinos fog, mist, cf. Old Alb. ren cloud Vendum place, wen-ta The Greeks were the first literate people to come into frequent contact with the speakers of Illyrian languages. Their conception of Illyrioi, however, differed from what the Romans would later call Illyricum, the Greek term encompassed only the peoples who lived on the borders of Macedonia and Epirus. Pliny the Elder, in his work Natural History, applies a stricter usage of the term Illyrii when speaking of Illyrii proprie dicti among the communities in the south of Roman Dalmatia. For a couple of centuries before and after the Roman conquest in the late 1st century BC, finally it encompassed all native peoples from the Adriatic to the Danube, inhabiting the Roman provinces of Dalmatia, Pannonia and Moesia, regardless of their ethnic and cultural differences. An extensive study of Illyrian names and territory was undertaken by Hans Krahe in the first decades of the twentieth century
29.
Tyrrhenians
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The Tyrrhenians or Tyrsenians is an exonym used by Greek authors to refer to a non-Greek people. The origin of the name is uncertain and it is only known to be used by Greek authors, but apparently not of Greek origin. It has been connected to tursis, also a Mediterranean loan into Greek, direct connections with Tusci, the Latin exonym for the Etruscans, from Turs-ci have also been attempted. The earliest instances in literature are in Hesiod and the Homeric hymn to Dionysus, Hesiod has And they ruled over the famous Tyrsenians, very far off in a recess of the holy islands. The Homeric hymn to Dionysus has Tyrsenian pirates seizing Dionysus, Presently there came swiftly over the sparkling sea Tyrsenian pirates on a well-decked ship — a miserable doom led them on. Later, in the 6th to 5th centuries BC, the name referred specifically to the Etruscans, for whom the Tyrrhenian Sea is named, the name is also attested in a fragment by Sophocles. The name becomes increasingly associated with the generic Pelasgians, herodotus places them in Crestonia in Thrace, as neighbours of the Pelasgians. Similarly, Thucydides mentions them together with the Pelasgians and associates them with Lemnian pirates, Lemnos remained relatively free of Greek influence up to Hellenistic times, and the Lemnos stele of the 6th century BC is inscribed with a language very similar to Etruscan. This has led to the postulation of a Tyrrhenian language group comprising Etruscan, Lemnian, there is thus evidence that there was indeed at least a linguistic relationship between the Lemnians and the Etruscans. Spard or Sard, another closely connected to the name Tyrrhenian, was the capital city of the land of Lydia. The name preserved by Greek and Egyptian renderings is Sard, for the Greeks call it Sardis and the name appears in the Egyptian inscriptions as Srdn
30.
Etruscan civilization
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The Etruscan civilization is the modern name given to a powerful and wealthy civilization of ancient Italy in the area corresponding roughly to Tuscany, western Umbria, and northern Lazio. Culture that is identifiably Etruscan developed in Italy after about 800 BC, the latter gave way in the 7th century BC to a culture that was influenced by ancient Greece, Magna Graecia, and Phoenicia. The decline was gradual, but by 500 BC the political destiny of Italy had passed out of Etruscan hands, the last Etruscan cities were formally absorbed by Rome around 100 BC. Politics were based on the city, and probably the family unit. In their heyday, the Etruscan elite grew very rich through trade with the Celtic world to the north and the Greeks to the south, archaic Greece had a huge influence on their art and architecture, and Greek mythology was evidently very familiar to them. The study also excluded recent Anatolian connection, the ancient Romans referred to the Etruscans as the Tuscī or Etruscī. Their Roman name is the origin of the terms Tuscany, which refers to their heartland, and Etruria, which can refer to their wider region. In Attic Greek, the Etruscans were known as Tyrrhenians, from which the Romans derived the names Tyrrhēnī, Tyrrhēnia, the word may also be related to the Hittite Taruisa. The Etruscans called themselves Rasenna, which was syncopated to Rasna or Raśna, the origins of the Etruscans are mostly lost in prehistory, although Greek historians as early as the 5th century BC, repeatedly associated the Tyrrhenians with Pelasgians. Strabo as well as the Homeric Hymn to Dionysus make mention of the Tyrrhenians as pirates, pliny the Elder put the Etruscans in the context of the Rhaetian people to the north and wrote in his Natural History, Adjoining these the Noricans are the Raeti and Vindelici. All are divided into a number of states, the Raeti are believed to be people of Tuscan race driven out by the Gauls, their leader was named Raetus. Historians have no literature and no original Etruscan texts of religion or philosophy, therefore, much of what is known about this civilization is derived from grave goods, another source of genetic data on Etruscan origins is from four ancient breeds of cattle. Analyzing the mitochondrial DNA of these and seven other breeds of Italian cattle, the other Italian breeds were linked to northern Europe. Etruscan expansion was focused both to the north beyond the Apennine Mountains and into Campania, some small towns in the sixth century BC disappeared during this time, ostensibly consumed by greater, more powerful neighbours. However, it is certain that the structure of the Etruscan culture was similar to, albeit more aristocratic than. The mining and commerce of metal, especially copper and iron, led to an enrichment of the Etruscans and to the expansion of their influence in the Italian peninsula and the western Mediterranean Sea. Here, their interests collided with those of the Greeks, especially in the sixth century BC and this led the Etruscans to ally themselves with Carthage, whose interests also collided with the Greeks. Around 540 BC, the Battle of Alalia led to a new distribution of power in the western Mediterranean, from the first half of the 5th century BC, the new political situation meant the beginning of the Etruscan decline after losing their southern provinces
31.
