DeWitt Clinton
DeWitt Clinton was an American politician and naturalist who served as a United States Senator, Mayor of New York City and sixth Governor of New York. In this last capacity, he was responsible for the construction of the Erie Canal. Clinton was a major candidate for the American presidency in the election of 1812, challenging incumbent James Madison. A nephew of long-time New York Governor George Clinton, DeWitt Clinton served as his uncle's secretary before launching his own political career; as a Democratic-Republican, Clinton won election to the New York State Legislature in 1798 before serving as a U. S. Senator. Returning to New York, Clinton served three terms as Mayor of New York City and won election as the Lieutenant Governor of New York. In the 1812 election, Clinton won support from the Federalists as well as a group of Democratic-Republicans dissatisfied with Madison. Though Madison won re-election, Clinton carried most of the Northeastern United States and fared better than the previous two Federalist-supported candidates.
After the presidential election, Clinton continued to affiliate with the Democratic-Republican Party. Clinton served as Governor of New York from 1817 to 1822 and from 1825 to 1828, presiding over the construction of the Erie Canal. Clinton believed that infrastructure improvements could transform American life, drive economic growth, encourage political participation, he influenced the development of New York State and the United States. DeWitt Clinton was born on March 2, 1769, the second son born to Major-General James Clinton and his wife Mary DeWitt, a descendant of the Dutch patrician De Witt family, he attended Kingston Academy and began his college studies at the College of New Jersey before transferring to King's College. Kings was renamed Columbia College, Clinton was the first to graduate under the school's new name, he was the brother of U. S. Representative George Clinton Jr. the half-brother of U. S. Representative James G. Clinton, the cousin of Simeon De Witt, he became the secretary to his uncle George Clinton, governor of New York.
Soon after, he became a member of the Democratic-Republican Party. He was a member of the New York State Assembly in 1798, of the New York State Senate from the Southern District in 1798–1802 and 1806–1811 He was a delegate to the New York State Constitutional Convention in 1801, he was a member of the Council of Appointments in 1801–1802 and 1806–1807. He won election by the New York State Legislature to the U. S. Senate seat left vacant by the resignation of John Armstrong, Jr. and served from February 9, 1802 to November 4, 1803. He resigned over unhappiness with living conditions in newly built Washington, D. C. and was appointed Mayor of New York City. He served as Mayor of New York from 1803 to 1807, 1808 to 1810, 1811 to 1815. While serving as mayor, he was its president, he helped re-organize the American Academy of the Fine Arts in 1808, served as its president between 1813 and 1817. He was a Regent of the University of the State of New York from 1808 to 1825. Clinton was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1814, served as its vice president from 1821 to 1828.
In 1816 he was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Sciences. In 1811, the death of John Broome left a vacancy in the office of Lieutenant Governor of New York. In a special election, Clinton defeated the Federalist Nicholas Fish and the Tammany Hall candidate Marinus Willett, to become Lieutenant Governor until the end of the term in June 1813. Clinton's uncle, George Clinton, had attempted to challenge James Madison for the presidency in 1808, but was chosen as the party's vice presidential nominee instead. In 1812, after George Clinton's death, the elder Clinton's supporters gravitated towards DeWitt Clinton. Clinton ran for President of the United States as candidate for both the Federalist Party and a small group of anti-war Democratic-Republicans. In the close election of 1812, Clinton was defeated by President Madison, it was the strongest showing of any Federalist candidate for the Presidency since 1800, the change of the votes of one or two states would have given Clinton the victory.
After the resignation of Governor Tompkins, elected Vice President, he won a special gubernatorial election in which he was the only candidate. 1,479 votes were cast for Peter Buell Porter – against Clinton's 43,310 – because the Tammany organization, which fiercely hated Clinton, had printed ballots with Porter's name on them and distributed them among the Tammany followers in New York City. On July 1, 1817, Clinton took office as Governor of New York, he was re-elected in 1820, defeating the sitting Vice President Tompkins in a narrow race – DeWitt Clinton 47,447 votes, Tompkins 45,900 – and served until December 31, 1822. During his second term, the New York State Constitutional Convention of 1821 shortened the gubernatorial term to two years, moved the beginning of the term from July 1 to January 1 cutting off the last 6 months of the 3-year-term he had been elected to; the gubernatorial election was moved from April to November, but Clinton was not renominated by his party to run for re-election in November 1822.
