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A pintura "Máscaras" apresenta três figuras femininas inseridas num ambiente arquitetónico abstrato, composto por arcos, colunas e formas geométricas.
As personagens exibem rostos fragmentados e coloridos, remetendo à ideia de disfarces ou identidades múltiplas.
Cada uma possui uma expressão e postura distintas, sugerindo uma narrativa implícita sobre identidade e representação.
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A figura da esquerda usa uma boina e tem parte do rosto decorado com um padrão de losangos em preto e branco, evocando um ar de teatralidade.
A mulher ao centro, de perfil e vestindo um traje vermelho, tem traços marcantes e angulosos, enquanto a terceira personagem, à direita, exibe um rosto dividido em luz e sombra, reforçando a ideia de dualidade.
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O fundo é composto por formas arquitetónicas abstratas em tons suaves de azul, lilás e amarelo, criando uma atmosfera etérea e quase onírica.
O uso da cor e da luz na obra contribui para a sensação de mistério e introspeção.
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A obra "Máscaras" sugere um diálogo com o cubismo e o simbolismo, utilizando a fragmentação da forma para explorar temas como identidade, aparência e encenação social.
A ideia de máscaras remete à teatralidade da vida e à maneira como as pessoas se apresentam ao mundo, ocultando ou revelando diferentes aspetos de si mesmas.
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O uso da geometrização nos rostos e vestimentas das figuras sugere a influência cubista, enquanto a paleta de cores suaves e a ambientação abstrata conferem um tom de mistério e introspeção.
A presença de diferentes padrões e cores nos rostos das mulheres pode simbolizar as múltiplas facetas da personalidade humana ou os papéis que cada indivíduo assume em diferentes contextos.
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Além disso, a disposição das personagens cria uma sensação de dinamismo e tensão, como se houvesse um jogo de olhares e interações implícitas entre elas.
A mulher ao centro, em vermelho, parece estar em movimento, contrastando com as outras duas, que mantêm posturas mais estáticas.
Esse contraste reforça a ideia de transformação e questionamento da identidade.
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A arquitetura abstrata ao fundo não serve apenas como cenário, mas também amplia o sentido simbólico da obra, sugerindo um espaço mental ou emocional onde essas identidades coexistem e se confrontam.
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Em conclusão, "Máscaras" é uma obra que transcende a mera representação visual, abordando conceitos profundos sobre identidade, teatralidade e a dualidade da existência humana.
Carneiro Rodrigues utiliza a fragmentação da forma e a sobreposição de cores para criar uma atmosfera intrigante, onde as personagens parecem flutuar entre o real e o simbólico.
A pintura convida o observador a refletir sobre as múltiplas faces da identidade e o papel das máscaras que todos usamos na vida quotidiana.
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Texto: ©MárioSilva
Pintura: Carneiro Rodrigues
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I have been to Throwley on at least three previous occasions, the fourth was going to be during Ride and Stride in September, but another crawler told me it had failed to open as per the list.
St Michael and All Angles is a large and from the outside and interesting looking church, looked like it had a story to tell. So, last week, I contacted the wardens through the CofE A church Near You website, I got a reply and a date and time agreed for Saturday morning.
We arrived 15 minutes early, and it was as locked as ever, but on a fine if frosty morning took the time to study the church ad churchyard, and saw yet more fine details we had missed previously.
Dead on time the warden arrived, and was very welcoming indeed. They loved to have visitors she said. Now I know how to contact them, I can see that.
She was clearly proud of the church, and rightly so, most impressive was the south chapel with a pair of kneeling couples on top of chest tombs, staring at each other for all eternity.
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St Michael & All Angels is the parish church of Throwley. The first church on the site was probably built between 800 and 825. This would have been a small wooden structure, barely distinguishable from a farm building.
After the Norman Conquest in 1066 this was replaced by a Romanesque stone structure.
This was still small, but as the population of the parish increased the church was enlarged, until in about 1510 it reached its present size. Since then its appearance has changed little, although an extra storey was added to the tower - now far seen - in the 1860s.
The church has an elaborate Romanesque west entrance; its east window in the chancel, by Curtis, Ward & Hughes of Soho, London, is a memorial to Throwley men who gave their lives in the First World War.
In the Harris chapel is the church's newest stained-glass window, commemorating Dorothy Lady Harris who died in 1981. It was designed and executed in the Canterbury Cathedral Workshops by Frederick Cole (see pictures on left).
The church has more than its fair share of fine 16th to 19th century monuments, mainly to members of the local Sondes and Harris families, and these are all described.
www.faversham.org/community/churches/throwley.aspx
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TQ 95 NE THROWLEY THROWLEY
ROAD
(west side)
4/181
Church of
St. Michael
and All
24.1.67 Angels
GV I
Parish Church. C12, C13 north chapel, C14 south chapel, C15
nave arcades, restored 1866 and tower heightened. Flint and
plain tiled roofs. Chancel, north and south chapels, nave and
aisles, south tower and south porch. West doorway, C12, with
attached shafts and 3 orders, the outer panelled with X's on
circles, the centre roll moulded with the blocks offset and
alternately projecting, the inner with more X's on circles,
with 2 offset buttresses either side of doorway. South aisle
with plinth, string course and parapet, 3 offset buttresses and
C15 Perpendicular windows. South tower of 2 stages with square
south-eastern stair turret and C16 moulded brick surround
sundial. Water spouts on each corner in the 4 Evangelical
symbols. Half-timbered C19 south porch, south doorway with
rolled and double hollow chamfered surround, and outer surround
with label and quatrefoil spandrels. North aisle under 1 roof
with nave, with C15 fenestration, and C19 chimney to north west.
North and south chapels with C14 cusped 'Y' tracery fenestration,
with hollow chamfered and ogee drip moulds. Chancel east
window C19 curvilinear style. Interior: 2 bay nave arcades,
double hollow chamfered arches on octagonal piers. C12 single
arches to north and south eastern bay, that to south recessed
and double chamfered through tower wall. Barrel roof.
Chamfered arch on corbels from south aisle to tower, itself
with corbel table on south wall, and triple arch through to south
chapel C19 chancel arch. Chancel with 2 bay double chamfered
arcade to north chapel with octagonal capitals on round piers, and
single double chamfered arch on round responds to south chapel.
Fittings: hollow chamfered piscina and sedile in window reveal in
chancel and cusped recess in north wall. C19 reredos and altar
rail. Cusped piscina and four centred arched wall recess in
south chapel. Choir stalls, some C19, the four on the south C15
with carved misericords. Monuments: south chapel C16 chest tomb,
with shields in panelled sides, moulded plinth, lozenge-shaped
flowers, fluting and frieze. Chest tomb, Sir George Sondes,
Earl of Faversham, d.1677. Black marble with blank panelled sides.
Inscription on the top panel (made 1728). Standing monument,
Sir Thomas Sondes, died 1592. Marble tomb chest, gadrooned with
achievements on side panels. Kneeling alabaster figures of
knight and his Lady on opposite sides of central prayer desk,
carrying inscription. Mary Sondes, died 1603. Smaller and
identical to Sir Thomas Sonde's monument, with 2 adults and 2
infant sons and daughters on either side of sarcophagus. Misplaced
scrolled and enriched carved achievement on floor to east of
those monuments. Wall plaque, Captain Thomas Sondes, died 1668.
Black and white marble, with draped apron, swagged and draped
sides with military trophies. Broken segmental pediment with male
bust. Signed W.S. (B.0.E. Kent II, p.477 suggests William Stanton).
North chapel C16 chest tomb, moulded plinth, panelled sides with
shields (1 panel reset in south chapel south wall). Early C16
tomb recess with moulded jambs, with rope work, crenellated,
with late Perpendicular motifs in spandrels, and tomb with 3
panelled recesses with 2 shields on each panel. Wall plaque,
Charles Harris, d.1814, by Flaxman. White plaque on white
background; dead soldier lifted from the grave by Victory, with
palms and cannon in background. Statue, to George, first Lord
Harris, life size soldier with sword and plans, on four foot
plinth. By George Rennie, 1835. Nave, wall plaque, Stephen
Bunce, d.1634. Black plaque on coved base and apron. Foliated
sides. Scrolled nowy cornice and pediment with achievement.
(See B.O.E. Kent II, 1983, 476-7.)
Listing NGR: TQ9883454254
www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-176587-church-of-st-m...
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LIES the next parish north-eastward from Stalisfield. It is called in the record of Domesday, Trevelei, in later records Truley and Thruley, in Latin ones Trulega and Truilla; it is now written both Throwley and Throwleigh.
THROWLEY is mostly situated on high ground, it is a more pleasant and open country than that last described, for though wild and romantic among the hills and woods, it is not so dreary and forlorn, nor the soil so uncomfortable, being much drier. Besides it has a more chearful and brighter aspect from the width of the principal valley which leads through it, from north to south, whence the hills rise on each side, with smaller delves interspersed among them. There is a good deal of wood-ground, mostly of beech, interspersed at places with oak and hazel, with some good timber trees of oak among them, especially in the northern and southern parts; much of the former belongs to the dean and chapter of Canterbury. The soil is mostly chalk, the rest a heavy tillage land of red cludy earth, the whole mixed with quantities of flint stones. There are some level lands, especially in the disparked grounds of Throwley park, which are tolerably good, much more so than those in the other parts of the parish; on the east side of the park are the foundations of the antient seat of the Sondes's, with the church close to them, the whole lying on high ground, with a good prospect of the surrounding country; not far from it is Town place, now only a farm-house. There is no village, excepting the few houses in Abraham-street may be so called, the rest of the houses, which are mostly cottages, standing dispersed throughout it, either single, or built round the little greens or softalls, of which there are several in different parts of the parish. On a larger one of these called Wilgate-green, there is a house belonging to the estate of Mr. Philerenis Willis's heirs, and another larger antient one, which with the estate belonging to it, was formerly the property of the Chapmans, and sold by them to Christopher Vane, lord Barnard, in 1789, gave it, with his other estates in this county, to David Papillon, esq. of Acrise, the present owner of it. (fn. 1)
There was a family named Wolgate, from whose residence here this green seems to have taken its name of Wolgate, or Wilgate-green. After they had remained here for some generations they ended in a daughter, for Mr. Ralph Wolgate dying in 1642, his daughter Anne married Mr. William Genery, and entitled him to her father's possessions here, at Posiers, in Borden, and other parts of this county. The Woodwards seem afterwards to have possessed their estate here, several of whom lie buried under a tomb in Throwley church-yard.
About half a mile distant south-westward from Wilgate-green, in Abraham-street, there is a seat, called, from its high situation and expensive prospect, BELMONT; it was built in the year 1769, by Edward Wilks, esq. storekeeper of the royal powdermills at Faversham, who inclosed a paddock or shrubbery round it, and occasionally resided here, till he alienated it in 1779 to John Montresor, esq. the present proprietor, who resides in it.
THE BEECH TREE flourishes in the greatest plenty, as well single to a large size, as in stubs in the coppice woods, which consist mostly of them, as well in these parts as they do in general on the range of chalk hills throughout this county, in some places extending two or three miles in width, and in others much more. The large tracts of ground in this and other counties, overspread with the beech-tree, the random situation of their stubs, and other circumstances which occur in viewing them, are strong proofs of their being the indigenous growth of this island, notwithstanding Cæfar's premptory assertion, in his Commentaries, of there being none here in this time. The Britons, he says, had every material for use and building, the same as the Gauls, excepting the fir and the beech. The former there is positive proof of his being grossly mistaken in, which will in some measure destroy that implicit credit we might otherwise give to his authority, as to the latter; indeed, the continued opposition he met with from the Britons, during his short stay here, assorded him hardly a possibility of seeing any other parts of this country than those near which he landed, and in the direct track through which he marched to wards Coway-stakes; too small a space for him to form any assertion of the general products of a whole country, or even of the neighbouring parts to him. Of those he passed through, the soil was not adapted to the growth of the beech tree; from which we may with great probability suppose, there were none growing on them, nor are there any throughout them, even at this time, a circumstance which most likely induced him to suppose, and afterwards to make the assertion beforementioned.
The slints, with which the cold unfertile lands in these parts, as well as some others in this county, are covered, have been found to be of great use in the bringing forward the crops on them, either by their warmth, or somewhat equivalent to it. Heretofore the occupiers of these lands were anxious to have them picked up and carried off from their grounds, but experiencing the disadvantage of it in the failure of their crops, they, never practice it themselves, and submit to the surveyors of the highways taking them off with great reluctance.
In the parish there are quantities of the great whitish ash coloured shell snail, which are of an unusual large size; they are found likewise near Darking, in Surry, and between Puckeridge and Ware, in Hertsordshire. They are not originally of this island, but have been brought from abroad, many of them are at this time observed in different parts of Italy.
MR. JACOB, in this Plantœ Favershamienses, has enumerated several scare plants observed by him in this parish, besides which, that scarce one, the Orchis myodes, or fly satrition, has been found here, growing on the side of the path, in a small wood, midway between the church and Wilgate green.
THIS PLACE, at the taking of the general survey of Domesday, about the 15th years of the Conqueror's reign, was part of the possessions of Odo, bishop of Baieux, and earl of Kent, the king's half brother, under the general title of whose lands it is thus described in it:
Hersrid holds Trevelai. It was taxed at three sulings. The arable land is eight carucates. In demesne there is one, and twenty-four villeins, with five borderers having six carucates and an half. There is a church, and five servants. Wood for the pannage of twenty bogs, and in the city three houses of thirty-two pence. In the time of king Edward the Conssessor it was worth seven pounds, and afterwards six pounds. Ulnod held it of king Edward.
On the bishop of Baieux's disgrace, about four years afterwards, this among his other estates, became consiscated to the crown.
After which it was held of the king in capite, by barony, by Jeffry de Peverel, and together with other lands made up the barony of Peverel, as it was called, being assigned to him for the defence of Dover-castle, for which purpose he was bound to maintain a certain number of soldiers from time to time for the desence of it, and to repair and defend at this own charge a particular tower or turret there, called afterwards Turris Gattoniana, or Gatton's tower.
In the reign of king Henry III. Robert de Gatton, who took his name from the lordship of Gatton, in Surry, of which his ancestors had been some time owners, was in possession of the manor Thrule, and died in the 38th year of that reign, holding it by knight's service of the king, of the honor of Peverel, by reason of the escheat of that honor, &c. (fn. 2) He was succeded in it by this eldest son Hamo de Gatton, who resided here, and served the office of sheriff in the 14th year of Edward I. His eldest son of the same name left one son Edmund, then an instant, who afterwards dying under age, his two sisters became his coheirs, and divided his inheritance, of which Elizabeth entitled her husband William de Dene to this manor, and all the rest of the estates in Kent; and Margery entitled her husband Simon de Norwood to Gatton, and all the other estates in Surry.
William de Dene had a charter of free warren for his lands in Thurley, in the 10th year of Edward II. He died anno 15 Edward III. then holding this manor by the law of England, as of the inheritance of Elizabeth his late wife deceased, of the king in capite, as of the castle of Dover, by knight's service, and paying to the ward of that castle. His son Thomas de Dene died possessed of it in the 23d year of that reign, leaving four daughters his coheirs, of whom Benedicta, the eldest, married John de Shelving, and entitled him to this manor, on whose death likewise without male issue, his two daughters became his coheirs, of whom, Joane married John Brampton, alias Detling, of Detlingcourt, and Ellen married John de Bourne, the former of whom, in his wife's right, became possessed of this manor. He lest only one daughter Benedicta his heir, who carried it in marriage to Thomas at Town, who was possessed of much land about Charing, and bore for his arms, Argent, on a chevron, sable, three crosscrostess, ermine, which coat is in the windows of Kennington church, impaled with Ellis, of that place. He removed hither in the reign of Henry VI. and built a feat for his residence in this parish, about a quarter of a mile from the church, which he named, from himself, Town-place, soon after which he died, leaving his possessions to his three daughters and coheirs, of whom Eleanor was married to Richard Lewknor, of Challock; Bennet to William Watton, of Addington, and Elizabeth to William Sondes, of this parish and of Lingfield, in Surry, in which county his ancestors had been seated as early as the reign of Henry III. at Darking, where their seat was named, from them, Sondes-place. (fn. 3) Upon the division of their inheritance, the manor of Throwley was allotted to William Sondes, and Town-place, with the lands belonging to it in Throwley, to Richard Lewknor, who sold it to Edward Evering, the eldest son of Nicholas, third son of John Evering, of Evering, in Alkham, and his daughter and heir Mary marrying in 1565, with John Upton, of Faversham, entitled him to this estate, which he very soon afterwards alienated to Shilling, from whom it as quickly afterwards passed by sale to Anthony Sondes, esq. of this parish, whose ancestor William Sondes, on the division of the inheritance of the daughters and coheirs of Thomas at Town as before mentioned, had become possessed of the manor of Throwley, and the antient mansion of it, in which he afterwards resided, and dying in 1474, anno 15 Edward IV. was buried in the north chapel of this church, though he ordered by his will a memorial for himself to be put up in the church of Lingfield. The family of Sondes bore for their arms, Argent, three blackmores heads, couped, between two chevronels, sable, which, with the several quarterings borne by them, are painted on their monuments in this church.
His descendant, Anthony Sondes, esq. of Throwley, in the 31st year of Henry VIII. procured his lands in this county to be disgavelled, by the act then passed, and died in 1575, having married Joane, daughter of Sir John Fineux, chief justice of the king's bench, by whom he had two sons, Thomas and Michael, and two daughters.
He was succeeded by his eldest son Sir Thomas Sondes, sheriff anno 22 Elizabeth, who founded the school in this parish. He died in 1592, leaving issue only by his second wife, one daughter Frances, married to Sir John Leveson, so that on his death without male issue, his only brother Sir Michael Sondes, of Eastry, succeeded to this manor and seat of his ancestors, in which he afterwards resided. He was sheriff in the 26th year of queen Elizabeth's reign, and died in the 16th year of king James I. having had by his first wife Mary, only daughter and heir of George Fynch, esq. of Norton, six sons and six daughters.
Sir Richard Sondes, the eldest son, resided at Throwley, where he died in the 8th year of Charles I. having had by his two wives a numerous issue, of both sons and daughters. He was succeeded in this manor and seat, with the rest of his estates, by his eldest son Sir George Sondes, who was made a knight of the Bath at the coronation of king Charles I. soon after which he began to rebuild his seat of Lees-court, in Sheldwich, and fixed his residence there, under the description of which a more particular account of him and his descendants may be seen. Not long after which this seat was entirely pulled down, and the park adjoining to it disparked. The foundations of the former still remain, and the disparked lands still retain the name of Throwley park.
Sir George Sondes was afterwards created Earl of Faversham, Viscount Sondes, of Lees court, and Baron of Throwley, whose two daughters became his coheirs; Mary was married to Lewis, lord Duras, marquis of Blanquefort, and afterwards earl of Faversham, and Katherine to Lewis Watson, esq. afterwards earl of Rockingham, who each successively, in right of their respective wives, inherited this manor and estate, which has since descended in like manner as Lees-court, in Sheldwich, to the right hon. Lewis-Thomas, lord Sondes, and he is the present possessor of this manor, with Town-place and the estate belonging to it. Acourt baron is held for this manor.
The denne of Toppenden, alias Tappenden, in Smarden, in the Weald, is an appendage to the manor of Throwley, and is held of it.
WILDERTON, alias Wolderton, called also in antient deeds Wilrinton, is a manor in this parish, which was once part of the possessions of the eminent family of Badlesmere, of which Bartholomew de Badlesmere was possessed of it in the reign of Edward II. of whom, for his services in the Scottish wars, he obtained in the 9th year of it many liberties and franchises for his different manors and estates, among which was that of free-warren in the demesne lands of this manor of Wolrington. (fn. 4) Having afterwards associated himself with the discontented barons, he was taken prisoner, and executed in the 16th year of that reign. By the inquisition taken after his death, which was not till anno 2 Edward III. at which time both the process and judgement against him was reversed, it was found that he died possessed of this manor, among others, which were then restored to his son Giles de Badlesmere, who died in the 12th year of Edward III. s. p. being then possessed of this manor. Upon which his four sisters became his comanor fell to the share of Margery, wife of William, manor fell to the share of Margery, wife of William, lord Roos, of Hamlake, who survived her husband, and died in the 37th year of Edward III. possessed of it, as did her grandson John, lord Roos, in the 9th year of Henry V. leaving no issue by Margaret his wife, who survived him, and had this manor assigned to her as part of her dower. She afterwards married Roger Wentworth, esq. whom she likewise survived, and died anno 18 Edward IV.
On the death of John, lord Roos, her first husband, s. p. the reversion of this manor, after her death, became vested in Thomas his next surviving brother and heir, whose son Thomas afterwards became a firm friend to the house of Lancaster, for which he was attainted anno 1 Edward IV. and his lands were consiscated to the crown.
On the death of Margaret, the widow of Roger Wentworth, esq. the manor of Wulrington, but whether by grant or purchase, I have not found, came into the possession of Richard Lewknor, of Challock, owner likewise of Town-place, as before-mentioned, who sold it to Edward Evering, already mentioned before, whose daughter and heir Mary marrying in 1565 with Mr. John Upton, of Faversham, entitled him to it. He joined with his brother Nicholas Upton, in 1583, in the sale of the manor-house, with all the demesne lands belonging to it, excepting one small piece called the manor-croft, and a moiety of the ma nor, which, from its situation, from that time was known by the name of NORTH-WILDERTON, to Anthony Terry, of North Wilderton, yeoman, upon whose death it came to his four sons, Arnold, William, Thomas, and George Terry, who in 1601 made a partition of their father's estates, in which this manor was allotted to Arnold Terry, and William his brother, from whom it descended to Anthony Terry, of Ospringe, who in 1689 sold it to Mr. Thomas Knowler, of Faversham, who devised it to his sister Abigail for her life, and after her death to John Knowler, gent. of Ospringe, in fee. She afterwards married John Bates, and they, together with John Knowler above-mentioned, about the year 1694, joined in the sale of it to Mr. Edward Baldock, of Aylesford, and Bennet his wife. He survived her, and by deed of gift in 1717, vested the fee of it in his son Edward Baldock, who passed it away to Mr. Thomas Greenstreet, of Norton, whose niece Elizabeth marrying with Mr. Thomas Smith, of Gillingham, entitled him to this manor, which has been since sold to John Montresor, esq. of Belmont, in this parish, the present owner of it. A court baron is held for this manor.
There was antiently a chapel at this manor of Wilrintune, as appears by a charter, dated anno 1217, lately in the treasury of St. Bertin's monastery at St. Omers, concerning the privilege of a bell to it.
BUT THE REMAINING MOIETY of the manor, with a small crost called the manor-croft, lying at the west end of Hockstet green, remained with John Upton, and thenceforward acquired the name of SOUTH, alias GREAT WILDERTON. After whose death it came to his eldest son John Upton, who died possessed of it in 1635, and was buried with his ancestors in Faversham church. They bore for their arms, Quarterly, sable, and or; in the first and fourth quarters, a cross flory, argent, each charged with a trefoil, azure. (fn. 5)
John Upton, his eldest son, inherited this manor, and at his death in 1664, by his will gave it to his daughter Anne, wife of Charles Castle, gent. who in 1688 devised it to her brother-in-law George Naylor, and George White, the former of whom becoming solely possessed of it, in 1705 devised it to his nephew Mr. John Dalton, gent. of St. Edmundsbury, for his life, and afterwards to his son Thomas Dalton, and his issue, in consequence of which it descended to Benjamin Shuckforth, of Diss, in Norfolk, who in 1741 sold it to Mr. Giles Hilton, of Lords, in Sheldwich, on whose death it descended to his three sons, John, William, and Robert Hilton, the youngest of whom, Mr. Robert Hilton, as well as by the devise of his two elder brothers, afterwards became the sole proprietor of this manor. He died in 1782, and his son Mr. John Hilton, of Sheldwich, as next in the entail, succeeded to it, and is the present possessor of it.
IN THE REIGN of king Stephen there was AN ALIEN PRIORY established in this parish, as a cell to the Benedictine abbey of St. Bertin, at St. Omers, the capital of Artois, in Flanders, William de Ipre, in 1153, having given this church, with that of Chilham, to it for that purpose; which gift was confirmed by king Stephen the same year, as it was by the several archbishops afterwards, and by the charters of Henry II. and III. The charter of this gift was till lately in the treasury of the monastery of St. Bertin, as were all the others hereafter mentioned relating to this church and priory.
There are very few formal foundations of these cells, the lands of them being usually granted to some monastery abroad, as an increase to their revenues, after which, upon some part of them they built convenient houses, for the reception of a small convent. Some of these cells were made conventual, having a certain number of monks, who were mostly foreigners, and removeable at pleasure, sent over with a prior at their head, who were little more than stewards to the superior abbey, to which they returned the revenues of their possessions annually; others were permitted to chuse their own prior, and these were entire societies within themselves, and received their revenues for their own use and benefit, paying perhaps only a yearly pension as an acknowledgement of their subjection, or what was at first the surplusage to the foreign house.
The cell at Throwley was of the former sort, for which reason, during the wars between England and France, as their revenues went to support the king's enemies, these kind of houses were generally seized on by the king, and restored again upon the return of a peace. (fn. 6)
In the 25th year of king Edward I. Peter, prior of Triwle, as it was spelt in the record, made fine to the king at Westminster, and had a privy seal for his protection, by which he had the custody of his house and possessions committed to his care, to retain them during the king's pleasure, answering to his exchequer for the profits of them, according to the directions of him and his council.
The scite of this priory was that of the parsonage of the church of Throwley, which, with that of Chilham, seems to have been all their possessions in this kingdom. These were valued in the 8th year of king Richard II. anno 1384, each at forty pounds annually, and their temporalities at 20s. 6d. at which time the parsonage of Throwley was become appropriated to this cell, and a vicarage was endowed in it. In which situation this priory remained till the general suppression of the alien priories throughout England, in the 2d year of Henry V. anno 1414, which was enacted in the parliament then held at Leicester, and all their houses, revenues, &c. were given to the king and his heirs for ever. (fn. 7)
This priory, with its possessions, seems to have remained in the hands of the crown till Henry VI. in his 22d year, settled them on the monastery of Sion, in Middlesex, founded by his father Henry V. with which they continued till the general suppression of religious houses, this being one of those greater monasteries dissolved by the act of the 31st year of king Henry VIII. How this priory was disposed of afterwards by the crown, may be further seen hereafter, under the description of the parsonage of the church of Throwley.
The only remains left of this priory are some few foundations, and two walls of flint, which support a building, standing behind the parsonage-house and garden.
THERE IS A FREE SCHOOL in this parish, the house of which is situated adjoining to the church-yard, which was founded by Sir Thomas Sondes, who died in 1592, who by his will devised a house and six poundes per annum to the master of it, to dwell in, and as a recompence for his pains; but having charged his executors and not his heirs to the fulfilling of this bequest, and charged the payment of the above sum, among other charitable legacies, on several leasehold estates, the terms of which expired in his nephew Sir Richard Sondes's time, and the house having tumbled down for want of repairs, Sir George Sondes, son of Sir Richard above-mentioned, thought it unreasonable, as he had none of the estates, that he should be bound to maintain the school; however, he voluntarily paid the master his salary, and gave him a house to live in, both which have been continued by the possessors of Throwley manor to this time, as far as I can learn, as of their own free gift.
The present right hon. lord Sondes appoints the schoolmaster as such during pleasure, and pays him a salary of twelve pounds per annum, besides which, he allots him an house and garden, worth about six pounds per annum, which his lordship repairs from time to time, and for which no parochial or church-dues are paid. There are at present fourteen boys taught reading, writing, and arithmetic, gratis, in this school, which though taken mostly from the parishes of Throwley, Badlesmere, and Leveland, are not confined to those parishes.
Charities.
CATHERINE, LADY SONDES, gave by will the sum of 40s. a year, to be received yearly on St. Barnabas's day, towards the relief of the poor, payable from a farm in it, called Bell-horn, now belonging to lord Sondes, and now of that annual produce.
THERE WERE three alms-houses in this parish, the gift of one of the Sondes family; one of them was some time since burnt down, and has not been rebuilt, but lord Sondes allows the person nominated to it the value of it in money yearly.
The poor constantly relieved are about thirty, casually double that number.
THROWLEY is within the ECCLESIASTICAL JURISDICTION of the diocese of Canterbury, and deanry of Ospringe.
The church, which is dedicated to St. Michael, consists of three isles and three chancels. The steeple is a square tower, and stands in the centre of the south side of it, in which there is a peal of six bells, given in 1781, at the expence of Mr. Montresor, of Belmont. In the south isle is a memorial for Francis Hosier Hart, gent. obt. 1761, leaving three daughters, Mary, Elizabeth, and Diana Hosier. In the middle isle is a small monument for Stephen Bunce, esq. of this parish, one of the Antients of New-Inn, who died there in 1634, and was buried in St. Clement's church, London. In the middle chancel there are two stalls of wood, which are not fixed, and in the north isle three more of the like sort, joined together, with a desk before them, which seem to have been removed from the chancel, and were both intended for the use of the religious of the priory here. In the middle of this chancel is a memorial for Dr. Thomas Horsemonden, patron and rector of Purleigh, in Essex, prebendary of Lincoln, &c. who died anno 1632. In the north and south chancel are several monuments for the family of Sondes, with their essigies, arms and quarterings; one of them in the latter, a plain altar tomb of black marble for Sir George Sondes, earl of Faversham, his lady and descendants; many more of this family, as appears by the parish register, are buried in the vault underneath, but the family of Watson burying at Rockingham, this vault has not been opened for several years. The north and south chancels above-mentioned belonged, one to the possessors of Throwley manor, the other to those of Townplace, but they both belong now to lord Sondes.
There were formerly in the windows the arms of Sondes, Finch, and Gatton, and in the north window this inscriptin, Pray for the good estate of Alice Martyn, the which did make this window, MCCCCXLV.
In the church yard, at the west end of the north isle, there is a circular door-case of stone, having several bordures of Saxon ornaments carved round it. In the church-yard is an altar tomb for William Woodward, gent. of Wilgate-green, obt. 1681, and Anne his wife.
It appears by the will of William Sondes, esq. anno 1474, that this church had then constantly burning in it lights, dedicated to St. Michael, the Holy Trinity, the Holy Cross, St. Mary, St. Thomas, St. Christopher, St. George, St. Katherine, St. Margaret, St. Mary Magdalen, and St. Nicholas.
An account of the antient patronage of the church of Throwley has already been given, as first belonging to the alien priory here, and then to the monastery of Sion, to the time of the dissolution of the latter in the 31st year of Henry VIII. the year after which, the king granted the rectory, with the advowson of the vicarage of the church of Throwley, to the prebendary of Rugmer, in the cathedral church of St. Paul, London, in exchange for lands belonging to that prebend, to be inclosed within the king's park of Marybone, in pursuance of an act then passed. Since which this parsonage and advowson have continued part of the abovementioned prebend. The former is leased out by the present prebendary to the right hon. lord Sondes, but the advowson of the vicarage he retains in his own hands, and is the present patron of it.
¶There was a rent of 4l. 18s. 4d. reserved from the parsonage by king Henry VIII. nomine decimœ, which was granted by queen Elizabeth, in her third year, to archbishop Parker, among other premises, in exchange for several manors, lands, &c. belonging to that see, which rent still continues part of the revenue of the archbishopric.
A vicarage was endowed here in 1367, anno 42 king Edward III. by archbishop Langham, at which time the chapel of Wylrington belonged to it. (fn. 8)
It is valued in the king's books at 7l. 11s. 8d. and the yearly tenths at 15s. 2d.
In 1578 there were one hundred and eighty communicants here. In 1640 it was valued at forty-five pounds, communicants two hundred and twenty.
The eyes are supposed to put away the djins, the bad spirits...
Formerly a British colony, Somaliland briefly reached its independence in 1960. It is one of the three Territories, with Puntland and former Italian Somalia that compose the current State of Somalia.
Somaliland proclaimed its independence in 1991, adopting its own currency, a fully independent government, working institutions and police. The authorities organized a referendum in 2001, advocating once again for full independence. However, to date, it is not internationally recognized.
Ethiopian Prime minister Meles Zenawi is the only one to speak about a Somalilander president, recognizing implicitly the existence of an independent State. Indeed the economy of neighboring Ethiopia dramatically depends on Somaliland stability, since the landlocked country’s main trade route passes through the Somalilander port of Berbera… And vice-versa, the economy of Somaliland largely depends on the taxes and duties it charges Ethiopia. Besides that, the principal economic activity of Somaliland is livestock exportation to the Arabian Peninsula. Most people are Sunni Muslims and speak Arabic, as well as some Somali dialect and many of them, English.Lastely, the East African demography being based on clan alliances, it is no surprise that the frontiers drawn by the colonists don’t match the ethnic divisions of territory, leading to open clashes. More broadly, this problem is recurrent across the African continent.
© Eric Lafforgue
1. Actuated signals communicate that cars are more important than people.
By almost constantly giving vehicles in one direction or the other a green light but giving pedestrians a walk signal only after a button press and a delay, the actuated signal embodies an institutional belief that the passage of vehicles is more important than the passage of pedestrians. This makes pedestrians feel like intruders on the street and contributes to drivers resenting the presence of any pedestrians who might slow them down. Only streets that provide some other extremely strong attraction can survive this implicit message that people are unwelcome.
2. Actuated signals make walking much slower.
With simple timed signals, delay to pedestrians from signals is minimal. Consider a typical street system (such as the north-south streets of downtown San Francisco) with intersections every 320 feet. Walking a mile involves crossing 16 streets. With optimal timing (each light beginning its walk signal 64 seconds after the previous block's signal) there might be no delay for pedestrians from the signals, so the total time to go a mile would be the 17:36 of actual walking time at 5 feet per second. More typically (with each light on a total 60-second cycle and generous 8-second clearance interval, but not timed to match walking speed), pedestrians will experience no delay 37% of the time and an average of 19 seconds of delay the other 63% of the time, for an overall average delay of 12 seconds per intersection, 192 seconds in total, contributing to a walking time of 20:48 for the mile.
With actuated signals, on the other hand, pedestrians never have a walk signal waiting when they arrive at a corner. If their walking speed exactly matches the green lights, they actually get the worst possible delay, 64 seconds at each intersection, waiting the entire length of a cycle for their walk signal, 1024 seconds waiting, making the total mile take a horrifying 34:40 to walk. More typically, they are unsynchronized to the cycle length, so their delay is an average of half the 60-second cycle at each intersection, 480 seconds in all, making the mile take 25:36. This is a 23% time penalty over timed signals in the typical case and a 97% penalty in the worst case.
3. Actuated signals ignore human factors research for user interfaces.
Actuated traffic signals are a user interface and, if they are to provide a satisfying experience, must follow the same rules of human factors as any other user interface. The standard rule of thumb is that interface components must signal feedback within 100 msec, should complete operations within 1 sec, and must provide a progress indicator for anything that takes longer than 10 sec or the user will assume that the program has crashed and will never finish. The typical actuated signal installation provides no feedback whatsoever until the light changes 30 seconds or more later, with the entirely predictable result that people will bang on the button repeatedly trying to determine if it is broken, and then give up and cross against the light before it eventually changes. (And in many cases the sensor really is broken and the walk signal will never come.) Newer installations often do have an indicator light to provide the 100 msec feedback, but it is still extremely rare to provide a progress indicator, let alone one that gives a plausible explanation for the length of the delay.