Wall of Jericho
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The Wall of Jericho was a Pre-Pottery Neolithic A defensive or flood protection wall suggested to date to approximately 8000 BC. If interpreted as a fortification, the Wall of Jericho is the oldest city wall discovered by archaeologists anywhere in the world. It is built of undressed stones and is located at the mound known as Tell es-Sultan. The topic of this article is the unique Neolithic-age stone wall, other walls, such as contemporary house walls, or later, Bronze and Iron Age city walls, are only mentioned for the sake of context. One wall was excavated by Sir Charles Warren in 1868 at the request of the Palestine Exploration Fund and he dug through the mud bricks of the wall without realizing what it was, suggesting there was little of interest at the site. Ernest Sellin and Carl Watzinger excavated Jericho between 1907 and 1909 and found the remains of two walls which they initially suggested supported the biblical account and they later revised this conclusion and dated their finds to the Middle Bronze Age. The site was excavated by John Garstang between 1930 and 1936, who again raised the suggestion that remains of the upper wall was that described in the Bible. Kathleen Kenyon resumed extensive excavations between 1952 and 1958 and found no late Bronze Age defensive wall or pottery and her excavations found a series of seventeen early Bronze Age walls, some of which she thought may have been destroyed by earthquakes. The last of the walls was put together in a hurry, another wall was built by a more sophisticated culture in the Middle Bronze Age with a steep plastered escarpment leading up to mud bricks on top. After this there was a hiatus until later Iron Age material dating to around the seventh century BC. This time period was called the Pre-Pottery Neolithic A, a late phase of the Stone Age predating the invention of pottery. It surrounded and protected a Neolithic settlement which contained a community of between 2,000 and 3,000 people. The Neolithic wall was complemented by a tower built into it. Furthermore, the construction of such a project implies some sort of organization, division of labour. Surrounding the wall was a ditch 8.2 metres wide by 2.7 metres deep, kathleen Kenyon commented on the work involved in the construction of the ditch, The labor involved in excavating this ditch out of solid rock must have been tremendous. As we have discovered nothing in the way of heavy flint picks, one can only suppose that it was carried out with stone mauls, perhaps helped by splitting with fire and water. The town of Jericho, which was about 2.5 hectares in size, in fact, evidence suggests that construction started prior to the agricultural revolution. The town contained round mud-brick houses, yet no street planning, despite the existence of the wall and tower, Jericho was still a proto-city, much like Çatalhöyük
32.
Ziggurat
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A ziggurat was a massive structure built in ancient Mesopotamia and the western Iranian plateau. It had the form of a step pyramid of successively receding stories or levels. Notable ziggurats include the Great Ziggurat of Ur near Nasiriyah, the Ziggurat of Aqar Quf near Baghdad, Ziggurats were built by the ancient Sumerians, Babylonians, Elamites, Akkadians, and Assyrians for local religions. Each ziggurat was part of a complex which included other buildings. The precursors of the ziggurat were raised platforms that date from the Ubaid period during the fourth millennium BCE, the earliest ziggurats began as a platform, the ziggurat was a pyramidal structure with a flat top. Sun-baked bricks made up the core of the ziggurat with facings of fired bricks on the outside, each step was slightly smaller than the step below it. The facings were often glazed in different colors and may have had astrological significance, kings sometimes had their names engraved on these glazed bricks. The number of floors ranged from two to seven, according to archaeologist Harriet Crawford, It is usually assumed that the ziggurats supported a shrine, though the only evidence for this comes from Herodotus, and physical evidence is nonexistent. It has also suggested by a number of scholars that this shrine was the scene of the sacred marriage. Herodotus describes the furnishing of the shrine on top of the ziggurat at Babylon, the god Marduk was also said to come and sleep in his shrine. The likelihood of such a shrine ever being found is sadly remote, erosion has usually reduced the surviving ziggurats to a fraction of their original height, but textual evidence may yet provide more facts about the purpose of these shrines. Access to the shrine would have been by a series of ramps on one side of the ziggurat or by a ramp from base to summit. The Mesopotamian ziggurats were not places for worship or ceremonies. They were believed to be dwelling places for the gods and each city had its own patron god, only priests were permitted on the ziggurat or in the rooms at its base, and it was their responsibility to care for the gods and attend to their needs. The priests were very powerful members of Sumerian society, one of the best-preserved ziggurats is Chogha Zanbil in western Iran. The Sialk ziggurat, in Kashan, Iran, is the oldest known ziggurat, Ziggurat designs ranged from simple bases upon which a temple sat, to marvels of mathematics and construction which spanned several terraced stories and were topped with a temple. An example of a simple ziggurat is the White Temple of Uruk, the ziggurat itself is the base on which the White Temple is set. Its purpose is to get the temple closer to the heavens, the Mesopotamians believed that these pyramid temples connected heaven and earth
33.