So, he still kept his post as President of the Erie Canal Commission. In April 1824, a majority of his political enemies, the Bucktails, voted in the New York State Legislature for his removal from the Canal Commission; this caused such a wave of indignation among the electorate, that he was nominated for Governor by the "People's Party", was re-elected governor against the official candidate of the Dem
Joseph Brodsky
Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky was a Russian and American poet and essayist. Born in Leningrad in 1940, Brodsky ran afoul of Soviet authorities and was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972, settling in the United States with the help of W. H. Auden and other supporters, he taught thereafter at Mount Holyoke College, at universities including Yale, Columbia and Michigan. Brodsky was awarded the 1987 Nobel Prize in Literature "for an all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity", he was appointed United States Poet Laureate in 1991. According to Professor Andrey Ranchin of Moscow State University: “Brodsky is the only modern Russian poet whose body of work has been awarded the honorary title of a canonized classic... Brodsky's literary canonization is an exceptional phenomenon. No other contemporary Russian writer has been honored as the hero of such a number of memoir texts. Brodsky was born into a Russian Jewish family in Leningrad, he was a descendant of a ancient rabbinic family Schorr.
His direct male-line ancestor is Joseph ben Isaac Bekhor Shor. His father, Aleksandr Brodsky, was a professional photographer in the Soviet Navy, his mother, Maria Volpert Brodskaya, was a professional interpreter whose work helped to support the family, they lived in poverty, marginalized by their Jewish status. In early childhood Brodsky survived the Siege of Leningrad where he and his parents nearly died of starvation, he suffered from various health problems caused by the siege. Brodsky commented that many of his teachers were anti-Semitic and that he felt like a dissident from an early age, he noted "I began to despise Lenin when I was in the first grade, not so much because of his political philosophy or practice... but because of his omnipresent images." As a young student Brodsky was "an unruly child" known for his misbehavior during classes. At fifteen, Brodsky tried to enter the School of Submariners without success, he went on to work as a milling machine operator. Having decided to become a physician, he worked at the morgue at the Kresty Prison and sewing bodies.
He subsequently held a variety of jobs in hospitals, in a ship's boiler room, on geological expeditions. At the same time, Brodsky engaged in a program of self-education, he learned Polish so he could translate the works of Polish poets such as Czesław Miłosz, English so that he could translate John Donne. On the way, he acquired a deep interest in classical philosophy, religion and English and American poetry. In 1955, Brodsky began producing literary translations, he circulated them in secret, some were published by the underground journal Sintaksis. His writings were apolitical. By 1958 he was well known in literary circles for his poems "The Jewish cemetery near Leningrad" and "Pilgrims". Asked when he first felt called to poetry, he recollected, "In 1959, in Yakutsk, when walking in that terrible city, I went into a bookstore. I snagged a copy of poems by Baratynsky. I had nothing to read. So I read that book and understood what I had to do in life. Or got excited, at least. So in a way, Evgeny Abramovich Baratynsky is sort of responsible."
His friend Ludmila Shtern recalled working with Brodsky on an irrigation project in his "Geological Period": "We bounced around the Leningrad Province examining kilometers of canals, checking their embankments, which looked terrible. They were falling down, coming apart, had all sorts of strange things growing in them... It was during these trips, that I was privileged to hear the poems "The Hills" and "You Will Gallop in the Dark". Brodsky read them aloud to me between two train cars as we were going towards Tikhvin."In 1960, the young Brodsky met Anna Akhmatova, one of the leading poets of the silver age. She encouraged his work, would go on to become his mentor. In 1962, in Leningrad, Anna Akhmatova introduced him to the artist Marina Basmanova, a young painter from an established artistic family, drawing Akhmatova's portrait; the two started a relationship. Bobyshev began to pursue the girl and Brodsky began to be pursued by the authorities. Brodsky dedicated much love poetry to Marina Basmanova: In 1963, Brodsky's poetry was denounced by a Leningrad newspaper as "pornographic and anti-Soviet".
