Liverpool (/ˈlɪvərpuːl/) is a city in Merseyside, England. A borough from 1207 and a city from 1880, in 2014 the city local government district had a population of 470,537[2] and the Liverpool/Birkenhead metropolitan area had a population of 2,241,000.[2]

 

Liverpool is in the south west of the historic county of Lancashire in North West England, on the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. The town historically lay within the ancient Lancashire division of West Derby known as a "hundred".[5][6]

 

The urbanisation and expansion of the city were largely brought about by its advantageous location during the industrial revolution status that led to its growth as a major port, which included its participation in the Atlantic slave trade. Liverpool was the port of registry of the ocean liner RMS Titanic, and many other Cunard and White Star ocean liners such as the RMS Lusitania, Queen Mary, and Olympic. Liverpool's status as a port city has contributed to its diverse population, which, historically, was drawn from a wide range of peoples, cultures, and religions, particularly those from Ireland. The city is also home to the oldest Black African community in the country and the oldest Chinese community in Europe.

 

Natives of Liverpool are referred to as Liverpudlians (from a long-standing jocular alteration of 'Liverpool' to 'Liverpuddle') and colloquially as "Scousers", a reference to "scouse", a form of stew. The word "Scouse" has also become synonymous with the Liverpool accent and dialect.[7]

 

Tourism forms a significant part of the city's modern economy. The city celebrated its 800th anniversary in 2007, and it held the European Capital of Culture title together with Stavanger, Norway, in 2008.[8] Labelled the "World Capital City of Pop" by Guinness World Records, the popularity of The Beatles, and other groups from the Merseybeat era and later, contributes to Liverpool's status as a tourist destination.

 

Several areas of Liverpool city centre were granted World Heritage Site status by UNESCOin 2004. The Liverpool Maritime Mercantile Cityincludes the Pier Head, Albert Dock, and William Brown Street.[9] Liverpool is also the home of two Premier League football clubs, Liverpool and Everton. Matches between the two are known as the Merseyside derby. The world-famous Grand National also takes places annually at Aintree Racecourse on the outskirts of the city.

  

Early history

King John's letters patent of 1207 announced the foundation of the borough of Liverpool, but by the middle of the 16th century the population was still only around 500. The original street plan of Liverpool is said to have been designed by King John near the same time it was granted a royal charter, making it a borough. The original seven streets were laid out in an H shape: Bank Street (now Water Street), Castle Street, Chapel Street, Dale Street, Juggler Street (now High Street), Moor Street (now Tithebarn Street) and Whiteacre Street (now Old Hall Street).

 

In the 17th century there was slow progress in trade and population growth. Battles for the town were waged during the English Civil War, including an eighteen-day siege in 1644. In 1699 Liverpool was made a parish by Act of Parliament, that same year its first slave ship, Liverpool Merchant, set sail for Africa. As trade from the West Indies surpassed that of Ireland and Europe, and as the River Dee silted up, Liverpool began to grow. The first commercial wet dock was built in Liverpool in 1715.[10][11]Substantial profits from the slave trade helped the town to prosper and rapidly grow, although several prominent local men, including William Rathbone, William Roscoe and Edward Rushton, were at the forefront of the abolitionist movement.

 

In the early 19th century Liverpool played a major role in the Antarctic sealing industry, in recognition of which Liverpool Beach in the South Shetland Islands is named after the city.[12]

 

By the start of the 19th century, a large volume of trade was passing through Liverpool, and the construction of major buildings reflected this wealth. In 1830, Liverpool and Manchesterbecame the first cities to have an intercity rail link, through the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. The population continued to rise rapidly, especially during the 1840s when Irishmigrants began arriving by the hundreds of thousands as a result of the Great Famine. By 1851, approximately 25% of the city's population was Irish-born. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Liverpool was drawing immigrants from across Europe. This is evident from the diverse array of religious buildings located across the city, many of which are still in use today. The Deutsche Kirche Liverpool, Greek Orthodox Church of St Nicholas, Gustav Adolf Church and Princes Road Synagoguewere all established in the 1800s to serve Liverpool's growing German, Greek, Nordic and Jewish communities respectively. One of Liverpool's oldest surviving churches, St. Peter's Roman Catholic Church, served the Polish community in its final years as a place of worship.

 

Given the crucial place of both cotton and slavery in the city's economy, during the American Civil War Liverpool was, in the words of historian Sven Beckert, "the most pro-Confederate place in the world outside the Confederacy itself."

  

20th Century

  

Given the crucial place of both cotton and slavery in the city's economy, during the American Civil War Liverpool was, in the words of historian Sven Beckert, "the most pro-Confederate place in the world outside the Confederacy.

  

20th century

The Housing Act 1919 resulted in mass council housing building across Liverpool during the 1920s and 1930s. Thousands of families were rehoused from the inner-city to new suburban housing estates, based on the pretext that this would improve their standard of living, though this is largely subjective. A large number of private homes were also built during this era. The process continued after the Second World War, with many more new housing estates being built in suburban areas, while some of the older inner city areas were also redeveloped for new homes. The Great Depression of the early 1930s saw unemployment in the city peak at around 30%.

 

During the Second World War there were 80 air-raids on Merseyside, killing 2,500 people and causing damage to almost half the homes in the metropolitan area. Significant rebuilding followed the war, including massive housing estates and the Seaforth Dock, the largest dock project in Britain. Much of the immediate reconstruction of the city centre has been deeply unpopular, and was as flawed as much town planning renewal in the 1950s and 1960s – the portions of the city's heritage that survived German bombing could not withstand the efforts of urban renewal. Since 1952 Liverpool has been twinned with Cologne, Germany, a city which also experienced severe aerial bombing during the war.