Architecture of Mesopotamia
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Among the Mesopotamian architectural accomplishments are the development of urban planning, the courtyard house, and ziggurats. No architectural profession existed in Mesopotamia, however, scribes drafted and managed construction for the government, nobility, the Mesopotamians regarded the craft of building as a divine gift taught to men by the gods as listed in me 28. Sumerian masonry was usually mortarless although bitumen was sometimes used, brick styles, which varied greatly over time, are categorized by period. The advantages to plano-convex bricks were the speed of manufacture as well as the surface which held the finishing plaster coat better than a smooth surface from other brick types. Bricks were sun baked to harden them and these types of bricks are much less durable than oven-baked ones so buildings eventually deteriorated. They were periodically destroyed, leveled, and rebuilt on the same spot and this planned structural life cycle gradually raised the level of cities, so that they came to be elevated above the surrounding plain. The resulting mounds are known as tells, and are throughout the ancient Near East. Civic buildings slowed decay by using cones of colored stone, terracotta panels, specially prized were imported building materials such as cedar from Lebanon, diorite from Arabia, and lapis lazuli from India. Mesopotamia is along the border of IRAQ, Babylonian temples are massive structures of crude brick, supported by buttresses, the rain being carried off by drains. One such drain at Ur was made of lead, the use of brick led to the early development of the pilaster and column, and of frescoes and enamelled tiles. The walls were brilliantly colored, and sometimes plated with zinc or gold, painted terra-cotta cones for torches were also embedded in the plaster. As time went on, however, later Assyrian architects began to shake free of Babylonian influence. The walls of Assyrian palaces were lined with sculptured and coloured slabs of stone, in Babylonia, in place of the bas relief, there is greater use of three-dimensional figures in the round – the earliest examples being the statues from Girsu, that are realistic if somewhat clumsy. The paucity of stone in Babylonia made every pebble precious, two seal-cylinders from the age of Sargon of Akkad are among the best examples of their kind. One of the first remarkable specimens of early metallurgy to be discovered by archaeologists is the vase of Entemena. At a later epoch, great excellence was attained in the manufacture of jewellery as earrings. Copper, too, was worked with skill, indeed, it is possible that Babylonia was the home of copper-working. The people were famous at a date for their embroideries
34.
Ziggurat of Ur
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The Ziggurat of Ur is a Neo-Sumerian ziggurat in what was the city of Ur near Nasiriyah, in present-day Dhi Qar Province, Iraq. The structure was built during the Early Bronze Age, but had crumbled to ruins by the 6th century BCE of the Neo-Babylonian period when it was restored by King Nabonidus and its remains were excavated in the 1920s and 1930s by Sir Leonard Woolley. Under Saddam Hussein in the 1980s, they were encased by a reconstruction of the façade. The ziggurat of Ur is the best-preserved of those known from Iran and Iraq and it is one of three well preserved structures of the Neo-Sumerian city of Ur, along with the Royal Mausolea and the Palace of Ur-Nammu. The ziggurat was built by King Ur-Nammu who dedicated the great ziggurat of Ur in honour of Nanna/Sîn, the massive step pyramid measured 64 m in length,45 m in width and over 30 m in height. The height is speculative, as only the foundations of the Sumerian ziggurat have survived, the ziggurat was a piece in a temple complex that served as an administrative center for the city, and which was a shrine of the moon god Nanna, the patron deity of Ur. The construction of the ziggurat was finished in the 21st century BCE by King Shulgi, during his 48-year reign, the city of Ur grew to be the capital of a state controlling much of Mesopotamia. Many ziggurats were made by stacking mud-bricks up and using mud to seal them together, the remains of the ziggurat were first discovered by William Kennett Loftus in 1850. The first excavations at the site were conducted by John George Taylor in the 1850s, after World War I, preliminary excavations were performed by Reginald Campbell Thompson and Henry Hall. The site was excavated in the 1920s by Sir Leonard Woolley by appointment of the University Museum of the University of Pennsylvania. The remains of the ziggurat consist of a solid mass of mud brick faced with burnt bricks set in bitumen. The lowest layer corresponds to the construction of Ur-Nammu, while the two upper layers are part of the Neo-Babylonian restorations. The façade of the lowest level and the staircase were rebuilt under the orders of Saddam Hussein. The ziggurat was damaged in the First Gulf War in 1991 by small arms fire, four bomb craters can be seen nearby and the walls of the ziggurat are marred by over 400 bullet holes. As of 2008, the site is under the supervision of curator Dief Mohssein Naiif al-Gizzy
35.