His papers were confiscated, he was interrogated, twice put in a mental institution and arrested. He was charged with social parasitism by the Soviet authorities in a trial in 1964, finding that his series of odd jobs and role as a poet were not a sufficient contribution to society, they called him "a pseudo-poet in velveteen trousers" who failed to fulfill his "constitutional duty to work for the good of the motherland". The trial judge asked "Who has recognized you as a poet? Who has enrolled you in the ranks of poets?" – "No one," Brodsky replied, "Who enrolled me in the ranks of the human race?" Brodsky was not yet 24. For his "parasitism" Brodsky was sentenced to five years hard labor and served 18 months on a farm in the village of Norenskaya, in the Archangelsk region, 350 miles from Leningrad, he rented his own small cottage, though it was without plumbing or central heating, having one's own, private space was taken to be a great luxury at the time. Basmanova and Brodsky'
Berlin
Berlin is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3,748,148 inhabitants make it the second most populous city proper of the European Union after London; the city is one of Germany's 16 federal states. It is surrounded by the state of Brandenburg, contiguous with its capital, Potsdam; the two cities are at the center of the Berlin-Brandenburg capital region, which is, with about six million inhabitants and an area of more than 30,000 km², Germany's third-largest metropolitan region after the Rhine-Ruhr and Rhine-Main regions. Berlin straddles the banks of the River Spree, which flows into the River Havel in the western borough of Spandau. Among the city's main topographical features are the many lakes in the western and southeastern boroughs formed by the Spree and Dahme rivers. Due to its location in the European Plain, Berlin is influenced by a temperate seasonal climate. About one-third of the city's area is composed of forests, gardens, rivers and lakes; the city lies in the Central German dialect area, the Berlin dialect being a variant of the Lusatian-New Marchian dialects.
First documented in the 13th century and situated at the crossing of two important historic trade routes, Berlin became the capital of the Margraviate of Brandenburg, the Kingdom of Prussia, the German Empire, the Weimar Republic, the Third Reich. Berlin in the 1920s was the third largest municipality in the world. After World War II and its subsequent occupation by the victorious countries, the city was divided. East Berlin was declared capital of East Germany. Following German reunification in 1990, Berlin once again became the capital of all of Germany. Berlin is a world city of culture, politics and science, its economy is based on high-tech firms and the service sector, encompassing a diverse range of creative industries, research facilities, media corporations and convention venues. Berlin serves as a continental hub for air and rail traffic and has a complex public transportation network; the metropolis is a popular tourist destination. Significant industries include IT, biomedical engineering, clean tech, biotechnology and electronics.
Berlin is home to world-renowned universities, orchestras and entertainment venues, is host to many sporting events. Its Zoological Garden is one of the most popular worldwide. With the world's oldest large-scale movie studio complex, Berlin is an popular location for international film productions; the city is well known for its festivals, diverse architecture, contemporary arts and a high quality of living. Since the 2000s Berlin has seen the emergence of a cosmopolitan entrepreneurial scene. Berlin lies in northeastern Germany, east of the River Saale, that once constituted, together with the River Elbe, the eastern border of the Frankish Realm. While the Frankish Realm was inhabited by Germanic tribes like the Franks and the Saxons, the regions east of the border rivers were inhabited by Slavic tribes; this is why most of the villages in northeastern Germany bear Slavic-derived names. Typical Germanised place name suffixes of Slavic origin are -ow, -itz, -vitz, -witz, -itzsch and -in, prefixes are Windisch and Wendisch.
The name Berlin has its roots in the language of West Slavic inhabitants of the area of today's Berlin, may be related to the Old Polabian stem berl-/birl-. Since the Ber- at the beginning sounds like the German word Bär, a bear appears in the coat of arms of the city, it is therefore a canting arm. Of Berlin's twelve boroughs, five bear a Slavic-derived name: Pankow, Steglitz-Zehlendorf, Marzahn-Hellersdorf, Treptow-Köpenick and Spandau. Of its ninety-six neighborhoods, twenty-two bear a Slavic-derived name: Altglienicke, Alt-Treptow, Buch, Gatow, Kladow, Köpenick, Lankwitz, Lübars, Marzahn, Prenzlauer Berg, Schmöckwitz, Stadtrandsiedlung Malchow, Steglitz and Zehlendorf; the neighborhood of Moabit bears a French-derived name, Französisch Buchholz is named after the Huguenots. The earliest evidence of settlements in the area of today's Berlin are a wooden beam dated from 1192, remnants of a house foundation dated to 1174, found in excavations in Berlin Mitte; the first written records of towns in the area of present-day Berlin date from the late 12th century.