 

Like most British cities and industrialised towns, Liverpool became home to a significant number of Commonwealth immigrants after World War II, mostly settling in older inner city areas such as Toxteth. However, a significant West Indian black community had existed in the city as long ago as the first two decades of the 20th century.

 

In the 1960s Liverpool was the centre of the "Merseybeat" sound which became synonymous with The Beatles and fellow Liverpudlian rock bands.

 

From the mid-1970s onwards Liverpool's docks and traditional manufacturing industries went into sharp decline. The advent of containerisation meant that the city's docks became largely obsolete. By the early 1980s unemployment rates in Liverpool were once again among the highest in the UK,[14] standing at 17% by January 1982 – although this was just over half of the level of unemployment that was affecting the city in an economic downturn 50 years previously.[15]

 

In recent years, Liverpool's economy has recovered and has experienced growth rates higher than the national average since the mid-nineties.

  

21st Century

  

To celebrate the Golden Jubilee of Elizabeth IIin 2002, the conservation charity Plantlifeorganised a competition to choose county flowers; the sea-holly was Liverpool's final choice.

 

Capitalising on the popularity of 1960s rock groups, such as The Beatles, as well as the city's world-class art galleries, museums and landmarks, tourism has also become a significant factor in Liverpool's economy.

 

In 2004, property developer Grosvenor started the Paradise Project, a £920 m development centred on Paradise Street, which involved the most significant changes to Liverpool's city centre since the post-war reconstruction. Renamed 'Liverpool ONE', the centre opened in May 2008.

 

In 2007, the city celebrated the 800th anniversary of the foundation of the borough of Liverpool, for which a number of events were planned. Liverpool is a joint European Capital of Culture for 2008. The main celebrations, in September 2008, included La Princesse, a large mechanical spider which is 20 metres high and weighs 37 tonnes, and represents the "eight legs" of Liverpool: honour, history, music, the Mersey, the ports, governance, sunshine and culture. La Princesse roamed the streets of the city during the festivities, and concluded by entering the Queensway Tunnel.

 

Spearheaded by the multi-billion-poundLiverpool ONE development, regeneration has continued on an unprecedented scale through to the start of the early 2010s in Liverpool. Some of the most significant regeneration projects to have taken place in the city include new buildings in the Commercial District, the King's Dock area, the Mann Island area, the Lime Street Gateway, the Baltic Triangle area, the RopeWalks area and the Edge Lane Gateway. All projects could however soon be eclipsed by the Liverpool Waters scheme which if built will cost in the region of £5.5billion and be one of the largest megaprojects in the UK's history. Liverpool Waters is a mixed use development which will contain one of Europe's largest skyscraper clusters. The project received outline planning permission in 2012, despite fierce opposition from the likes of UNESCO who claim it will have a damaging effect on Liverpool's World Heritage status.

 

On 9 June 2014, Prime Minister David Cameronlaunched the International Festival for Businessin Liverpool, the world's largest business event in 2014,[16] and the largest in the UK since the Festival of Britain in 1951.[17]

  

Second city of Empire

 

For periods during the 19th century the wealth of Liverpool exceeded that of London itself,[18]and Liverpool's Custom House was the single largest contributor to the British Exchequer.[19]Liverpool's status can be judged from the fact that it was the only British city ever to have its own Whitehall office.[20]

The first United States consul anywhere in the world, James Maury, was appointed to Liverpool in 1790, and remained in office for 39 years.

 

As early as 1851 the city was described as "the New York of Europe"[21] and its buildings, constructed on a heroic, even megalomaniacal, scale stand witness to the supreme confidence and ambition of the city at the turn of the 20th century.[22][editorializing]

 

Liverpool was also the site of the UK's first provincial airport, operating from 1930, and was the first UK airport to be renamed after an individual – John Lennon.[23]

 

Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance March No.1, often seen as Britain's Imperial anthem, was dedicated by the composer to the Liverpool Orchestral Society and had its premiere in the city in October 1901.

 

During the Second World War, the critical strategic importance of Liverpool was recognised by both Hitler and Churchill, with the city suffering a blitz second only to London's,[24] and the pivotal Battle of the Atlantic being planned, fought and won from Liverpool.[25]

 

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverpool

   

London band Average Sex supporting The Hungry Ghosts at Centrala Birmingham.

The eastern screech owl (Megascops asio) or eastern screech-owl, is a small owl that is relatively common in Eastern North America, from Mexico to Canada. This species is native to most wooded environments of its distribution, and more so than any other owl in its range, has adapted well to manmade development, although it frequently avoids detection due to its strictly nocturnal habits.

 

Description

Adults range from 16 to 25 cm (6+1⁄2 to 10 in) in length and weigh 121–244 g (4+1⁄4–8+5⁄8 oz). Among the differently sized races, length can average from 19.5 to 23.8 cm (7+11⁄16 to 9+3⁄8 in). The wingspan can range from 46 to 61 cm (18 to 24 in). In Ohio, male owls average 166 g (5+7⁄8 oz) and females 194 g (6+7⁄8 oz) while in central Texas, they average 157 g (5+1⁄2 oz) and 185 g (6+1⁄2 oz), respectively. They have either rusty or dark gray intricately patterned plumage with streaking on the underparts. Midsized by screech-owl standards, these birds are stocky, short-tailed (tail averages from 6.6 to 8.6 cm (2+5⁄8 to 3+3⁄8 in) in length) and broad-winged (wing chord averages from 14.5 to 17 cm (5+3⁄4 to 6+3⁄4 in) in length) as is typical of the genus. They have a large, round head with prominent ear tufts, yellow eyes, and a yellowish beak, which measures on average 1.45 cm (9⁄16 in) in length. The feet are relatively large and powerful compared to more southern screech owls and are typically feathered down to the toes, although the southernmost populations only have remnant bristles rather than full feathering on the legs and feet. The eastern screech owl (and its western counterpart) are actually some of the heaviest screech owls; the largest tropical screech owls do not exceed them in average or maximal weight, but (due to the eastern screech owls' relatively short tails) they are surpassed in length by Balsas (M. seductus), long-tufted (M. sanctaecatarinae), white-throated (M. albogularis), and rufescent owls (M. seductus), in roughly increasing order.