The human factors for bicycle actuation are even worse, because these never give feedback that the signal has been actuated, and the bicycle sensors are even more likely to be missing or broken than pedestrian buttons are.
4. Actuated signals deprive pedestrians and drivers of important information.
Because the human factors of signals lead people to believe that the walk signal will never come and the delay from waiting is so great, people frequently give up and cross against the light, especially if there is a green light for vehicles in the same direction. Because the pedestrian signal still shows "don't walk" as people cross illegally, drivers are more likely to turn without looking and hit the pedestrians, and pedestrians are deprived of the knowledge of why their signal might legitimately and importantly say "don't walk," such as a left turn arrow for vehicles in the opposite direction.
μαχαιροβγάλτης.
Barbarous talentis scrawled bealudæd flows,
odious umgang assassination gegenüberstellungen cut,
безумие extravagance grotesque abuse drips,
when léasmódnes hallucinates begeisterung schreit,
for lunaticos παρανοήσεις views vehementer drips,
as презрительно обсуждения goes beyond lágan macabre,
pleurant la poésie inenarrable knife špatnost zoufalství,
rutilant σκέψεις lewdness shocks corresponding facultates,
the маледицтионс spild excessively atrabilious,
rouillé conclusion implicit zealous tenebris medii aevi,
pedeapsă massive morals verdier skiver,
vents symboliques principals inexhaustible to reinterpretations igni,
confounding eyes faculties dazed defeated bear,
as andsæte resentments builds a турбулентно место,
déaþcwalu eternally mourns every luctus lienis,
airs allégoriques anguish iudicia confitetur,
helrúna phlegm the οισοφάγο κατεβαίνει to a mangle knochen,
illi, qui volvuntur, miserias the knife take it 離れて .
Steve.D.Hammond.
Unstoppable force that drives us.. the power within and beauty implicit... we can fight as much as we want.. but can never deny the very nature that makes us humans.. and it is on that nature.. that lies a beautiful sea of emotions.. always waiting to be released and drives us again... and again..
Still Time...
hi Watercolorists!
Today we worked with autumn leaves and branches. Thanks to those of you who brought these jewels of nature for us to paint. They are magnificent at this time of year. I have posted this before- but here it is again- IMO the best version ever of this tune. www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPHtQn1t1n4
Here is how to approach a subject like this single leaf:
Look at the subject. (I know! But you are doing it!) See the range of colors AND values in the leaf, stem, veins, the tips of the leaf.
Mix your colors with generosity and some extremity. Goose them! See the violet in the greens, the red in the stem. Have those colors richly mixed and ready.
Load your brushes with the prominent colors you see - one color for each brush. In this case I had a yellowy green, red and a deeper bluey green.
Put the loaded brushes in your secondary hand, and take them as needed with your painting hand.
Paint the subject by mixing the colors on the page.
Paint the subject by mixing the colors on the page. (I mean it.)
Work in sections, hand to hand with distinct colors so they really mix, push and parry with each other. Don't work overall in one color then another. Let them collide into each other and move to the next area. Don't forget to let your lights stay in the high octaves. Let them sing, don't pull them wrest them into overworked dullness.
Work as quickly as you can- without too much concern about details. Get the salient thing - the details will be implicit. The more abstract work looks the most alive. Let it live! I did this in a minute or two.
Remember that hues are greyed when mixed with their opposites. Violet tempers yellow, orange quiets blue and red tames green. For a beautiful soft mousey grey mix Cadmium Red and Cerulean Blue. For a crystal hard platinum grey mix Winsor Green and Alizarin Crimson. Try them in different ratios and you will see what I mean.
Other notes you asked me to record:
My teacher's book on flower painting is Flower Painting in Watercolor, by Mario Cooper
Van Nostrand Company
Any of his books are good to have. Most of what I know about watercolor I learned from him. I loved him to pieces and I feel very glad to be able to pass on a bit of what he taught me to you.
The village is splitted in 2 as one side is Somaliland and the other ethiopia.
All around, families run their own well to get water for them and the cattle.
Formerly a British colony, Somaliland briefly reached its independence in 1960. It is one of the three Territories, with Puntland and former Italian Somalia that compose the current State of Somalia.
Somaliland proclaimed its independence in 1991, adopting its own currency, a fully independent government, working institutions and police. The authorities organized a referendum in 2001, advocating once again for full independence. However, to date, it is not internationally recognized.
Ethiopian Prime minister Meles Zenawi is the only one to speak about a Somalilander president, recognizing implicitly the existence of an independent State. Indeed the economy of neighboring Ethiopia dramatically depends on Somaliland stability, since the landlocked country’s main trade route passes through the Somalilander port of Berbera… And vice-versa, the economy of Somaliland largely depends on the taxes and duties it charges Ethiopia. Besides that, the principal economic activity of Somaliland is livestock exportation to the Arabian Peninsula. Most people are Sunni Muslims and speak Arabic, as well as some Somali dialect and many of them, English.Lastely, the East African demography being based on clan alliances, it is no surprise that the frontiers drawn by the colonists don’t match the ethnic divisions of territory, leading to open clashes. More broadly, this problem is recurrent across the African continent.
© Eric Lafforgue
All early sources refer to the "sons of heaven" as angels. From the third century BCE onwards, references are found in the Enochic literature, the Dead Sea Scrolls (the Genesis Apocryphon, the Damascus Document, 4Q180), Jubilees, the Testament of Reuben, 2 Baruch, Josephus, and the book of Jude (compare with 2 Peter 2). For example: 1 Enoch 7:2 "And when the angels, (3) the sons of heaven, beheld them, they became enamoured of them, saying to each other, Come, let us select for ourselves wives from the progeny of men, and let us beget children." Some Christian apologists, such as Tertullian and especially Lactantius, shared this opinion.
The earliest statement in a secondary commentary explicitly interpreting this to mean that angelic beings mated with humans can be traced to the rabbinical Targum Pseudo-Jonathan and it has since become especially commonplace in modern-day Christian commentaries. This line of interpretation finds additional support in the text of Genesis 6:4 which juxtaposes the sons of God (male gender, divine nature) with the daughters of men (female gender, human nature). From this parallelism it could be inferred that the sons of God are understood as some superhuman beings. The New American Bible commentary draws a parallel to the Epistle of Jude and the statements set forth in Genesis, suggesting that the Epistle refers implicitly to the paternity of Nephilim as heavenly beings who came to earth and had sexual intercourse with women.[22] The footnotes of the Jerusalem Bible suggest that the biblical author intended the Nephilim to be an "anecdote of a superhuman race".
Some Christian commentators have argued against this view, citing Jesus's statement that angels do not marry. Others believe that Jesus was only referring to angels in heaven.
Evidence cited in favor of the fallen angels interpretation includes the fact that the phrase "the sons of God" (Hebrew: בְּנֵי הָֽאֱלֹהִים; or "sons of the gods") is used twice outside of Genesis chapter 6, in the Book of Job (1:6 and 2:1) where the phrase explicitly references angels. The Septuagint manuscript Codex Alexandrinus reading of Genesis 6:2 renders this phrase as "the angels of God" while Codex Vaticanus reads "sons". Targum Pseudo-Jonathan identifies the Nephilim as Shemihaza and the angels in the name list from 1 Enoch. The physical members of the Prince's staff had been constituted sex creatures for the purpose of participating in the plan of procreating offspring embodying the combined qualities of their special order united with those of the selected stock of the Andon tribes, and all of this was in anticipation of the subsequent appearance of Adam. The Life Carriers had planned a new type of mortal embracing the union of the conjoint offspring of the Prince's staff with the first-generation offspring of Adam and Eve. They had thus projected a plan envisioning a new order of planetary creatures whom they hoped would become the teacher- rulers of human society. Such beings were designed for social sovereignty, not civil sovereignty. But since this project almost completely miscarried, we shall never know what an aristocracy of benign leadership and matchless culture Urantia was thus deprived of. For when the corporeal staff later reproduced, it was subsequent to the rebellion and after they had been deprived of their connection with the life currents of the system.
77:2.3 The postrebellion era on Urantia witnessed many unusual happenings. A great civilization—the culture of Dalamatia—was going to pieces. "The Nephilim (Nodites) were on earth in those days, and when these sons of the gods went in to the daughters of men and they bore to them, their children were the `mighty men of old,' the `men of renown.'" While hardly "sons of the gods," the staff and their early descendants were so regarded by the evolutionary mortals of those distant days; even their stature came to be magnified by tradition. This, then, is the origin of the well-nigh universal folk tale of the gods who came down to earth and there with the daughters of men begot an ancient race of heroes. And all this legend became further confused with the race mixtures of the later appearing Adamites in the second garden.
77:2.4 Since the one hundred corporeal members of the Prince's staff carried germ plasm of the Andonic human strains, it would naturally be expected that, if they engaged in sexual reproduction, their progeny would altogether resemble the offspring of other Andonite parents. But when the sixty rebels of the staff, the followers of Nod, actually engaged in sexual reproduction, their children proved to be far superior in almost every way to both the Andonite and the Sangik peoples. This unexpected excellence characterized not only physical and intellectual qualities but also spiritual capacities.
The matter of Eve’s sincerity amid her fall into sin is arguably more complicated than that of Satan’s. Eve’s sin is precipitated by Satan’s rhetorical seduction when the lone Eve is met by Satan disguised as a serpent who claims he has been given reason and speech by eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil; and Eve being alone is the result of her unfortunate decision, for the sake of working more efficiently, to temporarily separate from Adam, a separation Adam agrees to despite first warning Eve that Satan is in Eden seeking their destruction. As many critics have noted, had Eve not left Adam’s presence, she would almost certainly have not succumbed to Satan’s rhetoric.10 But Milton’s text does suggest that Eve’s departure, however lacking foresight, was motivated by a sincere desire to work the garden more productively. At the same time, Milton’s text also suggests that Eve’s theological understanding, whatever her sincere motives, is already somewhat compromised by the time she leaves Adam, a factor that contributes to her spiritual vulnerability. Moreover, as Eve prepares to eat the forbidden fruit, and even more so when she encourages Adam to do likewise, she demonstrates, critical attempts to argue otherwise notwithstanding, a corruption of theology and intent that reveals her insincerity in both the senses that this essay has been discussing.
Gondwana formed part of Pangaea for c. 150 Ma
Gondwana and Laurussia formed the Pangaea supercontinent during the Carboniferous. Pangaea began to break up in the Mid-Jurassic when the Central Atlantic opened. In the western end of Pangaea, the collision between Gondwana and Laurussia closed the Rheic and Palaeo-Tethys oceans. The obliquity of this closure resulted in the docking of some northern terranes in the Marathon, Ouachita, Alleghanian, and Variscan orogenies, respectively. Southern terranes, such as Chortis and Oaxaca, on the other hand, remained largely unaffected by the collision along the southern shores of Laurentia. Some Peri-Gondwanan terranes, such as Yucatán and Florida, were buffered from collisions by major promontories. Other terranes, such as Carolina and Meguma, were directly involved in the collision. The final collision resulted in the Variscan-Appalachian Mountains, stretching from present-day Mexico to southern Europe. Meanwhile, Baltica collided with Siberia and Kazakhstania which resulted in the Uralian orogeny and Laurasia. Pangaea was finally amalgamated in the Late Carboniferous-Early Permian but the oblique forces continued until Pangaea began to rift in the Triassic.Space prevents an extensive analysis of Adam and Eve’s lengthy dialogue immediately preceding her departure.11 But of particular interest is the narrator’s comment that Eve, hurt by Adam’s urgings that she stay with him lest she be vulnerable to Satan on her own, “thought / Less attributed to her Faith sincere” (99.319–20).12 It is most significant that Milton’s narrator describes Eve’s faith as “sincere”—a sincerity that falls under the category of “unfeigned honesty”12—because the couple’s dialogue has earlier revealed that Eve, although still unfallen, has already strayed into theological error. Eve specifically speaks erroneously when, responding to Adam’s initial misgivings concerning Eve’s proposed departure, she objects, regarding Satan, that “His violence thou fearst not, being such, / As wee, not capable of death or paine, / Can either not receave, or can repell” (99.282–84). Eve’s error—which Adam, to his loss, fails to specifically confront—is to say that she and Adam are “not capable of death or paine,” a statement that contradicts God’s commandment to Adam that if he eats of the Tree of Knowledge, he “shalt dye” (88.330).References to the offspring of Seth rebelling from God and mingling with the daughters of Cain are found from the second century CE onwards in both Christian and Jewish sources. e.g. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, Augustine of Hippo, Sextus Julius Africanus, and the Letters attributed to St. Clement. It is also the view expressed in the modern canonical Amharic Ethiopian Orthodox Bible: Henok 2:1–3 "and the Offspring of Seth, who were upon the Holy Mount, saw them and loved them. And they told one another, 'Come, let us choose for us daughters from Cain's children; let us bear children for us.'"
Orthodox Judaism has taken a stance against the idea that Genesis 6 refers to angels or that angels could intermarry with men. Shimon bar Yochai pronounced a curse on anyone teaching this idea. Rashi and Nachmanides followed this. Pseudo-Philo, Biblical Antiquities 3:1–3 may also imply that the "sons of God" were human.[34] Consequently, most Jewish commentaries and translations describe the Nephilim as being from the offspring of "sons of nobles", rather than from "sons of God" or "sons of angels".[35] This is also the rendering suggested in the Targum Onqelos, Symmachus and the Samaritan Targum which read "sons of the rulers", where Targum Neophyti reads "sons of the judges". Likewise, a long-held view among some Christians is that the "sons of God" were the formerly righteous descendants of Seth who rebelled, while the "daughters of men" were the unrighteous descendants of Cain, and the Nephilim the offspring of their union.[36] This view, dating to at least the 1st century AD in Jewish literature as described above, is also found in Christian sources from the 3rd century if not earlier, with references throughout the Clementine literature,[37] as well as in Sextus Julius Africanus,[38] Ephrem the Syrian[39] and others. Holders of this view have looked for support in Jesus' statement that "in those days before the flood they [humans] were ... marrying and giving in marriage" (Matthew 24:38).
Some individuals and groups, including St. Augustine, John Chrysostom, and John Calvin, take the view of Genesis 6:2 that the "Angels" who fathered the Nephilim referred to certain human males from the lineage of Seth, who were called sons of God probably in reference to their prior covenant with Yahweh (cf. Deuteronomy 14:1; 32:5); according to these sources, these men had begun to pursue bodily interests, and so took wives of the daughters of men, e.g., those who were descended from Cain or from any people who did not worship God. This also is the view of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, supported by their own Ge'ez manuscripts and Amharic translation of the Haile Selassie Bible—where the books of 1 Enoch and Jubilees, counted as canonical by this church, differ from western academic editions. The "Sons of Seth view" is also the view presented in a few extra-biblical, yet ancient works, including Clementine literature, the 3rd century Cave of Treasures, and the ca. 6th Century Ge'ez work The Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan. In these sources, these offspring of Seth were said to have disobeyed God, by breeding with the Cainites and producing wicked children "who were all unlike", thus angering God into bringing about the Deluge, as in the Conflict: Certain wise men of old wrote concerning them, and say in their [sacred] books that angels came down from heaven and mingled with the daughters of Cain, who bare unto them these giants. But these [wise men] err in what they say. God forbid such a thing, that angels who are spirits, should be found committing sin with human beings. Never, that cannot be. And if such a thing were of the nature of angels, or Satans, that fell, they would not leave one woman on earth, undefiled ... But many men say, that angels came down from heaven, and joined themselves to women, and had children by them. This cannot be true. But they were children of Seth, who were of the children of Adam, that dwelt on the mountain, high up, while they preserved their virginity, their innocence and their glory like angels; and were then called 'angels of God.' But when they transgressed and mingled with the children of Cain, and begat children, ill-informed men said, that angels had come down from heaven, and mingled with the daughters of men, who bear them giants. In the eastern end collisions occurred slightly later. The North China, South China, and Indochina blocks rifted from Gondwana during the middle Paleozoic and opened the Proto-Tethys Ocean. North China docked with Mongolia and Siberia during the Carboniferous–Permian followed by South China. The Cimmerian blocks then rifted from Gondwana to form the Palaeo-Thethys and Neo-Tethys oceans in the Late Carboniferous and docked with Asia during the Triassic and Jurassic. Western Pangaea began to rift while the eastern end was still being assembled. The formation of Pangaea and its mountains had a tremendous impact on global climate and sea levels, which resulted in glaciations and continent-wide sedimentation. In North America, the base of the Absaroka sequence coincides with the Alleghanian and Ouachita orogenies and are indicative of a large-scale change in the mode of deposition far away from the Pangaean orogenies. Ultimately, these changes contributed to the Permian–Triassic extinction event and left large deposits of hydrocarbons, coal, evaporite, and metals. The break-up of Pangaea began with the Central Atlantic magmatic province (CAMP) between South America, Africa, North America, and Europe. CAMP covered more than seven million square kilometres over a few million years, reached its peak at c. 200 Ma, and coincided with the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event.[24] The reformed Gondwanan continent was not precisely the same as that which had existed before Pangaea formed; for example, most of Florida and southern Georgia and Alabama is underlain by rocks that were originally part of Gondwana, but this region stayed attached to North America when the Central Atlantic opened. A large number of terranes were accreted to Eurasia during Gondwana's existence but the Cambrian or Precambrian origin of many of these terranes remains uncertain. For example, some Palaeozoic terranes and microcontinents that now make up Central Asia, often called the "Kazakh" and "Mongolian terranes", were progressively amalgamated into the continent Kazakhstania in the Late Silurian. Whether these blocks originated on the shores of Gondwana is not known.
In the Early Palaeozoic the Armorican terrane, which today form large parts of France, was part of either Peri-Gondwana or core Gondwana; the Rheic Ocean closed in front of it and the Palaeo-Tethys Ocean opened behind it. Precambrian rocks from the Iberian Peninsula suggest it too probably formed part of core Gondwana before its detachment as an orocline in the Variscan orogeny close to the Carboniferous–Permian boundary.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nephilim
From Turkey to north-eastern India: the Taurides in southern Turkey; the Lesser Caucasus Terrane in Georgia; the Sanand, Alborz, and Lut terranes in Iran; the Mangysglak or Kopetdag Terrane in the Caspian Sea; the Afghan Terrane; the Karakorum Terrane in northern Pakistan; and the Lhasa and Qiangtang terranes in Tibet. The Permian–Triassic widening of the Neo-Tethys pushed all these terranes across the Equator and over to Eurasia. Antarctica, the centre of the supercontinent, shared boundaries with all other Gondwana continents and the fragmentation of Gondwana propagated clockwise around it. The break-up was the result of one of the Earth's most extensive large igneous provinces c. 200 to 170 Ma, but the oldest magnetic anomalies between South America, Africa, and Antarctica are found in what is now the southern Weddell Sea where initial break-up occurred during the Jurassic c. 160 to 180 Ma. The first ocean floor formed between Madagascar and Africa c. 150 Ma (left) and between India and Madagscar c. 70 Ma (right). Gondwana began to break up in the early Jurassic following the extensive and fast emplacement of the Karoo-Ferrar flood basalts c. 184 Ma. Before the Karoo plume initiated rifting between Africa and Antarctica, it separated a series of smaller continental blocks from Gondwana's southern, Proto-Pacific margin (along what is now the Transantarctic Mountains): the Antarctic Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land, Zealandia, and Thurston Island; the Falkland Islands and Ellsworth–Whitmore Mountains (in Antarctica) were rotated 90° in opposite directions; and South America south of the Gastre Fault (often referred to as Patagonia) was pushed westward.[32] The history of the Africa-Antarctica break-up can be studied in great detail in the fracture zones and magnetic anomalies flanking the Southwest Indian Ridge.
The first ocean floor formed between India and Antarctica c. 120 Ma (left). The Kerguelen LIP began to form the Ninety East ridge c. 80 Ma (centre). The Indian and Australian plates merged c. 40 Ma (right). East Gondwana, comprising Antarctica, Madagascar, India, and Australia, began to separate from Africa. East Gondwana then began to break up c. 132.5 to 96 Ma when India moved northwest from Australia-Antarctica.[36] The Indian Plate and the Australian Plate are now separated by the Capricorn Plate and its diffuse boundaries.[37] During the opening of the Indian Ocean, the Kerguelen hotspot first formed the Kerguelen Plateau on the Antarctic Plate c. 118 to 95 Ma and then the Ninety East Ridge on the Indian Plate at c. 100 Ma.[38] The Kerguelen Plateau and the Broken Ridge, the southern end of the Ninety East Ridge, are now separated by the Southeast Indian Ridge.
Separation between Australia and East Antarctica began c. 132 Ma with sea-floor spreading occurring c. 96 Ma. A shallow seaway developed over the South Tasman Rise during the Early Cenozoic and as oceanic crust started to separate the continents during the Eocene c. 35.5 Ma global ocean temperature dropped significantly.[39] A dramatic shift from arc- to rift magmatism c. 100 Ma separated Zealandia, including New Zealand, the Campbell Plateau, Chatham Rise, Lord Howe Rise, Norfolk Ridge, and New Caledonia, from West Antarctica c. 84 Ma.Significantly, Eve can in the same scene first speak words of theological error that help propel her to her fatal encounter with Satan and then, a bit later, be described by Milton’s narrator as having “faith sincere,” even as Eve’s theological purity appears to have slipped. Moreover, Milton’s narrator explicitly stresses well into her subsequent temptation that Eve is “yet sinless” (99.659). And Milton takes pains not to depict Eve’s unwise decision to depart from Adam as defiance. Rather, the confused and insecure Adam, having warned Eve of Satan’s dangerous presence, actually urges Eve to “Go” in her “native innocence” and “relie” on her own “vertue” (9.373–74). Milton’s narrator describes Eve as “yet submiss” as she departs, telling Adam that she leaves “With thy permission” (99.377–78).
At c. 126 Ma (left) the Falkland Plateau began to slide past southern Africa and the Paraná-Etendeka LIP had opened the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. At c. 83 Ma (right) the South Atlantic was fully opened and the Romanche Fracture Zone was forming near the Equator. The opening of the South Atlantic Ocean divided West Gondwana (South America and Africa), but there is a considerable debate over the exact timing of this break-up. Rifting propagated from south to north along Triassic–Early Jurassic lineaments, but intra-continental rifts also began to develop within both continents in Jurassic–Cretaceous sedimentary basins; subdividing each continent into three sub-plates. Rifting began c. 190 Ma at Falkland latitudes, forcing Patagonia to move relative to the still static remainder of South America and Africa, and this westward movement lasted until the Early Cretaceous 126.7 Ma. From there rifting propagated northward during the Late Jurassic c. 150 Ma or Early Cretaceous c. 140 Ma most likely forcing dextral movements between sub-plates on either side. South of the Walvis Ridge and Rio Grande Rise the Paraná and Etendeka magmatics resulted in further ocean-floor spreading c. 130 to 135 Ma and the development of rifts systems on both continents, including the Central African Rift System and the Central African Shear Zone which lasted until c. 85 Ma. At Brazilian latitudes spreading is more difficult to assess because of the lack of palaeo-magnetic data, but rifting occurred in Nigeria at the Benue Trough c. 118 Ma. North of the Equator the rifting began after 120.4 Ma and continued until c. 100 to 96 Ma.[41]
In the Early Cenozoic Australia was still connected to Antarctica c. 35–40° south of its current location and both continents were largely unglaciated. A rift between the two developed but remained an embayment until the Eocene-Oligocene boundary when the Circumpolar Current developed and the glaciation of Antarctica began.
Australia was warm and wet during the Palaeocene and dominated by rainforest. The opening of the Tasman Gateway at the Eocene-Oligocene boundary (33 Ma) resulted in abrupt cooling but the Oligocene became a period of high rainfall with swamps in southeast Australia.
The Tasman Gateway between Australia and Antarctica began to open c. 40 to 30 Ma. Palaeontological evidences indicate the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) was established in the Late Oligocene c. 23 Ma with the full opening of the Drake Passage and the deepening of the Tasman Gateway. The oldest oceanic crust in the Drake Passage, however, is 34 to 29 Ma-old which indicates spreading between the Antarctic and South American plates began near the Eocene/Oligocene boundary.[50] Deep sea environments in Tierra del Fuego and the North Scotia Ridge during the Eocene and Oligocene indicate a "Proto-ACC" opened opened during this period. Later, 26 to 14 Ma, a series of events severally restricted the Proto-ACC: change to shallow marine conditions along the North Scotia Ridge; closure of the Fuegan Seaway, the deep sea that existed in Tierra del Fuego; and uplift of the Patagonian Cordillera. This, together with the reactivated Iceland plume, contributed to global warming. During the Miocene, the Drake Passage began to widen and as water flow between South America and the Antarctic Peninsula increased, the renewed ACC resulted in cooler global climate.
Since the Eocene the northward movement of the Australian Plate has resulted in an arc-continent collision with the Philippine and Caroline plates and the uplift of the New Guinea Highlands. From the Oligocene to the late Miocene, the climate in Australia, dominated by warm and humid rainforests before this collision, began to alternate between open forest and rainforest before the continent became the arid or semiarid landscape it is today. The closure of the Rheic Ocean and the formation of Pangaea in the Carboniferous resulted in the rerouting of ocean currents which initiated an Ice House period. As Gondwana began to rotate clockwise, Australia shifted south to more temperate latitudes. An ice cap initially covered most of southern Africa and South America but began to spread to eventually cover most of the supercontinent, save for northern-most Africa-South America and eastern Australia. Giant lycopod and horsetail forests continued to evolve in tropical Laurasia together with a diversified assemblage of true insects. In Gondwana, in contrast, ice and, in Australia, volcanism decimated the Devonian flora to a low-diversity seed fern flora – the pteridophytes were increasingly replaced by the gymnosperms which were to dominate until the Mid-Cretaceous. Australia, however, was still located near the Equator during the Early Carboniferous and during this period temnospondyl and lepospondyl amphibians and the first amniote reptilians evolved, all closely related to the Laurasian fauna, but spreading ice eventually drove these animals away from Gondwana entirely.
During the Mid- to Late Triassic Hot House condition coincided with a peak in biodiversity — the end-Permian extinction was huge and so was the radiation that followed. Two families of conifers, Podocarpaceae and Araucariaceae, dominated Gondwana in the Early Triassic, but Dicroidium, an extinct genus of fork-leaved seed ferns, dominated woodlands and forests of Gondwana during most of the Triassic. Conifers evolved and radiated during the period with six of eight extant families already present before the end of it. Bennettitales and Pentoxylales, two now extinct orders of gymnospermous plants, evolved in the Late Triassic and became important in the Jurassic and Cretaceous. It is possible that gymnosperm biodiversity surpassed later angiosperm biodiversity and that the evolution of angiosperms began during the Triassic but, if so, in Laurasia rather than in Gondwana. Two Gondwanan classes, lycophytes and sphenophytes, saw a gradual decline during the Triassic while ferns, though never dominant, managed to diversify.Nonetheless, Eve continues to listen to Satan’s relentless appeals. As Stanley Fish (2015) has recently argued, “even before she hears Satan’s argument,” Eve should ask, “What part of ‘Ye shall not eat’ (PL 9.662) don’t you understand”? (“Milton” 7). But failing to do so, she is quickly overwhelmed by Satan’s subsequent impassioned speech, a speech that derides God’s injustice, extols the Tree’s wondrous power, and implores Eve—whom Satan calls “Queen of this Universe” (684)—of her need to eat the Tree’s fruit (679–732). The serpent’s rhetorical power—grounded in his insincere claim that his ability to speak came from the fruit, of which he says he ate without dying—combined with Eve’s physical hunger and the assault on her senses caused by the beautiful, delicious-smelling fruit, conspire against her previous adherence to God’s command.
The Cretaceous saw the arrival of the angiosperms, or flowering plants, a group that probably evolved in western Gondwana (South America-Africa). From there the angiosperms diversified in two stages: the monocots and magnoliids evolved in the Early Cretaceous followed by the hammamelid dicots. By the Mid-Cretaceous angiosperms constituted half of the flora in northeastern Australia. There is, however, no obvious connection between this spectacular angiosperm radiation and an extinction event nor vertebrate/insect evolution. Insect orders associated with pollination, such as beetles, flies, butterflies and moths, and wasps, bees, and ants, radiated continuously from the Permian-Triassic long before the arrival of the angiosperms. Well-preserved insect fossils have been found in the lake deposits of the Santana Formation in Brazil, the Koonwarra Lake fauna in Australia, and the Orapa diamond mine in Botswana. Dinosaurs continued to prosper but, as the angiosperm diversified, conifers, bennettitaleans and pentoxylaleans disappeared from Gondwana c. 115 Ma together with the specialised herbivorous ornithischians whilst generalist browsers such as several families of sauropodomorph Saurischia prevailed. The Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event killed off all dinosaurs except birds, but plant evolution in Gondwana was hardly affected by the event. Gondwanatheria is an extinct group of non-therian mammals with a Gondwanan distribution (South America, Africa, Madagascar, India, and Antarctica) during the Late Cretaceous and Palaeogene.[65] Xenarthra and Afrotheria, two placental clades, are of Gondwanan origin and probably began to evolve separately c. 105 Ma when Africa and South America separated.
The classic treatments of sincerity in the second half of the twentieth century have not emphasized the word’s older theological meaning. Although both Patricia M. Ball (1964) and Lionel Trilling (1972) note, in Ball’s words, that earlier “implications of sincerity were predominantly religious,” with the word being “used to affirm purity of belief, genuine doctrine, freedom from theological duplicity” (1), both Ball and Trilling stress that the effects of Romanticism and subsequent cultural movements brought the word to mean, as it still does in common parlance, “a congruence between avowal and actual feeling” (Trilling 2).1 As we investigate matters of sincerity in John Milton’s Paradise Lost (1667, second edition 1674), we must recognize that for the pre-Romantic Milton, sincerity is foremost a theological concern, and thus, that “feeling,” per se, is not a proper measure of a person’s sincerity; for, as events in Paradise Lost reveal, feelings can fluctuate wildly in the human heart and, if followed, lead characters to disobey God and fall into sin. Milton most certainly recognizes and emphasizes, however, a connection between theological purity and the unfeigned honesty of the individual in question. This connection is evident when Milton’s God the Father, speaking to his Son concerning why human and angelic wills must be free, asks, “Not free, what proof could they have givn sincere / Of true allegiance, constant Faith or Love” (3.103–04)?2 The individual angel or human must make the sincere choice to obey faithfully the true God on his terms, and that character cannot offer the Romantic argument that he or she chose disobedience through “sincere” feelings and actions of dissen...neither Satan’s, Eve’s, nor Adam’s decisions to transgress can be considered “sincere” in terms of either the pre-Romantic understanding of sincerity as theological purity or the largely romantic understanding of sincerity as unfeigned honesty. Rather, each character’s respective fall betrays both impious and self-serving motivations that undercut claims to sincerity proffered by either the characters themselves or their critical defenders.
Eilean Donan is a small tidal island situated at the confluence of three sea lochs (Loch Duich, Loch Long and Loch Alsh) in the western Highlands of Scotland, about 1 kilometre (5⁄8 mi) from the village of Dornie. It is connected to the mainland by a footbridge that was installed early in the 20th century and is dominated by a picturesque castle that frequently appears in photographs, film and television. The island's original castle was built in the thirteenth century; it became a stronghold of the Clan Mackenzie and their allies, the Clan MacRae. However, in response to the Mackenzies' involvement in the Jacobite rebellions early in the 18th century, government ships destroyed the castle in 1719. The present-day castle is Lieutenant-Colonel John Macrae-Gilstrap's 20th-century reconstruction of the old castle.
Eilean Donan is part of the Kintail National Scenic Area, one of 40 in Scotland. In 2001, the island had a recorded population of just one person, but there were no "usual residents" at the time of the 2011 census.
Eilean Donan, which means simply "island of Donnán", is named after Donnán of Eigg, a Celtic saint who was martyred in 617. Donnán is said to have established a church on the island, though no trace of this remains.
It is possible that an early Christian monastic cell was founded on the island in the 6th or 7th century, and that it was dedicated to Donnán of Eigg, an Irish saint who was martyred on Eigg in April 617. No remains of any Christian buildings survive, though fragments of vitrified stone (stone that has been subjected to very high temperatures) have been discovered, indicating that there was an Iron Age or early medieval fortification on the island.
In the earlier thirteenth century, during the reign of Alexander II (ruled 1214–1249), a large curtain-wall castle (wall of enceinte) was constructed; it enclosed much of the island. At this time, the area around the island was at the boundary of the Norse-Celtic Lordship of the Isles and the Earldom of Ross: Eilean Donan provided a strong defensive position against Norse expeditions. A founding legend has it that the son of a chief of the Mathesons acquired the power to communicate with birds; as a result of this power, and after many adventures overseas, he gained wealth, power, and the respect of Alexander II, who asked him to build the castle to defend his realm.
At a later date, the island became a stronghold of the Mackenzies of Kintail, originally vassals of William I, Earl of Ross. At this early stage, the castle is said to have been garrisoned by Macraes and Maclennans, both clans that were later closely associated with the Mackenzies. Traditional Mackenzie clan histories relate that Earl William sought advantage from the Treaty of Perth of 1266, by which King Magnus VI of Norway ceded the Hebrides to Scotland, and demanded that his kinsman Kenneth Mackenzie return the castle to allow his expansion into the islands. Mackenzie refused, and Earl William led an assault against Eilean Donan that the Mackenzies and their allies repulsed.
The Mackenzie clan histories also claim (with little, if any, supporting contemporary evidence), that Robert the Bruce sheltered at Eilean Donan during the winter of 1306 to 1307; the castle escaped any other involvement in the Wars of Scottish Independence. In 1331 Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, sent an officer to Eilean Donan to warn the occupants of his forthcoming visit. In preparation 50 wrongdoers were rounded up and executed, their heads being displayed on the castle walls to Moray's approval. By the middle of the 14th century the Mackenzies are said to have been on the losing side in the ongoing feuding with the Earls of Ross. William III, Earl of Ross granted Kintail to Raghnall Mac Ruaidhrí in 1342. With the assistance of Leod Macgilleandrais, the Earl allegedly apprehended Kenneth Mackenzie, 3rd of Kintail, and had him executed in 1346 at Inverness. Through this period Eilean Donan is said to have been held by Duncan Macaulay for the Mackenzies, against the Earl and his allies. Kenneth's young son Murdo Mackenzie supposedly evaded the Earl's attempts to eliminate him, and on the return of David II from exile Murdo Mackenzie was allegedly confirmed in the lands of Kintail and Eilean Donan by a charter of 1362 (of which, however, no trace survives to the present day). At some point in the earlier 14th century it is thought that the Clan Macrae began to settle in Kintail as a body, having migrated from the Beauly Firth, and there gained the trust of the Mackenzie lairds through possible kinship and an advantageous marriage. The Macraes began to act as Mackenzie's bodyguards, acquiring the soubriquet "Mackenzie's shirt of mail".
