Egyptian Navy
The Egyptian Navy known as the Egyptian Naval Force, is the maritime branch of the Egyptian Armed Forces. It is the largest navy in the Middle East and Africa, is the sixth largest in the world measured by the number of vessels; the navy's missions include protection of more than 2,000 kilometers of coastline of the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea, defense of approaches to the Suez Canal, support for army operations. The majority of the Egyptian Navy was created with the help of the Soviet Union in the 1960s; the navy received ships in the 1980s from China and other, sources. In 1989, the Egyptian Navy had 18,000 personnel as well as 2,000 personnel in the Coast Guard. Egypt has had a navy since Ancient Egyptian times; the Ancient Egyptian Navy was a vital part of the military of ancient Egypt, helping to transport troops along the Nile River and fighting many battles such as the Battle of the Delta against the Sea Peoples. The Ancient Egyptian Navy imported many of their ships from countries such as the Kingdom of Cyprus.
Several Ancient Egyptian solar ships are still present today. In the early 1800s, Egypt under Muhammad Ali Pasha developed navy. After intervening in the Greek War of Independence at Ottoman Turkey's request, the Egyptian navy was destroyed in 1827 at the Battle of Navarino by the fleets of Great Britain and Russia. With the Egyptian army in Greece isolated, Muhammad Ali made terms with the British and withdrew a year later. A replacement fleet was built for the First Egyptian-Ottoman War in 1831, landed troops at Jaffa in support of the main Egyptian army marching into Syria. In the Second Egyptian–Ottoman War in 1839, following Egyptian victory in the Battle of Nezib, the Ottoman fleet sailed to Alexandria and defected to the Egyptian side. However, these victories provoked decisive European intervention to support the Turks, while Muhammad Ali's dynasty continued to reign, Egypt ended up a British colony until the 1950s; the Egyptian navy was only peripherally involved in the series of conflicts with Israel.
On 22 October 1948, the Egyptian sloop El Amir Farouq was sunk in the Mediterranean Sea off Gaza by a motor explosive boat of the Israeli Navy during the Israeli naval campaign in Operation Yoav as part of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. During the Suez Crisis, Egypt dispatched the Ibrahim el Awal, an ex-British Hunt class destroyer, to Haifa with the aim of shelling that city's coastal oil installations. On 31 October the Ibrahim el Awal reached Haifa and began bombarding the city but was driven off by a French warship and pursued by the Israeli destroyers INS Eilat and INS Yaffo which, with the help of the Israeli Air Force, captured the ship. Egyptian destroyers and torpedo boats engaged larger British vessels in a move aimed at undermining the amphibious operations of the British and French. On the night of 31 October in the northern Red Sea, the British light cruiser HMS Newfoundland challenged and engaged the Egyptian frigate Domiat, reducing it to a burning hulk in a brief gun battle; the Egyptian warship was sunk by escorting destroyer HMS Diana, with 69 surviving Egyptian sailors rescued.
The Egyptian Navy's blockade of Israeli ships in the Strait of Tiran that were headed toward the Israeli port of Eilat was one of the main causes of the Six-Day War. During the war, the Israeli Navy landed six combat divers from the Shayetet 13 naval commando unit to infiltrate Alexandria harbor; the divers sank an Egyptian minesweeper before being taken prisoner. Both Egyptian and Israeli warships made movements at sea to intimidate the other side throughout the war, but did not engage each other. However, Israeli warships and aircraft did hunt for Egyptian submarines throughout the war. In October 1967, a few months after the cease-fire, the Egyptian Navy was the first navy in history to sink a ship using anti-ship missiles, when an Egyptian Komar-class fast-attack craft sank the Israeli destroyer INS Eilat with two direct hits; this was a milestone of modern naval warfare, for the first time anti-ship missiles showed their potential, sinking the destroyer 17 km off Port Said. On the night of 15–16 November 1969, Egyptian Navy frogmen attacked the port of Eilat and caused severe damages to the armed transport ship Bat Yam.