  

Eastern screech owl (gray morph) in Canada

Two color variations are referred to as "red or rufous morphs" and "gray morphs" by bird watchers and ornithologists. Rusty birds are more common in the southern parts of the range; pairings of the two color variants do occur. While the gray morph provides remarkably effective camouflage amongst the bark of hardwood trees, red morphs may find security in certain pine trees and the colorful leaves of changing deciduous trees. The highest percentage of red morphs is known from Tennessee (79% of population) and Illinois (78% of population). A rarer "brown morph" is known, recorded exclusively in the south (i.e. Florida), which may be the occasional product of hybridation between the morphs. In Florida, brown morphs are typically reported in the more humid portions of the state, whereas they appear to be generally absent in the northern and northwestern parts of the state. A paler gray variation (sometimes bordering on a washed-out, whitish look) also exists in western Canada and the north-central United States.

 

Confusion with other species

In the closely related western screech owl (Megascops kennicottii), no color morphs are known; all owls of the western species are gray. Besides coloration, the western screech owl is of almost exactly the same general appearance and size as the eastern. The only reliable distinguishing feature is the bill color, which is considerably darker (often a black-gray) in the western and olive-yellow in the eastern; their voices also differ. The eastern and western screech owls overlap in the range in the Rio Grande valley at the Texas–Mexico border and the riparian woods of the Cimarron tributary of the Arkansas River on the edge of southern Great Plains. Other somewhat similar species that may abut the eastern screech owl's range in its western and southernmost distribution, like the Middle American screech owl (Megascops guatemalae; formerly called "vermiculated screech owl"), whiskered screech owl (Megascops trichopsis), and the flammulated owl (Psiloscops flammeolus), are distinguished by their increasingly smaller body and foot size, different streaking pattern on breast (bolder on the whiskered, weaker on the others), different bare part coloration, and distinctive voices. Through much of the eastern United States, eastern screech owls are essentially physically unmistakable, because other owls with ear tufts are much larger and differently colored and the only other small owl, the northern saw-whet owl (Aegolius acadius) is even smaller, with no ear tufts, a more defined facial disc, and browner overall color.

 

Subspecies

Five subspecies are typically treated for the eastern screech owl, but the taxonomy in the species is considered "muddled". Much of the variation may be considered clinal, as predictably, the size tends to decrease from north to south and much of the color variation is explainable by adaptation to habitat.

 

M. a. asio (Linnaeus, 1758) includes previously described races no longer considered valid such as M. a. carolinensis, M. a. naevius and M. a. striatus. It is resident from eastern Minnesota to southwestern Quebec and southern New Hampshire south to Missouri, Tennessee, and northern South Carolina. Dorsal color is cold gray; the red morph is common (about 39% of overall population). The nominate's markings are coarse and sparse and its toes are densely feathered. Its primary song has a terminal, tremulous whinny. This is a medium-to-large race, measuring 14 to 18 cm (5+1⁄2 to 7 in) in wing chord length. The owls of southern Ontario are on the larger end of the scale, of similar size to the relatively big owls of Colorado and Wyoming.

M. a. maxwelliae (Ridgway, 1877). Includes M. a. swenki. Resident from central Montana, southeastern Saskatchewan, and southern Manitoba south to western Kansas. This race is similar to M. a. asio but dorsal color tends to be a paler gray, the ventrum being whiter and less heavily marked and red morphs tending to paler and rarer (~7% of populatio). With a wing chord length of 15 to 18 cm (6 to 7 in), this is the largest race in average linear measurements. This subspecies was named in honor of Martha Maxwell by ornithologist Robert Ridgway of the Smithsonian Institution.

M. a. hasbroucki (Ridgway, 1914). Replacement name for the formerly described M. a. trichopsis. This subspecies is a resident from Oklahoma panhandle and southern Kansas south to Edwards Plateau of central Texas. This subspecies is also similar to M. a. asio but the dorsal color is buffy gray, the red morph being rare (~5% of population), and markings coarse and dense. This race averages at a similar size as the first two, at 14 to 18 cm (5+1⁄2 to 7 in) in wing chord length.

M. a. mccallii (Cassin, 1854) includes previously described races such as M. a. enano and M. a. semplei. Resident from southern Texas (Big Bend to lower Rio Grande Valley) and northwestern Chihuahua and northern Coahuila southeast to eastern San Luis Potosí, this race is similar to M. a. hasbroucki, but its markings are fine and dense so the dorsum looks heavily mottled, with red morphs being rare (apparently entirely absent in South Texas). Its body size is smaller to the northern races, with a wing chord length of 13 to 17 cm (5 to 6+1⁄2 in). Unlike other subspecies, the primary song of M. a. mccallii lacks a terminal whinny.

M. a. floridanus (Ridgway, 1873) is resident in Florida and southern Georgia west through Gulf Coast states to western Louisiana and north in the Mississippi River valley to southeastern Arkansas. This race's dorsal color is often rusty-brown (red morph equally common), with fine and dense markings. As described above, this subspecies may occur in a true "brown morph". It is the smallest race of eastern screech owl, ranging in wing chord length from 13 to 16 cm (5 to 6+1⁄2 in).