James I, determined to pacify the Highlands, journeyed to Inverness in 1427 and invited the principal chiefs to meet him there. Allegedly among them was the young Alexander Mackenzie, 6th Earl of Kintail. James then arrested him, along with the other chiefs, on their arrival. Mackenzie clan histories relate that, although several chiefs were executed or imprisoned, Alexander, due to his youth, was instead sent to Perth to attend school. Alexander's uncles attempted to seize control of Kintail, but the constable Duncan Macaulay continued to hold Eilean Donan on his behalf. Fionnla Dubh mac Gillechriosd, considered by clan historians to be the founder of the Clan Macrae in Kintail, was dispatched to fetch the young laird back. During his lairdship Alexander appears to have supported the monarchy against the MacDonald Lords of the Isles and was allegedly rewarded by another charter of Kintail in 1463. Alexander died in about 1488 at a great age, and was succeeded by Kenneth Mackenzie, 7th of Kintail who won the Battle of Blar Na Pairce against the MacDonalds. Kenneth died a few years later and was succeeded first by his eldest son, then on his death in 1497 by his second son, John of Killin, who was still a minor. His uncle, Hector Roy Mackenzie, attempted to usurp the Mackenzie lands and installed his own constable in Eilean Donan, Malcolm Mac Ian Charrich Macrae. Hector's lawless activities caused the Mackenzies to be branded rebels, and in 1503 the Earl of Huntly offered to deliver Eilean Donan to the king, and to hold it on his behalf. James IV supplied a ship to support the enterprise. Eventually, John compelled his uncle to relinquish his claim, and Hector agreed to hand over Eilean Donan. The constable refused however, and John's supporters laid siege. Malcolm Mac Ian Charrich was eventually persuaded by Hector to relinquish the castle, after which he was dismissed as constable and Christopher Macrae (Gillechriosd Mac Fionnlagh Mhic Rath) was appointed in his place in around 1511. John of Killin obtained a further charter of Kintail and Eilean Donan in 1509.
In 1539, Donald Gorm Macdonald of Sleat ravaged the lands of MacLeod of Dunvegan on Skye and then attacked the Mackenzie lands of Kinlochewe, where Miles (Maolmure), brother of Christopher Macrae, was killed. After a series of retaliatory raids, Donald Gorm learned that Eilean Donan was weakly garrisoned and launched a surprise attack. In fact, only two people were in the castle: the recently appointed constable Iain Dubh Matheson and the warden. Duncan MacGillechriosd of the Clan Macrae, son of the former constable, arrived at the start of the attack and killed several MacDonalds at the postern gate. Arrows launched by the attackers killed Matheson and the warden, but MacGillechriosd managed to hit Donald Gorm with his last arrow, fatally wounding Gorm, and the Macdonalds retreated. Duncan MacGillechriosd expected to be appointed as the new constable but was considered too headstrong: the local clergyman John MacMhurchaidh Dhuibh (John Murchison) was appointed as a compromise between rival Macrae and Maclennan interests. Furious at this treatment, MacGillechriosd left Kintail and joined the service of Lord Lovat, though he eventually returned to settle at Inverinate. Meanwhile, an aggrieved Maclennan apparently shot MacMhurchaidh in the buttocks with an arrow.
MacGillechriosd's son Christopher Macrae became constable of Eilean Donan in turn, and held the castle during yet another clan feud, this time between the Mackenzies and the MacDonalds of Glengarry. Feuding broke out in 1580 and continued for almost 25 years. In around 1602 Eilean Donan was the base for a sea skirmish at the narrows of Kyle Rhea led by Christopher's son Duncan. During the action the MacDonalds were driven on to the Cailleach Rock at the eastern tip of Skye and Angus, son of MacDonald of Glengarry, was killed. Christopher was succeeded as constable by the Rev. Murdoch Murchison, minister of Kintail.
The Rev. Farquhar Macrae, son of Christopher Macrae, was born at the castle in 1580. After attending Edinburgh University and taking holy orders, in 1618 he was appointed constable of the castle and minister of Kintail on the death of Murdoch Murchison. Colin Mackenzie of Kintail was created Earl of Seaforth in 1623. He lived mainly at Chanonry of Ross in Fortrose, but made regular visits to Eilean Donan where the constable was required to entertain him and his retinue of between 300 and 500 retainers, as well as the neighbouring lairds. In 1635 George Mackenzie, 2nd Earl of Seaforth, appointed Farquhar as tutor to his six-year-old son Kenneth, who was subsequently raised at Eilean Donan.
In the civil wars of the mid 17th century, the Earl of Seaforth sided with Charles I. In 1650, after the king's execution, the Parliament of Scotland ordered a garrison to Eilean Donan. The local people did not welcome the garrison. When a party of 30 soldiers came out from the castle to request provisions from the local people, a band of 10 men who opposed their demands met the occupiers. An argument broke out, which led to the garrison men being driven off with several casualties. Shortly thereafter the garrison departed. The following year the Earl's brother, Simon Mackenzie of Lochslin, gathered troops for the royalist cause around Eilean Donan. For reasons unrecorded, he fell out with Farquhar Macrae and demanded his removal from the castle. Farquhar initially resisted, and despite interventions by the young Kenneth, had to be marched out by Lochslin and George Mackenzie (later Earl of Cromartie). He was finally persuaded to leave without violence, stating that he was too old to dwell in the cold castle. Farquhar was thus the last constable to dwell in Eilean Donan until its reconstruction, although he retained the ministry of Kintail until his death in 1662, at the age of 82.
After this time, the castle was briefly occupied by the Earl of Balcarres and his wife, who were in the Highlands in support of the Earl of Glencairn's royalist uprising, although Balcarres later disagreed with Glencairn and departed. In June 1654 General Monck, Oliver Cromwell's military governor in Scotland, marched through Kintail while suppressing the uprising. His troops destroyed much property, and stole 360 of Farquhar Macrae's cattle, though only one man was killed.
In 1689, King James VII of the House of Stuart was declared to have to forfeit the throne, and the crown was offered to William of Orange, in the so-called "Glorious Revolution". The revolution also established Presbyterianism in Scotland, although the Highlands generally remained Roman Catholic and loyal to the Stuarts. A series of Jacobite risings followed, leading to an increased military presence in Scotland as government forces attempted to penetrate and subdue the Highlands. In 1714 while surveying fortifications for the government, the military engineer Lewis Petit made the only surviving drawing of Eilean Donan. The sketch-elevation and carefully drawn plan show a dilapidated castle, largely roofless but for a small building by the entrance.
A major Jacobite uprising took place in 1715. Led by the Earl of Mar, it was an attempt to restore the exiled James Stuart, the "Old Pretender", to the throne. William Mackenzie, 5th Earl of Seaforth, joined the Jacobite army, leading out men of the Clan Mackenzie and Clan Macrae. The Macraes mustered at Eilean Donan, and are said to have danced on the roof of the castle before setting out to the Battle of Sheriffmuir where 58 Macraes were among the Jacobite dead. The battle was indecisive and the rising collapsed soon after.
Following the failure of the rising of 1715, the Jacobites found new support from Spain, now opposing both Britain and France in the War of the Quadruple Alliance. The Duke of Ormonde led the main invasion fleet from Spain, while an advance party of 300 Spanish soldiers under George Keith, 10th Earl Marischal, arrived in Loch Duich in April 1719, and occupied Eilean Donan Castle. The expected uprising of Highlanders did not occur, and the main Spanish invasion force never arrived. At the beginning of May, the Royal Navy sent ships to the area. Early in the morning on Sunday 10 May 1719 HMS Worcester, HMS Flamborough and HMS Enterprise anchored off Eilean Donan and sent a boat ashore under a flag of truce to negotiate. When the Spanish soldiers in the castle fired at the boat, it was recalled and all three frigates opened fire on the castle for an hour or more. The next day the bombardment continued while a landing party was prepared. In the evening under the cover of an intense cannonade, a detachment went ashore in the ships' boats and captured the castle against little resistance. According to Worcester's log, in the castle were "an Irishman, a captain, a Spanish lieutenant, a serjeant, one Scottish rebel and 39 Spanish soldiers, 343 barrels of powder and 52 barrels of musquet shot." The naval force spent the next two days in the castle and landed 27 barrels of gunpowder. The frigates' official logs are curiously worded, perhaps to conceal the reputed fact that the Macraes succeeded in destroying the castle although in naval hands, in order to prevent the English from garrisoning it: at all events, the castle was demolished by the gunpowder exploding. Flamborough then took the Spanish prisoners to Edinburgh. The remaining Spanish troops were defeated on 10 June at the Battle of Glen Shiel.
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.
The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.
The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.
Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.
Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".
Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".
Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West. Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way. The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes.
Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities. Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land. In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.
In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.
When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected. This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms. Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.
The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.
Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.
According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".
The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.
For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.
In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.
A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.
Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.
The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.
There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.
Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.
The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.
These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.
The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.
Climate
The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.
Places of interest
An Teallach
Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)
Arrochar Alps
Balmoral Castle
Balquhidder
Battlefield of Culloden
Beinn Alligin
Beinn Eighe
Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station
Ben Lomond
Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Cairngorms National Park
Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore
Cairngorm Mountains
Caledonian Canal
Cape Wrath
Carrick Castle
Castle Stalker
Castle Tioram
Chanonry Point
Conic Hill
Culloden Moor
Dunadd
Duart Castle
Durness
Eilean Donan
Fingal's Cave (Staffa)
Fort George
Glen Coe
Glen Etive
Glen Kinglas
Glen Lyon
Glen Orchy
Glenshee Ski Centre
Glen Shiel
Glen Spean
Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)
Grampian Mountains
Hebrides
Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.
Highland Wildlife Park
Inveraray Castle
Inveraray Jail
Inverness Castle
Inverewe Garden
Iona Abbey
Isle of Staffa
Kilchurn Castle
Kilmartin Glen
Liathach
Lecht Ski Centre
Loch Alsh
Loch Ard
Loch Awe
Loch Assynt
Loch Earn
Loch Etive
Loch Fyne
Loch Goil
Loch Katrine
Loch Leven
Loch Linnhe
Loch Lochy
Loch Lomond
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park
Loch Lubnaig
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Morlich
Loch Ness
Loch Nevis
Loch Rannoch
Loch Tay
Lochranza
Luss
Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)
Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran
Rannoch Moor
Red Cuillin
Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83
River Carron, Wester Ross
River Spey
River Tay
Ross and Cromarty
Smoo Cave
Stob Coire a' Chàirn
Stac Polly
Strathspey Railway
Sutherland
Tor Castle
Torridon Hills
Urquhart Castle
West Highland Line (scenic railway)
West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)
Wester Ross
Museo de Madinat Al-Zahra
(Museo arqueológico y centro de interpretación del Conjunto de Madinat al-Zahra)
Ctra. de Córdoba a Palma del Río, A-431, km 5.5, Córdoba
Arquitectos: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos: Fuensanta Nieto y Enrique Sobejano. Arquitecto de proyecto Miguel Ubarrechena. Equipo de proyecto Carlos Ballesteros, Pedro Quero y Juan Carlos Redondo. Dirección de obra: Fuensanta Nieto, Enrique Sobejano y Miguel Mesas Izquierdo. Proyecto museográfico: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos / Frade Arquitectos, S.L. Concurso: 1999 Proyecto: 2002 Finalización: 2009
Los Arquitectos describen su proyecto:
“Los restos de la antigua ciudad hispano-musulmana sugerían un diálogo con quienes mil años antes la habían concebido y construido, pero también con el paciente trabajo de los arqueólogos y con el paisaje agrícola circundante, al que la geometría de las ruinas otorgaba una inesperada cualidad abstracta. El terreno del recinto arqueológico destinado al museo provocaba, no obstante, sentimientos encontrados.
Por una parte, la añoranza de un pasado remoto aún por descubrir impregnaba el paisaje que se extendía hacia la sierra de Córdoba. Por otra parte, el desordenado avance de las construcciones recientes se cernía inquietante sobre el entorno de lo que un día fue la ciudad palatina. Nuestra primera reacción al llegar al lugar habría de marcar, desde el primer momento, la futura propuesta: no debíamos edificar en aquel paisaje.
Ante una extensión de tal amplitud, que aún espera ser excavada, decidimos actuar como lo haría un arqueólogo: no construyendo un nuevo edificio, sino encontrándolo bajo tierra, como si el paso del tiempo lo hubiera ocultado hasta el día de hoy. De esta forma, el proyecto descubre la planta de un museo subterráneo, que articula sus espacios en torno a una secuencia de llenos y vacíos, áreas cubiertas y patios que guían al visitante en su recorrido. A partir del vestíbulo principal se extiende un amplio patio de planta cuadrada que, como un claustro, organiza en torno suyo los espacios públicos principales: salón de actos, cafetería, tienda, biblioteca, y salas de exposición. Un patio profundo y longitudinal articula las zonas de uso privado: administración, talleres de conservación e investigación. Un último patio constituye la prolongación al exterior de las áreas expositivas del museo. Las zonas de almacenamiento, concebidas como grandes espacios visitables iluminados cenitalmente, se funden en los recorridos del edificio con las áreas públicas de exposición y difusión. La propia concepción del proyecto lleva implícito un posible futuro crecimiento, pudiéndose agregar nuevos pabellones como si de nuevas excavaciones se tratase.
El nuevo museo establece casi imperceptiblemente un permanente diálogo con la arquitectura y el paisaje de la antigua medina árabe. La planta de doble cuadrado del museo se hace homotética con la de la ciudad, los jardines evocan la geometría abandonada de una excavación, los muros de hormigón y las cubiertas de acero cortén reflejan en el blanco y el rojo los colores con que originalmente estuvieron estucados los muros de la ciudad califal. La luz, la sombra, la textura, el material, abstraen la riqueza perceptiva que transmiten las ruinas arqueológicas.
El museo de Madinat al-Zahra aparece en el paisaje silenciosamente, como si hubiera sido encontrado bajo tierra, del mismo modo que a lo largo de los años continuará ocurriendo con los restos de la antigua ciudad de los califas omeyas.”
En “Museos de Andalucía” podemos leer:
El Museo, abierto al público en octubre de 2009, es un complejo edificio que contiene los espacios propios de un museo moderno, así como toda la infraestructura dedicada a la gestión patrimonial que demanda un conjunto arqueológico de la magnitud de la ciudad califal. El edificio está concebido como el punto de partida para la visita al yacimiento, con una presentación y exposición museográfica sobre Madinat al-Zahra.
La creación del Museo resuelve varios problemas planteados desde el comienzo de la recuperación del yacimiento en 1911. El primer edificio construido para dar apoyo a la excavación quedó pronto obsoleto por la ingente cantidad de material arqueológico que se fue almacenando en sus instalaciones y por la insuficiencia de espacios expositivos.
El Museo viene a resolver, además, varias demandas del Conjunto, referidas tanto a la difusión y función didáctica de la institución, como a la tarea de custodia y conservación que esta institución tiene encomendada.
Destaca en el edificio su ubicación exterior a la ciudad, aprovechando uno de sus caminos originales de acceso, de forma que no condiciona ni las excavaciones futuras ni el crecimiento en extensión de las mismas. Este compromiso de la nueva infraestructura con el yacimiento se extiende también al paisaje, pues el proyecto planteado por el estudio de arquitectura Nieto y Sobejano la concibe como una edificación que se oculta parcialmente en el territorio, para no interferir ni en la contemplación del paisaje ni en el fundamental protagonismo de la ciudad califal.
Se trata, en definitiva, de una infraestructura, ideada para facilitar la comprensión del yacimiento y desarrollar a todos los niveles sus potencialidades. Se concibe como una infraestructura para impulsar nuevos proyectos de investigación, conservación y difusión de la ciudad de Madinat al-Zahra y toda la ordenación territorial que constituye su entorno. Cuenta con los siguientes servicios:
Área cultural, expositiva y didáctica: Auditorio, Exposición permanente, Biblioteca Especializada "Manuel Ocaña", Aula didáctica y Sala de seminarios. Área de conservación, investigación y Administración: Almacenes, Talleres de restauración, Centro de documentación, Oficinas y despachos. Otros servicios: Tienda con librería y Cafetería-restaurante.
Premios:
2009: Finalista Premio Intervención en Patrimonio Arquitectónico Español. The International Architecture Award. The Chicago Athenaeum Museum.
2010: Aga Khan Award for Architecture.
2011: Piranesi Prix de Rome. Obra Seleccionada Premio de Arquitectura Contemporánea de la Unión Europea – Premio Mies van der Rohe. Finalista Premio Arquitectura Española. Finalista Premios FAD
2012: European Museum of the Year Award
www.nietosobejano.com/project.aspx?i=1&t=MADINAT_ALZA...
www.metalocus.es/es/noticias/nieto-sobejano-arquitectos-m...
www.museosdeandalucia.es/cultura/museos/CAMA/?lng=es
NietoSobejano Arquitectos
Museo de Madinat Al-Zahra
(Museo arqueológico y centro de interpretación del Conjunto de Madinat al-Zahra)
Ctra. de Córdoba a Palma del Río, A-431, km 5.5, Córdoba
Arquitectos: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos: Fuensanta Nieto y Enrique Sobejano. Arquitecto de proyecto Miguel Ubarrechena. Equipo de proyecto Carlos Ballesteros, Pedro Quero y Juan Carlos Redondo. Dirección de obra: Fuensanta Nieto, Enrique Sobejano y Miguel Mesas Izquierdo. Proyecto museográfico: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos / Frade Arquitectos, S.L. Concurso: 1999 Proyecto: 2002 Finalización: 2009
Los Arquitectos describen su proyecto:
“Los restos de la antigua ciudad hispano-musulmana sugerían un diálogo con quienes mil años antes la habían concebido y construido, pero también con el paciente trabajo de los arqueólogos y con el paisaje agrícola circundante, al que la geometría de las ruinas otorgaba una inesperada cualidad abstracta. El terreno del recinto arqueológico destinado al museo provocaba, no obstante, sentimientos encontrados.
Por una parte, la añoranza de un pasado remoto aún por descubrir impregnaba el paisaje que se extendía hacia la sierra de Córdoba. Por otra parte, el desordenado avance de las construcciones recientes se cernía inquietante sobre el entorno de lo que un día fue la ciudad palatina. Nuestra primera reacción al llegar al lugar habría de marcar, desde el primer momento, la futura propuesta: no debíamos edificar en aquel paisaje.
Ante una extensión de tal amplitud, que aún espera ser excavada, decidimos actuar como lo haría un arqueólogo: no construyendo un nuevo edificio, sino encontrándolo bajo tierra, como si el paso del tiempo lo hubiera ocultado hasta el día de hoy. De esta forma, el proyecto descubre la planta de un museo subterráneo, que articula sus espacios en torno a una secuencia de llenos y vacíos, áreas cubiertas y patios que guían al visitante en su recorrido. A partir del vestíbulo principal se extiende un amplio patio de planta cuadrada que, como un claustro, organiza en torno suyo los espacios públicos principales: salón de actos, cafetería, tienda, biblioteca, y salas de exposición. Un patio profundo y longitudinal articula las zonas de uso privado: administración, talleres de conservación e investigación. Un último patio constituye la prolongación al exterior de las áreas expositivas del museo. Las zonas de almacenamiento, concebidas como grandes espacios visitables iluminados cenitalmente, se funden en los recorridos del edificio con las áreas públicas de exposición y difusión. La propia concepción del proyecto lleva implícito un posible futuro crecimiento, pudiéndose agregar nuevos pabellones como si de nuevas excavaciones se tratase.
El nuevo museo establece casi imperceptiblemente un permanente diálogo con la arquitectura y el paisaje de la antigua medina árabe. La planta de doble cuadrado del museo se hace homotética con la de la ciudad, los jardines evocan la geometría abandonada de una excavación, los muros de hormigón y las cubiertas de acero cortén reflejan en el blanco y el rojo los colores con que originalmente estuvieron estucados los muros de la ciudad califal. La luz, la sombra, la textura, el material, abstraen la riqueza perceptiva que transmiten las ruinas arqueológicas.
El museo de Madinat al-Zahra aparece en el paisaje silenciosamente, como si hubiera sido encontrado bajo tierra, del mismo modo que a lo largo de los años continuará ocurriendo con los restos de la antigua ciudad de los califas omeyas.”
En “Museos de Andalucía” podemos leer:
El Museo, abierto al público en octubre de 2009, es un complejo edificio que contiene los espacios propios de un museo moderno, así como toda la infraestructura dedicada a la gestión patrimonial que demanda un conjunto arqueológico de la magnitud de la ciudad califal. El edificio está concebido como el punto de partida para la visita al yacimiento, con una presentación y exposición museográfica sobre Madinat al-Zahra.
La creación del Museo resuelve varios problemas planteados desde el comienzo de la recuperación del yacimiento en 1911. El primer edificio construido para dar apoyo a la excavación quedó pronto obsoleto por la ingente cantidad de material arqueológico que se fue almacenando en sus instalaciones y por la insuficiencia de espacios expositivos.
El Museo viene a resolver, además, varias demandas del Conjunto, referidas tanto a la difusión y función didáctica de la institución, como a la tarea de custodia y conservación que esta institución tiene encomendada.
Destaca en el edificio su ubicación exterior a la ciudad, aprovechando uno de sus caminos originales de acceso, de forma que no condiciona ni las excavaciones futuras ni el crecimiento en extensión de las mismas. Este compromiso de la nueva infraestructura con el yacimiento se extiende también al paisaje, pues el proyecto planteado por el estudio de arquitectura Nieto y Sobejano la concibe como una edificación que se oculta parcialmente en el territorio, para no interferir ni en la contemplación del paisaje ni en el fundamental protagonismo de la ciudad califal.
Se trata, en definitiva, de una infraestructura, ideada para facilitar la comprensión del yacimiento y desarrollar a todos los niveles sus potencialidades. Se concibe como una infraestructura para impulsar nuevos proyectos de investigación, conservación y difusión de la ciudad de Madinat al-Zahra y toda la ordenación territorial que constituye su entorno. Cuenta con los siguientes servicios:
Área cultural, expositiva y didáctica: Auditorio, Exposición permanente, Biblioteca Especializada "Manuel Ocaña", Aula didáctica y Sala de seminarios. Área de conservación, investigación y Administración: Almacenes, Talleres de restauración, Centro de documentación, Oficinas y despachos. Otros servicios: Tienda con librería y Cafetería-restaurante.
Premios:
2009: Finalista Premio Intervención en Patrimonio Arquitectónico Español. The International Architecture Award. The Chicago Athenaeum Museum.
2010: Aga Khan Award for Architecture.
2011: Piranesi Prix de Rome. Obra Seleccionada Premio de Arquitectura Contemporánea de la Unión Europea – Premio Mies van der Rohe. Finalista Premio Arquitectura Española. Finalista Premios FAD
2012: European Museum of the Year Award
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NietoSobejano Arquitectos
Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in Scotland, the United Kingdom and the British Isles. The summit is 1,345 metres (4,413 ft) above sea level and is the highest land in any direction for 739 kilometres (459 miles). Ben Nevis stands at the western end of the Grampian Mountains in the Highland region of Lochaber, close to the town of Fort William.
The mountain is a popular destination, attracting an estimated 130,000 ascents a year, around three-quarters of which use the Mountain Track from Glen Nevis. The 700-metre (2,300 ft) cliffs of the north face are among the highest in Scotland, providing classic scrambles and rock climbs of all difficulties for climbers and mountaineers. They are also the principal locations in Scotland for ice climbing.
The summit, which is the collapsed dome of an ancient volcano, features the ruins of an observatory which was continuously staffed between 1883 and 1904. The meteorological data collected during this period is still important for understanding Scottish mountain weather. C. T. R. Wilson was inspired to invent the cloud chamber after a period spent working at the observatory.
Ben Nevis is the Anglicisation of the Scottish Gaelic name Beinn Nibheis. Whilst Beinn is the common Scottish Gaelic word for 'mountain' the origin of Nibheis is unclear.
Nibheis may preserve an earlier Pictish form, *Nebestis or *Nebesta, involving the Celtic root *neb, meaning 'clouds' (compare: Welsh nef )., thus 'Cloudy Mountain'.
Nibheis may also have an origin with the words nèamh meaning 'heaven' (which is related to the modern Scottish Gaelic word neamh meaning 'bright, shining') and bathais meaning 'the top of a man's head'. Thus, Beinn Nibheis could derive from beinn nèamh-bhathais, "the mountain with its head in the clouds", or 'mountain of heaven'.
The Scottish Gaelic word neimh can be translated as 'malice', 'poison' or 'venom' giving 'venomous mountain', possibly describing the storms that envelop the summit.
As is common for many Scottish mountains, it is known both to locals and visitors as simply the Ben.
Ben Nevis forms a massif with its neighbours to the northeast, Càrn Mòr Dearg, to which it is linked by the Càrn Mòr Dearg Arête, Aonach Beag and Aonach Mòr. All four are Munros and among the eleven mountains in Scotland over 4,000 feet (1,200 m) (of which nine are currently listed as Munros).
Western flank of the Nevis massif; from Sgùrr Dhòmhnuill
The western and southern flanks of Ben Nevis rise 1,200 metres (3,900 ft) in about 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) above the River Nevis flowing down Glen Nevis – the longest and steepest hill slope in Britain – with the result that the mountain presents an aspect of massive bulk on this side. To the north, by contrast, cliffs drop some 600 metres (2,000 ft) to Coire Leis
A descent of 200 metres (600') from this corrie leads to the Charles Inglis Clark Memorial Hut (known as the CIC Hut), a private mountain hut 680 metres (2,230 ft) above sea level, owned by the Scottish Mountaineering Club and used as a base for the many climbing routes on the mountain's north face. The hut is just above the confluence of Allt a' Mhuilinn and Allt Coire na Ciste.
In addition to the main 1,345-metre (4,413 ft) summit, Ben Nevis has two subsidiary "tops" listed in Munro's Tables, both of which are called Càrn Dearg ("red hill"). The higher of these, at 1,221 metres (4,006 ft), is to the northwest, and is often mistaken for Ben Nevis itself in views from the Fort William area. The other Càrn Dearg (1,020 m (3,350 ft)) juts out into Glen Nevis on the mountain's southwestern side. A lower hill, Meall an t-Suidhe (711 metres (2,333 ft)), is further west, forming a saddle with Ben Nevis which contains a small loch, Lochan Meall an t-Suidhe. The popular tourist path from Glen Nevis skirts the side of this hill before ascending Ben Nevis's broad western flank.
Ben Nevis is all that remains of a Devonian volcano that met a cataclysmic end in the Carboniferous period around 350 million years ago. Evidence near the summit shows light-coloured granite (which had cooled in subterranean chambers several kilometres; miles beneath the surface) lies among dark basaltic lavas (that form only on the surface). The two lying side by side is evidence the huge volcano collapsed in on itself creating an explosion comparable to Thera (2nd millennium BC) or Krakatoa (1883). The mountain is now all that remains of the imploded inner dome of the volcano. Its form has been extensively shaped by glaciation.
Research has shown igneous rock from the Devonian period (around 400 million years ago) intrudes into the surrounding metamorphic schists; the intrusions take the form of a series of concentric ring dikes. The innermost of these, known as the Inner Granite, constitutes the southern bulk of the mountain above Lochan Meall an t-Suidhe, and also the neighbouring ridge of Càrn Mòr Dearg; Meall an t-Suidhe forms part of the Outer Granite, which is redder in colour. The summit dome itself, together with the steep northern cliffs, is composed of andesite and basaltic lavas.
Ben Nevis has a highland tundra climate (ET in the Köppen classification). Ben Nevis's elevation, maritime location and topography frequently lead to cool and cloudy weather conditions, which can pose a danger to ill-equipped walkers. According to the observations carried out at the summit observatory from 1883 to 1904, fog was present on the summit for almost 80% of the time between November and January, and 55% of the time in May and June. The average winter temperature was around −5 °C (23 °F), and the mean monthly temperature for the year was −0.5 °C (31.1 °F). In an average year the summit sees 261 gales, and receives 4,350 millimetres (171 in) of rainfall, compared to only 2,050 millimetres (81 in) in nearby Fort William, 840 millimetres (33 in) in Inverness and 580 millimetres (23 in) in London. Rainfall on Ben Nevis is about twice as high in the winter as it is in the spring and summer. Snow can be found on the mountain almost all year round, particularly in the gullies of the north face – with the higher reaches of Observatory Gully holding snow until September most years and sometimes until the new snows of the following season.
The first recorded ascent of Ben Nevis was made on 17 August 1771 by James Robertson, an Edinburgh botanist, who was in the region to collect botanical specimens. Another early ascent was in 1774 by John Williams, who provided the first account of the mountain's geological structure. John Keats climbed the mountain in 1818, comparing the ascent to "mounting ten St. Pauls without the convenience of a staircase". The following year William MacGillivray, who was later to become a distinguished naturalist, reached the summit only to find "fragments of earthen and glass ware, chicken bones, corks, and bits of paper". It was not until 1847 that Ben Nevis was confirmed by the Ordnance Survey as the highest mountain in Britain and Ireland, ahead of its rival Ben Macdui.
The summit observatory was built in the summer of 1883, and would remain in operation for 21 years. The first path to the summit was built at the same time as the observatory and was designed to allow ponies to carry up supplies, with a maximum gradient of one in five. The opening of the path and the observatory made the ascent of the mountain increasingly popular, all the more so after the arrival of the West Highland Railway in Fort William in 1894. Around this time the first of several proposals was made for a rack railway to the summit, none of which came to fruition.
In 1911, an enterprising Ford dealer named Henry Alexander ascended the mountain in a Model T as a publicity stunt. The ascent was captured on film and can be seen in the archives of the British Film Institute. A statue of Alexander and the car was unveiled in Fort William in 2018.
In 2000, the Ben Nevis Estate, comprising all of the south side of the mountain including the summit, was bought by the Scottish conservation charity the John Muir Trust.
In 2016, the height of Ben Nevis was officially remeasured to be 1344.527m by Ordnance Survey. The height of Ben Nevis will therefore be shown on new Ordnance Survey maps as 1,345 metres (4,411 ft) instead of the now obsolete value of 1,344 metres (4,409 ft).
The 1883 Pony Track to the summit (also known as the Ben Path, the Mountain Path or the Tourist Route) remains the simplest and most popular route of ascent. It begins at Achintee on the east side of Glen Nevis about 2 km (1.2 mi) from Fort William town centre, at around 20 metres (60') above sea level. Bridges from the Visitor Centre and the youth hostel now allow access from the west side of Glen Nevis. The path climbs steeply to the saddle by Lochan Meall an t-Suidhe (colloquially known as the 'Halfway Lochan') at 570 m, then ascends the remaining 700 metres (2000') up the stony west flank of Ben Nevis in a series of zig-zags. The path is regularly maintained but running water, uneven rocks and loose scree make it hazardous and slippery in places. Thanks to the zig-zags, the path is not unusually steep apart from in the initial stages, but inexperienced walkers should be aware that the descent is relatively arduous and wearing on the knees.
A route popular with experienced hillwalkers starts at Torlundy, a few miles north-east of Fort William on the A82 road, and follows the path alongside the Allt a' Mhuilinn. It can also be reached from Glen Nevis by following the Pony Track as far as Lochan Meall an t-Suidhe, then descending slightly to the CIC Hut. The route then ascends Càrn Mòr Dearg and continues along the Càrn Mòr Dearg Arête ("CMD Arête") before climbing steeply to the summit of Ben Nevis. This route involves a total of 1,500 metres (5000') of ascent and requires modest scrambling ability and a head for heights. In common with other approaches on this side of the mountain, it has the advantage of giving an extensive view of the cliffs of the north face, which are hidden from the Pony Track.
It is also possible to climb Ben Nevis from the Nevis Gorge car park at Steall at the head of the road up Glen Nevis, either by the south-east ridge or via the summit of Càrn Dearg (south-west). These routes require mild scrambling, are shorter and steeper than the Pony Track, and tend only to be used by experienced hill walkers.
The summit of Ben Nevis comprises a large stony plateau of about 40 hectares (100 acres). The highest point is marked with a large, solidly built cairn atop which sits an Ordnance Survey trig point. The summit is the highest ground in any direction for 459 miles (739 km) before the Scandinavian Mountains in western Norway are reached.
The ruined walls of the observatory are a prominent feature on the summit. An emergency shelter has been built on top of the observatory tower for the benefit of those caught out by bad weather. Although the base of the tower is slightly lower than the true summit of the mountain, the roof of the shelter overtops the trig point by several feet, making it the highest man-made structure in the UK. A war memorial to the dead of World War II is located next to the observatory.
On 17 May 2006, a piano that had been buried under one of the cairns on the peak was uncovered by the John Muir Trust, which owns much of the mountain. The piano is believed to have been carried up for charity by removal men from Dundee over 20 years earlier.
The view from the UK's highest point is extensive. Under ideal conditions, it can extend to over 190 kilometres (120 mi), including such mountains as the Torridon Hills, Morven in Caithness, Lochnagar, Ben Lomond, Barra Head and to Knocklayd in County Antrim, Northern Ireland.
A meteorological observatory on the summit was first proposed by the Scottish Meteorological Society (SMS) in the late-1870s, at a time when similar observatories were being built around the world to study the weather at high altitude. In the summer of 1881, Clement Lindley Wragge climbed the mountain daily to make observations (earning him the nickname "Inclement Rag"), leading to the opening on 17 October 1883 of a permanent observatory run by the SMS. The building was staffed full-time until 1904, when it was closed due to inadequate funding. The twenty years worth of readings still provide the most comprehensive set of data on mountain weather in Great Britain.
In September 1894, C. T. R. Wilson was employed at the observatory for a couple of weeks as temporary relief for one of the permanent staff. During this period, he witnessed a Brocken spectre and glory, caused by the sun casting a shadow on a cloud below the observer. He subsequently tried to reproduce these phenomena in the laboratory, resulting in his invention of the cloud chamber, used to detect ionising radiation.
Ben Nevis's popularity, climate and complex topography contribute to a high number of mountain rescue incidents. In 1999 there were 41 rescues and four fatalities on the mountain. It has also been estimated that there are several deaths annually on Ben Nevis.
In two avalanches that occurred on Ben Nevis in 2009 and 2016 two people died on both occasions. In two avalanches that occurred in 1970 and 2019 three people died on both occasions. A climber died in an avalanche on the north face in 2022.
Some accidents arise over difficulties in navigating to or from the summit, especially in poor visibility. The problem stems from the fact that the summit plateau is roughly kidney-shaped and surrounded by cliffs on three sides; the danger is particularly accentuated when the main path is obscured by snow. Two precise compass bearings taken in succession are necessary to navigate from the summit cairn to the west flank, from where a descent can be made on the Pony Track in relative safety.
In the late 1990s, Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team erected two posts on the summit plateau to assist walkers attempting the descent in foggy conditions. These posts were subsequently cut down by climbers, sparking controversy in mountaineering circles on the ethics of such additions. Critics argued that cairns and posts are an unnecessary man-made intrusion into the natural landscape, which create a false sense of security and could lessen mountaineers' sense of responsibility for their own safety.