Assyrian sculpture
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Assyrian sculpture is the sculpture of the ancient Assyrian states, especially the Neo-Assyrian Empire of 911 to 612 BC, which ruled modern Iraq, Syria, and much of Iran. It forms a phase of the art of Mesopotamia, differing in particular because of its greater use of stone. The palace reliefs contain scenes in low relief which glorify the king, showing him at war, hunting, and fulfilling other kingly roles. Other surviving types of art include many cylinder seals, a few rock reliefs, reliefs and statues from temples, bronze relief strips used on large doors, the palace reliefs were fixed to the walls of royal palaces forming continuous strips along the walls of large halls. The style apparently began after about 879 BC, when Ashurnasirpal II moved the capital to Nimrud, thereafter, new royal palaces, of which there was typically one per reign, were extensively decorated in this way for the roughly 250 years until the end of the Assyrian Empire. There was subtle stylistic development, but a large degree of continuity in subjects. Compositions are arranged on slabs, or orthostats, typically about 7 feet high, the sculptures are often accompanied with inscriptions in cuneiform script, explaining the action or giving the name and extravagant titles of the king. Heads and legs are shown in profile, but torsos in a front or three-quarters view, eyes are also largely shown frontally. A full and characteristic set shows the leading up to the siege of Lachish in 701, it is the finest from the reign of Sennacherib, from his palace at Nineveh. Ernst Gombrich observed that none of the many casualties ever come from the Assyrian side, there are many reliefs of minor supernatural beings, called by such terms as winged genie, but the major Assyrian deities are only represented by symbols. The genies often perform a gesture of purification, fertilization or blessing with a bucket and cone, especially on larger figures, details and patterns on areas such as costumes, hair and beards, tree trunks and leaves, and the like are very meticulously carved. Other scenes seem to repeat a figure in a succession of different moments, performing the same action, but these were apparently experiments that remain unusual. The king is shown in narrative scenes, and also as a large standing figure in a few prominent places. Above the tree one of the gods, perhaps Ashur the chief god, leans out of a winged disc. Such scenes are shown elsewhere on the robe of the king, no doubt reflecting embroidery on the costumes. Elsewhere the tree is often attended to by genies, women are relatively rarely shown, and then usually as prisoners or refugees, an exception is a picnic scene showing Ashurbanipal with his queen. The many beardless royal attendants can probably be assumed to be eunuchs, kings are often accompanied by several courtiers, the closest to the king probably often being the appointed heir, who was not necessarily the oldest son. Lamassu were protective deities or spirits, the Assyrian version of the human-headed bull figure that had long figured in Mesopotamian mythology
36.
Babylon
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Babylon was a major city of ancient Mesopotamia in the fertile plain between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The city was built upon the Euphrates and divided in parts along its left and right banks. Babylon was originally a small Semitic Akkadian city dating from the period of the Akkadian Empire c.2300 BC, the town attained independence as part of a small city-state with the rise of the First Amorite Babylonian Dynasty in 1894 BC. Babylon grew and South Mesopotamia came to be known as Babylonia, the empire quickly dissolved after Hammurabis death and Babylon spent long periods under Assyrian, Kassite and Elamite domination. After being destroyed and then rebuilt by the Assyrians, Babylon became the capital of the Neo-Babylonian Empire from 609 to 539 BC, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. After the fall of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, the city came under the rule of the Achaemenid, Seleucid, Parthian, Roman, and Sassanid empires. It has been estimated that Babylon was the largest city in the world from c.1770 to 1670 BC and it was perhaps the first city to reach a population above 200,000. Estimates for the extent of its area range from 890 to 900 hectares. The remains of the city are in present-day Hillah, Babil Governorate, Iraq, about 85 kilometres south of Baghdad, comprising a large tell of broken mud-brick buildings, the English Babylon comes from Greek Babylṓn, a transliteration of the Akkadian Babili. The Babylonian name in the early 2nd millennium BC had been Babilli or Babilla, by the 1st millennium BC, it had changed to Babili under the influence of the folk etymology which traced it to bāb-ili. The Gate of God or Gate of El being from the Aramaic Hebrew Bab for Gate and El for God and this being similar to the Hebrew word for confusion Balal. In the Bible, the name appears as Babel, interpreted in the Hebrew Scriptures Book of Genesis to mean confusion, the modern English verb, to babble, or to speak meaningless words, is popularly thought to derive from this name, but there is no direct connection. The remains of the city are in present-day Hillah, Babil Governorate, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad, comprising a large tell of broken mud-brick buildings and debris. The site at Babylon consists of a number of mounds covering an area of about 2 by 1 kilometer, oriented north to south, along the Euphrates to the west. Originally, the river roughly bisected the city, but the course of the river has since shifted so that most of the remains of the western part of the city are now inundated. Some portions of the city wall to the west of the river also remain, remains of the city include, Kasr—also called Palace or Castle, it is the location of the Neo-Babylonian ziggurat Etemenanki and lies in the center of the site. Amran Ibn Ali—the highest of the mounds at 25 meters, to the south and it is the site of Esagila, a temple of Marduk which also contained shrines to Ea and Nabu. Homera—a reddish colored mound on the west side, most of the Hellenistic remains are here
37.