Plumage polymorphism

Eastern screech owls exhibit a similar polymorphism as tawny owls, whose plumage ranges from rufous to gray. The inheritance of morph in owls is likely complex, but rufous plumage may be controlled by a dominant allele and gray plumage alleles are recessive. There are latitudinal clines in screech owl polymorphism, with northern latitudes containing mostly gray individuals and southern latitudes containing primarily rufous individuals. This cline may be driven by higher metabolic rates in rufous individuals compared to gray individuals. Evidence of higher metabolic rates was show by a higher proportion of gray morphs in the rural areas surrounding Waco, TX compared to the warmer suburban areas. Rufous screech owls also had higher mortality during cold winters.

 

Habitat

Eastern screech owls inhabit open mixed woodlands, deciduous forests, parklands, wooded suburban areas, riparian woods along streams and wetlands (especially in drier areas), mature orchards, and woodlands near marshes, meadows, and fields. They try to avoid areas known to have regular activity of larger owls, especially great horned owls (Bubo virginianus). Their ability to live in heavily developed areas outranks even the great horned and certainly the barred owl (Strix varia); screech owls also are considerably more successful in the face of urbanization than barn owls (Tyto alba) following the conversion of what was once farmland. Due to the introduction of open woodland and cultivated strips in the Great Plains, the range of eastern screech owls there has expanded. Eastern screech owls have been reported living and nesting in spots such as along the border of a busy highway and on the top of a street light in the middle of a busy town square. They often nest in trees in neighborhoods and urban yards inhabited by humans. In such urban environments, they often meet their dietary needs via introduced species that live close to humans such as house sparrows (Passer domesticus) and house mice (Mus musculus). They also consume anole lizards and large insects such as cicadas. They occupy the greatest range of habitats of any owl east of the Rockies. Eastern screech owls roost mainly in natural cavities in large trees, including cavities open to the sky during dry weather. In suburban and rural areas, they may roost in manmade locations such as behind loose boards on buildings, in boxcars, or on water tanks. They also roost in dense foliage of trees, usually on a branch next to the trunk, or in dense, scrubby brush. The distribution of the species is largely concurrent with the distribution of eastern deciduous woodlands, probably discontinuing at the Rocky Mountains in the west and in northern Mexico in the south due to the occupation of similar niches by other screech owls and discontinuing at the start of true boreal forest because of the occupation of a similar niche by other small owls (especially boreal owls (Aegolius funereus). Eastern screech owls may be found from sea level up to 1,400 m (4,600 ft) in elevation in the eastern Rocky Mountains and up to 1,500 m (4,900 ft) in the eastern Sierra Madre Oriental Mountains, although their altitudinal limits in the Appalachian Mountains, near the heart of their distribution, is not currently known.

 

Behavior

Eastern screech owls are strictly nocturnal, roosting during the day in cavities or next to tree trunks. They are quite common, and can often be found in residential areas. However, due to their small size and camouflage, they are much more frequently heard than actually seen. These owls are frequently heard calling at night, especially during their spring breeding season. Despite their name, this owl does not truly screech. The eastern screech owl's call is a tremolo with a descending, whinny-like quality, like that of a miniature horse. They also produce a monotone purring trill lasting 3–5 seconds. Their voices are unmistakable and follow a noticeably different phrasing than that of the western screech owl. The lugubrious nature of the eastern screech owl's call has warranted description such as, "A most solemn graveyard ditty, the mutual consolation of suicide lovers remembering the pangs and delights of the supernal love in the infernal groves, Oh-o-o-o-o that I never had been bor-r-r-r-n!.

 

Breeding

Their breeding habitat is deciduous or mixed woods in eastern North America. Usually solitary, they nest in a tree cavity, either natural or excavated by a woodpecker. Holes must have a 7 to 20 cm (3 to 8 in) entrance to accommodate this owl. Usually, they fit only in the holes excavated by northern flickers (Colaptes auratus) or pileated woodpeckers (Dryocopus pileatus), as apparently the midsized red-bellied woodpecker (Melanerpes carolinensis) make holes that are not large enough to accommodate them.[18] Orchards, which often have trees with crevices and holes, as well as meadow voles (Microtus pennsylvanicus), a dietary favorite, are often preferred nesting habitats. Eastern screech owls also use nesting boxes erected by humans. Although some people put up nest boxes meant for screech owls, the owls also take over nest boxes meant for others, such as those for wood ducks (Aix sponsa), houses erected for purple martins (Progne subis), and dovecotes put up for rock pigeons (Columba livia), occasionally killing and consuming at least the latter two in the process of taking over the nest box. A 9-year study comparing the breeding success of eastern screech owls nesting in natural cavities and nesting in nest boxes showed that the fledging rate was essentially the same, although in some years, up to 10% more success occurred in the natural cavities.[18] Depending on the origins of the hole being used, eastern screech owl nests have been recorded from 1.5 to 25 m (5 to 80 ft) off the ground. Like all owls, these birds do not actually build a nest; instead, females lay their eggs directly on the bare floor of the nest hole or on the layer of fur and feathers left over from previous meals that line the bottom of its den. Breeding pairs often return to the same nest year after year.