Supporters of navigational aids pointed to the high number of accidents that occurred on the mountain. Between 1990 and 1995 alone there were 13 fatalities, although eight of these were due to falls while rock climbing rather than navigational error. Also there is a long tradition of placing such aids on the summit, and the potentially life-saving role they could play.
In 2016, the John Muir Trust cleared a number of smaller informal cairns which had recently been erected by visitors, many near the top of gullies, which were seen as dangerous as they could confuse walkers using them for navigation.
The north face of Ben Nevis is riven with buttresses, ridges, towers and pinnacles, and contains many classic scrambles and rock climbs. It is of major importance for British winter climbing, with many of its routes holding snow often until late April. It was one of the first places in Scotland to receive the attention of serious mountaineers; a partial ascent and, the following day, a complete descent of Tower Ridge in early September 1892 is the earliest documented climbing expedition on Ben Nevis. (It was not climbed from bottom to top in entirety for another two years). The Scottish Mountaineering Club's Charles Inglis Clark hut was built below the north face in Coire Leis in 1929. Because of its remote location, it is said to be the only genuine alpine hut in Britain. It remains popular with climbers, especially in winter.
Tower Ridge is the longest of the north face's four main ridges, with around 600 metres (2000') of ascent. It is not technically demanding (its grade is Difficult), and most pitches can be tackled unroped by competent climbers, but it is committing and very exposed. Castle Ridge (Moderate), the northernmost of the main ridges, is an easier scramble, while Observatory Ridge (Very Difficult), the closest ridge to the summit, is "technically the hardest of the Nevis ridges in summer and winter". Between the Tower and Observatory Ridges are the Tower and Gardyloo Gullies; the latter takes its name from the cry of "garde à l'eau" (French for "watch out for the water") formerly used in Scottish cities as a warning when householders threw their waste out of a tenement window into the street. The gully's top wall was the refuse pit for the now-disused summit observatory. The North-east Buttress (Very Difficult) is the southernmost and bulkiest of the four ridges; it is as serious as Observatory Ridge but not as technically demanding, mainly because an "infamous" rock problem, the 'Man-trap', can be avoided on either side.
The north face contains dozens of graded rock climbs along its entire length, with particular concentrations on the Càrn Dearg Buttress (below the Munro top of Càrn Dearg NW) and around the North-east Buttress and Observatory Ridge. Classic rock routes include Rubicon Wall on Observatory Buttress (Severe) – whose second ascent in 1937, when it was considered the hardest route on the mountain, is described by W. H. Murray in Mountaineering in Scotland – and, on Càrn Dearg, Centurion and The Bullroar (both HVS), Torro (E2), and Titan's Wall (E3), these four described in the SMC's guide as among "the best climbs of their class in Scotland".
Many seminal lines were recorded before the First World War by pioneering Scottish climbers like J. N. Collie, Willie Naismith, Harold Raeburn, and William and Jane Inglis Clark. Other classic routes were put up by G. Graham Macphee, Dr James H. B. Bell and others between the Wars; these include Bell's 'Long Climb', at 1,400 ft (430 m) reputedly the longest sustained climb on the British mainland. In summer 1943 conscientious objector Brian Kellett made a phenomenal seventy-four repeat climbs and seventeen first ascents including fourteen solos, returning in 1944 to add fifteen more new lines, eleven solo, including his eponymous HVS on Gardyloo buttress. Much more recently, an extreme and as yet ungraded climb on Echo Wall was completed by Dave MacLeod in 2008 after two years of preparation.
The north face is also one of Scotland's foremost venues for winter mountaineering and ice climbing and holds snow until quite late in the year; in a good year, routes may remain in winter condition until mid-spring. Most of the possible rock routes are also suitable as winter climbs, including the four main ridges; Tower Ridge, for example, is grade IV on the Scottish winter grade, having been upgraded in 2009 by the Scottish Mountaineering Club after requests by the local Mountain Rescue Team, there being numerous benightments and incidents every winter season. Probably the most popular ice climb on Ben Nevis is The Curtain (IV,5) on the left side of the Càrn Dearg Buttress. At the top end of the scale, Centurion in winter is a grade VIII,8 face climb.
In February 1960 James R. Marshall and Robin Clark Smith recorded six major new ice routes in only eight days including Orion Direct (V,5 400m); this winter version of Bell's Long Climb was "the climax of a magnificent week's climbing by Smith and Marshall, and the highpoint of the step-cutting era".
The history of hill running on Ben Nevis dates back to 1895. William Swan, a barber from Fort William, made the first recorded timed ascent up the mountain on or around 27 September of that year, when he ran from the old post office in Fort William to the summit and back in 2 hours 41 minutes. The following years saw several improvements on Swan's record, but the first competitive race was held on 3 June 1898 under Scottish Amateur Athletic Association rules. Ten competitors ran the course, which started at the Lochiel Arms Hotel in Banavie and was thus longer than the route from Fort William; the winner was 21-year-old Hugh Kennedy, a gamekeeper at Tor Castle, who finished (coincidentally with Swan's original run) in 2 hours 41 minutes.
Regular races were organised until 1903, when two events were held; these were the last for 24 years, perhaps due to the closure of the summit observatory the following year. The first was from Achintee, at the foot of the Pony Track, and finished at the summit; It was won in just over an hour by Ewen MacKenzie, the observatory roadman. The second race ran from new Fort William post office, and MacKenzie lowered the record to 2 hours 10 minutes, a record he held for 34 years.
The Ben Nevis Race has been run in its current form since 1937. It now takes place on the first Saturday in September every year, with a maximum of 500 competitors taking part. It starts and finishes at the Claggan Park football ground on the outskirts of Fort William, and is 14 kilometres (8.7 mi) long with 1,340 metres (4,400 ft) of ascent. Due to the seriousness of the mountain environment, entry is restricted to those who have completed three hill races, and runners must carry waterproofs, a hat, gloves and a whistle; anyone who has not reached the summit after two hours is turned back. As of 2018, the record for the men's race has stood unbroken since 1984, when Kenny Stuart of Keswick Athletic Club won with a time of 1:25:34. The record for the women's race of 1:43:01 was set in 2018 by Victoria Wilkinson.
Ben Nevis is becoming popular with ski mountaineers and boarders. The Red Burn (Allt Coire na h-Urcaire) just to the North of the tourist path gives the easiest descent, but most if not all of the easier gullies on the North Face have been skied, as has the slope once adorned by the abseil poles into Coire Leis. No 4 gully is probably the most skied. Although Tower scoop makes it a no-fall zone, Tower Gully is becoming popular, especially in May and June when there is spring snow.
In 2018 Jöttnar pro team member Tim Howell BASE jumped off Ben Nevis which was covered by BBC Scotland.
On 6 May 2019, a team of highliners completed a crossing above the Gardyloo Gully, a new altitude record for the UK.
Also in May 2019, a team of 12, led by Dundee artist Douglas Roulston carried a 1.5-metre (4.9-foot) tall statue of the DC Thomson character Oor Wullie to the top of the mountain. The statue, which had been painted by Roulston with a 360-degree scene of the view from the summit was later sold at the Oor Wullie Big Bucket Trail charity auction to raise money for a number of Scottish children's charities.
The Ben Nevis Distillery is a single malt whisky distillery at the foot of the mountain, near Victoria Bridge to the north of Fort William. Founded in 1825 by John McDonald (known as "Long John"), it is one of the oldest licensed distilleries in Scotland, and is a popular visitor attraction in Fort William. The water used to make the whisky comes from the Allt a' Mhuilinn, the stream that flows from Ben Nevis's northern corrie. "Ben Nevis" 80/‒ organic ale is, by contrast, brewed in Bridge of Allan near Stirling.
Ben Nevis was the name of a White Star Line packet ship which in 1854 carried the group of immigrants who were to become the Wends of Texas. At least another eight vessels have carried the name since then.
A mountain in Svalbard is also named Ben Nevis, after the Scottish peak. It is 922 metres (3025') high and is south of the head of Raudfjorden, Albert I Land, in the northwestern part of the island of Spitsbergen.
A comic strip character, Wee Ben Nevis, about a Scottish Highlands boarding school student with superhuman strength and his antics were featured in the British comic The Beano from 1974 to 1977, named after the mountain.
Hung Fa Chai, a 489-metre (1605') hill in Northeast New Territories of Hong Kong was marked as Ben Nevis on historical colonial maps.
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.
The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.
The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.
Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.
Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".
Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".
Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West. Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way. The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes.
Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities. Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land. In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.
In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.
When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected. This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms. Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.
The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.
Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.
According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".
The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.
For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.
In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.
A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.
Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.
The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.
There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.
Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.
The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.
These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.
The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.
Climate
The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.
Places of interest
An Teallach
Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)
Arrochar Alps
Balmoral Castle
Balquhidder
Battlefield of Culloden
Beinn Alligin
Beinn Eighe
Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station
Ben Lomond
Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Cairngorms National Park
Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore
Cairngorm Mountains
Caledonian Canal
Cape Wrath
Carrick Castle
Castle Stalker
Castle Tioram
Chanonry Point
Conic Hill
Culloden Moor
Dunadd
Duart Castle
Durness
Eilean Donan
Fingal's Cave (Staffa)
Fort George
Glen Coe
Glen Etive
Glen Kinglas
Glen Lyon
Glen Orchy
Glenshee Ski Centre
Glen Shiel
Glen Spean
Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)
Grampian Mountains
Hebrides
Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.
Highland Wildlife Park
Inveraray Castle
Inveraray Jail
Inverness Castle
Inverewe Garden
Iona Abbey
Isle of Staffa
Kilchurn Castle
Kilmartin Glen
Liathach
Lecht Ski Centre
Loch Alsh
Loch Ard
Loch Awe
Loch Assynt
Loch Earn
Loch Etive
Loch Fyne
Loch Goil
Loch Katrine
Loch Leven
Loch Linnhe
Loch Lochy
Loch Lomond
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park
Loch Lubnaig
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Morlich
Loch Ness
Loch Nevis
Loch Rannoch
Loch Tay
Lochranza
Luss
Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)
Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran
Rannoch Moor
Red Cuillin
Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83
River Carron, Wester Ross
River Spey
River Tay
Ross and Cromarty
Smoo Cave
Stob Coire a' Chàirn
Stac Polly
Strathspey Railway
Sutherland
Tor Castle
Torridon Hills
Urquhart Castle
West Highland Line (scenic railway)
West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)
Wester Ross
Bernini riprese un mito biblico già trattato da Donatello, Michelangelo Buonarroti e Andrea Verrocchio. I David del Rinascimento trattano i momenti successivi alla morte di Golia, rappresentando così un eroe meditativo, rilassato e soddisfatto del successo dell'impresa; al contrario, Bernini prende le distanze dall'iconografia tradizionale scegliendo di dipingere David nell'istante che precede il lancio della pietra contro Golia.
Il movimento circolare implicito nella tensione del David di Gian Lorenzo Bernini attira lo spettatore nella sua orbita, invitandolo a muoversi intorno alla scultura. interessante il contrasto con la calma statica del David di Battistello appeso al muro.
Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) - David (1623-1624) - 2nd Room Galleria Borghese Rome
Bernini resumed a biblical myth already treated by Donatello, Michelangelo Buonarroti, and Andrea Verrocchio. The Renaissance David deal with the moments following the death of Goliath, thus portraying a meditative hero, relaxed and satisfied with the success of the enterprise; on the contrary, Bernini distances himself from traditional iconography by choosing to depict David in the instant preceding the stone's throw against Goliath.
The circular movment implicit in the tension of Gian Lorenzo Bernini's David draws spectator into his orbit, inviting them to move round the sculpture. Interesting contrast with the static calm of Battistello's David hanging on the wall.
Painting Outside the Box' by Ilan Vizgan
The flute raises it's voice / what is it's story? / is it bad news or good ones or what? / It's about everything and all
A poem by
Nathan Alterman/ summer celebration
Mirit Ben-Nun’s paintings escape common description. An objective observation might describe it as contemporary art, though created by an upbeat young female artist, it is far from contemporary. This art possesses no “present day” defining elements.
Mirit's paintings speak in a distant dialect seemingly of another era and location. By trying to pinpoint this time and place, we find ourselves wandering about without a solid grasping point.
Her paintings are laced with a fire-like sensuality and striking colors. The naive and archetypal characteristics remind us of folk art. Reality is lost within the ‘erroneous’ size ratio of the numerous imagery, similarly to tribal and native art in Africa, Oceania and Australia.
The surface is laboriously worked and replicated similarly to rug weaving techniques. Motifs of Western Pop can be found in many of the paintings. This combination of Primeval motifs and Western Modern Art creates cultural and historical tensions between here and there, then and now. Formatively speaking the paintings are schematically divided into colorful segments with no intermediate transitions. Strong and clear boundaries outline the different areas, each is populated with a happening, opposing or complementing the one next to it. In this fashion, for example, round shapes are confronted with geometric ones or human images with those of animals and plants. Often the paintings are outlined with a ‘frame' thereby uniting the parts and creating an enclosure, like a window within a window. As a result, unconventional compositions are created and shatter the conventional formula of the "Uniformity of subject, shape & color". The rule breaking strengthens the untamed quality of these ‘uncivilized’ paintings.
In the center of Ben-Nun's paintings stands the image of the woman and the relationship between the sexes. Women are displayed as curvaceous, seductive images often in dancing poses. The dance is used as a metaphor for courting and seduction; the thick red lips, at times heart- shaped, symbolize passion and love. When it seems that the implicit allure isn't sufficient, the female image is portrayed in a frontal wide stance, in a composition that reminds us of the letter W. But when the two images meet, the feminine and the masculine, the unification is complete; melding into each other, the images' side view completely overlaps. When in a seated position the whole shape converts into the letter M emphasizing the complimenting opposites.
The protagonists - women and men - are accompanied by secondary characters; symbolic images of especially fish, hands (the Hamsa) and eyes. Those are prevalent in Middle East cultures and represent fertility, luck and protection from the evil eye. Their presence in the paintings, alongside the lovers, implies that the matter at hand is not barren erotica and carnal passion, but genuine love that yearns for a home, family and the raising of offsprings.
Beyond that, those images provide the observer that needed grasping point, for they corral this artistic creation, that seemed at first glance to fluctuate between other cultures and histories, to bring it back into this place, our own place, the here and now.
Mirit Ben-Nun is a wild plant who doesn't grow in the main avenue of the Israeli art but off the main road. She has her own path from which she defies the established Israeli art world. Like a Cupid, she sends her love arrows with a mischievous smile; when they hit a passerby the falling in love is instantaneous. Her paintings are filled with magic and humor. The unfamiliarity characterising them has an inexplicable attraction, similarly to the spell the wild has over the Westerner. In a sea of sounds that wraps around us, more pleasing or less, Ben-Nun‘s pure voice is echoed from the depths riddle- filled and unique, yearning for its own place in the world!
La Giralda est l'ancien minaret de la grande mosquée almohade de Séville, en Andalousie. Après la reconquête de la ville (la Reconquista), la mosquée a été convertie en cathédrale et la Giralda est devenu le clocher de la cathédrale. À la suite d'un tremblement de terre survenu au xive siècle, qui a entraîné la destruction de la mosquée d'origine, les devis de construction de la nouvelle cathédrale prévoyaient la préservation de la Giralda, qui a cependant fait l'objet de modifications en fonction du style architectural espagnol. C'est l'un des monuments les plus importants de l'architecture hispano-musulmane et la figure symbolique de Séville, à tel point qu'une règle implicite d'urbanisme de la ville interdit à tout autre bâtiment du centre de la capitale andalouse d'atteindre sa hauteur.
'Painting Outside the Box' by Ilan Vizgan
The flute raises it's voice / what is it's story? / is it bad news or good ones or what? / It's about everything and all
A poem by
Nathan Alterman/ summer celebration
Mirit Ben-Nun’s paintings escape common description. An objective observation might describe it as contemporary art, though created by an upbeat young female artist, it is far from contemporary. This art possesses no “present day” defining elements.
Mirit's paintings speak in a distant dialect seemingly of another era and location. By trying to pinpoint this time and place, we find ourselves wandering about without a solid grasping point.
Her paintings are laced with a fire-like sensuality and striking colors. The naive and archetypal characteristics remind us of folk art. Reality is lost within the ‘erroneous’ size ratio of the numerous imagery, similarly to tribal and native art in Africa, Oceania and Australia.
The surface is laboriously worked and replicated similarly to rug weaving techniques. Motifs of Western Pop can be found in many of the paintings. This combination of Primeval motifs and Western Modern Art creates cultural and historical tensions between here and there, then and now. Formatively speaking the paintings are schematically divided into colorful segments with no intermediate transitions. Strong and clear boundaries outline the different areas, each is populated with a happening, opposing or complementing the one next to it. In this fashion, for example, round shapes are confronted with geometric ones or human images with those of animals and plants. Often the paintings are outlined with a ‘frame' thereby uniting the parts and creating an enclosure, like a window within a window. As a result, unconventional compositions are created and shatter the conventional formula of the "Uniformity of subject, shape & color". The rule breaking strengthens the untamed quality of these ‘uncivilized’ paintings.
In the center of Ben-Nun's paintings stands the image of the woman and the relationship between the sexes. Women are displayed as curvaceous, seductive images often in dancing poses. The dance is used as a metaphor for courting and seduction; the thick red lips, at times heart- shaped, symbolize passion and love. When it seems that the implicit allure isn't sufficient, the female image is portrayed in a frontal wide stance, in a composition that reminds us of the letter W. But when the two images meet, the feminine and the masculine, the unification is complete; melding into each other, the images' side view completely overlaps. When in a seated position the whole shape converts into the letter M emphasizing the complimenting opposites.
The protagonists - women and men - are accompanied by secondary characters; symbolic images of especially fish, hands (the Hamsa) and eyes. Those are prevalent in Middle East cultures and represent fertility, luck and protection from the evil eye. Their presence in the paintings, alongside the lovers, implies that the matter at hand is not barren erotica and carnal passion, but genuine love that yearns for a home, family and the raising of offsprings.
Beyond that, those images provide the observer that needed grasping point, for they corral this artistic creation, that seemed at first glance to fluctuate between other cultures and histories, to bring it back into this place, our own place, the here and now.
Mirit Ben-Nun is a wild plant who doesn't grow in the main avenue of the Israeli art but off the main road. She has her own path from which she defies the established Israeli art world. Like a Cupid, she sends her love arrows with a mischievous smile; when they hit a passerby the falling in love is instantaneous. Her paintings are filled with magic and humor. The unfamiliarity characterising them has an inexplicable attraction, similarly to the spell the wild has over the Westerner. In a sea of sounds that wraps around us, more pleasing or less, Ben-Nun‘s pure voice is echoed from the depths riddle- filled and unique, yearning for its own place in the world!
TEJEDORA DE SUEÑOS: EL CONTENEDOR / CANASTO
Cuál puede ser el significado del canasto?
Su significado nos transporta a la relación materna del útero como contenedor básico de la raza humana, al igual, que los animales mamíferos. Los canastos, soluciones temporales a las necesidades de la vida. Se presentan tejidos muy tupidos o calados, tejidos asargado, según el uso para el cual estarán destinados. La aparición del contenedor transforma la primera organización social, socializa el grupo, quien se reafirma en toda ocasión de reunión. Por lo tanto, el desarrollo de la capacidad intelectual de cada individuo está implícito en su crecimiento como miembro útil de la sociedad...
Sony ILCE-7R
Carl Zeiss Sonnar 2.8 / 135mm T*
Hi all
For those keeping score, I am finally back in action here to unload images. I have been looked out of my own site for about 6 weeks now. It was a combination of operator error and the way Yahoo has built its security... and this may ultimately be attributable to operator error... but its logic escapes me.
I will also have a lot more time to play here as I have just retired. This all means more activity for me in both postings and commenting.
This leads me to another shift in the way that I will behave in conversations with photographers posting to Flickr. My intention is too provide as much criticism as compliment. It may be the retired teacher/designer in me but I believe this is where growth comes from. I have been thinking about this for quite some time so this is not a knee-jerk decision, and I hope you receive this in the spirit it is given. if you disagree with me let me know, conversations are gold here. And if you think I am an idiot I can hear that too!
This is a two way street. By doing this I am implicitly asking for criticism in return. We all love compliments but we will get better with criticism.
Respect...
Keith
Museo de Madinat Al-Zahra
(Museo arqueológico y centro de interpretación del Conjunto de Madinat al-Zahra)
Ctra. de Córdoba a Palma del Río, A-431, km 5.5, Córdoba
Arquitectos: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos: Fuensanta Nieto y Enrique Sobejano. Arquitecto de proyecto Miguel Ubarrechena. Equipo de proyecto Carlos Ballesteros, Pedro Quero y Juan Carlos Redondo. Dirección de obra: Fuensanta Nieto, Enrique Sobejano y Miguel Mesas Izquierdo. Proyecto museográfico: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos / Frade Arquitectos, S.L. Concurso: 1999 Proyecto: 2002 Finalización: 2009
Los Arquitectos describen su proyecto:
“Los restos de la antigua ciudad hispano-musulmana sugerían un diálogo con quienes mil años antes la habían concebido y construido, pero también con el paciente trabajo de los arqueólogos y con el paisaje agrícola circundante, al que la geometría de las ruinas otorgaba una inesperada cualidad abstracta. El terreno del recinto arqueológico destinado al museo provocaba, no obstante, sentimientos encontrados.
Por una parte, la añoranza de un pasado remoto aún por descubrir impregnaba el paisaje que se extendía hacia la sierra de Córdoba. Por otra parte, el desordenado avance de las construcciones recientes se cernía inquietante sobre el entorno de lo que un día fue la ciudad palatina. Nuestra primera reacción al llegar al lugar habría de marcar, desde el primer momento, la futura propuesta: no debíamos edificar en aquel paisaje.
Ante una extensión de tal amplitud, que aún espera ser excavada, decidimos actuar como lo haría un arqueólogo: no construyendo un nuevo edificio, sino encontrándolo bajo tierra, como si el paso del tiempo lo hubiera ocultado hasta el día de hoy. De esta forma, el proyecto descubre la planta de un museo subterráneo, que articula sus espacios en torno a una secuencia de llenos y vacíos, áreas cubiertas y patios que guían al visitante en su recorrido. A partir del vestíbulo principal se extiende un amplio patio de planta cuadrada que, como un claustro, organiza en torno suyo los espacios públicos principales: salón de actos, cafetería, tienda, biblioteca, y salas de exposición. Un patio profundo y longitudinal articula las zonas de uso privado: administración, talleres de conservación e investigación. Un último patio constituye la prolongación al exterior de las áreas expositivas del museo. Las zonas de almacenamiento, concebidas como grandes espacios visitables iluminados cenitalmente, se funden en los recorridos del edificio con las áreas públicas de exposición y difusión. La propia concepción del proyecto lleva implícito un posible futuro crecimiento, pudiéndose agregar nuevos pabellones como si de nuevas excavaciones se tratase.
El nuevo museo establece casi imperceptiblemente un permanente diálogo con la arquitectura y el paisaje de la antigua medina árabe. La planta de doble cuadrado del museo se hace homotética con la de la ciudad, los jardines evocan la geometría abandonada de una excavación, los muros de hormigón y las cubiertas de acero cortén reflejan en el blanco y el rojo los colores con que originalmente estuvieron estucados los muros de la ciudad califal. La luz, la sombra, la textura, el material, abstraen la riqueza perceptiva que transmiten las ruinas arqueológicas.
El museo de Madinat al-Zahra aparece en el paisaje silenciosamente, como si hubiera sido encontrado bajo tierra, del mismo modo que a lo largo de los años continuará ocurriendo con los restos de la antigua ciudad de los califas omeyas.”
En “Museos de Andalucía” podemos leer:
El Museo, abierto al público en octubre de 2009, es un complejo edificio que contiene los espacios propios de un museo moderno, así como toda la infraestructura dedicada a la gestión patrimonial que demanda un conjunto arqueológico de la magnitud de la ciudad califal. El edificio está concebido como el punto de partida para la visita al yacimiento, con una presentación y exposición museográfica sobre Madinat al-Zahra.
La creación del Museo resuelve varios problemas planteados desde el comienzo de la recuperación del yacimiento en 1911. El primer edificio construido para dar apoyo a la excavación quedó pronto obsoleto por la ingente cantidad de material arqueológico que se fue almacenando en sus instalaciones y por la insuficiencia de espacios expositivos.
El Museo viene a resolver, además, varias demandas del Conjunto, referidas tanto a la difusión y función didáctica de la institución, como a la tarea de custodia y conservación que esta institución tiene encomendada.
Destaca en el edificio su ubicación exterior a la ciudad, aprovechando uno de sus caminos originales de acceso, de forma que no condiciona ni las excavaciones futuras ni el crecimiento en extensión de las mismas. Este compromiso de la nueva infraestructura con el yacimiento se extiende también al paisaje, pues el proyecto planteado por el estudio de arquitectura Nieto y Sobejano la concibe como una edificación que se oculta parcialmente en el territorio, para no interferir ni en la contemplación del paisaje ni en el fundamental protagonismo de la ciudad califal.
Se trata, en definitiva, de una infraestructura, ideada para facilitar la comprensión del yacimiento y desarrollar a todos los niveles sus potencialidades. Se concibe como una infraestructura para impulsar nuevos proyectos de investigación, conservación y difusión de la ciudad de Madinat al-Zahra y toda la ordenación territorial que constituye su entorno. Cuenta con los siguientes servicios:
Área cultural, expositiva y didáctica: Auditorio, Exposición permanente, Biblioteca Especializada "Manuel Ocaña", Aula didáctica y Sala de seminarios. Área de conservación, investigación y Administración: Almacenes, Talleres de restauración, Centro de documentación, Oficinas y despachos. Otros servicios: Tienda con librería y Cafetería-restaurante.
Premios:
2009: Finalista Premio Intervención en Patrimonio Arquitectónico Español. The International Architecture Award. The Chicago Athenaeum Museum.
2010: Aga Khan Award for Architecture.
2011: Piranesi Prix de Rome. Obra Seleccionada Premio de Arquitectura Contemporánea de la Unión Europea – Premio Mies van der Rohe. Finalista Premio Arquitectura Española. Finalista Premios FAD
2012: European Museum of the Year Award
www.nietosobejano.com/project.aspx?i=1&t=MADINAT_ALZA...
www.metalocus.es/es/noticias/nieto-sobejano-arquitectos-m...
www.museosdeandalucia.es/cultura/museos/CAMA/?lng=es
NietoSobejano Arquitectos
Splendid item found in Curious magazine c.1971 issue 16:
Photo by Phil Franks.
© All rights reserved Copyright © Phil Franks 1971 - 2009 All rights reserved.
Of Myths and Man,
Two apprentice sorcerers perform a coming of age witch painting ceremony in the living room of a Holland Park apprentice pastry chef. The witch Nicki Kozakovitch, is preparing for a latter day coven to take place in public at the Hendon Classic. The Mystic sign is a reference to the duality of masculaine and feminine roles implicit in some forms of modern witchcraft. This photograph taken by Count Divanovitch Alexei Kravetski, of Portobello' Road, London wins a £5 prize in the Curious body painting competition.
Hmmm. I think this is a reference to the Richard Cavendish weekly compendium 'Man Myth and magic', I do not believe for a second that a Pastry Chef would be involved in such a caper... This is Barney Bubbles, in a public outing of the very few (probably less than 10) published photographs of him ( on the left). The painting is pure barney, I have posted up the label used for Glastonbury Fayre disc - the correct colour variation which show the same flame colours on Nicki the witch, yellow ,red and green. Please note, even in this published image of BB and friend the man foxes us - the image is printed in reverse*
When you believe a thing, believe it all .
The way implicitly and unquestionably.
The origin of Kathak is traditionally attributed to the traveling bards of ancient northern India known as Kathakars or storytellers.
I visit the Yorkshire sculpture park quite often I can never go there without walking across the park To see Andy Goldsworthy sculpture "Hanging Trees" . The tree is built into the walls that surround it. I love Andy Goldsworthy's work - his creations are all made from natural materials, wood, stone, leaves and they are so very memorable. Those are my words now some information on him from Wiki and were you can see his work... lots of it in the USA. By the way he is also a brilliant photographer
The materials used in Andy Goldsworthy's art often include brightly-coloured flowers, icicles, leaves, mud, pinecones, snow, stone, twigs, and thorns. He has been quoted as saying, "I think it's incredibly brave to be working with flowers and leaves and petals. But I have to: I can't edit the materials I work with. My remit is to work with nature as a whole." Goldsworthy is generally considered the founder of modern rock balancing. For his ephemeral works, Goldsworthy often uses only his bare hands, teeth, and found tools to prepare and arrange the materials; however, for his permanent sculptures like "Roof", "Stone River" and "Three Cairns", "Moonlit Path" (Petworth, West Sussex, 2002) and "Chalk Stones" in the South Downs, near West Dean, West Sussex he has also employed the use of machine tools.
Photography plays a crucial role in his art due to its often ephemeral and transient state. According to Goldsworthy, "Each work grows, stays, decays – integral parts of a cycle which the photograph shows at its heights, marking the moment when the work is most alive. There is an intensity about a work at its peak that I hope is expressed in the image. Process and decay are implicit."Goldsworthy produced a commissioned work for the entry courtyard of San Francisco's De Young Museum called "Drawn Stone", which echoes San Francisco's frequent earthquakes and their effects. His installation included a giant crack in the pavement that broke off into smaller cracks, and broken limestone, which could be used for benches. The smaller cracks were made with a hammer adding unpredictability to the work as he created it.
THANKS FOR YOUR VISIT HAVE A GREAT DAY
From Adbusters #74, Nov-Dec 2007
The Empire of Debt
Money for nothing. Own a home for no money down. Do not pay for your appliances until 2012. This is the new American Dream, and for the last few years, millions have been giddily living it. Dead is the old version, the one historian James Truslow Adams introduced to the world as “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement.”
Such Puritan ideals – to work hard, to save for a better life – didn’t die from the natural causes of age and obsolescence. We killed them, willfully and purposefully, to create a new gilded age. As a society, we told ourselves we could all get rich, put our feet up on the decks of our new vacation homes, and let our money work for us. Earning is for the unenlightened. Equity is the new golden calf. Sadly, this is a hollow dream. Yes, luxury homes have been hitting new gargantuan heights. Ferrari sales have never been better. But much of the ever-expanding wealth is an illusory façade masking a teetering tower of debt – the greatest the world has seen. It will collapse, in a disaster of our own making.
Distress is already rumbling through Wall Street. Subprime mortgages leapt into the public consciousness this summer, becoming the catchphrase for the season. Hedge fund masterminds who command salaries in the tens of millions for their supposed financial prescience, but have little oversight or governance, bet their investors’ multi-multi-billions on the ability that subprime borrowers – who by very definition have lower incomes and/or rotten credit histories – would miraculously find means to pay back loans far exceeding what they earn. They didn’t, and surging loan defaults are sending shockwaves through the markets. Yet despite the turmoil this collapse is wreaking, it’s just the first ripple to hit the shore. America’s debt crisis runs deep.
How did it come to this? How did America, collectively and as individuals, become a nation addicted to debt, pushed to and over the edge of bankruptcy? The savings rate hangs below zero. Personal bankruptcies are reaching record heights. America’s total debt averages more than $160,000 for every man, woman, and child. On a broader scale, China holds nearly $1 trillion in US debt. Japan and other countries are also owed big.
The story begins with labor. The decades following World War II were boom years. Economic growth was strong and powerful industrial unions made the middle-class dream attainable for working-class citizens. Workers bought homes and cars in such volume they gave rise to the modern suburb. But prosperity for wage earners reached its zenith in the early 1970s. By then, corporate America had begun shredding the implicit social contract it had with its workers for fear of increased foreign competition. Companies cut costs by finding cheap labor overseas, creating a drag on wages.
In 1972, wages reached their peak. According to the US department of Labor Statistics, workers earned $331 a week, in inflation-adjusted 1982 dollars. Since then, it’s been a downward slide. Today, real wages are nearly one-fifth lower – this, despite real GDP per capita doubling over the same period.
Even as wages fell, consumerism was encouraged to continue soaring to unprecedented heights. Buying stuff became a patriotic duty that distinguished citizens from their communist Cold War enemies. In the eighties, consumers’ growing fearlessness towards debt and their hunger for goods were met with Ronald Reagan’s deregulation the lending industry. Credit not only became more easily attainable, it became heavily marketed. Credit card debt, at $880 billion, is now triple what it was in 1988, after adjusting for inflation. Barbecues and TV screens are now the size of small cars. So much the better to fill the average new home, which in 2005 was more than 50 percent larger than the average home in 1973.
This is all great news for the corporate sector, which both earns money from loans to consumers, and profits from their spending. Better still, lower wages means lower costs and higher profits. These factors helped the stock market begin a record boom in the early ‘80s that has continued almost unabated until today.
These conditions created vast riches for one class of individuals in particular: those who control what is known as economic rent, which can be the income “earned” from the ownership of an asset. Some forms of economic rent include dividends from stocks, or capital gains from the sale of stocks or property. The alchemy of this rent is that it requires no effort to produce money.
Governments, for their part, encourage the investors, or rentier class. Economic rent, in the form of capital gains, is taxed at a lower rate than earned income in almost every industrialized country. In the US in particular, capital gains are being taxed at ever-decreasing rates. A person whose job pays $100,000 can owe 35 percent of that in taxes compared to the 15 percent tax rate for someone whose stock portfolio brings home the same amount.
Given a choice between working for diminishing returns and joining the leisurely riches of the rentier, people pursue the latter. If the rentier class is fabulously rich, why can’t everyone become a member? People of all professions sought to have their money work for them, pouring money into investments. This spurred the explosion of the finance industry, people who manage money for others. The now-$10 trillion mutual fund industry is 700 times the size it was in the 1970s. Hedge funds, the money managers for the super-rich, numbered 500 companies in 1990, managing $38 billion in assets. Now there are more than 6,000 hedge firms handling more than $1 trillion dollars in assets.
In recent years, the further enticement of low interest rates has spawned a boom for two kinds of rentiers at the crux of the current debt crisis: home buyers and private equity firms. But it should also be noted that low interest rates are themselves the product of outsourced labor.
America gets goods from China. China gets dollars from the US. In order to keep the value of their currency low so that exports stay cheap, China doesn’t spend those dollars in China, but buys us assets like bonds. China now holds some $900 billion in such US IOUs. This massive borrowing of money from China (and to a lesser extent, from Japan) sent us interest rates to record lows.
Now the hamster wheel really gets spinning. Cheap borrowing costs encouraged millions of Americans to borrow more, buying homes and sending housing prices to record highs. Soaring house prices encouraged banks to loan freely, which sent even more buyers into the market – many who believed the hype that the real estate investment offered a never-ending escalator to riches and borrowed heavily to finance their dreams of getting ahead. People began borrowing against the skyrocketing value of their homes, to buy furniture, appliances, and TVs. These home equity loans added $200 billion to the US economy in 2004 alone.
It was all so utopian. The boom would feed on itself. Nobody would ever have to work again or produce anything of value. All that needed to be done was to keep buying and selling each other’s houses with money borrowed from the Chinese.