Broch
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A broch is an Iron Age drystone hollow-walled structure of a type found only in Scotland. Brochs belong to the classification complex atlantic roundhouse devised by Scottish archaeologists in the 1980s and their origin is a matter of some controversy. The theory that they were defensive military structures is not accepted by modern archaeologists. Although most stand alone in the landscape, some examples exist of brochs surrounded by clusters of smaller dwellings, the word broch is derived from Lowland Scots brough, meaning fort. In the mid-19th century Scottish antiquaries called brochs burgs, after Old Norse borg, place names in Scandinavian Scotland such as Burgawater and Burgan show that Old Norse borg is the older word used for these structures in the north. Brochs are often referred to as duns in the west, antiquaries began to use the spelling broch in the 1870s. A precise definition for the word has proved elusive, brochs are the most spectacular of a complex class of roundhouse buildings found throughout Atlantic Scotland. Researcher Euan MacKie has proposed a smaller total for Scotland of 104. The origin of brochs is a subject of continuing research and this view contrasted, for example, with that of Sir Lindsay Scott, who argued, following Childe, for a wholesale migration into Atlantic Scotland of people from southwest England. Meanwhile, the increasing number – albeit still pitifully few – of radiocarbon dates for the use of brochs still suggests that most of the towers were built in the 1st centuries BC. A few may be earlier, notably the one proposed for Old Scatness Broch in Shetland, Caithness, Sutherland and the Northern Isles have the densest concentrations, but there are also a great many examples in the west of Scotland and the Hebrides. Although mainly concentrated in the northern Highlands and the Islands, a few occur in the Borders, on the west coast of Dumfries and Galloway. In a c.1560 sketch there appears to be a broch by the next to Annan Castle in Dumfries. This small group of southern brochs has never been satisfactorily explained, the original interpretation of brochs, favoured by nineteenth century antiquarians, was that they were defensive structures, places of refuge for the community and their livestock. They were sometimes regarded as the work of Danes or Picts, from the 1930s to the 1960s, archaeologists like V. Gordon Childe and later John Hamilton regarded them as castles where local landowners held sway over a subject population. The castle theory fell from favour among Scottish archaeologists in the 1980s, once again, however, there is a lack of archaeological proof for this reconstruction, and the sheer number of brochs, sometimes in places with a lack of good land, makes it problematic. Brochs close groupings and profusion in many areas may indeed suggest that they had a defensive or even offensive function. Often they are at key strategic points, in Shetland they sometimes cluster on each side of narrow stretches of water, the broch of Mousa, for instance, is directly opposite another at Burraland in Sandwick
38.
Scotland
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Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and covers the northern third of the island of Great Britain. It shares a border with England to the south, and is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, with the North Sea to the east. In addition to the mainland, the country is made up of more than 790 islands, including the Northern Isles, the Kingdom of Scotland emerged as an independent sovereign state in the Early Middle Ages and continued to exist until 1707. By inheritance in 1603, James VI, King of Scots, became King of England and King of Ireland, Scotland subsequently entered into a political union with the Kingdom of England on 1 May 1707 to create the new Kingdom of Great Britain. The union also created a new Parliament of Great Britain, which succeeded both the Parliament of Scotland and the Parliament of England. Within Scotland, the monarchy of the United Kingdom has continued to use a variety of styles, titles, the legal system within Scotland has also remained separate from those of England and Wales and Northern Ireland, Scotland constitutes a distinct jurisdiction in both public and private law. Glasgow, Scotlands largest city, was one of the worlds leading industrial cities. Other major urban areas are Aberdeen and Dundee, Scottish waters consist of a large sector of the North Atlantic and the North Sea, containing the largest oil reserves in the European Union. This has given Aberdeen, the third-largest city in Scotland, the title of Europes oil capital, following a referendum in 1997, a Scottish Parliament was re-established, in the form of a devolved unicameral legislature comprising 129 members, having authority over many areas of domestic policy. Scotland is represented in the UK Parliament by 59 MPs and in the European Parliament by 6 MEPs, Scotland is also a member nation of the British–Irish Council, and the British–Irish Parliamentary Assembly. Scotland comes from Scoti, the Latin name for the Gaels, the Late Latin word Scotia was initially used to refer to Ireland. By the 11th century at the latest, Scotia was being used to refer to Scotland north of the River Forth, alongside Albania or Albany, the use of the words Scots and Scotland to encompass all of what is now Scotland became common in the Late Middle Ages. Repeated glaciations, which covered the land mass of modern Scotland. It is believed the first post-glacial groups of hunter-gatherers arrived in Scotland around 12,800 years ago, the groups of settlers began building the first known permanent houses on Scottish soil around 9,500 years ago, and the first villages around 6,000 years ago. The well-preserved village of Skara Brae on the mainland of Orkney dates from this period and it contains the remains of an early Bronze Age ruler laid out on white quartz pebbles and birch bark. It was also discovered for the first time that early Bronze Age people placed flowers in their graves, in the winter of 1850, a severe storm hit Scotland, causing widespread damage and over 200 deaths. In the Bay of Skaill, the storm stripped the earth from a large irregular knoll, when the storm cleared, local villagers found the outline of a village, consisting of a number of small houses without roofs. William Watt of Skaill, the laird, began an amateur excavation of the site, but after uncovering four houses
39.