 

This species commences egg laying on average about two months after great horned owls, but about two weeks before American kestrels (Falco sparveius) and almost throughout the range lays its first egg at some point in April. Eggs are laid at two-day intervals and incubation begins after laying of the first egg. Eggs vary in size in synch with their ultimate body size, ranging from an average of 36.3 mm × 30.2 mm (1+7⁄16 in × 1+3⁄16 in) in the Northern Rockies to 33.9 mm × 29.2 mm (1+5⁄16 in × 1+1⁄8 in) in south Texas. From one to six eggs have been recorded per clutch, with an average of 4.4 in Ohio, 3.0 in Florida, and 4.56 in the north-central United States. The incubation period is about 26 days, and the young reach the fledging stage at about 31 days old. Females do most of the incubating and brooding, but males also occasionally take shifts. As is the typical division of labor in owls, the male provides most of the food while the female primarily broods the young, and they stockpile food during the early stages of nesting, although the male tends to work hard nightly because many nestlings often appear to live almost entirely on freshly caught insects and invertebrates. The male's smaller size make it superior in its nimbleness, which allows it to catch insects and other swift prey. Eastern screech owls are single-brooded, but may renest if the first clutch is lost, especially towards the southern end of its range. When the young are small, the female tears the food apart for them. The female, with her larger size and harder strike, takes on the duty of defending the nest from potential threats, and even humans may be aggressively attacked, sometimes resulting in them drawing blood from the head and shoulders of human passers-by.

 

Feeding habits

Like most predators, eastern screech owls are opportunistic hunters. Due to the ferocity and versatility of their hunting style, early authors nicknamed eastern screech owls "feathered wildcats".[21] In terms of ecological niche, they have no easy ecological equivalent in Europe, perhaps the closest being the little owl (Athene noctua), the similar looking Eurasian scops owl (Otus scops) being smaller and weaker and the long-eared owl (Asio otus) more fully dependent on rodents. The success of eastern screech (and western screech) owls in North America may be the reason long-eared owls are much more restricted to limited northern forest habitat in North America than they are in Europe. Eastern screech owls hunt from dusk to dawn, with most hunting being done during the first four hours of darkness. A combination of sharp hearing and vision is used for prey location. These owls hunt mainly from perches, dropping down onto prey. Occasionally, they also hunt by scanning through the treetops in brief flights or hover to catch prey. This owl mainly hunts in open woodlands, along the edges of open fields or wetlands, or makes short forays into open fields. When prey is spotted, the owl dives quickly and seizes it in its talons. Small prey usually is swallowed whole on the spot, while larger prey is carried in the bill to a perch and then torn into pieces. An eastern screech owl tends to frequent areas in its home range where it hunted successfully on previous nights. The eastern screech owl's sense of hearing is so acute, it can even locate mammals under heavy vegetation or snow. The bird's ears (as opposed to its ear tufts) are placed asymmetrically on its head, enabling it to use the differences between each ear's perception of sound to home in on prey. Additionally, the feathers the eastern screech owl uses to fly are serrated at their tips. This muffles the noise the bird makes when it flaps its wings, enabling it to sneak up on prey quietly. Both the specialized ear placement and wing feathers are a feature shared by most living owl species to aid them in hunting in darkness.

 

During the breeding season, large insects are favored in their diet, with invertebrates often composing more than half of the owls' diet. Some regularly eaten insects include beetles, moths, crickets, grasshoppers, katydids, and cicadas, although they likely consume any commonly available flying insect. Also taken are crayfish, snails, spiders, earthworms, scorpions, leeches, millipedes, and centipedes. Small mammals, ranging in size from shrews to young rabbits (Sylvilagus ssp.), are regular prey and almost always become the owl's primary food during winter. Small rodents such as microtine rodents and mice account for about 67% of mammals taken, although rodents of a similar weight to the owl, such as rats and squirrels, especially the red squirrel (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus), are also taken. Jumping mice (Zapus ssp.), chipmunks, moles, and bats (especially the little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) may be taken occasionally. Small birds such as chickadees (Poecile ssp.), swallows, sparrows, finches, flycatchers, and warblers are the most common avian prey, and such species are normally caught directly from their nocturnal perches or during nocturnal migration. In Ohio, the most commonly reported avian prey species, and most commonly stored food items behind meadow voles, were yellow-rumped warblers (Setophaga coronata) and white-throated sparrows (Zonotrichus albicollis). Abundant midsized avian or largish passerine prey are also not uncommon foods, such as mourning doves (Zenaida macroura), downy woodpeckers (Picoides pubescens), northern flickers, blue jays (Cyanocitta cristata), American robins (Turdus migratorius), European starling (Sturnus vulgaris), red-winged blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus), and common grackles (Quiscalus quiscula). However, larger avian prey are sometimes caught, including northern bobwhite (Colinus virginianus) and American woodcocks (Scolopax minor) and even rock pigeons and ruffed grouse (Bonasa umbellus), most likely young or fledgling aged birds, but all of which are likely to be heavier than the screech owls themselves. All told, more than 100 species of bird have been hunted by eastern screech owls. Irregularly, small fish, small snakes (i.e. Heterodon ssp.), lizards, baby soft-shelled turtles (Apalone ssp.), small frogs such as tree frogs and northern leopard frogs (Lithobates pipiens), toads, newts, and salamanders are also preyed upon. They have even been observed hunting for fish at fishing holes made by people or cracks in ice at bodies of water during winter. The most commonly reported fish prey in Ohio were American gizzard shad (Dorosoma cepedianum) and green sunfish (Lepomis cyanellus). Brown bullheads (Ameiurus nebulosus) have been captured by eastern screech owls along coastal areas during winter.