On Wall Street, private equity firms played a similar game: buying companies with borrowed billions, sacking employees to cut costs, and then selling the companies to someone else who did the same. These leveraged buyouts inflated share values, minting billionaires all around. The virtues that produce profit – innovation, entrepreneurialism and good management – stopped mattering so long as there were bountiful capital gains.
But the party is coming to a halt. An endless housing boom requires an endless supply of ever-greater suckers to pay more for the same homes. The rich, as Voltaire said, require an abundant supply of poor. Mortgage lenders have mined even deeper into the ranks of the poor to find takers for their loans. Among the practices included teaser loans that promised low interest rates that jumped up after the first few years. Sub-prime borrowers were told the future pain would never come, as they could keep re-financing against the ever-growing value of their homes. Lenders repackaged the shaky loans as bonds to sell to cash-hungry investors like hedge funds.
Of course, the supply of suckers inevitably ran out. Housing prices leveled off, beginning what promises to be a long, downward slide. Just as the housing boom fed upon itself, so too, will its collapse. The first wave of sub-prime borrowers have defaulted. A flood of foreclosures sent housing prices falling further. Lenders somehow got blindsided by news that poor people with bad credit couldn’t pay them back. Frightened, they staunched the flow of easy credit, further depleting the supply of homebuyers and squeezing debt-fueled private equity. Hedge funds that merrily bought sub-prime loans collapsed.
More borrowers will soon be unable to make payments on their homes and credit cards as the supply of rent dries up. Consumer spending, and thus corporate profits, will fall. The shrinking economy will further depress workers’ wages. For most people, the dream of easy money will never come true, because only the truly rich can live it. Everyone else will have to keep working for less, shackled to a mountain of debt.
_Dee Hon is a Vancouver-based writer has contributed to The Tyee and Vancouver magazine.
Adbusters Magazine
Abstract: A Universe of combustion powered by en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter as being en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyanobacteria that energizes, powers and links the food and combustion chains by means of its role in making N2O (and other combustion gasses) as visualized powering this photo as a sea of examples of theory as the reality of the Universe whereby it is possible 'Billions' are successfully 'Served' so much Bacterial Dark Energy as expressed so many 'Happy Meals' or Big Mac's -- which being so many macromolecules that can be measures in terms of calories that produce heat in the combustion chain or energy in the food chain as measured by Calories and or BTU's here to be understood as Bacterial vs. British Thermal Units here for the illustrative purpose of essays analysis thesis and central 'line of logic' writ in material by the power of Dark Energy of light examined analyzed and explained as being organic in nature and hence the key to understanding the perpetual operation of a Universe that hosts so many McDonald's in 'reality as well as theory'.
As calories produced in Nature are combusted or converted to some other gear in the dark material box that contains explains and radiates; breakfast lunch and dinner by means and method of the 'Fuel, Transmission, and, Breaks on the Speed of Light as Dark Matter Makes the Fast Food Chain Possible in Reality as Well as Theory' perpetually which is my thesis of how bacteria's atomic core acts as the nuclear engine of fast food's 'motor' to power the arrow of time and the expansion of the Universe in the process of the customer service of billions under the Golden Arches' as a example of how my inventor's paradoxical reasoning flows from facts; old and fresh off the presses of Science; by means of reading and remembering the reporting in the: Science News, Wired, New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, et al..
My meal plan over my sales career and beyond has featured heaping helping of a traveling stack of recursive reading material in the form of magazines and newspapers, which got read cover to cover and then re-read for subtext + the answers, while working myriad 'problems' in a wide variety of food and chemical process plants selling machinery to help industries by means better mixing commodities to create value added products, and or by measure of the ingredients constituent 'energy departments' by means their light bending properties as a 'organic lens' by means to focus my learning about applied industrial en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refractometry over the years to form a unique point of view that provides a singular lens to understand the (refractual)-factual information available to all -- which to draw conclusions that, if in fact confirms and explains this thesis, in every aspect) while maintaining the consistency of the 'line of logic' as condensed into the 'nutshell' of the case: which makes possible nutshells --> by which "Nitrous oxide is emitted by bacteria in soils and oceans, and thus has been a part of Earth's atmosphere for millennia. ... Nitrous oxide reacts with ozone in the stratosphere. Nitrous oxide is the main naturally occurring regulator of stratospheric ozone. Nitrous oxide is a major greenhouse gas. Considered over a 100-year period, it has 298 times more impact per unit weight than carbon dioxide. Thus, despite its low concentration, nitrous oxide is the fourth largest contributor to these greenhouse gases. It ranks behind water vapor, carbon dioxide, and methane. Control of nitrous oxide is part of efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. " - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrous_oxide
.
This 'data stack' has been compiled and essayed as way to explain and drive home the point of a insight by means a photo as examples served, to help unify a general understanding of Quantum Mechanics by bringing it into harmony with the Quantum Dynamic via 'tuning' the logical notes so as to produce a harmonic chord into the scientific signal chain. This method seeks to know by mildly obsessively removal of the noise and assorted 'clams' in the music that causes distortion in the current comprehension the fine grain factual that is the Devil complicating the details to render the obvious mysterious (for his own unknown devises) distorting the understanding and comprehension of "Dark Matter and Energy" -- which given it has the power in the the micro to macro over the Universe to 'bend of light' which is "spooky action at a distance" as well in terms of organic chemistry, which contains the energy, power and logical means to run the World Economy as well Solar System in the present, by means drawing on the power of the past in the meta, so as to expand the future at Λ.
The great common denominator is understood to be the organic power of the bonds of atom in action over space and time in the micro and macro to bend light which therefore, hence, consequential powers the present, by means the energy of the past, with exactly enough 'juice' to expand the future at at rate we know as the Cosmological Constant which happens to be the Macro Economic rate of inflation or other activity, when measured precisely over time in a given economy; as explained by Dark Matter and Energy being 'the stuff of the food and combustion chains' literal -- "power and light" -- as represented by a well oiled food chain of, fruits and vegetables, grains, meats, dairy, spice, Tea, and Coffee, with plenty of cooking oil and or motor oil to deliver same about all of which has a refractive index which determines price by means 'refinement, intensity and purity, etc.'.
Hence I conclude the economic activity inside each ingredient has the power to bend light at a given rate which is the power be worth more or less due; the presence or absence of Dark Matter or Energy - as being some 'star stuff' that makes 'gas that goes boom', by means the power of bacteria, at some level to cause a function of taste, smell and or the 'heat of the kitchen' that powers a person, group, or planet to expand at the Cosmological Constant by means the 'secret sauce' of spice on top floating atop a river of coffee, drained daily to achieve a insight into cracking the code that is the redundant power to run a Solar System from the micro to the macro and therefore power 'the program' with enough intensity to handle the business of light bending which I hold to be the answer to the Dark Matter and Energy Riddle™; which; creates, distributes and, bends light, -- by means the power of complimentary quark repair as understood and explained to us by Niels Bohr.
From this line of logic come a bonus answer {answer 'blowing in' the planetary weather patterns[for fun fact reality checking]} -- which is picture 'visualized' (and verbalized) as the 'planetary gearbox' running micro to macro by means the complete set of "planetary gears" -- Earth being the third gear, (counter rotating) as a example of how in this (and every) Solar system, per the Cosmological Principle's planetary rotation is powered by means of rotary evaporation, condensation, and quark repair's energy which explains the precision rotation and counter rotation of the Planets sorting the major elements from the Sun to the Black Hole in the Center Galley and back to Faint Young Star Power, in addition to explaining how the food chain and combustion chains run the worlds markets on so much 'horse power' by means of the food, fuel and mineral supplies which are understood to be 'of this world and more or less constantly 'bug based' to have mass which makes for substance that is organic, ---> then -- perhaps some or all of the Dark Matter and Energy riddle can begin to be considered (re)solved given the existing pieces of the natural machinery explained with out having to invent or discover strange new mysterious here to fore unknown 'matter' or 'stuff' that is the light -- 'illustrated' in its quantum mechanical and dynamic operations.
Therefore, Bacteria micro phylogenetic ilk form the vital cogs in the gearbox of the machinery of the of the perpetual manufacture of all elements of combustion and the biomass of any given hydrocarbon atomic bit and, or molecule that runs this economy or, any given eco or solar system.
Hence, Bacteria self-identifies itself as being THE prime candidate as the engine and (con)vector of Dark Matter and Energy on multiple levels of micro to macro levels and layers of Time and Space -- explained.
Further evidence of 'bacteria power' being a heretofore, 'secret agent' and, or 'sauce' of the hydrogen bonding process; E.g.; www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110810132832.htm
"Hydrogen-Powered Symbiotic Bacteria Found in Deep-Sea Hydrothermal Vent Mussels"
Consequently, to connect the known dots that we as a planet full of various species which are bacterial powered, and therefore 'connected' - because of 'we are, what we eat' technology, it is not too great a leap in logic to see the micro to the macro of what I perceive the food and combustion chain moving along in the form of burgers, cars, people, lights, with the common atomic denominator of complimentary paired quarks of the non combustible expansive atomic core of Bacteria which pumps the N20 'laughing back' in a witches brewing tangled with the incomplete combustion of VOC's aka en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatile_organic_compound 's which are sorted by means Hawking Radiation with the Dark Matter/Energy being the Bacteria that makes combustion possible on a atomic level to matter at the junction of the CNO cycles where one or another family of Bacteria uses matter as fuel to bind en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrus_oxide to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon , by means the 'intestinal fortitude' of en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyanobacteria functioning as the atomic core of Dark Matter and Energy in its role in combustion process at the atomic level, bring light to life as heat and the building blocks of the food chain where there is no waste whereby matter bound is form and released in Hydrogen bonds of demi-big bang being 'ripped' free and re broken to 'dribble out' and vent safely though a series of (black at night type) holes in the Earths ozone, past the gas giants of the solar system, and or then, back up to the 'mother ship' of a Black Hole in the middle of the galaxy to be reprocessed into basic matter and new stars; imho, and according to my version of the General Unified Theory the remainder of the combusted Matter is spun off from the inferno in a Energy input = Energy output to/fro Earth over Space Time in visual form as a large pile of 'mass equivalence' goes 'up in smoke' c/o Bacteria in concert with the food chain, as ordained by people, and their Stars.
A bacterial 'method of accounting' for the elements of the combustion chains common denominators power supply in the case of everything in the above photo from; the grill, to vehicles fuels, to the lights, to the ingredients served food chain creation, all draw by means the power of bacteria and returning energy to the Sun as organic chemistry in the waste streams returning V.O.C.'s + 'free radicals' back to Black Holes for 'rework' by means the food and combustion chains machinery along with resultant thermal energy as heat - not unlike a watch, all pieces of the machinery are required which to tell time, and or power, key, and, gear the Universes continuously running of a waste free process with zero inefficiencies in the (re) winding of the atomic clockworks of the; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Phylogenetic_tree.svg by means of the 'arrow of time' being organic and thus a natural explanation and account for the Material Science and Physics of the Past, Present, and, Future expanding the Universe in the micro and macro at the en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_constant .
By means of McDonald's cunning control of the food chains macro and micro of ingredients respective half life through the applied combination of combustion and the Bose Einstein condensate as expressed in the freezer and refrigeration processes with the heat of the deep frier and grill wiped clean of 'bugs' by the hygiene process ("If you have time to lean -- you have time to clean")^ to grease the wheels of maximum predictability to add velocity as a expression of 'fast food' running at ultra high velocity of the supply chain, so as to be both profitable and by keeping the flipping quantum burgers and selling them as levers on the 'half life' of life which is so much en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-mass_equivalence on the 'hoof and or bun' or Dark Matter and Energy fueling the present, driving the futures expansion, while drawing off the power of the past, in the process of repairing the pasts quarks, while moving the industrial age super high speed supply chain fast, from freezer to grill, such that very little spoils in becoming breakfast, lunch or dinner in the many super saturated heartbeats kept in motion - so to speak in praise of the high velocity of the nutrition moving by means of a menu offered at the counter or 24/7 at drive thru that binds and connects a world by 'bill of fare' from a common 'supply chain' to forge the common bond of 'been there, ate that'; got that "Happy Meal" feeling and connectivity by means of 'you are what you eat', as one of the 'billions served' and thus bonded at a atomic level this 'Small World™ is formed and powered said as a gear in the machinery of moving the Universe forward at exactly the Cosmological Constant each burger and fry being a vital thread in the vastness of the fabric of Space which keeps the 'arrow of time' in 'free flight' by means the perpetual power of Dark Matter and Energy.
Bacteria' sub-atomic bond's further self identify themselves as Dark Matter in terms of; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_energy when busted through the above mentioned data points over Space Time shot though the single cellular 'buns' of the expanse of the power of said Bacteria whose role in the formation of all fuels that have the power and volume and necessary gas byproducts fuel the building blocks and heat the life as we know it of a expanding Universe, as I understand the Grande Scheme as it seems to be -- making more sense every day, in light of the evidence w/o bacteria there is no serving billions and billions over the course of space and time breakfast, lunch, and dinner, anyplace, anytime, anywhere; with perfectly predictable results.
While searching for Bacteria as the missing link in the Dark Material puzzle and or cog in the Universal gear box by searching for evidence that amounts to proof of the above thesis in a late 20st century hydrocarbon fueled economy based and chase scene as a conceptual word problem/thought exercise of the quantum dynamics of the following to power the atomic chain reaction that is the contents of this clip, (and the following cinematic immortal chase scene) from The Blues Brothers film, from the point of the line; 'Hit It': E.g. www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvKs2VLmVnY it is all one vast Cyanobacteria powered Hydrocarbon coming unglued in a cinematic en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chain_reaction set of events that flow from that '...full tank of gas' and those of the Illinois State Police and Chicago Police Department pursuit fleets respective fuel supplies by my estimates and a per this hypothesis, which also can be made as a means of the (bacteria) count for a Dark Matter math made of the original quality of the crude oil or gas sourced as energy not needed to remove it is some sort of V.O.C. or sulfur in the refining processes as I (begin to attempt to) under stand that phase of the hydrocarbon world, by thinking through what Nature did to produce the worlds resource map over time and space in the micro and macro c/o the predictable expansion of the 'Bacteria count' (method of comprehending this system writ large is), that it is the metaphorical and literal chemical keys to the locks that 'unchain' the Energy of the rest of the Dark Material Energies machinery in the subatomic bits as expressed and transmitted in larger life forms of the; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Phylogenetic_tree.svg by means the turning of the wheels in the perpetual generational workings of the 'circle of life', species specific grade grind.
It is key to my understanding the organic driver of Matter over time and space as the vector of radiant Energy from the Sun up the food chain, with the feed back loop to the source Stars paired quark, and or Black Hole so the Yin Yang of the Universe is observed yet expansion happens at the speed of light curved at the rate of expansion of the this corner of the Universe as defined by its mix of atoms as apples of the proverbial/metaphorical/literal Phylogenetic tree to which all life is connected as "Star stuff" back at some Sun -- in to/fro runs that never stops this and all other local worlds turning by means of the power of quarks in free flight repair.*
Further insight to my thinking on Dark Matter can be achieved though the point of view of the functionality of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange as a thought experiment the price theory calculations of the trading of the relative Dark Material 'bacteriological load' of what wikipedia cites as; "Agricultural Commodity Contracts to include: Live Cattle, Lean Hogs，Feeder Cattle, Class IV Milk, Class III Milk, Frozen Pork Bellies, International Skimmed Milk Powder (ISM), Nonfat Dry Milk, Deliverable Nonfat Dry Milk, Dry Whey, Cash-Settled Butter, Butter, Random Length Lumber, Softwood Pulp, Hardwood Pulp. " - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Mercantile_Exchange hence, whole crops and 'great herds' have their market price known in dollar value and therefore understood by the 'group mind' as expressed by the market on a dynamic basis as a set of outcomes based on decisions which would therefor also enable a Game Theory analysis of the functions of the interplay of bacteria as Dark Matter over Time and Space on the Markets writ large so as to make a certain amount of micro and macro economic sense out of reality to my mind -- as a function of its Dark Matter in motion and working out such things as impacts on crop rotation and micro climate as expressed in soil, flora, fauna, and in the end expressed as the en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_exchange_market as reflected in the worth of a countries economic fortune and political sense as determined by the rest of the world as an expression of the market (volatility expressed as a aspect of the Geo Politic) to put a numerical fine point on this biological bacterial concept as having a economic and political reality in the purest economic bottom line analysis expressed as the "Big Mac Index" www.economist.com/news/2018/07/11/the-big-mac-index where as we know; " en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_politics_is_local " material-logically and economically speaking and understanding the language of 'knowledge being power' to produce breakfast lunch and dinner like as well according to clockwork.
Therefore, kindly consider the concept of the 'lines of communication' as a historic reflection of this method of bacterial transmission of the hydrogen and nitrogen bonds by means the; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spice_Route and its consequence; as a means transmission by mode of market propelled by men moving matter to markets in their bacterial based bodies made of what they ate as they hauling spices in flowing robes more or less doing the bidding of The Bacteria (as matter and antimatter in the form of bodies and antibodies) the runs their Genome as a means of maintaining health and spread direction by means slaying en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwell%27s_demon by overwhelming the Demon with the message in the material in the form of the spices transported to form immunity. A soul 'being you are what you ate' is therefore as intense as its 'spice matrix', held together by such things as those same trace nutrients salts that make the whole micro a expression of the en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutrient_cycle of the macro as seen above in the spice rout 'moving matter'/the en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass-energy_equivalence of dehydrated spice 'on the hoof'/over time and space 'in sickness and health' using the spice to charge the immune system to the stars, and thereby expand the human 'group mind' in the process. So goes bacteria and the immune system running down the en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficient_energy_use highway somewhere as the saying, movie title and, quark repair goes; 'Back to the Future" to form the present as the arrow of time accounted for.
Back to present where let's consider for a moment the line of cars at the drive through running on hydrocarbons which are spewing the byproducts of combustion out their exhaust pipes as so much proto-photo-chemical glue bacteria/N2O and then digested by the process into so many VOC's emissions and ozone and or the local Dark Matter mat (you see as dirty snow/particulates) which then tends to coat the local population in a binding network of common chemical bonds care of the haze of bacteria spewed forth bacteria working their digestive magic by making and breaking hydrocarbons into bits of matter to yield energy as well as unintended consequences of letting loose bacteria to form more N2O and thus make matter in a loop, which explains quite a bit in a expanding Universe with that en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faint_young_Sun_paradox in need of resolution as accounting does providing the 'gas' in the form of none other than Bacteria (+and and all other breathing living creatures in the food and combustion chain that use or produce the gasses that run the Natural world to be found in the Phylogenetic tree* that make themselves the self evident candidates for the vital role of Dark Matter in producing Energy, by means of a technical explanation of the organic reality of the engineering of heat, light, beaming billions of 'Argument from Design'^^ burgers with cheese along with life as we know it in concert with a combustion chain made possible by the same of the organic Star powered operating system which is the quantum physics of light derived from the particulate energy of nature -- spinning on the axis of reality that leads to and fro black holes for the final business of quark repair and reseeding as fresh young Star power as the final answer offered to the riddle of the expanding Universe at the observed rate of cosmic inflation.
*Attributions and Notes;
Part of the Title of this essay is a reference from a James Q. Wilson appreciation and quotation in the Wall Street Journal;
online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052970203986604577...
- "The joke about the French philosopher—"We know it works in fact, but will it work in theory?"
Sources and Thanks;
Wikipedia multiple instances as links indicate, The New York Times, The Blues Brothers (movies), The Science News, The Science Daily, The Scientific American, Smithsonian (magazine and websites), Grand Master Cho, Donald Street Jr., (the spirits of) Larry Bird, Bruce Lee, Floyd Little, Keith Moon, Ray Kroc, Kenneth G. Wilson, Niels Bohr, Lewis Alvarez, Hans Bethe, Richard Feynman,Carl Woese, my ancestors, and friends as expressed in the great human spirit as its collection of intellectual marbles of the mind found in the halls of Education, Science and Industry all inclusive. Marbles that can be added to compose the picture of the Universe the in the mosaic of Macro by understanding how the organic bonds of the micro fuel and expand the Big Picture™.
Magazines and Newspapers read with regularity; Wired, New Yorker, New York Times, Atlantic, The Economist, The Science News, Smithsonian, Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, Wooden Boat, The Guardian, and The Wall Street Journal.
Thanks to the folks, their content provided on pages served by wikipedia, Linkedin, 'The' google and youtube.
All citations and video links are strictly for informational power of navel gazing and educational purposes only.
All brain farts and typos mine. 'Pardon my prose', this is a work in progress and can be read with that in mind and clean through w/o hitting the links then on second pass go in for the hypertext as topically curious.
Note: no entertainment value or incidental rights explicit or implicit assumed by citations to to or fro links contained herein.
Not unlike the original ideas about Dark Matter and Energy or any incidental cosmic-intellectual sod busted along the way of this thought exercise verbalized as semi complete set of insights, to go with the rest of my analysis of the "'Color Theory' of Dark Matter and Energy", are my uncompensated business (in passive-aggressive search of a publisher) that ponders another paragraph on the how the Universe works through the lens that is outside looking in at Bacteria's nuclear material manifesting itself as a function of the expansion of the Universe as powered by nothing less than the Dark Material heart that beats by means the expansive radiant Energy of Cyanobacteria, made oh so edible at McDonald's.
^ "Some people say he (McDonald's founder Ray Kroc) was almost obsessed with cleanliness." - money.howstuffworks.com/mcdonalds1.htm
^^The Argument from Design
www.princeton.edu/~grosen/puc/phi203/design.html
* My topically related hyper-detailed, and 'dense as a young Star' 'Full Report' on why; "'The Dark Side of' Matter and Energy Sets the Speed of Lights Limits, A Photo Essay with Image 'Remixed' by 'Dream 11'"
For clarity, 'roll-over' notes presented as continuous comment moving from the bottom Right to the lower Left by way of the 'Finish Line' in the 'roll-over' mode noting in that order the pickup truck driver, sign, and drive up window as a series of metaphors, folded down to this, with apologies for the technology;
No doubt driver is off working on a en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_deduction proof of Bacteria as Dark Matter and Energy in his spare time, when not otherwise engaged in struggle for survival in the City. Never mind, the guy across the street with the camera did all that in his head; while doing the same. You can check via this intense method, and or by just reading on into this train of a chain reaction of thought that is parked right here in this space.
The "FinishLine" and Time are illusory concepts unless you happen to be en..wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Phelps because it seems more the case as once more or less was stated that;
“Life is a (bacteriological driven) journey, not a destination.”
Not unlike ― Robert Frosts road predating McDonalds and thus 'less traveled' non the less memorable and a immortal 'difference maker', E,g.;
www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-road-not-taken/
The Road Not Taken
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
- Robert Frost
Humans Carry More Bacterial Cells than Human Ones n -- is bunk -- www.sciencenews.org/article/body%E2%80%99s-bacteria-don%E...
Never the less there are bacteria running the health 'code' if you have any grip on -- health and good eating in general to form a whole package that can comprehend the 'body census' POV as formed;
By Melinda Wenner
www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=strange-but-tru...
Digressing but speaking of the search for the Universal source code;
How the Father of Computer Science Decoded Nature’s Mysterious Patterns
In research shortly before his death in 1954, Alan Turing used mathematics to explore how forms emerge, yielding insights that are now being applied to problems like desalination.
Which seems to be confirmed by The New York Times on July 14, 2014 in Personal Health -- as
"We Are Our Bacteria"
By Jane E. Brody; nyti.ms/1zBrZrJ
Further proof in the cosmic 'pudding' of this 'line of logic' applied as matter made as not only burgers, but believe it or not The Bahamas being Cyanoacterial 'born' from the micro to the 'Big Macro'' --> e.g.:
Bahamas Bacteria May Feast on Dust from the Saharan Desert
By Laura Geggel, | July 29, 2014 03:01pm ET
www.livescience.com/47072-sahara-dust-great-bahama-bank.html
and then there is the distinct -
"Possible layout of the quarks in a pentaquark particle. The five quarks might be tightly bound (left). The five quarks might be tightly bound. They might also be assembled into a meson (one quark and one anti quark) and a baryon (three quarks), weakly bound together."
lifeboat.com/blog/2015/08/exotic-pentaquark-particle-disc... --
Therefore logically it follows is understood and hopefully explained here that this is the natural source of the gears that we derive from Nature employs to form essential sub atomic gearing that constitutes the fabric of the Universe which is woven by the (2x2 quarks + 1 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axion )accounted for now as being found present in the form factors of the colors blue and green quarks two each, plus the 'wild red' Axion (that transports the above linked font of information by means the power of "The (micro) RGB Light") manufactured in that thar recurring blue-green en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyanobacteria producing the -- 'show must go on business' -- which in turn forms the 'stage' that is 'all the world' inclusive of the Saharan dust that offers a theoretical physical-chemical explanation of the Bahamas’ paradoxical existence by "Windblown nutrients may fertilize island-building bacteria" as a footprint formed in the macro.
BY Thomas Sumner July 11, 2014
Magazine issue: Vol. 186 No. 3, August 9, 2014
"Dust-fertilized cyanobacteria could also explain the origin of carbonate rocks elsewhere in the ocean that formed over 400 million years ago, before mollusks and corals evolved, Swart says."
www.sciencenews.org/article/saharan-dust-explains-bahamas...
"The rocks here in Oman are
special, this scientist says." -- which is also the point of this essay to provide a full pictorial accounting of the myriad 'common denominators likeness' and suggest formal logical links as they organic chemically occur to support this hypothosis;
--> www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/04/26/climate/oman-rocks...
Yet more people with a beef about burgers in world today due to their perceived supersized impact on climate by means the combustion chain saw of power of being carbon based that make for the thinking linking; beef, cars and climate together as; "The Case for a Carbon Tax on Beef" - nyti.ms/2GCdixI that was argued for on March 17, 2018 as reported By Richard Conniff
in the New York Times.
Therefore it is concluded by this long line of logic that deduces in the final analysis that the electric color coding of quarks in formation and repair that inform and bind the ingredients, that create the matter in the Universe by means the gears of nature being organic running on the many shoulders of the nitrogen building blocks of a army navy and air force of the matter and resultant fuel of hydrogen oxygen helium of a Universe of organic 'bug power' production which forms, binds expands and operate the 'code' of Nature which is borne by light electrically as explained by "Albert Einstein's mathematical description of how the photoelectric effect was caused by absorption of quanta of light in one of his 1905 papers, named "On a Heuristic Viewpoint Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light". "
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photoelectric_effect illustrated.
CJC
Rev. 1/29/18
twitter.com/Memoire2cite le Logement Collectif* 50,60,70's dans tous ses états..Histoire & Mémoire de l'Habitat / Rétro-Villes / HLM / Banlieue / Renouvellement Urbain / Urbanisme 😊 De grandes barres d’immeubles, appelées les grands ensembles, sont le symbole de nos banlieues. Entrée Libre revient sur le phénomène de destruction de ces bâtiments qui reflètent aujourd’hui la misere www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCqHBP5SBiM Quatre murs et un toit 1953 Scenario et réalisation Pierre Jallaud MRU (ministère de la reconstruction et de l'urbanisme) www.dailymotion.com/video/xk6xui twitter.com/Memoire2cite/status/1121877386491043840/photo... Avril 1993, 6 ans après l'implosion de la tour DEBUSSY des 4000, 30% seulement des travaux de rénovation ont été réalisés et le chômage frappe toujours 1/3 des hbts. C'est un échec. A Mantes la Jolie, 6 mois après la destruction des 4 tours du Val Fourré, www.youtube.com/watch?v=ta4kj05KJOM … Banlieue 89, Bacalan à Bordeaux 1986 - Un exemple de rénovation urbaine et réhabilitation de l'habitat dans un des quartiers de Bordeaux La Cité Claveau à BACALAN. A l'initiative du mouvementla video içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=IN0JtGBaA1o … L'assoçiation de ROLLAND CASTRO @ Le Plan Banlieue 89 - mode d'emploi - Archive INA - La video içi. TRANSFORMER LES PAYSAGES URBAINS AVEC UNE APPROCHE CULTURELLE www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aw-_f-bT2TQ … SNCF les EDITIONS DU CABRI PRESENTE PARIS LA BANLIEUE 1960-1980 -La video Içi.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDEQOsdGjsg … Içi la DATAR en 1000 clichés missionphotodatar.cget.gouv.fr/accueil - Notre Paris, 1961, Réalisation : André Fontaine, Henri Gruel Les archives filmées de la cinémathèque du ministère de 1945 à nos jours içi www.dailymotion.com/video/xgis6v?playlist=x34ije
31 TOULOUSE - le Mirail 1962 réalisation : Mario Marret construction de la ville nouvelle Toulouse le Mirail, commentée par l'architecte urbaniste Georges Candilis le film www.dailymotion.com/video/xn4t4q?playlist=x34ije Il existe de nos jours, de nombreux photographes qui privilégient la qualité artistique de leurs travaux cartophiles. A vous de découvrir ces artistes inconnus aujourd’hui, mais qui seront peut-être les grands noms de demain.Les films du MRU - Le temps de l'urbanisme, 1962, Réalisation : Philippe Brunet www.dailymotion.com/video/xgj2zz?playlist=x34ije … … … … -Les grands ensembles en images Les ministères en charge du logement et leur production audiovisuelle (1944-1966) MASSY - Les films du MRU - La Cité des hommes, 1966, Réalisation : Fréderic Rossif, Albert Knobler www.dailymotion.com/video/xgiqzr?playlist=x34i - Les films du MRU @ les AUTOROUTES - Les liaisons moins dangereuses 1972 la construction des autoroutes en France - Le réseau autoroutier 1960 Histoire de France Transports et Communications - www.dailymotion.com/video/xxi0ae?playlist=x34ije … - A quoi servaient les films produits par le MRU ministère de la Reconstruction et de l'Urbanisme ? la réponse de Danielle Voldman historienne spécialiste de la reconstruction www.dailymotion.com/video/x148qu4?playlist=x34ije … -les films du MRU - Bâtir mieux plus vite et moins cher 1975 l'industrialisation du bâtiment et ses innovations : la préfabrication en usine, le coffrage glissant... www.dailymotion.com/video/xyjudq?playlist=x34ije … - TOUT SUR LA CONSTRUCTION DE NOTRE DAME LA CATHEDRALE DE PARIS Içi www.notredamedeparis.fr/la-cathedrale/histoire/historique... -MRU Les films - Le Bonheur est dans le béton - 2015 Documentaire réalisé par Lorenz Findeisen produit par Les Films du Tambour de Soie içi www.dailymotion.com/video/x413amo?playlist=x34ije …
archipostcard.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2009-02-13T... -Créteil.un couple à la niaiserie béate exalte les multiples bonheurs de la vie dans les new G.E. www.youtube.com/watch?v=FT1_abIteFE … La Ville bidon était un téléfilm d'1 heure intitulé La Décharge.Mais la censure de ces temps de présidence Pompidou en a interdit la diffusion télévisuelle - museedelacartepostale.fr/periode-semi-moderne/ - archipostalecarte.blogspot.com/ - Hansjörg Schneider BAUNETZWOCHE 87 über Papiermoderne www.baunetz.de/meldungen/Meldungen_BAUNETZWOCHE_87_ueber_... … - ARCHITECTURE le blog de Claude LOTHIER içi leblogdeclaudelothier.blogspot.com/2006/ - - Le balnéaire en cartes postales autour de la collection de David Liaudet, et ses excellents commentaires.. www.dailymotion.com/video/x57d3b8 -Restaurants Jacques BOREL, Autoroute A 6, 1972 Canton d'AUXERRE youtu.be/LRNhNzgkUcY munchies.vice.com/fr/article/43a4kp/jacques-borel-lhomme-... … Celui qu'on appellera le « Napoléon du prêt-à-manger » se détourne d'ailleurs peu à peu des Wimpy, s'engueule avec la maison mère et fait péricliter la franchise ...
museedelacartepostale.fr/blog/ - museedelacartepostale.fr/exposition-permanente/ - www.queenslandplaces.com.au/category/headwords/brisbane-c... - collection-jfm.fr/t/cartes-postales-anciennes/france#.XGe... - www.cparama.com/forum/la-collection-de-cpa-f1.html - www.dauphinomaniac.org/Cartespostales/Francaises/Cartes_F... - furtho.tumblr.com/archive
le Logement Collectif* 50,60,70's, dans tous ses états..Histoire & Mémoire d'H.L.M. de Copropriété Renouvellement Urbain-Réha-NPNRU., twitter.com/Memoire2cite tout içi sig.ville.gouv.fr/atlas/ZUS/ - media/InaEdu01827/la-creatio" rel="noreferrer nofollow">fresques.ina.fr/jalons/fiche-media/InaEdu01827/la-creatio Bâtir mieux plus vite et moins cher 1975 l'industrialisation du bâtiment et ses innovations : www.dailymotion.com/video/xyjudq?playlist=x34ije la préfabrication en usine www.dailymotion.com/video/xx6ob5?playlist=x34ije , le coffrage glissant www.dailymotion.com/video/x19lwab?playlist=x34ije ... De nouvelles perspectives sont nées dans l'industrie du bâtiment avec les principes de bases de l'industrialisation du bâtiment www.dailymotion.com/video/x1a98iz?playlist=x34ije ,
www.dailymotion.com/video/xk6xui?playlist=x34ije , www.dailymotion.com/video/xk1dh2?playlist=x34ije :- que dire de RICARDO BOFFIL Les meilleures balades que j’ai fait autour de Paris je les ai faites dans l’application Plans. Je ne minore pas le rôle de Google Maps, révolution cartographique sans précédent et sans égale, qui aura réalisé nos fantasmes d’Aleph borgesien — l’idée d’un point d’où le monde serait visible en totalité — parachevé Mercator et permis d’explorer des parties du globe inconnues de Cook, Bougainville et Amundsen. Je n’oublie pas non plus cet exercice de cartographie au collège, qui nous avait démontré que nous étions à 3 cartes IGN de la capitale, et que le tissu urbain était de plus en plus serré à mesure que nous avancions vers le nord. Mais Plan possédait une fonctionnalité inédite, le Flyover, technologie à l’origine destinée aux pilotes de chasse, et qui fournissait des rendus 3D spectaculaire des bâtiments survolés — ainsi que des arbres et des déclivités du sol.
On quittait enfin les champs asphyxiants de la photographie aérienne pour des vues à l’oblique des villes visitées : après un siècle d’écrasement — la photographie aérienne est étroitement contemporaine du bombardement aérien — les villes reprenaient enfin de la vigueur et remontaient vers le ciel. J’avais d’ailleurs effectué moi-même une manœuvre de redressement similaire le jour où j’étais parti, à pied depuis Paris, visiter à Nanterre une exposition sur la photographie aérienne. J’étais à la quête des premières vues de Paris qu’avait prises Nadar depuis un ballon captif. À défaut de ces images, définitivement manquantes, j’avais parcouru, après la Grande Arche, les derniers kilomètres de la Voie Royale, cette prodigieuse perspective historique partie du Louvre — rare exemple de frise chronologique implémentée dans une structure urbanistique.