On 5–6 February 1970, the frogmen attacked the Israeli landing ships at the same port and same piers causing severe damages to the landing ship Bait Shivaa and transport armed ship Hydroma. On 8 March 1970, the frogmen attacked the Israeli oil drill Keting at the port of Abidjan in Ivory Coast believing that Israel had bought this oil drill from the Netherlands for the purposes of oil exploration in the Suez Gulf. In the Yom Kippur War, Egypt blocked commercial traffic to Eilat in the Gulf of Aqaba by laying mines; the navy used the coastal artillery to the east of Port Fouad to support the Egyptian Army in order to prepare for the assault on the Suez Canal. In the Battle of Baltim, three Egyptian Osa-class missile boats were sunk; the Egyptian navy's headquarters and main base is at Alexandria on the Mediterranean Sea with other Mediterranean naval bases at Port Said and Mersa Matruh. Egypt naval bases on the Red Sea are Hurghada, Safaga and Suez; the Egyptian Navy will be restructured into two different fleets, one for the Mediterranean sea and the other for the Red Sea.
This in a context where the safety of shipping in the Red Sea is becoming important. The navy lacked its own air arm and depended on the air force for maritime reconnaissance and protection against submarines; the air force's equipment that supported the navy included twelve Gazelle and five Sea King helicopters mounted with anti
Royal Adelaide Hospital
The Royal Adelaide Hospital is Adelaide's largest hospital. The RAH provides tertiary health care services for South Australia and provides secondary care clinical services to residents of Adelaide's city centre and inner suburbs; the Adelaide Hospital was founded in the Adelaide Park Lands on the north side of North Terrace between Frome Road and the Adelaide Botanic Gardens in 1856, was proclaimed "Royal" on 2 November 1939. It is adjacent to the University of South Australia, its campus is home to the University of Adelaide's Medical School, the Adelaide Dental Hospital, the Hanson Institute and SA Pathology. The facility houses C-Max, The Department of Radiation Oncology contains 5 bunkers containing Varian linear accelerators; the Burns Unit The Royal Adelaide Hospital is the only provider of hyperbaric oxygen therapy in South Australia. Its Hyperbaric Medical Unit has been in operation since 1985 and has been in its current location since 2001; the principal treatment equipment is a pair of multiplace hyperbaric chambers.
One of these chambers was the first rectangular steel chamber in Australia. The HMU co-ordinates the Divers Emergency Service, a telephone-based consultation service for diving-related matters within Australia, the Southern Pacific and Southeast Asia. Completed in 2017, the new Royal Adelaide Hospital is located on a 10 hectares site within the Adelaide Park Lands, on the north side of North Terrace, west of Morphett Street, it cost more than A$2 billion to construct, making it one of the most expensive buildings built. 6,000 staff are expected to work at the hospital, all rooms are single patient suites with private bathroom facilities. There are 40 operating theatres, each measuring 65m2; the nRAH will be Australia's most technologically advanced hospital, with a fleet of automated robotic vehicles to help move supplies and equipment around the hospital, a tailor made patient electronic medical record. The hospital has been designed with a target of 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions compared to equivalent hospitals.
A co-generation system uses waste heat from energy generators for the domestic hot water system. Orientation of the buildings is optimised to minimise solar thermal loads, with extensive daylight penetration to reduce artificial lighting requirements. Rainwater and stormwater harvesting is used to offset potable water requirements, along with extensive use of water sensitive landscaping and a water efficient thermal plant; the new RAH forms an integral part of Adelaide BioMed City. Other completed facilities include the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute, the University of Adelaide Health and Medical Sciences building, the University of South Australia's Health Innovation Building, Flinders University's John Chalmers Centre for Transforming Healthcare, including a Proton Therapy Unit. There are plans for Children's Hospital to be co-located at this site; the new RAH opened on 4 September 2017 and the Emergency Department opened on 5 September. On that date, the former Royal Adelaide Hospital closed.
The Dental Hospital has relocated to the new Hospital. The old RAH is being used by various entities, such as the Australian Defence Force and the Adelaide Fringe. Demolition has begun on some of the non-heritage buildings, such as the Hone Wing, Cobalt Wing, the bigger East Wing. List of hospitals in Australia Royal Adelaide Hospital Homepage
Penang
Penang is a Malaysian state located on the northwest coast of Peninsular Malaysia, by the Malacca Strait. It has two parts: Penang Island, where the capital city, George Town, is located, Seberang Perai on the Malay Peninsula; the second smallest Malaysian state by land mass, Penang is bordered by Kedah to the north and the east, Perak to the south. Penang is home to Southeast Asia's Longest bridge connecting the island to mainland. Penang's population stood at nearly 1.767 million as of 2018, while its population density rose to 1,684/km2. It has among the nation's highest population densities and is one of the country's most urbanised states. George Town, Malaysia's second largest city, is home to a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Penang's modern history began upon the establishment of George Town by Francis Light. Penang formed part of the Straits Settlements in 1826, which became a British crown colony in 1867. Direct British rule was only interrupted during World War II, when Japan occupied Penang.