Tower house
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A tower house is a particular type of stone structure, built for defensive purposes as well as habitation. Tower houses began to appear in the Middle Ages, especially in mountainous or limited access areas, at the same time, they were also used as an aristocrats residence, around which a castle town was often constructed. In Italian medieval communes, tower houses were built by the local barons as power centres during times of internal strife. In seventeenth century Scotland these castles became the pleasurable retreats of the upper-classes, while able to adopt a military nature, they were furnished for comfort and social interaction. Tower houses are commonly found in northern Spain, especially in the Basque Country. They were mainly used as residences and were able to provide shelter against several enemies, starting with the Arabs and later Castile. However, due to complex legal charters, few had boroughs attached to them, during the petty wars among the Basque nobles from 1379 to 1456, the upper floors of most of them were demolished. Few have survived unscathed to the present day, since then they have been used only as residences by their traditional noble owners or converted into farm houses. To the west of the Basque Country, in Cantabria and Asturias similar tower houses are found, furthest west in the Iberian peninsula in Galicia, medieval tower houses are in the origin of many Modern Age pazos, noble residences as well as strongholds. The tower house served the purpose of protecting the extended family and these tower houses were typically not intended to be used in any major military actions, for this purpose the crusaders relied on a number of larger order castles. A number of tower houses still exist, well-preserved examples include Purtse, Vao. The Yemeni city of Shibam has hundreds of houses which were the tallest in the world. Many other buildings in the Asir and Al-Bahah provinces of Saudi Arabia also have many stone towers and tower houses, most notable in the New World might be considered a focal element of the Mesa Verde Anasazi ruin in Colorado, United States. There is a prominent structure at that site which is in called the tower house and has the general appearance characteristics of its counterparts in Britain. Aul Svan tower Diaolou Bastle house Castle Keep L Plan Castle Manor house Peel tower The Fortified House in Scotland Fortified house Pazo Qasaba Z-plan castle Johnson Westropp, notes on the Lesser Castles or Peel Towers of the County Clare. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, the Culture of the English People, Iron Age to the Industrial Revolution. Architecture of the Islamic world, its history and social meaning, media related to Tower houses at Wikimedia Commons Cutaway drawing Of Urquhart Castle tower house
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Phoenicia
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The enterprising, sea-based Phoenician civilization spread across the Mediterranean between 1500 BC and 300 BC. Their civilization was organized in city-states, similar to those of Ancient Greece, perhaps the most notable of which were Tyre, Sidon, Arvad, Berytus and Carthage. Each city-state was an independent unit, and it is uncertain to what extent the Phoenicians viewed themselves as a single nationality. In terms of archaeology, language, lifestyle, and religion there was little to set the Phoenicians apart as markedly different from other Semitic Canaanites. The Phoenicians were the first state-level society to make use of alphabets. By their maritime trade, the Phoenicians spread the use of the alphabet to Anatolia, North Africa, and Europe, where it was adopted by the Greeks, the name Phoenicians, like Latin Poenī, comes from Greek Φοίνικες. The word φοῖνιξ phoînix meant variably Phoenician person, Tyrian purple, the word may be derived from φοινός phoinós blood red, itself possibly related to φόνος phónos murder. Beekes has suggested a Pre-Greek origin of the ethnonym, the oldest attested form of the word in Greek may be the Mycenaean po-ni-ki-jo, po-ni-ki, possibly borrowed from Ancient Egyptian fnḫw Asiatics, Semites, although this derivation is disputed. The folk-etymological association of Φοινίκη with φοῖνιξ mirrors that in Akkadian which tied kinaḫni, the land was natively known as knʿn and its people as the knʿny. In the Amarna tablets of the 14th century BC, people from the region called themselves Kenaani or Kinaani, the ethnonym survived in North Africa until the 4th century AD. Herodotus account refers to the myths of Io and Europa, according to the Persians best informed in history, the Phoenicians began the quarrel. The Greek historian Strabo believed that the Phoenicians originated from Bahrain, Herodotus also believed that the homeland of the Phoenicians was Bahrain. The people of Tyre in South Lebanon in particular have long maintained Persian Gulf origins, however, there is little evidence of occupation at all in Bahrain during the time when such migration had supposedly taken place. Canaanite culture apparently developed in situ from the earlier Ghassulian chalcolithic culture, Byblos is attested as an archaeological site from the Early Bronze Age. The Late Bronze Age state of Ugarit is considered quintessentially Canaanite archaeologically, fernand Braudel remarked in The Perspective of the World that Phoenicia was an early example of a world-economy surrounded by empires. The high point of Phoenician culture and sea power is usually placed c, archaeological evidence consistent with this understanding has been difficult to identify. A unique concentration in Phoenicia of silver hoards dated between 1200 and 800 BC, however, contains hacksilver with lead isotope ratios matching ores in Sardinia and Spain. This metallic evidence agrees with the memory of a western Mediterranean Tarshish that supplied Solomon with silver via Phoenicia
41.
Mogador
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Essaouira, formerly known as Mogador, is a city in the western Moroccan economic region of Marrakesh-Safi, on the Atlantic coast. The modern name means the little rampart, a reference to the walls that still enclose part of the city. The name of the city is usually spelled Essaouira in Latin script, both spellings represent its name in Moroccan Arabic, ṣ-Ṣwiṛa. This is the diminutive of the noun ṣuṛ which means wall, the pronunciation with pharyngealized /ṣ/ and /ṛ/ is a typically Moroccan development. In Classical Arabic, the noun is sūr, diminutive suwayrah, hence the spelling of the name in Arabic script according to the classical pronunciation is السويرة al-Suwayrah. In the Berber language which is spoken by a proportion of the citys inhabitants, it is called Taṣṣort. In Moroccan Arabic, a single male inhabitant is called ṣwiṛi, plural ṣwiṛiyin, in the Berber language, a single male inhabitant is U-Taṣṣort, plural, Ayt Taṣṣuṛt, a single female inhabitant is Ult Taṣṣort, plural Ist Taṣṣort. Until the 1960s, Essaouira was generally known by its Portuguese name and this