J’avais en réalité un peu dévié de la ligne droite pour aller voir les tours Nuages d’Emile Aillaud, le Facteur Cheval du modernisme, dont je connaissais déjà les autres chefs d’œuvres d'architecture naïve, les nouilles chinoises de Grigny et le spaghetti de Pantin.
C’était précisément l’usage que j’avais fait de l’application Plans : j’étais parti à la recherche de tous les groupements de tour qu’elle m’avait permis d’identifier, sur mon iPad. Je les faisais tourner avec deux doigts, comme un éclaireur qui marcherait autour d’un donjon, avant de les immortaliser, sous leur plus bel angle, par une capture d’écran.Un éclaireur autour d’un donjon : c’était exactement cela, qui m’avait fasciné. Les guerres territoriales entre Les Tarterêts de Corbeil et les Pyramides d’Evry avaient marqué mon enfance. La notion de cité, telle qu’elle avait été définie, à partir des années 80, dans le second âge des grands ensembles, l’âge du déclin, avait conservé un cachet médiéval. Ici, vivaient guetteurs et trafiquants, condottieres à la tête d’une écurie de go-fast et entretenant des chenils remplis de mâtins rares et dangereux. Ici, l’État central ne remplissait plus ses tâches régaliennes, ici la modernité laïque était entrée en crise. Mais ce que j’avais découvert, en collectionnant ces captures d’écran, c’était à quel point l’urbanisme de la banlieue parisienne était, strictement, d’obédience médiévale. On était passé, d’un seul mouvement et sans même s’en rendre compte de Château-Gaillard à la Cité 4000, du Donjon de Vincennes aux tours de Sarcelles, du château de Gisors aux choux fleurs de Créteil.J’ai même retrouvé la colonne détruite du désert de Retz dans le babylonien château d’eau de Noisiel.
Des hauteurs de Rosny à celle de Chanteloup, du plateau de Clichy à la dalle d’Argenteuil, on avait bizarrement livré des pastiches inconscients de la grande architecture militaire médiévales : les environs de Paris s’étaient retrouvés à nouveau fortifiés, la vieille tour de Montlhéry n’était plus solitaire, et même les immeubles de briques rouges qui avaient succédé à l’enceinte de Thiers évoquaient des murailles.
Et ce que j’avais initialement pris pour des anomalies, des accidents malheureux du post-modernisme, les grand ensembles voûtés et cannelés de Ricardo Boffil, étaient peut-être ce qui exprimait le mieux tout cela — ou du moins qui clôturaient avec le génie le plus clair cet âge des grands ensembles.
Car c’était cela, ces Carcassonnes, ces Acropoles, ces Atlandides qui surnageaient avec le plus de conviction au milieu des captures d’écrans de ruines médiévales qui s’accumulaient sur mon bureau.
Si décriées, dès leur construction, pour leur kitch intolérable ces mégastructures me sont soudain apparues comme absolument nécessaires.
Si les Villes Nouvelles n’ont jamais existé, et persisteront dans la mémoire des hommes, elles le doivent à ces rêveries bizarres et grandioses, à ces hybridations impossibles entre les cités idéales de Ledoux et les utopies corbuséennes.
L’Aqueduc de Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, les Espaces d’Abraxas à Marne-la-Vallée, les Colonnes de Saint-Christophe à Cergy-Pontoise sont les plus belles ruines du Grand Paris.
www.franceculture.fr/emissions/la-conclusion/ricardo-bofill immerssion dans le monde du logement social, l'univers des logements sociaux, des H.B.M au H.L.M - Retour sur l'histoire du logement collectif d'apres guerre - En Françe, sur l’ensemble du territoire avant, 4 millions d’immeubles étaient vétustes, dont 500.000 à démolir; au total 10% des logements étaient considérés comme insalubres et 40% réputés d’une qualité médiocre, et surpeuplés. C’est pour ces raisons que, à partir de 1954, le Ministre à la Reconstruction et au Logement évalue le besoin en logements à 2.000.660, devenant ainsi une priorité nationale. Quelques années plus tard à l’appel de l’Abbé Pierre, le journaliste Gilbert Mathieu, en avril 1957 publiait dans le quotidien Le Monde une série d’articles sur la situation dramatique du logement : Logement, notre honte et dénonçant le nombre réduit de logements et leur impitoyable état. Robert Doisneau, Banlieue après-guerre, 1943-1949 /Le mandat se veut triple : reconstruire le parc immobilier détruit durant les bombardements essentiellement du printemps/été 1944, faire face à l’essor démographique et enfin résorber l’habitat insalubre notamment les bidonvilles et les cités de transit. Une ambition qui paraît, dès le début, très élevée, associée à l’industrialisation progressive de la nation entre autre celle du secteur de la construction (voir le vidéo de l’INA du 17 juillet 1957 intitulée La crise du logement, un problème national. Cela dit, l’effort pour l’État français était d’une ampleur jamais vue ailleurs. La double nécessité de construire davantage et vite, est en partie la cause de la forme architecturale excentrique qui constituera les Grands Ensembles dans les banlieues françaises. Cinq caractéristiques permettent de mieux comprendre ce terme : la rupture avec le tissu urbain ancien, un minimum de mille logements, une forme collective (tours, barres) de quatre jusqu’à vingt niveaux, la conception d’appartements aménagés et équipés et enfin une gestion destinée pour la plupart à des bailleurs de logement social.
Pour la banlieue parisienne leur localisation s’est opérée majoritairement dans la périphérie, tandis que dans les autres cas, plus de la moitié a été construite dans le centre ville, le plus souvent à la limite des anciens faubourgs.
Architecture d’Aujourd’hui n° 46, 1953 p. 58-55
C’est le triomphe de l’urbanisme fonctionnel et rationaliste cher à Le Corbusier. Entre 1958 et 1973, cent quatre-vingt-quinze Zones à Urbaniser en Priorité (ZUP) sont créées, comprenant deux millions de logements, essentiellement de type populaire en Habitations à Loyer Modéré (HLM), mais pas exclusivement, remplaçant ainsi les anciennes Habitations à Bon Marché (HBM) crées en 1894. Selon le décret du 27 mars 1954 qui en fixe les conditions d’attribution, les bénéficiaires de la législation n’ont pas changé, ce sont toujours des « personnes peu fortunées vivant principalement de leur salaire », selon la loi Strauss de 1906. En 1953, tous les HLM voient leur surface maximale se réduire, en passant de 71 à 65 mètres carrés pour un quatre pièces. L’accès au logement des familles modestes se fera donc au détriment de la qualité et quantité de l’espace habité pour des familles nombreuses. À ce propos, le sociologue Thierry Oblet a bien montré comment se sont articulées les pensées des architectes et des ingénieurs modernistes, avec leur souci planificateur d’un État interventionniste[8] grâce à l’hégémonie du béton, de la ligne droite et de la standardisation de la construction.
Les exemples de cette architecture restent nombreux : de la Cité de 4000 (pour 4000 logements) à la Courneuve en Seine-Saint-Denis (93) aux logements de 15 étages aux balcons pétales, appelés « Chou-fleur » à Créteil en Val-de Marne (94) dessinés au début des années 70 par l’architecte Gérard Grandval. De la Cité des nuages à Nanterre dans les Hauts-de-Seine (92) à la Grande borne construite entre 1967 et 1971 sur le territoire des communes de Grigny et Viry-Châtillon, dans l’Essonne (91) en passant par la Noé à Chanteloup-les-Vignes dans le département des Yvelines (78) scénario du célèbre film La Haine[9] de Kassovits.
Récemment, plusieurs expositions photographiques se sont
concentrées sur cette nouvelle figure de l’urbanisme fonctionnaliste français de l’après-guerre. Par exemple Toit&Moi, 100 ans de logement social (2012), Les Grands ensembles 1960-2010 (2012) produite par l’école supérieure d’arts & médias de Caen/Cherbourg, selon un projet du Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication. Enfin l’exposition Photographie à l’œuvre, (2011-2012) d’Henri Salesse, photographe du service de l’inventaire du Ministère de la Reconstruction et de l’Urbanisme et Voyage en périphérie (2012) de Cyrus Cornut.
Il s’agissait là non seulement d’un progrès matériel, mais aussi démocratique, donnant ainsi à chaque citoyen, la possibilité d’accéder à son petit appartement doté de tous les conforts de l’époque. La recherche d’économie et de rapidité dans la conduite des chantiers portent à l’utilisation du béton comme matériel privilégié et à des plans architecturaux aussi simples que possible avec la réalisation de logements standardisés, dont les barres et les tours deviennent les figures principales : Au mitan des années cinquante, apparurent d’étranges formes urbaines. Des immeubles d’habitation de plus en plus longs et de plus en plus hauts, assemblés en blocs qui ne s’intégraient pas aux villes existantes. Ces blocs s’en différenciaient ostensiblement et parfois comme systématiquement, s’en isolaient. Ils semblaient faire ville à part. Surtout ils ne ressemblaient pas à ce qu’on avait l’habitude d’appeler ville. Et leur architecture aussi, qui était tellement déroutante. On les a nommés » grands ensembles. Cité de l’Abreuvoir, Bobigny (93), 2003 (Inventaire général du Patrimoine, Région Ile de France / Stéphane Asseline)
Bref, entre 1946 et 1975 le parc immobilier français passe de 12,7 millions à 21 millions de logements. Environ 8 millions de ceux-ci sont neufs, construits entre 1953-1975 – dont la moitié sous forme de grands ensembles – et près de 80 % des logements grâce à une aide de l’État avec des crédits publics. Le nombre de logements sociaux passe de moins de 500.000 à près de 3 millions, dont 43 % en région parisienne, où la demande est la plus forte[11]. Ce qui témoigne d’un effort énorme. Secrétariat d’État à la Reconstruction et au Logement, Supplément du logement en 1954, cité par Bachmann, C. Le Guennec, N., Violences urbaines…Op.cit, p.24. Alors que l’hiver 1954 est particulièrement rigoureux, l’abbé Pierre lance un appel en faveur des sans-logis et déshérités et organise des collectes de vêtements et de nourriture pour les plus démunis. Cela nous rappelle également que les inégalités sociales restaient particulièrement importantes à l’époque, malgré les débuts de la croissance économique, et que la crise du logement n’était pas encore complètement résolue. Danièle Voldman, La reconstruction des villes françaises de 1940 à 1954 : histoire d’une politique, Paris, L’Harmattan, 1997. Les Actualités françaises, La crise du logement, un problème national, 17 juillet, 1957, in fresques.ina.fr/…/la-crise-du-logement-un-probleme-n…, consulté le 20/02/2014. C’est l’urbaniste Marcel Rotival dans un numéro d’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui de juin 1935 (vol.1, n°6, juin 1935, p.57) qui propose pour la première fois cette terminologie pour désigner les Habitations à Bon Marché (HBM) et leur transformation en Habitations à Loyer Modéré (HLM), par la loi du 21 juillet 1951: « Nous espérons, un jour, sortir des villes comme Paris, non seulement par l’avenue des Champs Elysées, la seule réalisation de tenue sans laquelle Paris n’existerait pas, mais sortir par Belleville, par Charonne, par Bobigny, etc., et trouver harmonieusement disposés le long de larges autostrades, au milieu de grands espaces boisés, de parcs, de stades, de grandes cités claires, bien orientées, lumineusement éclairées par le soleil. » Largement reprise depuis les années 1950 dans le jargon administratif et public, elle apparaît pour la première fois dans un texte officiel qu’en 1973 avec la Circulaire Guichard, alors Ministre de l’Aménagement du territoire, de l’Equipement, du Logement et du tourisme. Celui-ci met un terme à la politique initiée après-guerre afin « d’empêcher la réalisation des formes d’urbanisation désignées généralement sous le nom de “grands ensembles”, peu conforme aux aspirations des habitants et sans justification économique sérieuse ». Paradoxalement, le terme de grands ensembles s’officialise donc au moment même où ils son mis en question. ZUP est un acronyme qui signifie Zone à Urbaniser en Priorité. Elles ont été créées par le décret N°58-1464 du 31 décembre 1958, afin de planifier et d’encadrer sur le territoire national, le développement urbain pour répondre à la carence de logements face à l’accroissement démographique et favoriser enfin la résorption de l’habitat insalubre. Oblet, Thierry, Gouverner la ville. Les voies urbaines de la démocratie moderne, Paris, PUF, 2003. En particulier par l’intermédiaire de la Société centrale de construction et de la Société centrale pour l’équipement du territoire, créées au milieu des années 1950 en tant que filiales de la Caisse des dépôts et consignations.
Kassovitz, Mathieu, La Haine, France, 1995.
Cornu, Marcel, Libérer la ville, Bruxelles, Casterman, 1977, p.60. twitter.com/Memoire2citeil Les 30 Glorieuses . com et la carte postale ... Il existe de nos jours, de nombreux photographes qui privilégient la qualité artistique de leurs travaux cartophiles. A vous de découvrir ces artistes inconnus aujourd’hui, mais qui seront peut-être les grands noms de demain. archipostcard.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2009-02-13T... - museedelacartepostale.fr/periode-semi-moderne/ - archipostalecarte.blogspot.com/ - museedelacartepostale.fr/blog/ - museedelacartepostale.fr/exposition-permanente/ - www.queenslandplaces.com.au/category/headwords/brisbane-c... - collection-jfm.fr/t/cartes-postales-anciennes/france#.XGe... - www.cparama.com/forum/la-collection-de-cpa-f1.html - www.dauphinomaniac.org/Cartespostales/Francaises/Cartes_F... - furtho.tumblr.com/archive
le Logement Collectif* 50,60,70's, dans tous ses états..Histoire & Mémoire d'H.L.M. de Copropriété Renouvellement Urbain-Réha-NPNRU., twitter.com/Memoire2cite tout içi sig.ville.gouv.fr/atlas/ZUS/ - media/InaEdu01827/la-creatio" rel="noreferrer nofollow">fresques.ina.fr/jalons/fiche-media/InaEdu01827/la-creatio Bâtir mieux plus vite et moins cher 1975 l'industrialisation du bâtiment et ses innovations : www.dailymotion.com/video/xyjudq?playlist=x34ije la préfabrication en usine www.dailymotion.com/video/xx6ob5?playlist=x34ije , le coffrage glissant www.dailymotion.com/video/x19lwab?playlist=x34ije ... De nouvelles perspectives sont nées dans l'industrie du bâtiment avec les principes de bases de l'industrialisation du bâtiment www.dailymotion.com/video/x1a98iz?playlist=x34ije ,
www.dailymotion.com/video/xk6xui?playlist=x34ije , www.dailymotion.com/video/xk1dh2?playlist=x34ije : mécanisation, rationalisation et élaboration industrielle de la production. Des exemples concrets sont présentés afin d'illustrer l'utilisation des différentes innovations : les coffrages outils, coffrage glissant, le tunnel, des procédés pour accélérer le durcissement du béton. Le procédé dit de coffrage glissant est illustré sur le chantier des tours Pablo Picasso à Nanterre. Le principe est de s'affranchir des échafaudages : le coffrage épouse le contour du bâtiment, il s'élève avec la construction et permet de réaliser simultanément l'ensemble des murs verticaux. Au centre du plancher de travail, une grue distribue en continu le ferraillage et le béton. Sur un tel chantier les ouvriers se relaient 24h / 24 , www.dailymotion.com/video/xwytke?playlist=x34ije , www.dailymotion.com/video/x1bci6m?playlist=x34ije
Le reportage se penche ensuite sur la préfabrication en usine. Ces procédés de préfabrication en usine selon le commentaire sont bien adaptés aux pays en voie de développement, cela est illustré dans le reportage par une réalisation en Libye à Benghazi. Dans la course à l'allégement des matériaux un procédé l'isola béton est présenté. Un chapitre sur la construction métallique explique les avantage de ce procédé. La fabrication de composants ouvre de nouvelles perspectives à l'industrie du bâtiment.
Lieux géographiques : la Grande Borne 91, le Vaudreuil 27, Avoriaz, Avenue de Flandres à Paris, tours Picasso à Nanterre, vues de la défense, Benghazi Libye
www.dailymotion.com/playlist/x34ije_territoiresgouv_cinem... - mémoire2cité - le monde de l'Architecture locative collective et bien plus encore - mémoire2cité - Bâtir mieux plus vite et moins cher 1975 l'industrialisation du bâtiment et ses innovations : www.dailymotion.com/video/xyjudq?playlist=x34ije la préfabrication en usine www.dailymotion.com/video/xx6ob5?playlist=x34ije , le coffrage glissant www.dailymotion.com/video/x19lwab?playlist=x34ije ... De nouvelles perspectives sont nées dans l'industrie du bâtiment avec les principes de bases de l'industrialisation du bâtiment www.dailymotion.com/video/x1a98iz?playlist=x34ije ,
Le Joli Mai (Restauré) - Les grands ensembles BOBIGNY l Abreuvoir www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUY9XzjvWHE … et la www.youtube.com/watch?v=hK26k72xIkU … www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCKF0HEsWWo …
Genève Le Grand Saconnex & la Bulle Pirate - architecte Marçel Lachat -
Un film de Julien Donada içi www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=4E723uQcpnU … … .Genève en 1970. pic.twitter.com/1dbtkAooLM è St-Etienne - La muraille de Chine, en 1973 ce grand immeuble du quartier de Montchovet, existait encore photos la Tribune/Progres.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJAylpe8G48 …, - la tour 80 HLM située au 1 rue Proudhon à Valentigney dans le quartier des Buis Cette tour emblématique du quartier avec ces 15 étages a été abattu par FERRARI DEMOLITION (68). VALENTIGNEY (25700) 1961 - Ville nouvelle-les Buis 3,11 mn www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_GvwSpQUMY … - Au nord-Est de St-Etienne, aux confins de la ville, se dresse une colline Montreynaud la ZUP de Raymond Martin l'architecte & Alexandre Chemetoff pour les paysages de St-Saens.. la vidéo içi * Réalisation : Dominique Bauguil www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqfb27hXMDo … … - www.dailymotion.com/video/xk6xui?playlist=x34ije , www.dailymotion.com/video/xk1dh2?playlist=x34ije : mécanisation, rationalisation et élaboration industrielle de la production. Des exemples concrets sont présentés afin d'illustrer l'utilisation des différentes innovations : les coffrages outils, coffrage glissant, le tunnel, des procédés pour accélérer le durcissement du béton. Le procédé dit de coffrage glissant est illustré sur le chantier des tours Pablo Picasso à Nanterre. Le principe est de s'affranchir des échafaudages : le coffrage épouse le contour du bâtiment, il s'élève avec la construction et permet de réaliser simultanément l'ensemble des murs verticaux. Au centre du plancher de travail, une grue distribue en continu le ferraillage et le béton. Sur un tel chantier les ouvriers se relaient 24h / 24 , www.dailymotion.com/video/xwytke?playlist=x34ije , www.dailymotion.com/video/x1bci6m?playlist=x34ije
Le reportage se penche ensuite sur la préfabrication en usine. Ces procédés de préfabrication en usine selon le commentaire sont bien adaptés aux pays en voie de développement, cela est illustré dans le reportage par une réalisation en Libye à Benghazi. Dans la course à l'allégement des matériaux un procédé l'isola béton est présenté. Un chapitre sur la construction métallique explique les avantage de ce procédé. La fabrication de composants ouvre de nouvelles perspectives à l'industrie du bâtiment.
la Grande Borne 91, le Vaudreuil 27, Avoriaz, Avenue de Flandres à Paris, tours Picasso à Nanterre, vues de la défense, Benghazi Libye 1975 Réalisateur : Sydney Jézéquel, Karenty
la construction des Autoroutes en France - Les liaisons moins dangereuses 1972 www.dailymotion.com/video/xxi0ae?playlist=x34ije Cardem les 60 ans de l'entreprise de démolition française tres prisée des bailleurs pour les 80, 90's (1956 - 2019) toute l'Histoire de l'entreprise içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yyf1XGvTZYs - 69 LYON & la Cardem pour la démolition de la barre 230 Quartier la Duchère le 2 juillet 2015, youtu.be/BSwidwLw0NA pic.twitter.com/5XgR8LY7At -34 Béziers - C'était Capendeguy le 27 janv 2008 En quelques secondes, 450 kg d'explosifs ont soufflé la barre HLM de 492 lgts, de 480 m, qui laissera derrière elle 65.000 tonnes de gravas. www.youtube.com/watch?v=rydT54QYX50 … … Les usines Peugeot - Sochaux Montbéliard. 100 ans d'histoire en video www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4w3CxXVAyY … - 42 LOIRE SAINT-ETIENNE MONTREYNAUD LA ZUP Souvenirs avec Mascovich & son clip "la tour de Montreynaud" www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7Zmwn224XE …
- Villeneuve-la-Garenne, La Caravelle est à mettre au crédit de Jean Dubuisson, l’un des architectes les plus en vue des années 1960, www.dailymotion.com/video/x1re3h5 via @Dailymotion - AMIENS les HLM C'était le 29 juillet 2010, à 11h02. En quelques secondes, cette tour d'habitation s'est effondrée, détruite par implosion. Construite en 1961, la tour avait été vidée de ses habitants quelques années auparavant. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajz2xk5KBNo … … - Les habitants de Montreynaud parlent de leur quartier et de cette destruction entre nostalgie et soulagement içi en video www.dailymotion.com/video/xmiwfk - Les bâtiments de la région parisienne - Vidéo Ina.fr www.ina.fr/video/CAF96034508/les-batiments-de-la-region-p... … via @Inafr_officiel - Daprinski - George Michael (Plaisir de France remix) www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJeH-nzlj3I
Ministère de l'Équipement et de l'Aménagement du Territoire - Dotation par la France d'autoroutes modernes "nécessité vitale" pour palier à l'inadaptation du réseau routier de l'époque voué à la paralysie : le reportage nous montre des images d'embouteillages. Le ministre de l'Équipement et de l'Aménagement du Territoire dans les deux gouvernements de Pierre Messmer, de 1972 à 1974, Olivier Guichard explique les ambitions du programme de construction qui doit atteindre 800 km par ans en 1978. L'ouverture de section nouvelles va bon train : Nancy / Metz par exemple. Le reportage nous montre l'intérieur des bureaux d'études qui conçoivent ces autoroute dont la conception est assistée par ordinateurs dont le projet d'ensemble en 3D est visualisé sur un écran. La voix off nous informe sur le financement de ces équipements. Puis on peut voir des images de la construction du pont sur la Seine à Saint Cloud reliant l'autoroute de Normandie au périphérique, de l'échangeur de Palaiseau sur 4 niveau : record d'Europe précise le commentaire. Le reportage nous informe que des sociétés d'économies mixtes ont étés crées pour les tronçons : Paris / Lille, Paris / Marseille, Paris / Normandie. Pour accélérer la construction l’État a eu recours à des concessions privées par exemple pour le tronçon Paris / Chartres. "Les autoroutes changent le visage de la France : artères économiques favorisant le développement industriel elles permettent de revitaliser des régions en perte de vitesse et de l'intégrer dans le mouvement général de l'expansion" Sur le plan européen elles vont combler le retard de la France et réaliser son insertion. Images de l'inauguration de l'autoroute entre Paris et Bruxelles par le président Georges Pompidou. Le reportage rappel que l'autre fonction capitale des autoroute est de favoriser la sécurité. La question de la limitation de vitesse est posée au ministre de l’Équipement, qui n'y est favorable que sur certains tronçons. Un des facteur de sécurité selon le commentaire est l'humanisation des autoroutes : aires de repos, restaurants, signalisation touristiques... "Rien n'est impossible aux techniques modernes" nous apprend la voix off qui prend comme exemple le déplacement sur rail de 65 mètres d'un château classé afin de faire passer l'autoroute Lille / Dunkerque.Durée : 4 minutes 30 secondes
Sur les routes de France les ponts renaissent 1945 reconstruction de la France après la Seconde Guerre mondiale www.dailymotion.com/video/xuxrii?playlist=x34ije Lyon, Tournon, Caen - Le Bosquel, un village renait 1947 l'album cinématographique de la reconstruction, réalisation Paul de Roubaix production ministère de la Reconstruction et de l'Urbanisme, village prototype, architecte Paul Dufournet, www.dailymotion.com/video/xx5tx8?playlist=x34ije - Demain Paris 1959 dessin animé présentant l'aménagement de la capitale dans les années 60, Animation, dessin animé à vocation pédagogique visant à promouvoir la politique d’aménagement suivie dans les années 60 à Paris. Un raccourci historique sur l’extension de Paris du Moyen Âge au XIXe siècle (Lutèce, œuvres de Turgot, Napoléon, Haussmann), ce dessin animé retrace la naissance de la banlieue et de ses avatars au XXe siècle. Il annonce les grands principes d’aménagement des villes nouvelles et la restructuration du centre de Paris (référence implicite à la charte d’Athènes). Le texte est travaillé en rimes et vers. Une chanson du vieux Paris conclut poétiquement cette vision du futur. Thèmes principaux : Aménagement urbain / planification-aménagement régional Mots-clés : Banlieue, extension spatiale, histoire, quartier, ville, ville nouvelle Lieu géographique : Paris 75 Architectes ou personnalités : Eugène Haussmann, Napoléon, Turgot Réalisateurs : André Martin, Michel Boschet Production : les films Roger Leenhardt
www.dailymotion.com/video/xw6lak?playlist=x34ije - Rue neuve 1956 la reconstruction de la France dix ans après la fin de la seconde guerre mondiale, villes, villages, grands ensembles réalisation : Jack Pinoteau , Panorama de la reconstruction de la France dix ans après la fin de la seconde guerre mondiale, ce film de commande évoque les villes et villages français détruits puis reconstruits dans un style respectant la tradition : Saint-Malo, Gien, Thionville, Ammerschwihr, etc. ainsi que la reconstruction en rupture avec l'architecture traditionnelle à Châtenay-Malabry, Arles, Saint Étienne, Évreux, Chambéry, Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, Abbeville, Le Havre, Marseille, Boulogne-sur-Mer, Dunkerque. Le documentaire explique par exemple la manière dont a été réalisée la reconstruction de Saint-Malo à l'intérieur des rempart de la vieille ville : "c'est la fidélité à l'histoire et la force du souvenir qui a guidé l'architecte". Dans le même esprit à Gien, au trois quart détruite en 1940, seul le château construit en 1494 pour Anne de Beaujeu, fille aînée de Louis XI, fut épargné par les bombardements. La ville fut reconstruite dans le style des rares immeubles restant. Gien est relevé de ses ruines et le nouvel ensemble harmonieux est appelé « Joyau de la Reconstruction française ». Dans un deuxième temps est abordé le chapitre de la construction des cités et des grands ensembles, de l’architecture du renouveau qualifiée de "grandiose incontestablement". S’il est précisé "on peut aimer ou de ne pas aimer ce style", l’emporte au final l’argument suivant : les grands ensembles, c'est la campagne à la ville, un urbanisme plus aéré, plus vert." les films caravelles 1956, Réalisateur : Jack Pinoteau (connu pour être le metteur en scène du film Le Triporteur 1957 qui fit découvrir Darry Cowl) www.dailymotion.com/video/xuz3o8?playlist=x34ije - www.dailymotion.com/video/xk1g5j?playlist=x34ije Brigitte Gros - Urbanisme - Filmer les grands ensembles 2016 - par Camille Canteux chercheuse au CHS -Centre d'Histoire Sociale - Jeanne Menjoulet - Ce film du CHS daté de 2014 www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDUBwVPNh0s … L'UNION SOCIALE POUR L'HABITAT le Musée des H.L.M. musee-hlm.fr/ union-habitat.org/ - EXPOSITION :LES 50 ANS DE LA RESIDENCe SALMSON POINT-Du JOUR www.salmsonlepointdujour.fr/pdf/Exposition_50_ans.pdf - Sotteville Construction de l’Anjou, le premier immeuble de la Zone Verte sottevilleaufildutemps.fr/2017/05/04/construction-de-limm... - www.20minutes.fr/paris/diaporama-7346-photo-854066-100-an... - www.ladepeche.fr/article/2010/11/02/940025-140-ans-en-arc... dreux-par-pierlouim.over-blog.com/article-chamards-1962-9... missionphoto.datar.gouv.fr/fr/photographe/7639/serie/7695...
Official Trailer - the Pruitt-Igoe Myth: an Urban History
www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7RwwkNzF68 - la dérive des continents youtu.be/kEeo8muZYJU Et la disparition des Mammouths - RILLIEUX LA PAPE & Dynacité - Le 23 février 2017, à 11h30, les tours Lyautey étaient foudroyées. www.youtube.com/watch?v=W---rnYoiQc …
Ginger CEBTP Démolition, filiale déconstruction du Groupe Ginger, a réalisé la maîtrise d'oeuvre de l'opération et produit les études d'exécution. L'emblématique ZUP Pruitt Igoe. vaste quartier HLM (33 barres de 11 étages) de Saint-Louis (Missouri) USA. démoli en 1972 www.youtube.com/watch?v=nq_SpRBXRmE … "Life is complicated, i killed people, smuggled people, sold people, but perhaps in here.. things will be different." ~ Niko Bellic - cité Balzac, à Vitry-sur-Seine (23 juin 2010).13H & Boom, quelques secondes plus tard, la barre «GHJ», 14 étages et 168 lgts, s’effondrait comme un château de cartes sous les applaudissements et les sifflets, bientôt enveloppés dans un nuage de poussière. www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9nBMHS7mzY … - "La Chapelle" Réhabilitation thermique de 667 logements à Andrézieux-Bou... youtu.be/0tswIPdoVCE - 11 octobre 1984 www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk-Je1eQ5po …
DESTRUCTION par explosifs de 10 tours du QUARTIER DES MINGUETTES, à LYON. les tours des Minguettes ; VG des tours explosant et s'affaissant sur le côté dans un nuage de fumée blanche ; à 13H15, nous assistons à l'explosion de 4 autres tours - St-Etienne Métropole & Montchovet - la célèbre Muraille de Chine ( 540 lgts 270m de long 15 allees) qui était à l'époque en 1964 la plus grande barre HLM jamais construit en Europe. Après des phases de rénovation, cet immeuble a été dynamité en mai 2000 www.youtube.com/watch?v=YB3z_Z6DTdc … - PRESQU'ILE DE GENNEVILLIERS...AUJOURD'HUI...DEMAIN... (LA video içi parcours.cinearchives.org/Les-films-PRESQU-ILE-DE-GENNEVI... … ) Ce film de la municipalité de Gennevilliers explique la démarche et les objectifs de l’exposition communale consacrée à la presqu’île, exposition qui se tint en déc 1972 et janvier 1973 - le mythe de Pruitt-Igoe en video içi nextcity.org/daily/entry/watch-the-trailer-for-the-pruitt... … - 1964, quand les loisirs n’avaient (deja) pas le droit de cité poke @Memoire2cite youtu.be/Oj64jFKIcAE - Devenir de la ZUP de La Paillade youtu.be/1qxAhsqsV8M v - Regard sur les barres Zum' youtu.be/Eow6sODGct8 v - MONTCHOVET EN CONSTRUCTION Saint Etienne, ses travaux - Vidéo Ina.fr www.ina.fr/video/LXF99004401 … via - La construction de la Grande Borne à Grigny en 1969 Archive INA www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=12&v=t843Ny2p7Ww (discours excellent en seconde partie) - Annie Fourcaut « Les banlieues populaires ont aussi une histoire », Projet 4/2007 (n° 299), pp. 7-15.
www.dailymotion.com/video/xw6lak?playlist=x34ije - Rue neuve 1956 la reconstruction de la France dix ans après la fin de la seconde guerre mondiale, villes, villages, grands ensembles réalisation : Jack Pinoteau , Panorama de la reconstruction de la France dix ans après la fin de la seconde guerre mondiale, ce film de commande évoque les villes et villages français détruits puis reconstruits dans un style respectant la tradition : Saint-Malo, Gien, Thionville, Ammerschwihr, etc. ainsi que la reconstruction en rupture avec l'architecture traditionnelle à Châtenay-Malabry, Arles, Saint Étienne, Évreux, Chambéry, Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, Abbeville, Le Havre, Marseille, Boulogne-sur-Mer, Dunkerque. Le documentaire explique par exemple la manière dont a été réalisée la reconstruction de Saint-Malo à l'intérieur des rempart de la vieille ville : "c'est la fidélité à l'histoire et la force du souvenir qui a guidé l'architecte". Dans le même esprit à Gien, au trois quart détruite en 1940, seul le château construit en 1494 pour Anne de Beaujeu, fille aînée de Louis XI, fut épargné par les bombardements. La ville fut reconstruite dans le style des rares immeubles restant. Gien est relevé de ses ruines et le nouvel ensemble harmonieux est appelé « Joyau de la Reconstruction française ». Dans un deuxième temps est abordé le chapitre de la construction des cités et des grands ensembles, de l’architecture du renouveau qualifiée de "grandiose incontestablement". S’il est précisé "on peut aimer ou de ne pas aimer ce style", l’emporte au final l’argument suivant : les grands ensembles, c'est la campagne à la ville, un urbanisme plus aéré, plus vert." les films caravelles 1956, Réalisateur : Jack Pinoteau (connu pour être le metteur en scène du film Le Triporteur 1957 qui fit découvrir Darry Cowl) www.dailymotion.com/video/xuz3o8?playlist=x34ije - www.dailymotion.com/video/xk1g5j?playlist=x34ije Brigitte Gros - Urbanisme - Filmer les grands ensembles 2016 - par Camille Canteux chercheuse au CHS -Centre d'Histoire Sociale - Jeanne Menjoulet - Ce film du CHS daté de 2014 www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDUBwVPNh0s … L'UNION SOCIALE POUR L'HABITAT le Musée des H.L.M. musee-hlm.fr/ union-habitat.org/ - EXPOSITION :LES 50 ANS DE LA RESIDENCe SALMSON POINT-Du JOUR www.salmsonlepointdujour.fr/pdf/Exposition_50_ans.pdf - Sotteville Construction de l’Anjou, le premier immeuble de la Zone Verte sottevilleaufildutemps.fr/2017/05/04/construction-de-limm... - www.20minutes.fr/paris/diaporama-7346-photo-854066-100-an... - www.ladepeche.fr/article/2010/11/02/940025-140-ans-en-arc... dreux-par-pierlouim.over-blog.com/article-chamards-1962-9... missionphoto.datar.gouv.fr/fr/photographe/7639/serie/7695...