Spandau is first mentioned in 1197 and Köpenick in 1209, although these areas did not join Berlin until 1920. The central part of Berlin can be traced back to two towns. Cölln on the Fischerinsel is first mentioned in a 1237 document, Berlin, across the Spree in what is now called the Nikolaiviertel, is referenced in a document from 1244. 1237 is considered the founding date of the city. The two towns over time formed close economic and social ties, profited from the staple right on the two important trade routes Via Imperii and from Bruges to Novgorod. In 1307, they formed an alliance with a common external policy, their internal administrations still being separated. In 1415, Frederick I became the elector of the Margraviate of Brandenburg, which he ruled until 1440. During the 15th century, his successors established Berlin-Cölln as capital of the margraviate, subsequent members of the Hohenzol
Eugène Farcot
Henri-Eugène-Adrien Farcot was a French clock-maker, inventor, mechanical-engineer, occasional writer and one of the most celebrated conical pendulum clock makers. In 1853 he established the Manufacture d’horlogerie E. Farcot with headquarters, from 1855, in rue des Trois-Bornes, 39, wherein he worked until his retirement in the late 1880s, same as the successors, his son-in-law the Belgian Henri-Charles Wandenberg, or Vandenberg, until December 1903 and Paul Grenon until 1914. Between October 1855-March 1856 the company's name changed to Farcot et Cie, in 1887 it was renamed Farcot et Wandenberg, although the partnership was constituted in April 1890. Throughout his career path, Eugène Farcot was awarded with one honorable mention and four medals in the following expositions: Besançon 1860, London 1862, Paris, as well as Henri Wandenberg, both with a silver medal in Paris 1889 and a gold medal in Paris 1900. In addition to clock-making, he was a member of the Société aérostatique et météorologique de France and the defunct Chambre syndicale d'horlogerie de Paris.
The Musée Farcot, in Sainville, preserves memories of his life and work. Of the nineteen patents registered to his name between 1855 and 1886, 16 are linked to horology, they are by chronological order (files for each patent containing description and drawings can be consulted in the archives of the Institut national de la propriété industrielle: A class of its own among the conical pendulum clocks are the monumental timepieces commercialized between 1862 and 1878. When this model debuted at the London International Exhibition of 1862, it was presented as the first application of the conical pendulum to statuary. In addition to the British capital, it was displayed in the Paris Exposition des beaux-arts appliqués à l’industrie, as well as in the major world's fairs held in Paris and Philadelphia. In his own words, Eugène Farcot explained the origins of his idea during the 1867 Paris universal exposition: Huygens suspended his conical pendulum from the rod itself, which gave it its rotation.
Some wheels and pinions more than this clock needs have stopped the clock makers of the period when dentures were still made by hand. It was forgotten in our days. Mr. Foucault, by his experiment in the Panthéon, etc. brought it to mind, it is to Mr. Balliman that we owe the first successful application to clocks, he exhibited a type in the show of 1855. Afterwards, Mr. Redier came to the Besançon exposition, in 1860, with a conical pendulum regulator with horizontal motion, he published a memoir on this topic in the same year; these diverse works made me conceive the idea of applying the pendulum in question to decorative clock making, to say, the statues hold in their hand the pendulum whose silent operation and decorative effect should be suitable for bedrooms, etc. There remained its implementation, because it had to be created: caliber, fast-slow control, driving fork, etc. In 1862, I took to London the first specimens of its kind that took place in our industry since I first marketed it commercially.
Each mystery clock of this one-of-a-kind series was individually made and therefore, no two are alike. They are distinguished for their artistic/horological excellence where foremost, award-winning people from various arts and sciences, created a masterpiece of Second Empire decorative arts. Besides a remarkable precision in timekeeping, one of their most distinctive characteristics is the slow continual circular motion at a constant speed of the noiseless pendulum, tracing a conical trajectory in space, hence its name, it is unknown the total number of units crafted, so far 13 have been found. It is unclear if the company used a separate serial number for its large-scale conical pendulum clocks, although no more than twenty were made; those known are: In 1878, the largest conical pendulum clock built was erected in the missing Palais du Champ-de-Mars on the occasion of the Paris Exposition universelle internationale. It was his ultimate contribution to the conical pendulum clock, a type of timepiece not invented by the Frenchman, but that he brought to a new level of sophistication and engineering.