Penang was merged with the Federation of Malaya, which gained independence from the British in 1957. Following the decline of its entrepôt trade towards the 1970s, Penang's economy was reoriented towards hi-tech manufacturing. Known as the Silicon Valley of the East for its industries, Penang is one of Malaysia's most vital economic powerhouses. Penang has the highest Gross Domestic Product per capita among all Malaysian states and is considered a high-income economy. In addition, Penang recorded the nation's second highest Human Development Index, after Kuala Lumpur. Correspondingly, the state has a well-educated population, with a youth literacy rate of 99.5% as of 2014. Its heterogeneous population is diverse in ethnicity, culture and religion. Aside from the three main races, the Chinese and Indians, Penang is home to significant Eurasian and expatriate communities. A resident of Penang is colloquially known as a Penang Lâng; the name, comes from the modern Malay name Pulau Pinang, which means The Island of the Areca Nut Palm.
The State of Penang is referred to as the Pearl of the Orient and Pulau Pinang Pulau Mutiara. Penang Island was known by native seafarers as Pulau Ka-Satu, meaning The First Island, because it was the largest island encountered on the trading sea-route between Lingga and Kedah; the Siamese the overlord of Kedah, referred to the island as Koh Maak. In the 15th century, Penang Island was referred to as Bīnláng Yù in the navigational drawings used by Admiral Zheng He of Ming China. Emanuel Godinho de Eredia, a 16th-century Portuguese historian referred to the island as Pulo Pinaom in the Description of Malacca. Human remains, dating back to about 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, have been uncovered in Seberang Perai, along with seashells and hunting tools; these artifacts indicate that the earliest inhabitants of Penang were nomadic Melanesians during the Neolithic era. The Cherok Tok Kun megalith in Bukit Mertajam, uncovered in 1845, contains Pali inscriptions, indicating that the Hindu-Buddhist Bujang Valley civilisation based in what is now Kedah had established control over parts of Seberang Perai by the 6th century.
The entirety of what is now Penang would become part of the Sultanate of Kedah up to the late 18th century. However, the modern history of Penang only began in the late 18th century. In the 1770s, Francis Light was instructed by the British East India Company to form trade relations in the Malay Peninsula. Light subsequently landed in Kedah, by a Siamese vassal state. Aware that the Sultanate was under external and internal threats, he promised British military protection to the Sultan of Kedah, Sultan Muhammad Jiwa Zainal Adilin II, it was only in 1786 when the British East India Company ordered Light to obtain the island from Kedah. Light negotiated with the new Sultan of Kedah, Sultan Abdullah Mukarram Shah, regarding the cession of the island to the British East India Company in exchange for British military aid. After an agreement between Light and the Sultan was ratified and his entourage sailed on to Penang Island, where they arrived on 17 July 1786. Light took formal possession of the island on 11 August "in the name of His Britannic Majesty, King George III and the Honourable East India Company".
Penang Island was renamed the Prince of Wales Island after the heir to the British throne, while the new settlement of George Town was established in honour of King George III. Unbeknownst to Sultan Abdullah, Light had been acting without the authority or the consent of his superiors in India; when Light reneged on his promise of military protection, the Kedah Sultan launched an attempt to recapture the Prince of Wales Island in 1791. In 1800, Lieutenant-Governor Sir George Leith secured a strip of hinterland across the Penang Strait and named it Province Wellesley. Province Wellesley was gradually expanded up to its present-day boundaries in 1874. In exchange for the acquisition, the annual payment to the Sultan of Kedah was increased to 10,000 Spanish dollars per annum. To this day, the Malaysian federal government still pays Kedah, on behalf of Penang, RM 10,000 annually as a symbolic gesture. Light founded George Town as a free port to entice traders away from nearby Dutch trading posts. Spices were harvested on the island, turning it into a regional centre fo
Glenelg, South Australia
Glenelg is a beach-side suburb of the South Australian capital of Adelaide. Located on the shore of Holdfast Bay in Gulf St Vincent, it has become a tourist destination due to its beach and many attractions, home to several hotels and dozens of restaurants. Glenelg became infamous for being the site of the Beaumont children disappearance in 1966. Established in 1836, it is the oldest European settlement on mainland South Australia, it was named after Lord Glenelg, a member of British Cabinet and Secretary of State for War and the Colonies. Through Lord Glenelg the name derives from Glenelg, Scotland. In Scottish Gaelic the name is Gleann Eilg; the name Glenelg is noteworthy for being a palindrome. Prior to the 1836 European settlement of South Australia and the rest of the Adelaide Plains was home to the Kaurna group of Indigenous Australians, they knew the area as "Pattawilya" and the local river as "Pattawilyangga", now named the Patawalonga River. Evidence has shown that at least two smallpox epidemics had killed the majority of the Kaurna population prior to 1836.