 

From hundreds of prey remains from Ohio, 41% were found to be mammals (23% of which were mice or voles), 18% were birds, and 41% were insects and other assorted invertebrates. Of vertebrates taken in the nesting season, 65% were birds (of about 54 species), 30% were mammals (11% meadow voles; 8% each of house mice and deermice of the genus Peromyscus), 3% were fish, and less than 2% were reptiles and amphibians. In Michigan, among winter foods, 45–50% were meadow voles, 45% were white-footed mice (Peromyscus leucopus) and 1–10% were birds; during the summer, these respective numbers changed to 30, 23, and 19%, with as much as 28% of the food in summer being crayfish (Cambarus ssp.). Due to meeting the needs of their nestlings, eastern screech owls frequently consume less per day during summer than they do during winter. Five owls captured in April, averaging about 160 g (5+3⁄4 oz) in males and 190 g (6+3⁄4 oz) in females, gained on average 28 g (1 oz) when captured in fall (October–December) and 13 g (1⁄2 oz) when captured in winter (January–February). In Michigan, screech owls consumed about 25% of their own weight per day during winter against 16% of their weight in summer. The average weight of vertebrate prey for screech owls in Michigan is 26 g (15⁄16 oz) In Wisconsin, the average weight of vertebrate prey is 28 g (1 oz). While much of their insect prey can weigh only a fraction of a gram, their largest prey, such as adult rats and pigeons and juvenile rabbits and gamebirds, can weigh up to at least 350 g (12+1⁄4 oz).

 

Urban/suburban vs. rural behavior

Eastern screech owls are known for their ability to live in close proximity to humans. There is previous information pointing to potential behavioral adaptations of urban and suburban eastern screech owls from their rural counterparts. There have been previous studies that found suburban eastern screech owls breed no differently in man-made nest boxes than in natural tree cavities. Climate, food sources, and predator presence are some potential factors that impact the behaviors of suburban and rural eastern screech owls. Living in suburbia can have some additional impacts on eastern screech owl behavior such as secondary poisoning, vehicles, and more predation and competition from raccoon, opossum and squirrels.

 

Previous research has shown that male eastern screech owls find and defend two to three potential nesting sites (man-made and natural) in order to have backups for failed first nesting attempts. However, in a study by Gehlbach it was found that suburban eastern screech owls had fewer alternative nesting sites due to humans cutting down trees with natural cavities, pruning the trees, or filling in the natural cavities with cement. Gehlbach also found that nesting sites close to houses and with fewer surrounding shrubs were some of the most used. Additionally, older eastern screech owls were found to be more likely to habituate to human disturbances compared to younger eastern screech owls. A study by Artuso found that there were larger average brood sizes and earlier average fledging dates of eastern screech owls shown in moderate and high-density suburban areas than in low-density suburban and rural areas. Urban and suburban populations of eastern screech owls are more dense and productive than their rural counterparts. There are various differences in habitat that have impacts on the nesting behaviors of eastern screech owls.

 

Eastern screech owl feeding behaviors have also been shown through previous research to be impacted by whether the owl lived in a rural or suburban area. In a previous study, prey diversity for eastern screech owls peaked in low-density suburban areas. The owl's feeding habits changed based on the habitat type—owls in low-density suburban sites consumed almost double the amount of birds in non-breeding season as owls in high-density sites and triple that of owls in rural sites. Rural owls generally consumed more invertebrates and fewer caterpillars and earthworms. It is already known that eastern screech owl diets vary throughout the breeding and non-breeding season, but now there is more research describing habitat's role in feeding behaviors as well.

 

The climate within urban or suburban and rural areas differ as well which in turn impacts eastern screech owl behavior. Suburban climate is typically warmer than rural climate due to the "heat island effect" A previous study showed that as suburban climates got warmer over the course of a few years, eastern screech owls started nesting an average of 4.5 days earlier annually. There were also more avian prey and a 93% success rate in annual nests. Bird baths and feeders located in the suburban habitats were also noted as being likely factors in enhancing residence successes.

 

Mortality

While eastern screech owls have lived for over 20 years in captivity, wild birds seldom, if ever, live that long. Mortality rates of young and nestling owls may be as high as 70% (usually significantly less in adult screech owls). Many losses are due to predation. Common predators at screech owl nests including Virginia opossums (Didelphis virginiana), American minks (Neogale vison), weasels (Mustela and Neogale sp.), raccoons (Procyon lotor), ringtails (Bassariscus astutus), skunks (Mephitis and Spilogale sp.), snakes, crows (Corvus sp.), and blue jays (Cyanocitta cristata). Eastern fox squirrels (Sciurus niger) may raid the tree holes being used by eastern screech owls, not only destroying or consuming the eggs, but also displacing the adult owls from the hole to use the hole for themselves. Adults have fewer predators, but larger species of owls do take them, since they have similar periods of activity. Larger owls known to have preyed on eastern screech owls have included great horned owls (Bubo virginianus), barred owls (Strix varia), spotted owls (Strix occidentalis), long-eared owls (Asio otus), short-eared owls (Asio flammeus), and snowy owls (Bubo scandianus). Diurnal birds of prey may also kill and eat them, including Cooper's hawks (Accipiter cooperii), northern harriers (Circus cyaenus), red-tailed hawks (Buteo jamaicensis), red-shouldered hawk (Buteo lineatus) and rough-legged hawks (Buteo lagopus). Most prolific by far of the eastern screech owl's avian predators is the great horned owl, which can destroy up to 78% of a local population, but locally, Cooper's hawks and barred owls are almost as serious of a threat. A most dramatic case illustrating the owl food chain involved a barred owl, which upon examination after being shot in New England, contained a long-eared owl in its stomach that, in its own stomach, contained an eastern screech owl. All other common owls in this species range also live on similar rodent prey, but direct competition is obviously disadvantageous to the screech owl. One exception is the even smaller northern saw-whet owl, on which eastern screech owls have been known to prey. In rural Michigan, 9 different species of owls and diurnal raptors including the screech owl fed primarily on the same four species of small rodents from the Peromyscus and Microtus genera. Eastern screech owls have had nesting attempts fail due to biocide poisoning, which causes the thinning of eggs and failure of nests, but seemingly not to the overall detriment of the species. Collisions with cars, trains, and windowpanes kill many screech owls, the earlier especially while feeding on road-side rodents and road kills.