Official Trailer - the Pruitt-Igoe Myth: an Urban History
www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7RwwkNzF68 - la dérive des continents youtu.be/kEeo8muZYJU Et la disparition des Mammouths - RILLIEUX LA PAPE & Dynacité - Le 23 février 2017, à 11h30, les tours Lyautey étaient foudroyées. www.youtube.com/watch?v=W---rnYoiQc …
Ginger CEBTP Démolition, filiale déconstruction du Groupe Ginger, a réalisé la maîtrise d'oeuvre de l'opération et produit les études d'exécution. L'emblématique ZUP Pruitt Igoe. vaste quartier HLM (33 barres de 11 étages) de Saint-Louis (Missouri) USA. démoli en 1972 www.youtube.com/watch?v=nq_SpRBXRmE … "Life is complicated, i killed people, smuggled people, sold people, but perhaps in here.. things will be different." ~ Niko Bellic - cité Balzac, à Vitry-sur-Seine (23 juin 2010).13H & Boom, quelques secondes plus tard, la barre «GHJ», 14 étages et 168 lgts, s’effondrait comme un château de cartes sous les applaudissements et les sifflets, bientôt enveloppés dans un nuage de poussière. www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9nBMHS7mzY … - "La Chapelle" Réhabilitation thermique de 667 logements à Andrézieux-Bou... youtu.be/0tswIPdoVCE - 11 octobre 1984 www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk-Je1eQ5po …
DESTRUCTION par explosifs de 10 tours du QUARTIER DES MINGUETTES, à LYON. les tours des Minguettes ; VG des tours explosant et s'affaissant sur le côté dans un nuage de fumée blanche ; à 13H15, nous assistons à l'explosion de 4 autres tours - St-Etienne Métropole & Montchovet - la célèbre Muraille de Chine ( 540 lgts 270m de long 15 allees) qui était à l'époque en 1964 la plus grande barre HLM jamais construit en Europe. Après des phases de rénovation, cet immeuble a été dynamité en mai 2000 www.youtube.com/watch?v=YB3z_Z6DTdc … - PRESQU'ILE DE GENNEVILLIERS...AUJOURD'HUI...DEMAIN... (LA video içi parcours.cinearchives.org/Les-films-PRESQU-ILE-DE-GENNEVI... … ) Ce film de la municipalité de Gennevilliers explique la démarche et les objectifs de l’exposition communale consacrée à la presqu’île, exposition qui se tint en déc 1972 et janvier 1973 - le mythe de Pruitt-Igoe en video içi nextcity.org/daily/entry/watch-the-trailer-for-the-pruitt... … - 1964, quand les loisirs n’avaient (deja) pas le droit de cité poke @Memoire2cite youtu.be/Oj64jFKIcAE - Devenir de la ZUP de La Paillade youtu.be/1qxAhsqsV8M v - Regard sur les barres Zum' youtu.be/Eow6sODGct8 v - MONTCHOVET EN CONSTRUCTION Saint Etienne, ses travaux - Vidéo Ina.fr www.ina.fr/video/LXF99004401 … via - La construction de la Grande Borne à Grigny en 1969 Archive INA www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=12&v=t843Ny2p7Ww (discours excellent en seconde partie) -David Liaudet : l'image absolue, c'est la carte postale" phothistory.wordpress.com/2016/04/27/david-liaudet-limage... … l'architecture sanatoriale Histoire des sanatoriums en France (1915-1945). Une architecture en quête de rendement thérapeutique..
passy-culture.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/Les-15-Glori... … … & hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-01935993/document … explosion des tours Gauguin Destruction par implosion des Tours Gauguin (quartier de La Bastide) de Limoges le dimanche 28 novembre 2010 à 11 heures. Limoges 28/11/2010 youtu.be/cd0ln4Nqqbs … 42 Roanne - c'etait le 11 novembre 2013 - Souvenirs des HLM quartier du Parc... Après presque 45 minutes de retard, les trois dernières tours Chanteclair sont tombées. Le tir prévu etait à 11h14 La vidéo içi www.leprogres.fr/loire/2013/11/01/roanne-les-3-dernieres-... … … www.leprogres.fr/loire/2013/11/01/roanne-une-vingtaine-de... …Besançon (25) - la Nouvelle cité d'HLM La Planoise en 1960 avec la video des premiers habitants de Planoise en juin 1968 www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVKAkJSsCGk … … … archive INA … BEGIN Japanology - les utopies de l'extreme et Kenzo Tange l'architecte japonnais - la video içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlAOtYFE4GM … 71 les Prés Saint-Jean a Chalon-sur-Saône - L'Implosion des 3 tours HLM de 15 etages le 5 décembre 2009 par FERRARI DEMOLITION içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDsqOjQJS8E … … … & là www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARQYQLORBBE … 21 DIJON Cité des Grésilles - c'etait l'implosion de la residençe HLM Paul Bur le 19 02 2010 www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAEuaq5mivM … … & la www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTUm-mky-sw … 59 - la technique dite du basculement - Destruction de l'immeuble Rhone a Lille avec pleins de ralentit içi video-streaming.orange.fr/actu-politique/destruction-de-l... … 21 Chenôve (le GRAND DIJON) - Implosion de la barre François RUDE le 3 nov 2010 (top video !!) www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClmeXzo3r5A … …Quand l histoire çe repete et çe repetera autant de fois que nesçessaire quand on voie la quantitée de barres 60 70's...dans le collimateur de l'ANRU2.. 77 MEAUX 3 grandes tours..& puis s'en vont.. Démolition Pierre Collinet Batiment Genêt, Hortensia et Iris - Reportage Journal le 26 juin 2011 youtu.be/fpPcaC2wRIc 71 CHALON SUR SAONE C'etait les Prés Saint Jean le 05 décembre 2009 , pour une implosion hlm hors du commun !!! Caméra mise à même le sol , à une vingtaine de mètres de la première tour .... www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVlC9rYU-gs … 78 les MUREAUX le 3 octobre 2010 ,Les dernières minutes de la Tour Molière aux Mureaux (Yvelines) et sa démolition par semi-foudroyage, filmés du quartier de la Vigne Blanche. www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2FDMxrLHcw …71 MACON LES GRANDES PERRIERES C'etait un 30 juin 2013, avec l'implosion de la barre HLM des Perrières par GINGER www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzYwTcCGUGA … … une video exceptionnelle ! c'etait Le Norfolk Court un ensemble résidentiel, le Norfolk Court, construit dans les années 1970, a été démoli à Glasgow en Ecosse le 9 mai 2016 . Il rate la démolition d'un immeuble au tout dernier moment LES PASSAGERS DU BUS EN PROFITE A SA PLAçE lol www.20minutes.fr/tv/t-as-vu/237077-il-rate-la-demolition-... … 69 LYON Quand La Duchère disait adieu à sa barre 230 le jeudi 2 juillet 2015
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSwidwLw0NA … www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdLjUAK1oUk … www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DZ5RSLpYrM …Avenir Deconstruction : Foudroyage de 3 barres HLM - VAULX-EN-VELIN (69) www.youtube.com/watch?v=-E02NUMqDno Démolition du quartier Bachelard à Vaulx-en-Velin www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSAEBIYYpXY Démolition des tours du Pré de l'Herpe (Vaulx-en-Velin)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=fG5sD1G-QgU REPORTAGE - En sept secondes, un ensemble de 407 appartements à Vaulx-en-Velin a été détruit à l'explosif dans le cadre du renouvellement urbain... www.youtube.com/watch?v=Js6w9bnUuRM www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCj5D1NhxhI - St-QUENTIN LA ZUP (scic)- NOUMEA - NOUVELLE CALEDONIE historique de la cité Saint-Quentin içi www.agence-concept.com/savoir-faire/sic/
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Gt6STiH_pM …[VIDEOS] Trois tours de la cité des Indes de Sartrouville ont été démolies dans le cadre du plan de rénovation urbaine du quartier Mille quatre cent soixante-deux détonateurs, 312 kilos le 06/06/2010 à 11 heures. la belle video içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=fY1B07GWyDE VIGNEUX-SUR-SEINE, VOTRE HISTOIRE, VOS SOUVENIRS. içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=8o_Ke26mB48 … , Film des Tours et du quartier de la Croix Blanche, de 1966 à 1968. Les Tours en train de finir de se construire, ainsi que le centre commerciale. Destruction de la Tour 21, pour construire de nouveaux HLM...
42 LOIRE ST-ETIENNE MONTREYNAUD tout une histoire youtu.be/ietu6yPB5KQ - Mascovich & la tour de Montreynaud www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7Zmwn224XE … -Travaux dalle du Forum à Montreynaud Saint-Etienne www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WaFbrBEfU4 … & içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHnT_I5dEyI … - et fr3 là www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCsXNOMRWW4 … - Au nord-Est de St-Etienne, aux confins de la ville, se dresse une colline et sur les pentes de cette colline s’accroche une petite ville, un quartier, un peu à part. Cet endroit niché au milieu de la verdure, c’est le quartier de Montreynaud. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqfb27hXMDo&fbclid=IwAR2ALN4d... …Et sinon, avez-vous remarqué au dessus du P de AGIP ? On voit, dans le film, la Tour Réservoir Plein Ciel du quartier de Montreynaud, détruite 3 ans plus tard par foudroyage ! Sûr que @Memoire2cite a des photos du quartier et de la tout à l'époque ! ;-) 42 LOIRE SAINT-ETIENNE MONTREYNAUD LA ZUP Souvenirs avec Mascovich & son clip "la tour de Montreynaud" www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7Zmwn224XE …
- Que de chemin parcouru, Muraille de Chine La Palle Beaulieu jusqu'aux années 90. L habitat se transforme et s adapte aux nouveaux besoins. Autre temps, période d'essor économique et du "vivre ensemble". Merci à @Memoire2cite pour cette introspection du passé! -
WEEK 12 – Manifest Columbia, Set III
One more shot from within the used CD area before we move on to other parts of the store. Like I said last time (as well as implicitly said earlier today), I spent a lot of time looking around in these aisles, and as a result I didn’t exactly take my photos in as structured of a store-walkaround format as I tend to do in most other situations. Consequently, I’ve just been stitching all these photos together into what I hope is a cohesive stour. One regret is that in all my looking around the used CDs, I didn’t photograph them as much… but I tried to make up for that on my second visit here, during the liquidation! (Still bummed this place closed, though… :( )
(c) 2019 Retail Retell
These places are public so these photos are too, but just as I tell where they came from, I'd appreciate if you'd say who :)
The River Moriston is a river in Inverness-shire, Scotland. It flows broadly east-north-east from the outfall of the dam at Loch Cluanie to Loch Ness. Its waters and those of its tributaries have been harnessed to generate hydro-electric power.
The River Moriston begins just below the dam at the eastern end of Loch Cluanie. Flow in the river is maintained by releasing compensation water from the loch. The A887 road from Kyle of Lochalsh to Loch Ness closely follows the course of the river for much of its length, and is on the north bank at this point. A small river, the Allt nam Peathrain, flows southwards to pass under the road and join the channel on its left bank. At Bun Loyne, a bridge carries the A87 road over the river, as it heads southwards to Glen Garry and the River Garry. Below the bridge, the River Loyne joins on the right bank. This is largely compensation water released from the dam at the eastern end of Loch Loyne. The A887 road crosses to the south bank at Ceannacroc Bridge. The road formerly crossed the old bridge, constructed by Thomas Telford in 1808-1811, and located a little further downstream. It consists of a main span of 50 feet (15 m) for the river and a flood arch of 36 feet (11 m).
The river sweeps round in a large bend, where it is joined by the waters of the River Doe and its tributary the Allt Bhuruisgidh, both of which are dammed further upstream. The main channel continues in an east-north-easterly direction, past the hamlet of Tomchrasky on its northern bank. There is a hatchery on the right bank, and then the A887 crosses to the left bank at Torgoyle Bridge. A bridge was constructed here in 1811 by Telford, but in 1818 was destroyed by a flood. A temporary wooden bridge was put in place to maintain the route, and the present three-arched structure was completed in 1823, to the design of Joseph Mitchell, who was Telford's principal inspector. The outside two arches span 48 feet (15 m) while the centre one, which is wider and higher, spans 55 feet (17 m). The is extensive forest on both banks of the river, which gradually widens as it becomes part of Dundreggan Reservoir. A dam impounds the water at its eastern end, and a hydro-electric power station is located on the south bank close to the dam.
The river narrows again, as it is fed with compensation water from the dam, and is joined by Allt Bhlaraidh, flowing southwards from three lochs and a reservoir, all of which are dammed. The river finally turns towards the south-east as it approached Invermoriston, the main settlement on its course. The A82 road which runs along the bank of Loch Ness used to cross the river on a two-arched bridge, with another arch on the right bank of the river and a three-arched clapper bridge in the approach on the left bank. It is in line with Telford's road built for the Commission for Highland Roads and Bridges in 1808-1811, but is thought to date from the mid-18th century. A replacement bridge was built in 1933, slightly further downstream. It consists of a single 90-foot (27 m) concrete span with a small flood arch, and was designed by Mears and Carcus-Wilson. Below the newer bridge is a nine-sided gazebo, perched on a rocky outcrop overlooking the river. It dates from the early 19th century. Shortly afterwards, the river discharges into Loch Ness.
Thomas Telford FRS FRSE (9 August 1757 – 2 September 1834) was a Scottish civil engineer. After establishing himself as an engineer of road and canal projects in Shropshire, he designed numerous infrastructure projects in his native Scotland, as well as harbours and tunnels. Such was his reputation as a prolific designer of highways and related bridges, he was dubbed the Colossus of Roads (a pun on the Colossus of Rhodes), and, reflecting his command of all types of civil engineering in the early 19th century, he was elected as the first president of the Institution of Civil Engineers, a post he held for 14 years until his death.
The town of Telford in Shropshire was named after him.
Invermoriston is a small village 11 kilometres (7 miles) north of Fort Augustus, Highland, Scotland. The village is on the A82 road, at a junction with the A887.
The village's most visited attraction is the Thomas Telford bridge, built in 1813, which crosses the spectacular River Moriston falls. This bridge used to form part of the main road between Drumnadrochit and Fort Augustus but was replaced in the 1930s with the new bridge used today. Invermoriston's attractions include a hotel, called Glenmoriston Arms, village shop, clog and craft shop as well as a coffee shop/restaurant. From the top of the hill above the village, Sròn Na Muic (Scottish Gaelic for "The Nose of the Pig"), one can admire the finest views of the Great Glen.
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.
The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.
The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.
Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.
Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".
Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".
Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West. Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way. The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes.
Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities. Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land. In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.
In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.
When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected. This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms. Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.
The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.
Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.
According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".
The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.
For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.
In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.
A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.
Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.
The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.
There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.
Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.
The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.
These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.
The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.
Climate
The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.
Places of interest
An Teallach
Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)
Arrochar Alps
Balmoral Castle
Balquhidder
Battlefield of Culloden
Beinn Alligin
Beinn Eighe
Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station
Ben Lomond
Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Cairngorms National Park
Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore
Cairngorm Mountains
Caledonian Canal
Cape Wrath
Carrick Castle
Castle Stalker
Castle Tioram
Chanonry Point
Conic Hill
Culloden Moor
Dunadd
Duart Castle
Durness
Eilean Donan
Fingal's Cave (Staffa)
Fort George
Glen Coe
Glen Etive
Glen Kinglas
Glen Lyon
Glen Orchy
Glenshee Ski Centre
Glen Shiel
Glen Spean
Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)
Grampian Mountains
Hebrides
Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.
Highland Wildlife Park
Inveraray Castle
Inveraray Jail
Inverness Castle
Inverewe Garden
Iona Abbey
Isle of Staffa
Kilchurn Castle
Kilmartin Glen
Liathach
Lecht Ski Centre
Loch Alsh
Loch Ard
Loch Awe
Loch Assynt
Loch Earn
Loch Etive
Loch Fyne
Loch Goil
Loch Katrine
Loch Leven
Loch Linnhe
Loch Lochy
Loch Lomond
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park
Loch Lubnaig
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Morlich
Loch Ness
Loch Nevis
Loch Rannoch
Loch Tay
Lochranza
Luss
Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)
Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran
Rannoch Moor
Red Cuillin
Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83
River Carron, Wester Ross
River Spey
River Tay
Ross and Cromarty
Smoo Cave
Stob Coire a' Chàirn
Stac Polly
Strathspey Railway
Sutherland
Tor Castle
Torridon Hills
Urquhart Castle
West Highland Line (scenic railway)
West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)
Wester Ross
Loch Leven is a sea loch located on the west coast of Scotland. It is spelled Loch Lyon in Timothy Pont's map of the area and is pronounced Li' un. The local Gaelic pronunciation is Lee' oon
Loch Leven extends 8+3⁄4 miles (14.1 km), varying in width between 220 yards (200 m) and just over 1 mile (1.6 km). It opens onto Camus a' Chois at North Ballachulish, part of Loch Linnhe at its western end. There are nine small islands, some rocky and covered with heather and some just smooth green grass, near the western end of the loch.
The village of Glencoe (Scottish Gaelic: A' Chàrnaich) lies on its southern shore. The burial place of the MacDonald clan of Glencoe lies on an island - Eilean Munde, St.Munda's or St Munn's or Saint Fintan Munnu's Island, opposite the village. The island burial place was also shared by the Camerons of Callart, on the north shore of the loch, the Stewarts of Ballachulish and Appin and other local families.
The village of Kinlochleven at the head of the loch was established when the aluminium smelter was built there during the first decade of the twentieth century. It was originally the hamlets of Kinlochmore (Inverness-shire) and Kinlochbeg (Argyll) either side of the River Leven. A road connecting the village to Glencoe and the south was not constructed until 1922: until this date the village could only be reached from the south by boat or on foot. The road on the north of the loch continues on to Fort William (Scottish Gaelic: An Gearasdan Inbhir Lochaidh), and was built in 1927.
For many years the Ballachulish Ferry plied the route across the mouth of the loch, providing a key link on the A82 between Glasgow and Fort William. In 1975 the Ballachulish Bridge replaced the ferry. Under the bridge lie the narrows of Caolas Mhic Phàdraig. The settlements either side of this point are North and South Ballachulish - Baile a' Chaolais (the settlement on the narrows). There is a fast tidal stream through the narrows, running at up to seven knots at springs; it is wise, therefore, to time and match any passage through the narrows with the tides. Further up the loch, there are several other narrows - principally Caolas na Con - with significant, but diminishing tidal streams. The Caolas na Con represented a considerable barrier to shipping, restricting the size of vessels that could reach Kinlochleven, however in 1907 the channel was dredged and the silt-bearing Allt Gleann a' Chaolais diverted to allow ships bringing bauxite alumina to reach the smelter at Kinlochleven.
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.
The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.
The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.
Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.
Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".
Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".
Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West. Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way. The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes.
Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities. Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land. In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.
In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.
When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected. This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms. Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.
The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.
Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.
According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".
The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.
For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.
In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.
A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.
Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.
The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.
There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.
Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.
The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.
These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.
The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.
Climate
The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.
Places of interest
An Teallach
Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)
Arrochar Alps
Balmoral Castle
Balquhidder
Battlefield of Culloden
Beinn Alligin
Beinn Eighe
Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station
Ben Lomond
Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Cairngorms National Park
Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore
Cairngorm Mountains
Caledonian Canal
Cape Wrath
Carrick Castle
Castle Stalker
Castle Tioram
Chanonry Point
Conic Hill
Culloden Moor
Dunadd
Duart Castle
Durness
Eilean Donan
Fingal's Cave (Staffa)
Fort George
Glen Coe
Glen Etive
Glen Kinglas
Glen Lyon
Glen Orchy
Glenshee Ski Centre
Glen Shiel
Glen Spean
Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)
Grampian Mountains
Hebrides
Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.
Highland Wildlife Park
Inveraray Castle
Inveraray Jail
Inverness Castle
Inverewe Garden
Iona Abbey
Isle of Staffa
Kilchurn Castle
Kilmartin Glen
Liathach
Lecht Ski Centre
Loch Alsh
Loch Ard
Loch Awe
Loch Assynt
Loch Earn
Loch Etive
Loch Fyne
Loch Goil
Loch Katrine
Loch Leven
Loch Linnhe
Loch Lochy
Loch Lomond
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park
Loch Lubnaig
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Morlich
Loch Ness
Loch Nevis
Loch Rannoch
Loch Tay
Lochranza
Luss
Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)
Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran
Rannoch Moor
Red Cuillin
Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83
River Carron, Wester Ross
River Spey
River Tay
Ross and Cromarty
Smoo Cave
Stob Coire a' Chàirn
Stac Polly
Strathspey Railway
Sutherland
Tor Castle
Torridon Hills
Urquhart Castle
West Highland Line (scenic railway)
West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)
Wester Ross
Loch Tarff is a small freshwater loch approximately 1.25 km (0.78 mi) from the southeastern shore of Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands.
The loch is located in the hills that rise steeply from the eastern shore of Loch Ness and has an elevation of 292 metres (958 ft) ASL. It has a surface area of approximately 500,000 square metres with a prominent inlet to the northwest and a smaller inlet to the southwest. The loch is fed by a number of small streams, most of which enter its northeastern shore from the southern slopes of Beinn a' Bhacaidh. There are a number of islets in the loch, the largest of which, Eilean Ban, lies near its northeastern shore.
Geological evidence indicates that the loch was formed in the last Ice Age approximately 10,000 years ago, and is the result of glaciation that scoured the landscape. The surrounding rock is metamorphic, mostly schists, although there are also sedimentary conglomerates formed from the metamorphic and igneous strata in the fault scarp that comprises the Great Glen. Glacial sediments can be found to the south of the loch around the southern shore of Loch Ness.
By car, the loch is approximately 6.0 km (3.7 mi) from Fort Augustus, and is accessible by the B862 road, which runs along the eastern shore of the loch.
For walkers, the loch is located on the South Loch Ness Trail, approximately one and a half to two hours via an ascending route that rises 280 metres (920 ft) with two moderate inclines from the southern shore of Loch Ness at Fort Augustus.
Footage of the loch was used in the 1983 film Local Hero (in the scene immediately following the rabbit and the fog; the lead character's car, a Ford Cortina is stopped on the road). The scene is taken from the B862 looking westward and some of the loch's islets can be seen in the background.
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.
The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.
The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.
Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.
Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".
Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".
Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West. Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way. The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes.
Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities. Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land. In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.
In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.
When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected. This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms. Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.
The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.
Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.
According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".
The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.
For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.
In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.
A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.
Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.
The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.
There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.
Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.
The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.
These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.
The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.
Climate
The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.
Places of interest
An Teallach
Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)
Arrochar Alps
Balmoral Castle
Balquhidder
Battlefield of Culloden
Beinn Alligin
Beinn Eighe
Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station
Ben Lomond
Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Cairngorms National Park
Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore
Cairngorm Mountains
Caledonian Canal
Cape Wrath
Carrick Castle
Castle Stalker
Castle Tioram
Chanonry Point
Conic Hill
Culloden Moor
Dunadd
Duart Castle
Durness
Eilean Donan
Fingal's Cave (Staffa)
Fort George
Glen Coe
Glen Etive
Glen Kinglas
Glen Lyon
Glen Orchy
Glenshee Ski Centre
Glen Shiel
Glen Spean
Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)
Grampian Mountains
Hebrides
Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.
Highland Wildlife Park
Inveraray Castle
Inveraray Jail
Inverness Castle
Inverewe Garden
Iona Abbey
Isle of Staffa
Kilchurn Castle
Kilmartin Glen
Liathach
Lecht Ski Centre
Loch Alsh
Loch Ard
Loch Awe
Loch Assynt
Loch Earn
Loch Etive
Loch Fyne
Loch Goil
Loch Katrine
Loch Leven
Loch Linnhe
Loch Lochy
Loch Lomond
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park
Loch Lubnaig
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Morlich
Loch Ness
Loch Nevis
Loch Rannoch
Loch Tay
Lochranza
Luss
Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)
Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran
Rannoch Moor
Red Cuillin
Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83
River Carron, Wester Ross
River Spey
River Tay
Ross and Cromarty
Smoo Cave
Stob Coire a' Chàirn
Stac Polly
Strathspey Railway
Sutherland
Tor Castle
Torridon Hills
Urquhart Castle
West Highland Line (scenic railway)
West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)
Wester Ross
Museo de Madinat Al-Zahra
(Museo arqueológico y centro de interpretación del Conjunto de Madinat al-Zahra)
Ctra. de Córdoba a Palma del Río, A-431, km 5.5, Córdoba
Arquitectos: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos: Fuensanta Nieto y Enrique Sobejano. Arquitecto de proyecto Miguel Ubarrechena. Equipo de proyecto Carlos Ballesteros, Pedro Quero y Juan Carlos Redondo. Dirección de obra: Fuensanta Nieto, Enrique Sobejano y Miguel Mesas Izquierdo. Proyecto museográfico: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos / Frade Arquitectos, S.L. Concurso: 1999 Proyecto: 2002 Finalización: 2009
Los Arquitectos describen su proyecto:
“Los restos de la antigua ciudad hispano-musulmana sugerían un diálogo con quienes mil años antes la habían concebido y construido, pero también con el paciente trabajo de los arqueólogos y con el paisaje agrícola circundante, al que la geometría de las ruinas otorgaba una inesperada cualidad abstracta. El terreno del recinto arqueológico destinado al museo provocaba, no obstante, sentimientos encontrados.
Por una parte, la añoranza de un pasado remoto aún por descubrir impregnaba el paisaje que se extendía hacia la sierra de Córdoba. Por otra parte, el desordenado avance de las construcciones recientes se cernía inquietante sobre el entorno de lo que un día fue la ciudad palatina. Nuestra primera reacción al llegar al lugar habría de marcar, desde el primer momento, la futura propuesta: no debíamos edificar en aquel paisaje.
Ante una extensión de tal amplitud, que aún espera ser excavada, decidimos actuar como lo haría un arqueólogo: no construyendo un nuevo edificio, sino encontrándolo bajo tierra, como si el paso del tiempo lo hubiera ocultado hasta el día de hoy. De esta forma, el proyecto descubre la planta de un museo subterráneo, que articula sus espacios en torno a una secuencia de llenos y vacíos, áreas cubiertas y patios que guían al visitante en su recorrido. A partir del vestíbulo principal se extiende un amplio patio de planta cuadrada que, como un claustro, organiza en torno suyo los espacios públicos principales: salón de actos, cafetería, tienda, biblioteca, y salas de exposición. Un patio profundo y longitudinal articula las zonas de uso privado: administración, talleres de conservación e investigación. Un último patio constituye la prolongación al exterior de las áreas expositivas del museo. Las zonas de almacenamiento, concebidas como grandes espacios visitables iluminados cenitalmente, se funden en los recorridos del edificio con las áreas públicas de exposición y difusión. La propia concepción del proyecto lleva implícito un posible futuro crecimiento, pudiéndose agregar nuevos pabellones como si de nuevas excavaciones se tratase.
El nuevo museo establece casi imperceptiblemente un permanente diálogo con la arquitectura y el paisaje de la antigua medina árabe. La planta de doble cuadrado del museo se hace homotética con la de la ciudad, los jardines evocan la geometría abandonada de una excavación, los muros de hormigón y las cubiertas de acero cortén reflejan en el blanco y el rojo los colores con que originalmente estuvieron estucados los muros de la ciudad califal. La luz, la sombra, la textura, el material, abstraen la riqueza perceptiva que transmiten las ruinas arqueológicas.
El museo de Madinat al-Zahra aparece en el paisaje silenciosamente, como si hubiera sido encontrado bajo tierra, del mismo modo que a lo largo de los años continuará ocurriendo con los restos de la antigua ciudad de los califas omeyas.”
En “Museos de Andalucía” podemos leer:
El Museo, abierto al público en octubre de 2009, es un complejo edificio que contiene los espacios propios de un museo moderno, así como toda la infraestructura dedicada a la gestión patrimonial que demanda un conjunto arqueológico de la magnitud de la ciudad califal. El edificio está concebido como el punto de partida para la visita al yacimiento, con una presentación y exposición museográfica sobre Madinat al-Zahra.
La creación del Museo resuelve varios problemas planteados desde el comienzo de la recuperación del yacimiento en 1911. El primer edificio construido para dar apoyo a la excavación quedó pronto obsoleto por la ingente cantidad de material arqueológico que se fue almacenando en sus instalaciones y por la insuficiencia de espacios expositivos.
El Museo viene a resolver, además, varias demandas del Conjunto, referidas tanto a la difusión y función didáctica de la institución, como a la tarea de custodia y conservación que esta institución tiene encomendada.
Destaca en el edificio su ubicación exterior a la ciudad, aprovechando uno de sus caminos originales de acceso, de forma que no condiciona ni las excavaciones futuras ni el crecimiento en extensión de las mismas. Este compromiso de la nueva infraestructura con el yacimiento se extiende también al paisaje, pues el proyecto planteado por el estudio de arquitectura Nieto y Sobejano la concibe como una edificación que se oculta parcialmente en el territorio, para no interferir ni en la contemplación del paisaje ni en el fundamental protagonismo de la ciudad califal.
Se trata, en definitiva, de una infraestructura, ideada para facilitar la comprensión del yacimiento y desarrollar a todos los niveles sus potencialidades. Se concibe como una infraestructura para impulsar nuevos proyectos de investigación, conservación y difusión de la ciudad de Madinat al-Zahra y toda la ordenación territorial que constituye su entorno. Cuenta con los siguientes servicios:
Área cultural, expositiva y didáctica: Auditorio, Exposición permanente, Biblioteca Especializada "Manuel Ocaña", Aula didáctica y Sala de seminarios. Área de conservación, investigación y Administración: Almacenes, Talleres de restauración, Centro de documentación, Oficinas y despachos. Otros servicios: Tienda con librería y Cafetería-restaurante.
Premios:
2009: Finalista Premio Intervención en Patrimonio Arquitectónico Español. The International Architecture Award. The Chicago Athenaeum Museum.
2010: Aga Khan Award for Architecture.
2011: Piranesi Prix de Rome. Obra Seleccionada Premio de Arquitectura Contemporánea de la Unión Europea – Premio Mies van der Rohe. Finalista Premio Arquitectura Española. Finalista Premios FAD
2012: European Museum of the Year Award
www.nietosobejano.com/project.aspx?i=1&t=MADINAT_ALZA...
www.metalocus.es/es/noticias/nieto-sobejano-arquitectos-m...
www.museosdeandalucia.es/cultura/museos/CAMA/?lng=es
NietoSobejano Arquitectos
Loch Tummel is a long, narrow loch, seven kilometres (4+1⁄2 miles) northwest of Pitlochry in the council area of Perth and Kinross, Scotland. It is fed and drained by the River Tummel, which flows into the River Tay about 13 km (8 mi) south-east of the Clunie Dam at the loch's eastern end.
The loch is traversed by roads to both north and south. Along the northern side the road is numbered as the B8019, and runs from the Pass of Killiecrankie on the A9 in the east to Tummel Bridge at the head of the loch. The road on the southern side is unclassified, and meets the A9 further south, near to Pitlochry.
The loch gives its name to the Loch Tummel National Scenic Area (NSA), one of 40 such areas in Scotland, which are defined so as to identify areas of exceptional scenery and to ensure its protection by restricting certain forms of development. The Loch Tummel Lyon NSA covers 9,013 hectares (22,272 acres), all of which lies within Perth and Kinross. The NSA covers the hills surrounding the loch, and extends along the River Tummel to also take in the area surrounding the Pass of Killiecrankie on the River Garry.
Loch Tummel is popular with anglers who fish for brown trout and pike. Fishing is managed by the Loch Rannoch Conservation Association, who issue permits and control catches. Loch Tummel Sailing Club is based at Foss on the south west shore of the loch. The loch is also very popular with campers during the spring and summer. The roads on either side of the loch both offer splendid views of the surrounding countryside, especially from the well-known 'Queen's View' from the north shore, which was made famous by Queen Victoria in 1866. This viewpoint offers a magnificent vista over the loch with Schiehallion in the background. It is also claimed that the view was originally named after Queen Isabel, wife of Robert the Bruce, who is said to have hidden in the nearby woods after the Bruce's defeat at the Battle of Methven in 1306.
Areas of forestry around Loch Tummel owned by Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) form part of the Tay Forest Park, a network of FLS forests spread across the Highland parts of Perthshire that are managed to provide walks and amenities for visitors.
The River Tummel is a tributary of the River Tay, and Loch Tummel is included as part of the River Tay Special Area of Conservation. The designation notes the river system's importance for salmon, otters, brook lampreys, river lampreys and sea lampreys. Brown trout and pike are also present in the loch.
The woods to the north of the loch are home to a number of protected species, including capercaillie, black grouse, red squirrel, pearl-bordered fritillary and juniper.
Loch Tummel from the Queen's View in about 1895. Note the lower water level when compared to the modern image.
Loch Tummel became part of the Tummel Hydro-Electric Power Scheme when the Clunie Dam was constructed by Wimpey Construction at its eastern end in 1950, raising the water level by 4.5 m (15 ft). Prior to this the loch, which is now approximately 11 km (7 mi) long and just under 0 km (1 mi) wide was much smaller, being 4.4 km (2+3⁄4 mi) long and 0.8 km (1⁄2 mi) wide.
Water from Loch Tummel is diverted to Loch Faskally, running via Clunie power station, which has a vertical head of 53 m (174 ft) and a total generating capacity of 61 MW. There is also a power station at Tummel Bridge at the western end of the loch that takes water from Dunalastair reservoir below Loch Rannoch, and discharges into Loch Tummel: this station has a vertical head of 53 m (174 ft) and a total generating capacity of 34 MW.
The northern side of the loch has many archeological sites, including an Iron Age ring fort, abandoned townships, and the remains of Pictish fortified villages. This area also includes the standing stones of Clachan Aoraidh, located at the head of Glen Fincastle in the Allean Forest. Fincastle House, a 17th-century Category A listed building, sits at the eastern end of the strath.
The raising of the loch for hydroelectricity led to the drowning of an artificial island of a type known as a crannog lying off Port an Eilean on the northern side of the loch. The island is now 3 m underwater, and was investigated by the Scottish Trust for Underwater Archaeology and Perth & Kinross Heritage Trust in 2004. A well-made flagstone floor and a flight of steps that led down a distance of 2 m to the loch bed were found. Analysis of one of the timbers found on the site revealed that it dated from around 1840.
Above the head of the loch, there are two bridges over the River Tummel at Tummel Bridge. The original humpbacked bridge was built by General Wade in about 1734 as part of his construction of some 240 miles (390 km) of roads and 30 bridges in Scotland between 1725 and 1737. A modern replacement alongside Wade's bridge carries the traffic from Aberfeldy on the B846 road. The historic drove road of the Road to the Isles leaves Wade's military road at Tummel Bridge, from where it heads west into Lochaber, and Tummel is one of the places mentioned in the Scottish folk song named after the road.
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.
The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.
The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.
Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.
Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".
Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".
Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West. Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way. The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes.
Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities. Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land. In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.
In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.
When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected. This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms. Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.
The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.
Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.
According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".
The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.
For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.
In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.
A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.
Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.
The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.
There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.
Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.
The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.
These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.
The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.
Climate
The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.
Places of interest
An Teallach
Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)
Arrochar Alps
Balmoral Castle
Balquhidder
Battlefield of Culloden
Beinn Alligin
Beinn Eighe
Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station
Ben Lomond
Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Cairngorms National Park
Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore
Cairngorm Mountains
Caledonian Canal
Cape Wrath
Carrick Castle
Castle Stalker
Castle Tioram
Chanonry Point
Conic Hill
Culloden Moor
Dunadd
Duart Castle
Durness
Eilean Donan
Fingal's Cave (Staffa)
Fort George
Glen Coe
Glen Etive
Glen Kinglas
Glen Lyon
Glen Orchy
Glenshee Ski Centre
Glen Shiel
Glen Spean
Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)
Grampian Mountains
Hebrides
Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.