The disease appeared to have come down the River Murray from New South Wales. The first British settlers set sail for South Australia in 1836. Several locations for the settlement were considered, including Kangaroo Island, Port Lincoln and Encounter Bay; the Adelaide plains were chosen by Colonel William Light, Governor John Hindmarsh proclaimed the province of South Australia at the site of The Old Gum Tree in Glenelg North on 28 December 1836. The first post office in Glenelg opened on 5 December 1849. A telegraph office was opened in September 1859 and the two offices amalgamated in 1868; the present post office building on Moseley Square was built in 1912. The sale of the surveyed lots that constitute the Town of Glenelg was remarkable: the right to purchase, at ₤1 per "town acre", was allocated by means of a ballot held in February 1839; the "winner" was a syndicate of six led by William Finke, with Osmond Gilles, his nephew John Jackson Oakden and H. R. Wigley notable members. Among the town's earliest public buildings were the Independent church, opened 7 March 1848, St Peter's church, opened 28 March 1852 and the Pier Hotel, opened Christmas Day 1856, all the work of Henry J. Moseley, for whom Moseley Street and Moseley Square were named.
No trace of the original structures remains. The Corporate Town of Glenelg was proclaimed in 1855, separating local governance of the township of Glenelg from that of the West Torrens and Brighton district councils. Construction of the Glenelg Institute, now the Glenelg Town Hall, started in 1875; the institute opened with lecture rooms, a concert hall and a library. The classical structure was designed by Edmund Wright, whose works include the Adelaide Town Hall and Adelaide General Post Office on King William Street; the hall sits on Moseley Square, just off the beach. The Holdfast Bay city council acquired the hall in 1887. Today it houses tourist information centre and restaurants. In August 1857, construction of Glenelg's first jetty commenced. Costing over £31,000 to build, the structure was 381 metres long; the jetty was used not only by fishermen but to accept cargo from ships, including a mail service operated by P&O, until Port Adelaide replaced it as Adelaide's main port. Passengers were able travel from the Glenelg jetty to Kangaroo Island by steamer.
Several additions to the jetty were made. A lighthouse was built in 1872 at the jetty's end, but a year it caught fire and was cast into the sea to save the rest of the structure. A replacement lighthouse was built in 1874, was 12.1 metres tall. Other additions included public baths, an aquarium, a police shed and a three-story kiosk with tea rooms; the kiosk structure housed a family. The kiosk was wrecked in a storm in 1943, the jetty was damaged by a freak cyclone in 1948. Most of the structure washed away and the remaining structure was deemed unsafe. Just two weeks the local council began drafting plans for a new jetty and construction was completed in 1969; the new structure was just 215 metres long, less than two-thirds of the length of the original jetty. The second jetty continues to stand today, at the end of Jetty Road. On 1 January 2016, two boys were drowned after falling into the water from rocks to north of the Glenelg jetty. Glenelg has been a popular spot for leisure for much of its history.
Following the success of Luna Park, Melbourne, a similar amusement park was constructed on Glenelg's foreshore in 1930. Luna Park Glenelg was placed in voluntary liquidation in 1934, all the rides were disassembled, purchased by the directors, transported to Sydney, where they were used to create Luna Park Milsons Point; the park's managers claimed that the reasons for the closure were the inability to make money from the park as it was, opposition to changes from Council and residents, who were afraid that "undesirables" would be attracted to the area. Built near the former Luna Park site was Magic Mountain, which first opened in 1982, it featured water slides, mini-golf, bumper boats, dodgem cars and many other amusements and was popular with many Adelaide residents. It was extensively criticised, called an eyesore and likened to a "giant dog dropping" in the media; as part of the Holdfast Shores development, Magic Mountain was demolished in 2004 and replaced with The Beachouse, a 5-storey modern centre with a more conservative design which still incorporates the historic car
Napoleon
Napoléon Bonaparte was a French statesman and military leader who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led several successful campaigns during the French Revolutionary Wars. He was Emperor of the French as Napoleon I from 1804 until 1814 and again in 1815 during the Hundred Days. Napoleon dominated European and global affairs for more than a decade while leading France against a series of coalitions in the Napoleonic Wars, he won most of these wars and the vast majority of his battles, building a large empire that ruled over much of continental Europe before its final collapse in 1815. He is considered one of the greatest commanders in history, his wars and campaigns are studied at military schools worldwide. Napoleon's political and cultural legacy has endured as one of the most celebrated and controversial leaders in human history, he was born in Corsica to a modest family of Italian origin from minor nobility. He was serving as an artillery officer in the French army when the French Revolution erupted in 1789.