 

Parasites

This species has the potential to be infected by several parasites, including Plasmodium elongatum, Plasmodium forresteri, and Plasmodium gundersi.

Scientific classification

Kingdom:Animalia

Phylum:Chordata

Class:Aves

Order:Passeriformes

Family:Turdidae

Genus:Turdus

Species:T. migratorius

Binomial name

Turdus migratorius

 

Average mass

77 g

2.71 oz

Average Length

25 cm

9.84 in

Average Wingspan

119 to 137 mm

4.69 to 5.39 in

 

Songs and Calls

Song is a series of rich caroling notes, rising and falling in pitch: cheer-up, cheerily, cheer-up, cheerily.

 

Conservation statusAbundant and widespread. Because it is so familiar and occurs around places where humans live, it sometimes serves as an early warning of environmental problems, such as overuse of pesticides.

FamilyThrushes

HabitatCities, towns, lawns, farmland, forests; in winter, berry-bearing trees. Over most of continent, summers wherever there are trees for nest sites and mud for nest material. In arid southwest, summers mainly in coniferous forest in mountains, rarely in well-watered lowland suburbs. In winter, flocks gather in wooded areas where trees or shrubs have good crops of berries.

A very familiar bird over most of North America, running and hopping on lawns with upright stance, often nesting on porches and windowsills. The Robin's rich caroling is among the earliest bird songs heard at dawn in spring and summer, often beginning just before first light. In fall and winter, robins may gather by the hundreds in roaming flocks, concentrating at sources of food.

Photo Gallery

 

Feeding Behavior

Does much foraging on the ground, running and pausing on open lawns; apparently locates earthworms by sight (not, as had been suggested, by hearing them move underground). When not nesting, usually forages in flocks.

 

Eggs

Usually 4, sometimes 3-7. Pale blue or "robin's-egg blue." Incubation by female, 12-14 days. Young: Both parents feed young, though female does more. Parents very aggressive in defense of nest. Young leave the nest about 14-16 days after hatching. Male may tend the fledged young while female begins second nesting attempt. 2 broods per season, sometimes 3.

 

Young

Both parents feed young, though female does more. Parents very aggressive in defense of nest. Young leave the nest about 14-16 days after hatching. Male may tend the fledged young while female begins second nesting attempt. 2 broods per season, sometimes 3.

 

Diet

Mostly insects, berries, earthworms. In early summer, insects make up majority of diet; also feeds on many earthworms, snails, spiders, other invertebrates. Feeds heavily on fruit, especially in winter (fruit accounts for perhaps 60% of diet year-round); mainly wild berries, also some cultivated fruits. Young are fed mostly on insects and earthworms.

 

Nesting

Males arrive before females on nesting grounds and defend territories by singing, sometimes by fighting. In early stages of courtship, female may be actively pursued by one or several males. Nest: Female does most of nest building with some help from male. Site on horizontal branch of tree or shrub, usually 5-25' above ground, rarely on ground or up to 70' high; also nests on ledges of houses, barns, bridges. Nest is a cup of grasses, twigs, debris, worked into solid foundation of mud, lined with fine grasses and plant fibers.

 

Migration

Migrates in flocks, often by day. Although some robins winter as far north as Canada, they are in localized concentrations then. With the breakup of flocks prior to the nesting season, when northerners see their "first robin of spring," it may be a bird that has wintered only a few miles away, not one that has just arrived from southern climates. To the south, winter range is highly variable from year to year, depending on local food supplies.

I've no idea which is the most offensive word in the English language; American or Cunt.

Jimmy Carr

who sat down and played the entire Goldberg Variations at the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

This has many more views than the companion picture. If you're not reading the info on the pic in the comments, he is Christopher O'Riley, host of NPR's "From the Top." Not average at all!

average,boring,complete

The Karpas Peninsula is a long, finger-like peninsula that is one of the most prominent geographical features of the island of Cyprus. Its farthest extent is Cape Apostolos Andreas, and its major population centre is the town of Rizokarpaso (Greek: Ριζοκάρπασο; Turkish: Dipkarpaz). The peninsula de facto forms the İskele District of Northern Cyprus, while de jure it lies in the Famagusta District of the Republic of Cyprus.

 

It covers an area of 898 km2, making up 27% of the territory of Northern Cyprus. It is much less densely populated than the average of Northern Cyprus, with a population density of 26 people per km2 in 2010. The town of Trikomo (İskele), the district capital, is considered to be the "gateway" and the geographical starting point of the peninsula, along with the neighboring village of Bogazi (Boğaz). Apart from Trikomo, the most important towns and municipalities in the area are Yialousa, Galateia, Rizokarpaso, Komi Kebir and Akanthou.

 

The peninsula hosts a number of historical sites such as Kantara Castle and Apostolos Andreas Monastery, as well as the ruins of Agia Trias Basilica and the ancient cities of Karpasia and Aphendrika among numerous others.

 

There are more than 46 sandy beaches in the peninsula, which are the primary Eastern Mediterranean nesting grounds for the loggerhead (Caretta caretta) and green sea turtles (Chelonia mydas). The Golden Beach is situated around 15 km from the town of Rizokarpaso and is considered one of the finest and most remote beaches of Cyprus. It is one of the least tourist-frequented beaches in the island. The Karpas Peninsula is home to the Karpas donkey, known as a symbol of Cyprus; there are campaigns carried out jointly by Turkish and Greek Cypriots to conserve the rare donkeys of the peninsula.