Highland Wildlife Park
Inveraray Castle
Inveraray Jail
Inverness Castle
Inverewe Garden
Iona Abbey
Isle of Staffa
Kilchurn Castle
Kilmartin Glen
Liathach
Lecht Ski Centre
Loch Alsh
Loch Ard
Loch Awe
Loch Assynt
Loch Earn
Loch Etive
Loch Fyne
Loch Goil
Loch Katrine
Loch Leven
Loch Linnhe
Loch Lochy
Loch Lomond
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park
Loch Lubnaig
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Morlich
Loch Ness
Loch Nevis
Loch Rannoch
Loch Tay
Lochranza
Luss
Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)
Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran
Rannoch Moor
Red Cuillin
Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83
River Carron, Wester Ross
River Spey
River Tay
Ross and Cromarty
Smoo Cave
Stob Coire a' Chàirn
Stac Polly
Strathspey Railway
Sutherland
Tor Castle
Torridon Hills
Urquhart Castle
West Highland Line (scenic railway)
West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)
Wester Ross
The audio portion in Pennsylvania might pose a problem to you.
13th and Chestnut Street
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
this kid lives in Berbera old town. I made pics of her family and when she paused for me, she put her niqab, and she stood with this gangsta attitude! Very funny!
Formerly a British colony, Somaliland briefly reached its independence in 1960. It is one of the three Territories, with Puntland and former Italian Somalia that compose the current State of Somalia.
Somaliland proclaimed its independence in 1991, adopting its own currency, a fully independent government, working institutions and police. The authorities organized a referendum in 2001, advocating once again for full independence. However, to date, it is not internationally recognized.
Ethiopian Prime minister Meles Zenawi is the only one to speak about a Somalilander president, recognizing implicitly the existence of an independent State. Indeed the economy of neighboring Ethiopia dramatically depends on Somaliland stability, since the landlocked country’s main trade route passes through the Somalilander port of Berbera… And vice-versa, the economy of Somaliland largely depends on the taxes and duties it charges Ethiopia. Besides that, the principal economic activity of Somaliland is livestock exportation to the Arabian Peninsula. Most people are Sunni Muslims and speak Arabic, as well as some Somali dialect and many of them, English.Lastely, the East African demography being based on clan alliances, it is no surprise that the frontiers drawn by the colonists don’t match the ethnic divisions of territory, leading to open clashes. More broadly, this problem is recurrent across the African continent.
© Eric Lafforgue
Crosskirk Broch was a fortification near the present day hamlet of Crosskirk near Thurso, Caithness, Scotland. After thorough archaeological exploration it was destroyed in 1972 since the site had become unsafe due to sea erosion. The site was unusual in having a broch, a large circular fortification, built within an older promontory fortification with a ring wall and blockhouse.
Crosskirk was occupied at the end of the Bronze Age. From the early Iron Age that followed there is carinated pottery that appears to be locally made but is similar to pottery of the same period in southern and eastern England. A few samples are black-burnished. Uncorrected radiocarbon dates for this pottery are in the 6th and 5th centuries BC. There seems to be a discontinuity in the middle Iron Age when the buildings were reconstructed and new types of pottery and artifacts were introduced, although variants of some of the older styles continued. This may be interpreted as being due to the influx of some influential new population.
Further use of local pottery continued into the period of Roman occupation of the south of Scotland in 80-180 AD. There were also remains of Roman pottery and glassware that may have been Roman in origin. A body was buried in a sitting position in the middle of an approximately circular building around the time that the site was abandoned. No grave goods were found.
There are traces of two long cist burials in the debris of the broch from some time around 600 AD. There used to be a stone with a runic inscription at Crosskirk, now lost, dating from the period of the Norse raiders in the 9th, 10th and 11th centuries. St Mary's Chapel (Crosskirk), built around the 13th century and now ruined, is about 30 yards (27 m) south of the site. Some of the land south of the broch was levelled when St Mary's was built. In recent times, some of the stones from the broch mound were removed, perhaps for building field dykes.
The promontory fort predated the broch, which was built inside the older structure. The earlier structure was an outwork that began at the edge of the promontory in the east, a 15 feet (4.6 m) thick wall or rampart of rock with an earth core. A gateway that widened towards the outside provided access through the wall. To the west of the gateway the rampart included a structure like a cell, and then there was a recess in the inner face of the wall. The outwork continued west, ending in a fence made of flagstones that reached to the cliff edge at Chapel Geo.
Based on radiocarbon dates, the broch was built around 200 BC, and was still in use in the second century AD. The broch would have given an impression of great strength, rising above the existing defensive wall. It included a guard cell, an intramural chamber and a stair entrance at ground level. Although the wall of the broch was relatively thick, it was poorly built, with a core of earth, rubble and boulders. This may be interpreted as being an early, experimental broch design. The roundhouse was not built strongly enough to support a tower more than 4.5 metres (15 ft), half the height of later towers.
There were external buildings around the tower that are thought to have been a village, an arrangement found only in northern Scotland.[8] These houses were occupied from about the same time as the broch was completed. During the next two centuries there were a series of changes and repairs to the broch, but they could not overcome its underlying weakness of design, and by the end of that period it would have been in poor shape. During the same period, house enclosures of the settlement outside the broch but within the rampart were steadily added and improved. A final phase of occupation and construction took place in the 2nd century AD, when the broch was rehabilitated before being finally abandoned. During this last period it seems that there was no defensive concern
The main crop was barley. Samples found at Crosskirk and Bu also include the seeds of other plants such as fat hen, sorrel and chick weed. This mix was probably deliberate, since the other seeds have medical and nutritional value. Cattle and some sheep were raised, and were supported through the winters. The people ate shellfish, particularly limpets, winkles and whelks, and ate seabirds. At nearby locations there is evidence of deep sea fishing for plaice and cod, and of consumption of venison. The evidence shows that the community had an ample and varied diet, and was largely self-sufficient.
An 1871 description of the broch said it
has an internal diameter of approximately 30 to 32ft and a wall 14 to 15ft thick. It has been broken into from the S, where there appears to have been an entrance to the left of which the sides of a chamber are visible in the wall. At the edge of the cliff, some 20ft of wall about 4 to 5ft high is exposed. On the landward side about 10ft from the broch are the remains of an outer bank or wall, now some 8ft wide at the base.
A report in 1964 said the broch was visible as a circular enclosure, covered in grass, with the wall no more than 1.1 metres (3 ft 7 in) high on the inside, and no more than 1.5 metres (4 ft 11 in) high on the exterior. The cliff edge had eroded, partly exposing traces of the north of the wall. There was a shallow depression around the broch and a low bank on the southwest side that may have been the remains of the outer defense wall. Coastal erosion was undercutting the cliff, making the site unsafe. Between 1966 and 1972 Fairhurst and Taylor excavated the ruin. The remains of the broch were then pushed over the cliff by a bulldozer, the site grassed over, and a memorial cairn erected.
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.
The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.
The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.
Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.
Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".
Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".
Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West. Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way. The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes.
Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities. Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land. In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.
In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.
When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected. This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms. Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.
The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.
Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.
According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".
The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.
For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.
In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.
A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.
Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.
The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.
There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.
Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.
The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.
These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.
The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.
Climate
The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.
Places of interest
An Teallach
Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)
Arrochar Alps
Balmoral Castle
Balquhidder
Battlefield of Culloden
Beinn Alligin
Beinn Eighe
Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station
Ben Lomond
Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)
Cairngorms National Park
Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore
Cairngorm Mountains
Caledonian Canal
Cape Wrath
Carrick Castle
Castle Stalker
Castle Tioram
Chanonry Point
Conic Hill
Culloden Moor
Dunadd
Duart Castle
Durness
Eilean Donan
Fingal's Cave (Staffa)
Fort George
Glen Coe
Glen Etive
Glen Kinglas
Glen Lyon
Glen Orchy
Glenshee Ski Centre
Glen Shiel
Glen Spean
Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)
Grampian Mountains
Hebrides
Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.
Highland Wildlife Park
Inveraray Castle
Inveraray Jail
Inverness Castle
Inverewe Garden
Iona Abbey
Isle of Staffa
Kilchurn Castle
Kilmartin Glen
Liathach
Lecht Ski Centre
Loch Alsh
Loch Ard
Loch Awe
Loch Assynt
Loch Earn
Loch Etive
Loch Fyne
Loch Goil
Loch Katrine
Loch Leven
Loch Linnhe
Loch Lochy
Loch Lomond
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park
Loch Lubnaig
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Morlich
Loch Ness
Loch Nevis
Loch Rannoch
Loch Tay
Lochranza
Luss
Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)
Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran
Rannoch Moor
Red Cuillin
Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83
River Carron, Wester Ross
River Spey
River Tay
Ross and Cromarty
Smoo Cave
Stob Coire a' Chàirn
Stac Polly
Strathspey Railway
Sutherland
Tor Castle
Torridon Hills
Urquhart Castle
West Highland Line (scenic railway)
West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)
Wester Ross
"At certain moments I felt that the entire world was turning
into stone: a slow petrification, more or less advanced depending on people and places but one that spared no aspect of life.
It was as if no one could escape the inexorable stare of Medusa. "
"The only hero able to cut off Medusa’s head is Perseus, who flies with winged sandals; Perseus, who does not turn his gaze upon the face of the Gorgon but only upon her image reflected in his bronze shield.
To cut off Medusa’s head without being turned to stone, Perseus supports himself on the very lightest of things, the winds and the clouds, and fixes his gaze upon what can be revealed only by indirect vision, an image caught in a mirror.
The relationship between Perseus and the Gorgon is a complex one and does not end with the beheading of the monster. Medusa’s blood gives birth to a winged horse, Pegasus—the heaviness of stone is transformed into its opposite. With one blow of his hoof on Mount Helicon, Pegasus makes a spring gush forth, where the Muses drink. In certain versions of the myth, it is Perseus who rides the miraculous Pegasus, so dear to the Muses, born from the accursed blood of Medusa.
As for the severed head, Perseus does not abandon it but carries it concealed in a bag. When his enemies are about to overcome him, he has only to display it, holding it by its snaky locks, and this bloodstained booty becomes an invincible weapon in the hero’s hand. It is a weapon he uses only in cases of dire necessity, and only against those who deserve the punishment of being turned into statues. Here, certainly, the myth is telling us something, something implicit in the images that can’t be explained in any other way. Perseus succeeds in mastering that horrendous face by keeping it hidden,
just as in the first place he vanquished it by viewing it in a mirror. Perseus’s strength always lies in a refusal to look directly,
but not in a refusal of the reality in which he is fated to live; he carries the reality with him and accepts it as his particular burden.
On the relationship between Perseus and Medusa, we can learn something more from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Perseus
wins another battle: he hacks a sea-monster to pieces with his sword and sets Andromeda free. Now he prepares to do what any of us would do after such an awful chore—he wants to wash his hands. But another problem arises: where to put Medusa’s head. And here Ovid has some lines (IV.740-752) that seem to me extraordinary in showing how much delicacy of spirit a man must have to be a Perseus, the killer of monsters: “So that the rough sand should not harm the snake-haired head, he makes the ground soft with a bed of leaves, and on top of that he strews little branches of plants born under water, and on this he places Medusa’s head, face down.” I think that the lightness, of which Perseus is the hero, could not be better represented than by this gesture of refreshing courtesy toward a being so monstrous and terrifying yet at the same time somehow fragile and perishable. But the most unexpected thing is the miracle that follows: when they touch Medusa, the little marine plants turn to coral and the nymphs, in order to have coral for adornments, rush to bring sprigs and seaweed to the terrible head.
Italo Calvino's Six Memos for the Next Millenium
«In certi momenti mi sembrava che il mondo stesse diventando tutto di pietra: una lenta pietrificazione più o meno avanzata a seconda delle persone e dei luoghi, ma che non risparmiava nessun aspetto della vita. Era come se nessuno potesse sfuggire allo sguardo inesorabile della Medusa.»
«L'unico eroe capace di tagliare la testa della Medusa è Perseo, che vola coi sandali alati, Perseo che non rivolge il suo sguardo sul volto della Gorgone, ma solo sulla sua immagine riflessa nello scudo di bronzo ... per tagliare la testa di Medusa senza lasciarsi pietrificare, Perseo si sostiene su ciò che vi è di più leggero: i venti e le nuvole, e spinge il suo sguardo su ciò che può rivelarglisi solo in una visione indiretta, in un'immagine catturata da uno specchio»"
«Il rapporto tra Perseo e la Gorgone è complesso: non finisce con la decapitazione del mostro. Dal sangue della Medusa nasce un cavallo alato: Pegaso; la pesantezza della pietra può essere rovesciata nel suo contrario; con un colpo di zoccolo sul monte Elicona, Pegaso fa scaturire la fonte da cui bevono le Muse ... Quanto alla testa mozzata, Perseo non l'abbandona ma la porta con sé, nascosta in un sacco; quando i nemici stanno per sopraffarlo, basta che egli la mostri sollevandola per la chioma di serpenti, e quella spoglia sanguinosa diventa un'arma invincibile nella mano dell'eroe ... Perseo riesce a padroneggiare quel volto tremendo tenendolo nascosto, come prima l'aveva vinto guardandolo in uno specchio. È sempre in un rifiuto della visione diretta che sta la forza di Perseo, ma non in un rifiuto della realtà di mostri in cui gli è toccato di vivere, una realtà che egli porta con sé che assume come proprio fardello ... Sul rapporto tra Perseo e Medusa possiamo apprendere [ancora] qualcosa di più leggendo Ovidio nelle Metamorfosi. Perseo ha vinto una nuova battaglia, ha massacrato a colpi di spada un mostro marino ... E ora si accinge a fare quello che ciascuno di noi farebbe dopo un lavoraccio simile: va a lavarsi le mani. In questi casi il suo problema è dove posare la testa di Medusa. E qui Ovidio ha dei versi che mi paiono straordinari per spiegare quanta delicatezza d'animo sia necessaria per essere un Perseo, vincitore di mostri:
"Perché la ruvida sabbia non sciupi la testa anguicrinata, egli rende soffice il terreno con uno strato di foglie, vi stende sopra dei ramoscelli nati sott'acqua e vi depone la testa di Medusa a faccia in giù".
Mi sembra che la leggerezza di cui Perseo è l'eroe non potrebbe essere meglio rappresentata che da questo gesto di rinfrescante gentilezza verso quell'essere mostruoso e tremendo, ma anche in qualche modo deteriorabile, fragile. Ma la cosa più inaspettata è il miracolo che ne segue: i ramoscelli marini a contatto con la Medusa si trasformano in coralli, e le ninfe per adornarsi di coralli accorrono e avvicinano ramoscelli e alghe alla terribile testa»
Italo Calvino's Six Memos for the Next Millenium
Paul P. drew these evocative ink studies on-site during visits to the sculptural collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in new York and the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. The works reflect the artist’s interest in the implicit representation f homosexuality I historical European art. They take their place in the history of copying, an important practice over the centuries in the relay of queer imagery.
Today was the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome and demonstrations of support were held all over Europe. This one was held by EU citizens from the HIghlands to protest about the uncertainty ruling their lives because of Brexit. People who have lived in Scotland for decades are living with the implicit threat of deportation and separation from their families, all because some nut-jobs want to drag our society back to the nostalgic 1950's timewarp. This is delusional rubbish and hopefully these demos are the start of a fightback. We need to keep moving forward, not back in time.
Monolithic basin. Kildalton churchyard. Isle of Islay. Inner Hebrides.
It's difficult to know if this is a sunken boulder or bedrock. If portable and it may be termed a ‘craterolith’, if bedrock and it is a monolithic basin. In Ireland both can be called Ballum stones and with Ireland so close and implicit within the Isle of Islay's past, it is worth taking note. www.irishmegaliths.org.uk/crosspillars2.htm
Ritual use of some bullaun stones continued well into the Christian period and many are found in association with early churches.
Whilst the stone is identified in texts as a prehistoric saddle stone, the 'saddle' type of ‘quern stone’ (grind stones) tends to have extended flat sections from where grains or stones were pushed to assure the grind. With the above stone, the sides are steep and the floor curved. ‘knocking stones’ have steeper sides and tighter ‘floors’ and tend to predate quern stones. 'Knocking stones' - Clach chnotainn in Gaelic - can also be associated with sacred places. Their use in the highlands of Scotland has been documented into the 19th century. Typically oat grains were added to a basin shape and pounded until husks were removed. Oats for either ‘knockit beer’ or mixes for oat breads. Knockit stones placed adjacent to chapels may have been used to attain blessed produce. Some knocking stones had wooded lids and they tend to be circular – the above is obviously oval… Grain was pounded with either a rounded stone or with a hardwood mell on a long handle (many thanks to the assimilation of information presented at www.revolvy.com/page/Knocking-stone) and it is at least possible that the oval shape is due to either an action from either side by two people or action on only two polarities (east, west?).
Sometimes a basin can be found integrated into a Neolithic ensemble of cups and canals. Expelling a lingering doubt that the basin is simply a geofact is often technically impossible. Here the basin may have originated as a natural depression but can only have had a use by man for the simple reason that unwanted imperfections to an important walking surface (a churchyard) are always infilled to stop unsolemnly tripping. This has not been infilled, so it must have had a role.
Experience will tell local individuals that ‘the stone has always been there’ - but this experience tends to pin down to a short chain of adjacent generations. It was certainly potentially used for blessing and rites of grain (a spiritual knocking stone) – potentially used for its collected water (closer to pagan ballaum stone rites) and with a cycle of twelve months, it potentially changed function with seasons - reducing its rites to a stop as time faded to move on.
None of this helps when trying to ascertain if the basin was attracted to the Kildalton Celtic Cross, or if the Celtic Cross was attracted to a protohistoric or prehistoric ritulaistic site with, among other items, a ritual basin (wooden carvings, carved stones later incorporated and broken into buildings, wicker constructions and so on now missing). The south coast of Islay is full of neolithic megalitism, and its vivid ‘miniature mountains’ and holding position in a sea of potential destination must have been attractive, so we are not surprised to find a sacred basin and do need to find a reason as to why such an incredible early Christian cross might be placed 'over' a Bell Beaker/Celtic ritual site.
Other potential ritual basins have been posted from Ilkley Moor on the British mainland with a datable late neolithic example posted from Spain with other Flickr posts of potential late prehistoric basins posted from sites in Germany, France, Sweden...
There are few archaeological signs of a past monastery... How might a late prehistoric basin attract so much attention to its site ? The Neolithic and Calcolithic were times of experimentation, with new food transformation techniques being adapted to local situations and products (milk to cheese, barley to beer, wheat to dough). Donating different produce to a ritual stone at different periods of the year, and leaving them to transform, may have been a cultural aid during a period of transition (residual relic rites that may have inspired the ‘bubble bubble’ of stigmatized headstrong ‘witches’). Once the skills were assimilated, a residue of offering milk to the ‘earth spirits’ (at times reported for Ballum stones) may have faded in view. At other times of the year, a basin may be employed as a water-mirror to assure ones presentation and transcendance at a special place.
Here is another thought experiment for a rite that might find a place with a basin – during the neolithic there was a desire to polish stones to perfection – the stone's grip as well as the head. The act of polishing a mirror-like shine may have had a pious ritual significance. When stone tools were replaced by first copper and then bronze and iron tools, the ritual element of making stone tools would have lost its common expression. Inducting the polishing act to a new gesture in a new locality may have been a way to remain in touch with important spiritual gestures. It is at times reported that river stones are associated with ballum basins, stones that you turn as you pass. pilgrimagemedievalireland.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/1-d... Contrast this image with a complete saddle quern canmore.org.uk/collection/1453555 There are twelve months in a year and one loci can have multiple functions through the dynamic schedule of a year’s cycle. In Ireland there are also examples of one monolith with multiple basins which may support ideas of multiple functions. ‘Epicurean’ (hot water for body) ... ritual cleaning ... blessing of grain ... demonstrating fermentation again with warmth inducted via stones... diverse rites that were culturally deep enough to marry to an early Christian cross.
AJM 05.11.18
Murder at the Governor's Solstice Ball at New Victoria Township - December 20 1899
The Governor’s Solstice Ball was the highlight of New Victoria’s winter season. The Governor’s Mansion shimmered with gaslight, and the ballroom sparkled with festive decor. Music filled the grand hall, where the town’s elite mingled and celebrated. Yet, beneath the festive glamour, shadows gathered unseen.
Miss Frost, in a striking gown of deep red, stood at the center of the room. With a steady voice, she addressed the gathered crowd. “I will be departing for London tomorrow. My father has passed, and I must settle his affairs. There are matters of family and business that require my attention. Gabriella will accompany me to London to assist in these matters.”
The crowd murmured, stunned by the implicit admission of her connection to Gabriella, whose crimson gown matched the intensity of her presence. Frost’s gaze lingered on Gabriella before turning to Miss Dagger. “I leave this town in the capable hands of Miss Dagger, who has my utmost trust to maintain the order and dignity New Victoria deserves.”
Not far from the center of the ballroom, Vivienne Ravenwood guided Jordan Valentine onto the dance floor. As the music swelled, their movements became more fluid, their connection palpable. Vivienne leaned closer, her voice barely audible over the melody. “You should be safe now. Those who were threatening you are no longer a danger.”
Jordan’s brows furrowed. “Why would they want to hurt me? I’m nobody.”
Vivienne’s hand tightened on Jordan’s. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re not nobody to me.”
Their moment shattered with a sharp cry. “Persi, get down!” Miss Dagger’s voice cut through the air just as a gunshot echoed. Without hesitation, Jed Dagger threw herself in front of Frost. The bullet struck her rib cage, sending her sprawling to the ground. The ballroom erupted into chaos.
The second assassin moved swiftly. Amidst the confusion, a knife gleamed in the flickering light before finding its mark. Frost crumpled to the floor as Gabriella’s anguished cry silenced the room. Clutching Frost’s body, Gabriella pleaded, “Stay with me, Persi. I just found you.”
Frost’s trembling hand reached up, brushing Gabriella’s cheek. Her voice was faint, barely above a whisper. “I thought we would have more time.” Her hand fell limp as Gabriella’s tears mingled with the blood on her gown.
Vivienne rushed to Jed’s side. “Jed, stay down! You’ve done enough!”
Jed’s voice was weak but determined. “Not enough… Protect… her…” Her strength gave out, leaving Vivienne to steady her as chaos swirled around them.
Jordan’s voice broke through the noise. “Why would someone want to harm Miss Frost?”
Vivienne’s jaw clenched. “Because I refused the contract to kill her. Her brother, Percival, hired them when I wouldn’t.”
Gabriella rose, her crimson gown now streaked with blood, her voice filled with resolve. “They will regret this.”
As the ballroom emptied, its festive warmth was replaced by chilling determination.The Solstice Ball had ended in tragedy, but it marked the beginning of a new fight. Gabriella, Vivienne, and Jed would gather a group of women to avenge Frost’s death and dismantle the treacherous schemes of Percival Frost and the High Table —no matter the cost.
Diablo Lake is a reservoir in the North Cascade mountains of northern Washington state, United States. Created by Diablo Dam, the lake is located between Ross Lake and Gorge Lake on the Skagit River at an elevation of 1,201 feet (366 m) above sea level. Diablo Lake is part of the Skagit River Hydroelectric Project and managed by Seattle City Light. Diablo Lake Trail, designated a National Recreation Trail in 1981, runs for 3.80 miles (6.12 km) along the lake's northern shore.
The lake holds rainbow, coastal cutthroat, brook, and the federally threatened bull trout. It is a popular recreational spot for kayakers and canoeists. The unique, intense turquoise hue of the lake's water is attributed to the surrounding glaciers that grind rocks into a fine powder that is carried into the lake through creeks. That fine powder stays suspended in the lake, giving the water its brilliant color.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diablo_Lake
Photo of Diablo Lake with Pyramid Peak, 7,182 feet above sea-level, captured via Minolta MD W.Rokkor-X 24mm F/2.8 Lens and the bracketing method of photography. Ross Lake National Recreation Area. North Cascades Region of the Cascades Range. Whatcom County, Washington. On the first day of May 2016.
Exposure Time: 1/250 sec. * ISO Speed: ISO-100 * Aperture: F/8 * Bracketing: +1 / -1 * Film Plug-In: Fuji Velvia 100
Huile sur toile, 114 x 147 cm, 1926-1927, National Gallery of Scotland, Edimbourg.
Cette toile a été peinte alors qu'Ernst travaillait avec le groupe surréaliste à Paris, et semble mettre en lumière ses conflits œdipiens avec son père. Cette jeune fille est peut être la sœur décédée de l'artiste, auquel cas un triangle incestueux, père, fils et fille est implicite.
L'artiste a utilisé une technique qu'il a inventée, appelée grattage pour créer la forêt. Cela implique que la toile peinte soit posée sur une surface en bois rugueuse et grattée pour produire une texture riche et granuleuse. Le grand anneau en arrière-plan représente le soleil (cf. National Gallery of Scotland).
So I have been tagged. Of course I knew it would come sooner or later, I just didn't know where the arrow would come from exactly :-)
Well, the implicit rules now force me to tell you 8 completely, absolutely useless things about me. Don't complain, I am in no way responsible here. The one to blame is Lifer...
Here we go :
1) I live in Brussels, under the sky of Brel, Magritte and Delvaux. As you may know, Belgium is not a nationalist country. However, we shall NEVER NEVER let the Swiss declare they have got the best chocolate in the world. Stop kidding, the best is ours.
2) My mothertongue is French. I am ok with English, and I can survive without problems in Polish. During my school and university years I also learned Dutch, Italian (not to mention Latin), though unfortunately I don't master any of these languages anymore. One day, I would love to learn Japanese.
3) My favourite book is "The Lord of the Rings". I can say I learned English thanks to it. At that time (no, I won't tell you my age !), The LOTR had been translated in French already but none of the Appendices. As I was quite motivated, I took a dictionary and began painstakingly and painfully translating the appendices, word after word, line after line, page after page. I don't remember how far I went but when I stopped, I had more or less mastered the structures of the language. The drawback, of course, is that it would be easier for me to buy medieval weaponry in English than to ask something in a do-it-yourself centre. By chance, I hate hammers and nails.
4) Though, to my knowledge, I have not a single drop of English blood and I never stayed in UK longer than a couple of days, I often wonder if I don't have hidden English genes. I love Beowulf and Tolkien, Connolly (Joseph), Hornby and Lodge, Oscar Wilde or Keira Knightley, Lewis Caroll, Emily Brontë, Oxford or the Monty Python... Despite Nigel Farage and cucumber sandwiches, I believe that a nation who invented snooker and Emma Peel cant' be totally bad. No, seriously : I can sit and listen to British English for hours, without even paying attention to the words, just for the pleasure of its inimitable music.
5) Movies I love incude Dead Poets Society, Le Grand Bleu, Pride and Prejudice, Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain...
6) When time allows, I am a novelist.
7) In my Second Life, I am not escaping, I am not hiding, I am not pretending, I am not schizophrenic. I am telling you a story, for what I hope to be your enjoyment, and my main character is named Aelin Quan. The difference with a novel being that through your words and messages, you help me build that story, day after day - it's very much a collaborative one.
8) Though she is a fictional character, a large part of Aelin's feelings are obviously mine. I feel authorized to say here that Aelin likes the works I like, and that she likes the people I like. This means (a message I feel important for my FlickR and SL friends) that if her wardrobe is 100% virtual, her feelings are 100% genuine...
And now, who comes next ?? I tag my friends Lillou, Karro and Sista... but only if they feel like it :-)
Credits
**********
- Thanks to Lillou Merlin who is the author of this superb portrait of Aelin : www.flickr.com/photos/lillou_merlin/4021345181
- Aelin's gown is one of Lillou's creation and precious to her as she received it from Lillou as a present :-) It can be found, as well as her other creations, in Lillou's shop (see her stream!).
- I owe the expression "my human" to another avatar friend, Zonja Capalini. I often used the phrase "my avatar in RL" but "my human" sounds soooooo much better :-)
Museo de Madinat Al-Zahra
(Museo arqueológico y centro de interpretación del Conjunto de Madinat al-Zahra)
Ctra. de Córdoba a Palma del Río, A-431, km 5.5, Córdoba
Arquitectos: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos: Fuensanta Nieto y Enrique Sobejano. Arquitecto de proyecto Miguel Ubarrechena. Equipo de proyecto Carlos Ballesteros, Pedro Quero y Juan Carlos Redondo. Dirección de obra: Fuensanta Nieto, Enrique Sobejano y Miguel Mesas Izquierdo. Proyecto museográfico: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos / Frade Arquitectos, S.L. Concurso: 1999 Proyecto: 2002 Finalización: 2009
Los Arquitectos describen su proyecto:
“Los restos de la antigua ciudad hispano-musulmana sugerían un diálogo con quienes mil años antes la habían concebido y construido, pero también con el paciente trabajo de los arqueólogos y con el paisaje agrícola circundante, al que la geometría de las ruinas otorgaba una inesperada cualidad abstracta. El terreno del recinto arqueológico destinado al museo provocaba, no obstante, sentimientos encontrados.
Por una parte, la añoranza de un pasado remoto aún por descubrir impregnaba el paisaje que se extendía hacia la sierra de Córdoba. Por otra parte, el desordenado avance de las construcciones recientes se cernía inquietante sobre el entorno de lo que un día fue la ciudad palatina. Nuestra primera reacción al llegar al lugar habría de marcar, desde el primer momento, la futura propuesta: no debíamos edificar en aquel paisaje.
Ante una extensión de tal amplitud, que aún espera ser excavada, decidimos actuar como lo haría un arqueólogo: no construyendo un nuevo edificio, sino encontrándolo bajo tierra, como si el paso del tiempo lo hubiera ocultado hasta el día de hoy. De esta forma, el proyecto descubre la planta de un museo subterráneo, que articula sus espacios en torno a una secuencia de llenos y vacíos, áreas cubiertas y patios que guían al visitante en su recorrido. A partir del vestíbulo principal se extiende un amplio patio de planta cuadrada que, como un claustro, organiza en torno suyo los espacios públicos principales: salón de actos, cafetería, tienda, biblioteca, y salas de exposición. Un patio profundo y longitudinal articula las zonas de uso privado: administración, talleres de conservación e investigación. Un último patio constituye la prolongación al exterior de las áreas expositivas del museo. Las zonas de almacenamiento, concebidas como grandes espacios visitables iluminados cenitalmente, se funden en los recorridos del edificio con las áreas públicas de exposición y difusión. La propia concepción del proyecto lleva implícito un posible futuro crecimiento, pudiéndose agregar nuevos pabellones como si de nuevas excavaciones se tratase.
El nuevo museo establece casi imperceptiblemente un permanente diálogo con la arquitectura y el paisaje de la antigua medina árabe. La planta de doble cuadrado del museo se hace homotética con la de la ciudad, los jardines evocan la geometría abandonada de una excavación, los muros de hormigón y las cubiertas de acero cortén reflejan en el blanco y el rojo los colores con que originalmente estuvieron estucados los muros de la ciudad califal. La luz, la sombra, la textura, el material, abstraen la riqueza perceptiva que transmiten las ruinas arqueológicas.
El museo de Madinat al-Zahra aparece en el paisaje silenciosamente, como si hubiera sido encontrado bajo tierra, del mismo modo que a lo largo de los años continuará ocurriendo con los restos de la antigua ciudad de los califas omeyas.”
En “Museos de Andalucía” podemos leer:
El Museo, abierto al público en octubre de 2009, es un complejo edificio que contiene los espacios propios de un museo moderno, así como toda la infraestructura dedicada a la gestión patrimonial que demanda un conjunto arqueológico de la magnitud de la ciudad califal. El edificio está concebido como el punto de partida para la visita al yacimiento, con una presentación y exposición museográfica sobre Madinat al-Zahra.
La creación del Museo resuelve varios problemas planteados desde el comienzo de la recuperación del yacimiento en 1911. El primer edificio construido para dar apoyo a la excavación quedó pronto obsoleto por la ingente cantidad de material arqueológico que se fue almacenando en sus instalaciones y por la insuficiencia de espacios expositivos.
El Museo viene a resolver, además, varias demandas del Conjunto, referidas tanto a la difusión y función didáctica de la institución, como a la tarea de custodia y conservación que esta institución tiene encomendada.
Destaca en el edificio su ubicación exterior a la ciudad, aprovechando uno de sus caminos originales de acceso, de forma que no condiciona ni las excavaciones futuras ni el crecimiento en extensión de las mismas. Este compromiso de la nueva infraestructura con el yacimiento se extiende también al paisaje, pues el proyecto planteado por el estudio de arquitectura Nieto y Sobejano la concibe como una edificación que se oculta parcialmente en el territorio, para no interferir ni en la contemplación del paisaje ni en el fundamental protagonismo de la ciudad califal.
Se trata, en definitiva, de una infraestructura, ideada para facilitar la comprensión del yacimiento y desarrollar a todos los niveles sus potencialidades. Se concibe como una infraestructura para impulsar nuevos proyectos de investigación, conservación y difusión de la ciudad de Madinat al-Zahra y toda la ordenación territorial que constituye su entorno. Cuenta con los siguientes servicios:
Área cultural, expositiva y didáctica: Auditorio, Exposición permanente, Biblioteca Especializada "Manuel Ocaña", Aula didáctica y Sala de seminarios. Área de conservación, investigación y Administración: Almacenes, Talleres de restauración, Centro de documentación, Oficinas y despachos. Otros servicios: Tienda con librería y Cafetería-restaurante.
Premios:
2009: Finalista Premio Intervención en Patrimonio Arquitectónico Español. The International Architecture Award. The Chicago Athenaeum Museum.
2010: Aga Khan Award for Architecture.
2011: Piranesi Prix de Rome. Obra Seleccionada Premio de Arquitectura Contemporánea de la Unión Europea – Premio Mies van der Rohe. Finalista Premio Arquitectura Española. Finalista Premios FAD
2012: European Museum of the Year Award
www.nietosobejano.com/project.aspx?i=1&t=MADINAT_ALZA...
www.metalocus.es/es/noticias/nieto-sobejano-arquitectos-m...
www.museosdeandalucia.es/cultura/museos/CAMA/?lng=es
NietoSobejano Arquitectos
The main problem in non touristic zones that i visit is to avoid to have 200 kids following me, asking for pictures!
Formerly a British colony, Somaliland briefly reached its independence in 1960. It is one of the three Territories, with Puntland and former Italian Somalia that compose the current State of Somalia.
Somaliland proclaimed its independence in 1991, adopting its own currency, a fully independent government, working institutions and police. The authorities organized a referendum in 2001, advocating once again for full independence. However, to date, it is not internationally recognized.
Ethiopian Prime minister Meles Zenawi is the only one to speak about a Somalilander president, recognizing implicitly the existence of an independent State. Indeed the economy of neighboring Ethiopia dramatically depends on Somaliland stability, since the landlocked country’s main trade route passes through the Somalilander port of Berbera… And vice-versa, the economy of Somaliland largely depends on the taxes and duties it charges Ethiopia. Besides that, the principal economic activity of Somaliland is livestock exportation to the Arabian Peninsula. Most people are Sunni Muslims and speak Arabic, as well as some Somali dialect and many of them, English.Lastely, the East African demography being based on clan alliances, it is no surprise that the frontiers drawn by the colonists don’t match the ethnic divisions of territory, leading to open clashes. More broadly, this problem is recurrent across the African continent.
© Eric Lafforgue