He rose through the ranks of the military, seizing the new opportunities presented by the Revolution and becoming a general at age 24. The French Directory gave him command of the Army of Italy after he suppressed a revolt against the government from royalist insurgents. At age 26, he began his first military campaign against the Austrians and the Italian monarchs aligned with the Habsburgs—winning every battle, conquering the Italian Peninsula in a year while establishing "sister republics" with local support, becoming a war hero in France. In 1798, he led a military expedition to Egypt, he became First Consul of the Republic. Napoleon's ambition and public approval inspired him to go further, he became the first Emperor of the French in 1804. Intractable differences with the British meant that the French were facing a Third Coalition by 1805. Napoleon shattered this coalition with decisive victories in the Ulm Campaign and a historic triumph over the Russian Empire and Austrian Empire at the Battle of Austerlitz which led to the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1806, the Fourth Coalition took up arms against him because Prussia became worried about growing French influence on the continent. Napoleon defeated Prussia at the battles of Jena and Auerstedt marched his Grande Armée deep into Eastern Europe and annihilated the Russians in June 1807 at the Battle of Friedland. France forced the defeated nations of the Fourth Coalition to sign the Treaties of Tilsit in July 1807, bringing an uneasy peace to the continent. Tilsit signified the high-water mark of the French Empire. In 1809, the Austrians and the British challenged the French again during the War of the Fifth Coalition, but Napoleon solidified his grip over Europe after triumphing at the Battle of Wagram in July. Napoleon invaded the Iberian Peninsula, hoping to extend the Continental System and choke off British trade with the European mainland, declared his brother Joseph Bonaparte the King of Spain in 1808; the Spanish and the Portuguese revolted with British support. The Peninsular War lasted six years, featured extensive guerrilla warfare, ended in victory for the Allies against Napoleon.
The Continental System caused recurring diplomatic conflicts between France and its client states Russia. The Russians were unwilling to bear the economic consequences of reduced trade and violated the Continental System, enticing Napoleon into another war; the French launched a major invasion of Russia in the summer of 1812. The campaign did not yield the decisive victory Napoleon wanted, it resulted in the collapse of the Grande Armée and inspired a renewed push against Napoleon by his enemies. In 1813, Prussia and Austria joined Russian forces in the War of the Sixth Coalition against France. A lengthy military campaign culminated in a large Allied army defeating Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813, but his tactical victory at the minor Battle of Hanau allowed retreat onto French soil; the Allies invaded France and captured Paris in the spring of 1814, forcing Napoleon to abdicate in April. He was exiled to the island of Elba off the coast of Tuscany, the Bourbon dynasty was restored to power.
Napoleon took control of France once again. The Allies responded by forming a Seventh Coalition which defeated him at the Battle of Waterloo in June; the British exiled him to the remote island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic, where he died six years at the age of 51. Napoleon's influence on the modern world brought liberal reforms to the numerous territories that he conquered and controlled, such as the Low Countries and large parts of modern Italy and Germany, he implemented fundamental liberal policies throughout Western Europe. His Napoleonic Code has influenced the legal systems of more than 70 nations around the world. British historian Andrew Roberts states: "The ideas that underpin our modern world—meritocracy, equality before the law, property rights, religious toleration, modern secular education, sound finances, so on—were championed, consolidated and geographically extended by Napoleon. To them he added a rational and efficient local administration, an end to rural banditry, the encouragement of science and the arts, the abolition of feudalism and the greatest codification of laws since the fall of the Roman Empire".