Not to mention that he helped to its popularization offering affordable mantel models, some with a patent of invention. The mechanical marvel was reviewed in several publications, next are included three of them: Review 1: The largest pendulum in the Exhibition is the revolving one above the large clock made by Farcot; the pendulum is suspended from the roof of the building, performs six revolutions in a minute, is made in conformity with Foucault’s method. The large gilt ball which serves for the bob, about 2 feet in diameter, must be subject to considerable disturbance from the wind, for being just opposite the main entrance it is in a draughty position. Review 2: In the middle of the noble space under the entrance tower, stood the Monumental Clock, constructed by M. Eugène Farcot, inmense in size, elaborate in design, equalling as a wonder, though falling far short in elaboration, the celebrated Clock of Strasbourg, it was of
University of São Paulo
The University of São Paulo is a public university in the Brazilian state of São Paulo. It is the largest Brazilian public university and the country's most prestigious educational institution, the best university in Ibero-America, holds a high reputation among world universities, being ranked 100 worldwide in reputation by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings. USP is involved in teaching and university extension in all areas of knowledge, offering a broad range of courses; the university was founded in 1934, regrouping existing schools in the state of São Paulo, such as the Faculdade de Direito do Largo de São Francisco, the Escola Politécnica and the Escola Superior de Agricultura Luiz de Queiroz. The university's foundation is marked by the creation in 1934 of the Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras, has subsequently created new departments, becoming one of the largest institutions of higher education in Latin America, with 90,000 enrolled students, it has eleven campuses, four of them in the city of São Paulo.
The remaining campuses are in the cities of Bauru, Piracicaba, Ribeirão Preto and two in São Carlos. Several students from the University of São Paulo achieved important positions in the Brazilian society, it was the alma mater of twelve Brazilian presidents. USP was ranked 19th worldwide in a rank based on the number of alumni who became CEOs in the world's 500 largest companies, and classed in the top 100 worldwide in the Global Employability University Ranking. In terms of research, USP is Brazil's largest research institution, producing more than 25% of the scientific papers published by Brazilian researchers in high quality conferences and journals. In 2015, out of 36 subjects, the QS World University Rankings ranked USP in the top 50 in eight subjects and in the top 51-100th position in 21 more subjects. Over the years, QS consistently ranked USP among the top 5 universities in the Latin world. After its defeat in the Constitutionalist Revolution, São Paulo needed institutional improvements.
Therefore, in 1933 a group of businessmen founded the Free School of Politics. In 1934, the intervenor of São Paulo, Armando de Sales Oliveira founded the University of São Paulo; that was one of the efforts carried out to provide Brazil with modern administrative and military institutions in a period known as "search for alternatives". One of the main initiatives included that same year, of the University of São Paulo, its nucleus was the School of Philosophy and Languages, with professors coming from France, Spain and other European countries. The ELSP assumed the goal of administrative elites to form a new model in which they noted an increasing role of the state, while USP focused on training teachers for secondary schools, experts in sciences, lawyers and professors. ELSP followed a sociological American model, while USP used the French academic world as its main source of inspiration. Foreign professors such as Claude Lévi-Strauss, Fernand Braudel, Roger Bastide, Robert H. Aubreton, Heinrich Rheinboldt, Paul Arbousse Bastide, Jean Magüé, Martial Gueroult, Emilio Willems, Donald Pierson, Gleb Vassielievich Wataghin, Pierre Monbeig, Giacomo Albanese, Luigi Fantappiè, Vilém Flusser, Giuseppe Ungaretti and Herbert Baldus, broadcast in various institutions new standards for teaching and research, creating new generations of scientists in Brazil.
Since its foundation USP received professors and researchers from all over the world, such as David Bohm, Giuseppe Occhialini, François Châtelet, Anatol Rosenfeld, Helmi Nasr, Gérard Lebrun, Fritz Köberle, Alexander Grothendieck, Heinz Dieter Heidemann. University of São Paulo is the result of a combination of the newly created School of Philosophy and Letters with the existing Polytechnic School of Engineering, the "Luiz de Queiroz" College of Agriculture, the Medical School, the traditional Law School, the old School of Pharmacy and Dentistry, the Institute of Astronomy and Atmospheric Sciences and the School of Veterinary Medicine; the FFCL emerged as the integrating element of the university, bringing together courses in various areas of knowledge. In 1934 the School of Physical Education of the State of São Paulo was created, the first civil school of physical education in Brazil, which would be part of the university. In 1944 the Medical School opened its public hospital. In the same year, the School of Engineering of Sao Carlos emerged.