name is probably a corruption of the older Berber name Amaqdūl that is mentioned by the 11th-century geographer al-Bakrī. Archaeological research shows that Essaouira has been occupied since prehistoric times, the bay at Essaouira is partially sheltered by the island of Mogador, making it a peaceful harbor protected against strong marine winds. Essaouira has long considered as one of the best anchorages of the Moroccan coast. The Carthaginian navigator Hanno visited in the 5th century BC and established the trading post of Arambys and this dye colored the purple stripe in Imperial Roman Senatorial togas. A Roman villa was excavated on Mogador island, a Roman vase was found as well as coinage from the 3rd century CE. Most of the artifacts are now visible in the Sidi Mohammed ben Abdallah Museum, during the Middle Ages, a Muslim saint named Sidi Mogdoul was buried in Essaouira, probably giving its origin to the name Mogador. In 1506, the king of Portugal, D. Manuel I, ordered a fortress to be built there, four of them only had a short duration, Graciosa, São João da Mamora, Castelo Real of Mogador and Aguz. Two became permanent urban settlements, Santa Cruz do Cabo de Gué, following the 1541 Fall of Agadir, the Portuguese had to abandon most of their settlements between 1541 and 1550, although they were able to keep Ceuta, Tangier and Mazagan. The fortress of Castelo Real of Mogador fell to the resistance of the Regraga fraternity four years after its establishment. During the 16th century, powers including Spain, England, the Netherlands, Essaouira remained a haven for the export of sugar, molasses and the anchoring of pirates. France was involved in an attempt to colonize Mogador in 1629
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Watchtower
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A watchtower, or watch tower, is a type of fortification used in many parts of the world. It differs from a tower in that its primary use is military. Its main purpose is to provide a high, safe place from which a sentinel or guard may observe the surrounding area, in some cases, non-military towers, such as religious pagodas, may also be used as watchtowers. The Romans built numerous towers as part of a system of communications, in medieval Europe, many castles and manor houses, or similar fortified buildings, were equipped with watchtowers. In some of the houses of western France, the watchtower equipped with arrow or gun loopholes was one of the principal means of defense. A feudal lord could keep watch over his domain from the top of his tower, in southern Saudi Arabia and Yemen, small stone and mud towers called qasaba were constructed as either watchtowers or keeps in the Asir mountains. Furthermore, in Najd, a watchtower, called Margab, was used to watch for approaching enemies far in distance and shout calling warnings from atop. Scotland saw the construction of Peel towers that combined the function of watchtower with that of a keep or tower house served as the residence for a local notable family. Later many were restored or built against the Barbary pirates, some notable examples of military Mediterranean watchtowers include the towers that the Knights of Malta had constructed on the coasts of Malta. These towers ranged in size from small watchtowers to large structures armed with numerous cannons and they include the Wignacourt, de Redin, and Lascaris towers, named for the Grand Master, such as Martin de Redin, that commissioned each series. In the Channel Islands, the Jersey Round Towers and the Guernsey loophole towers date from the late 18th Century and they were erected to give warning of attacks by the French. One of the last Martello towers to be built was Fort Denison in Sydney harbour, the most recent descendants of the Martello Towers are the flak towers that the various combatants erected in World War II as mounts for anti-aircraft artillery. An example of nonmilitary watchtower in history is the one of Jerusalem, though the Hebrews used it to keep a watch for approaching armies, the religious authorities forbade the taking of weapons up into the tower as this would require bringing weapons through the temple. Rebuilt by King Herod, that watchtower was renamed after Mark Antony, his friend who battled against Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus, fire lookout tower Observation towers are similar constructions being usually outside of fortifications. A similar use have also Control towers on airports or harbours, diaolou Watchtower Media related to Watch towers at Wikimedia Commons
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Diocletian's Palace
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Diocletians Palace is an ancient palace built by the Roman Emperor Diocletian at the turn of the fourth century AD, that today forms about half the old town and city center of Split, in Croatia. Diocletian built the palace in preparation for his retirement on 1 May 305 AD. It lies in a bay on the side of a short peninsula running out from the Dalmatian coast, four miles from Salona. The terrain slopes gently seaward and is typical karst, consisting of low ridges running east to west with marl in the clefts between them. After the Romans abandoned the site, the Palace remained empty for several centuries, in the 7th century, nearby residents fled to the walled palace in an effort to escape invading Croats. Since then the palace has been occupied, with making their homes and businesses within the palace basement. Today many restaurants and shops, and some homes, can still be found within the walls, a few decades later, in 1782, the French painter Louis-François Cassas created drawings of the palace, published by Joseph Lavallée in 1802 in the chronicles of his voyages. This palace is today, with all the most important historical buildings, Diocletians Palace far transcends local importance because of its degree of preservation. The Palace is one of the most famous and complete architectural and cultural features on the Croatian Adriatic coast, as the worlds most complete remains of a Roman palace, it holds an outstanding place in Mediterranean, European and world heritage. In November 2006 the City Council decided to permit over twenty new buildings within the palace and it is said that this decision was politically motivated and largely due to lobbying by local property developers. Once the public in 2007 came aware of the project, they petitioned against the decision and won, no new buildings, shopping center or the underground garage was built. The World Monuments Fund has been working on a project at the palace, including surveying structural integrity and cleaning and restoring the stone. The palace is depicted on the reverse of the Croatian 500 kuna banknote, the ground plan of the palace is an irregular rectangle with towers projecting from the western, northern, and eastern facades. It combines qualities of a villa with those of a military camp, with its huge gates. The palace is enclosed by walls, and at times, it housed over 9000 people, subterranean portions of the palace feature barrel vaulted stonework. Only the southern facade, which rose directly from, or very near to, the elaborate architectural composition of the arcaded gallery on its upper floor differs from the more severe treatment of the three shore facades. A monumental gate in the middle of each of these led to an enclosed courtyard. The design is derived from both villa and castrum types, and this duality is also evident in the arrangement of the interior, the transverse road linking the eastern gate and western gate divided the complex into two-halves