The ancestors of Napoleon descended from minor Italian nobility of Tuscan origin who had come to Corsica fr
Kedah
Kedah known by its honorific Darul Aman or "Abode of Peace", is a state of Malaysia, located in the northwestern part of Peninsular Malaysia. The state covers a total area of over 9,000 km², it consists of the mainland and the Langkawi islands; the mainland has a flat terrain, used to grow rice, while Langkawi is an archipelago, most of which are uninhabited islands. Kedah was known as Kadaram by the ancient and medieval Tamil people, Kataha or Kalahbar by the Arabs, Syburi by the Siamese when it was under their influence. To the north, Kedah borders the state of Perlis and shares an international boundary with the Songkhla and Yala provinces of Thailand, it borders the states of Perak to Penang to the southwest. The state's capital is the royal seat is in Anak Bukit. Other major towns include Sungai Petani, Kulim on the mainland, Kuah on Langkawi. Archaeological evidence found in Bujang Valley reveals that a Hindu–Buddhist kingdom ruled ancient Kedah as early as 110 A. D; the discovery of temples, jetty remains, iron smelting sites, clay brick monuments dating back to 110 A.
D shows that a maritime trading route with south Indian Tamil kingdoms was established since that time. The discoveries in Bujang Valley made the ancient Kedah as the oldest civilisation of Southeast Asia. Reference to ancient Kedah was first mentioned in a Tamil poem Paṭṭiṉappālai written at the end of the 2nd century A. D, it described. Other than Kadaram, Kedah was known with different names at varying times in Indian literature. In the middle eastern literature, ancient Kedah was referred as Qilah by Ibn Khordadbeh in Kitāb al Masālik w'al Mamālik, Kalah-Bar by Soleiman Siraf & Abu Zaid al Hassan in Silsilat-al-Tawarikh, Kalah by Abu-Dulaf Misa'r Ibn Muhalhil in Al-Risalah al-thaniyah; the famous Tang dynasty Buddhist monk, Yi Jing who visited Malay archipelago between 688–695 mentioned about a kingdom known as Ka-Cha in the northern part of Malay peninsular, which according to him was 30 days sail from Bogha, the capital of Sribogha. In the 7th and 8th centuries, Kedah was under the loose control of Srivijaya.
Indian and Arab sources consider Kedah to be one of the two important sites during the Srivijaya period calling the king of the straits "the ruler of Srivijaya and Kataha". In 1025, Rajendra Chola, the Chola king from Coromandel in South India, captured Kedah in his invasion of Srivijaya and occupied it for some time. A second invasion was led by Virarajendra Chola of the Chola dynasty who conquered Kedah in the late 11th century. During the reign of Kulothunga Chola I Chola overlordship was established over the Sri Vijaya province Kedah in the late 11th century. According to Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa or the Kedah Annals, Kedah was founded by a Hindu king named Merong Mahawangsa. According to the text further, the Sultanate of Kedah started in year 1136 when King Phra Ong Mahawangsa converted to Islam and adopted the name Sultan Mudzafar Shah. However, an Acehnese account gave a date of 1474 for the year of conversion to Islam by the ruler of Kedah; this date accords with an account in the Malay Annals where a raja of Kedah visited Malacca during the reign of its last sultan seeking the honour of the royal band that marks the sovereignty of a Muslim ruler.
It was under Siam, until it was conquered by the Malay sultanate of Malacca in the 15th century. In the 17th century, Kedah was attacked by the Portuguese after their conquest of Malacca, by Aceh. In the hope that Great Britain would protect what remained of Kedah from Siam, the sultan handed over Penang and Province Wellesley to the British at the end of the 18th century; the Siamese invaded Kedah in 1821, it remained under Siamese control under the name of Syburi. In 1896, Kedah along with Perlis and Setul was combined into the Siamese province of Monthon Syburi which lasted until transferred to the British by the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909. In World War II, Kedah was the first part of Malaya to be invaded by Japan; the Japanese returned Kedah to their Thai allies who had it renamed Syburi, but it returned to British rule after the end of the war. Kedah was a reluctant addition to the Federation of Malaya in 1948. Since 1958, the hereditary Sultan of Kedah has been Tuanku Abdul Halim Mu'adzam Shah.
The Kedah Sultanate began when the 9th Kedah Maharaja Derbar Raja or Phra Ong Mahawangsa, converted to Islam and changed his name to Sultan Mudzafar Shah I. Since there have been 27 Sultans who ruled Kedah. Kedah is the 8th largest state by land area and 8th most populated state in Malaysia, with a total land area of 9,500 km2, a population of 1,890,098; the Pedu Lake is the largest man-made lake in the state. Kedah has a heterogeneous populace constituted by three major ethnic groups. Prior to the formation of the Federation of Malaya, there was an ethnic group known as the Sam Sam people, they speak Siamese language. Most of these communities are extinct due to assimilation with the Malays. In some places in Kedah, the Sam Sam people still retain their Siamese language as their mother tongue; these communities can be found in Pendang District, Kuala Nera