In subsequent years several other research units were created, such as a second Medical School, located in the city of Ribeirão Preto (
Urania, Vienna
Urania is a public educational institute and observatory in Vienna, Austria. It was built according to the plans of Art Nouveau style architect Max Fabiani at the outlet of the Wien River and was opened in 1910 by Franz Joseph I of Austria as an educational facility with a public observatory, it was named after the Muse Urania. During World War II, the Urania was damaged and the dome with the observatory was destroyed. After its reconstruction, it was reopened in 1957; the observatory itself has been continually improved technically over the years. Presently the Urania has seminar rooms in which wide-ranging classes and lectures are given, a movie theater that screens at the annual Viennale movie festival and a puppet theater created by actor Hans Kraus, it hosts a restaurant. Wiener Urania Urania Observatory The birth of Vienesse modernism
Bucharest
Bucharest is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, at 44°25′57″N 26°06′14″E, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than 60 km north of the Danube River and the Bulgarian border. Bucharest was first mentioned in documents in 1459, it became the capital of Romania in 1862 and is the centre of Romanian media and art. Its architecture is a mix of historical, communist era and modern. In the period between the two World Wars, the city's elegant architecture and the sophistication of its elite earned Bucharest the nickname of "Little Paris". Although buildings and districts in the historic city centre were damaged or destroyed by war and above all Nicolae Ceaușescu's program of systematization, many survived and have been renovated. In recent years, the city has been experiencing an cultural boom. In 2016, the historical city centre was listed as "endangered" by the World Monuments Watch. According to the 2011 census, 1,883,425 inhabitants live within the city limits, a decrease from the 2002 census.
Adding the satellite towns around the urban area, the proposed metropolitan area of Bucharest would have a population of 2.27 million people. According to Eurostat, Bucharest has a functional urban area of 2,412,530 residents. Bucharest is the sixth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits, after London, Madrid and Paris. Economically, Bucharest is the most prosperous city in Romania and is one of the main industrial centres and transportation hubs of Eastern and Central Europe; the city has big convention facilities, educational institutes, cultural venues, traditional "shopping arcades", recreational areas. The city proper is administratively known as the "Municipality of Bucharest", has the same administrative level as that of a national county, being further subdivided into six sectors, each governed by a local mayor; the Romanian name București has an unverified origin. Tradition connects the founding of Bucharest with the name of Bucur, a prince, an outlaw, a fisherman, a shepherd or a hunter, according to different legends.
In Romanian, the word stem bucurie means "joy", it is believed to be of Dacian origin, hence the city Bucharest means "city of joy". Other etymologies are given by early scholars, including the one of an Ottoman traveller, Evliya Çelebi, who said that Bucharest was named after a certain "Abu-Kariș", from the tribe of "Bani-Kureiș". In 1781, Austrian historian Franz Sulzer claimed that it was related to bucurie, bucuros, or a se bucura, while an early 19th-century book published in Vienna assumed its name has been derived from "Bukovie", a beech forest. In English, the city's name was rendered as Bukarest. A native or resident of Bucharest is called a "Bucharester". Bucharest's history alternated periods of development and decline from the early settlements in antiquity until its consolidation as the national capital of Romania late in the 19th century. First mentioned as the "Citadel of București" in 1459, it became the residence of the famous Wallachian prince Vlad III the Impaler; the Ottomans appointed Greek administrators to run the town from the 18th century.
A short-lived revolt initiated by Tudor Vladimirescu in 1821 led to the end of the rule of Constantinople Greeks in Bucharest. The Old Princely Court was erected by Mircea Ciobanul in the mid-16th century. Under subsequent rulers, Bucharest was established as the summer residence of the royal court. During the years to come, it competed with Târgoviște on the status of capital city after an increase in the importance of southern Muntenia brought about by the demands of the suzerain power – the Ottoman Empire. Bucharest became the permanent location of the Wallachian court after 1698. Destroyed by natural disasters and rebuilt several times during the following 200 years, hit by Caragea's plague in 1813–14, the city was wrested from Ottoman control and occupied at several intervals by the Habsburg Monarchy and Imperial Russia, it was placed under Russian administration between 1828 and the Crimean War, with an interlude during the Bucharest-centred 1848 Wallachian revolution. An Austrian garrison took possession after the Russian departure.
On 23 March 1847, a fire consumed about 2,000 buildings. In 1862, after Wallachia and Moldavia were united to form the Principality of Romania, Bucharest became the new nation's capital city. In 1881, it became the political centre of the newly proclaimed Kingdom of Romania under King Carol I. During the second half of the 19th century, the city's population increased and a new period of urban development began. During this period, gas lighting, horse-drawn trams, limited electrification were introduced; the Dâmbovița River was massively channelled in 1883, thus putting a stop to endemic floods like the 1865 flooding of Bucharest. The Fortifications of Bucharest were built; the extravagant architecture and cosmopolitan high culture of this period won Bucharest the nickname of "Little Paris" of the east, with Calea Victoriei as its Champs-Élysées. Between 6 December 1916 and November 1918, the city was occupied by German forces as a result of the Battle of Bucharest, with the official capital temporarily moved to Iași, in
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed. (1870). . Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology.