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Croatia
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Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a sovereign state between Central Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Mediterranean. Its capital city is Zagreb, which one of the countrys primary subdivisions. Croatia covers 56,594 square kilometres and has diverse, mostly continental, Croatias Adriatic Sea coast contains more than a thousand islands. The countrys population is 4.28 million, most of whom are Croats, the Croats arrived in the area of present-day Croatia during the early part of the 7th century AD. They organised the state into two duchies by the 9th century, tomislav became the first king by 925, elevating Croatia to the status of a kingdom. The Kingdom of Croatia retained its sovereignty for nearly two centuries, reaching its peak during the rule of Kings Petar Krešimir IV and Dmitar Zvonimir, Croatia entered a personal union with Hungary in 1102. In 1527, faced with Ottoman conquest, the Croatian Parliament elected Ferdinand I of the House of Habsburg to the Croatian throne. In 1918, after World War I, Croatia was included in the unrecognized State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs which seceded from Austria-Hungary, a fascist Croatian puppet state backed by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany existed during World War II. After the war, Croatia became a member and a federal constituent of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. On 25 June 1991 Croatia declared independence, which came wholly into effect on 8 October of the same year, the Croatian War of Independence was fought successfully during the four years following the declaration. A unitary state, Croatia is a republic governed under a parliamentary system, the International Monetary Fund classified Croatia as an emerging and developing economy, and the World Bank identified it as a high-income economy. Croatia is a member of the European Union, United Nations, the Council of Europe, NATO, the World Trade Organization, the service sector dominates Croatias economy, followed by the industrial sector and agriculture. Tourism is a significant source of revenue during the summer, with Croatia ranked the 18th most popular tourist destination in the world, the state controls a part of the economy, with substantial government expenditure. The European Union is Croatias most important trading partner, since 2000, the Croatian government constantly invests in infrastructure, especially transport routes and facilities along the Pan-European corridors. Internal sources produce a significant portion of energy in Croatia, the rest is imported, the origin of the name is uncertain, but is thought to be a Gothic or Indo-Aryan term assigned to a Slavic tribe. The oldest preserved record of the Croatian ethnonym *xъrvatъ is of variable stem, the first attestation of the Latin term is attributed to a charter of Duke Trpimir from the year 852. The original is lost, and just a 1568 copy is preserved—leading to doubts over the authenticity of the claim, the oldest preserved stone inscription is the 9th-century Branimir Inscription, where Duke Branimir is styled as Dux Cruatorvm. The inscription is not believed to be dated accurately, but is likely to be from during the period of 879–892, the area known as Croatia today was inhabited throughout the prehistoric period
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Aurelian Walls
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The Aurelian Walls are a line of city walls built between 271 AD and 275 AD in Rome, Italy, during the reign of the Roman Emperors Aurelian and Probus. They superseded the earlier Servian Wall built during the 4th century BC, the walls enclosed all the seven hills of Rome plus the Campus Martius and, on the right bank of the Tiber, the Trastevere district. The river banks within the city appear to have been left unfortified. The size of the enclosed area is 1,400 hectares. The full circuit ran for 19 kilometres surrounding an area of 13.7 square kilometres, the walls were constructed in brick-faced concrete,3.5 metres thick and 8 metres high, with a square tower every 100 Roman feet. In the 4th century, remodelling doubled the height of the walls to 16 metres, by 500 AD, the circuit possessed 383 towers,7,020 crenellations,18 main gates,5 postern gates,116 latrines, and 2,066 large external windows. By the third century AD, the boundaries of Rome had grown far beyond the area enclosed by the old Servian Wall, Rome had remained unfortified during the subsequent centuries of expansion and consolidation due to lack of hostile threats against the city. The citizens of Rome took great pride in knowing that Rome required no fortifications because of the stability brought by the Pax Romana and the protection of the Roman Army. However, the need for updated defences became acute during the crisis of the Third Century, when barbarian tribes flooded through the Germanic frontier and the Roman Army struggled to stop them. In 270, the barbarian Juthungi and Vandals invaded northern Italy, further trouble broke out in Rome itself in the summer of 271, when the mint workers rose in rebellion. Several thousand people died in the fighting that resulted. The construction of the walls was by far the largest building project that had taken place in Rome for many decades, the construction project was unusually left to the citizens themselves to complete as Aurelian could not afford to spare a single legionary for the project. The walls were built in the time of only five years. Progress was accelerated, and money saved, by incorporating existing buildings into the structure and these included the Amphitheatrum Castrense, the Castra Praetoria, the Pyramid of Cestius, and even a section of the Aqua Claudia aqueduct near the Porta Maggiore. As much as a sixth of the walls is estimated to have composed of pre-existing structures. An area behind the walls was cleared and sentry passages were built to enable it to be reinforced quickly in an emergency, the actual effectiveness of the wall is disputable, given the relatively small size of the citys garrison. The entire combined strength of the Praetorian Guard, cohortes urbanae, instead, they carried out hit-and-run raids against ill-defended targets. The wall was a deterrent against such tactics, parts of the wall were doubled in height by Maxentius, who also improved the watch-towers
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