 

Most of the activities in the Karpas Peninsula are related to agriculture, fishing, hunting, and some to micro-tourism. Local farmers take advantage of this natural environment to grow different fruits and vegetables mostly as sub-subsistence farming (although for local commerce too). The region is mostly known for its karpuz (Turkish for "watermelon"). Several tourist businesses can be found in the town of Rizokarpaso. These are generally restaurants serving traditional Turkish-Cypriot Cuisine, including meze.

 

Due to its geographical position, the Karpas Peninsula is somewhat protected from human interference. This makes it a pristine natural environment, home to many inland and marine species. When hunting season starts, the Karpas's forests are a popular location to go hunting for partridges. Meanwhile, the coastal region, with its clear waters, moderate northern currents, and rocky bottom with cave-like structures, is home to two of the most highly valued fish species: the orfoz (dusky grouper) and lahos (Epinepheluses). The price per kilogram of each species ranges from 35-80 Turkish lira, depending on the location and the season. However, fishing rates in the Karpas region and most of North Cyprus dramatically decreased last century because of the use of dynamite. This is why the Zafer Burunu (the tip of the peninsula) is now a protected natural heritage area, where marine species are slowly recovering to healthy population parameters.

 

Northern Cyprus, officially the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), is a de facto state that comprises the northeastern portion of the island of Cyprus. It is recognised only by Turkey, and its territory is considered by all other states to be part of the Republic of Cyprus.

 

Northern Cyprus extends from the tip of the Karpass Peninsula in the northeast to Morphou Bay, Cape Kormakitis and its westernmost point, the Kokkina exclave in the west. Its southernmost point is the village of Louroujina. A buffer zone under the control of the United Nations stretches between Northern Cyprus and the rest of the island and divides Nicosia, the island's largest city and capital of both sides.

 

A coup d'état in 1974, performed as part of an attempt to annex the island to Greece, prompted the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. This resulted in the eviction of much of the north's Greek Cypriot population, the flight of Turkish Cypriots from the south, and the partitioning of the island, leading to a unilateral declaration of independence by the north in 1983. Due to its lack of recognition, Northern Cyprus is heavily dependent on Turkey for economic, political and military support.

 

Attempts to reach a solution to the Cyprus dispute have been unsuccessful. The Turkish Army maintains a large force in Northern Cyprus with the support and approval of the TRNC government, while the Republic of Cyprus, the European Union as a whole, and the international community regard it as an occupation force. This military presence has been denounced in several United Nations Security Council resolutions.

 

Northern Cyprus is a semi-presidential, democratic republic with a cultural heritage incorporating various influences and an economy that is dominated by the services sector. The economy has seen growth through the 2000s and 2010s, with the GNP per capita more than tripling in the 2000s, but is held back by an international embargo due to the official closure of the ports in Northern Cyprus by the Republic of Cyprus. The official language is Turkish, with a distinct local dialect being spoken. The vast majority of the population consists of Sunni Muslims, while religious attitudes are mostly moderate and secular. Northern Cyprus is an observer state of ECO and OIC under the name "Turkish Cypriot State", PACE under the name "Turkish Cypriot Community", and Organization of Turkic States with its own name.

 

Several distinct periods of Cypriot intercommunal violence involving the two main ethnic communities, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, marked mid-20th century Cyprus. These included the Cyprus Emergency of 1955–59 during British rule, the post-independence Cyprus crisis of 1963–64, and the Cyprus crisis of 1967. Hostilities culminated in the 1974 de facto division of the island along the Green Line following the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. The region has been relatively peaceful since then, but the Cyprus dispute has continued, with various attempts to solve it diplomatically having been generally unsuccessful.

 

Cyprus, an island lying in the eastern Mediterranean, hosted a population of Greeks and Turks (four-fifths and one-fifth, respectively), who lived under British rule in the late nineteenth-century and the first half of the twentieth-century. Christian Orthodox Church of Cyprus played a prominent political role among the Greek Cypriot community, a privilege that it acquired during the Ottoman Empire with the employment of the millet system, which gave the archbishop an unofficial ethnarch status.

 

The repeated rejections by the British of Greek Cypriot demands for enosis, union with Greece, led to armed resistance, organised by the National Organization of Cypriot Struggle, or EOKA. EOKA, led by the Greek-Cypriot commander George Grivas, systematically targeted British colonial authorities. One of the effects of EOKA's campaign was to alter the Turkish position from demanding full reincorporation into Turkey to a demand for taksim (partition). EOKA's mission and activities caused a "Cretan syndrome" (see Turkish Resistance Organisation) within the Turkish Cypriot community, as its members feared that they would be forced to leave the island in such a case as had been the case with Cretan Turks. As such, they preferred the continuation of British colonial rule and then taksim, the division of the island. Due to the Turkish Cypriots' support for the British, EOKA's leader, Georgios Grivas, declared them to be enemies. The fact that the Turks were a minority was, according to Nihat Erim, to be addressed by the transfer of thousands of Turks from mainland Turkey so that Greek Cypriots would cease to be the majority. When Erim visited Cyprus as the Turkish representative, he was advised by Field Marshal Sir John Harding, the then Governor of Cyprus, that Turkey should send educated Turks to settle in Cyprus.

 

Turkey actively promoted the idea that on the island of Cyprus two distinctive communities existed, and sidestepped its former claim that "the people of Cyprus were all Turkish subjects". In doing so, Turkey's aim to have self-determination of two to-be equal communities in effect led to de jure partition of the island.[citation needed] This could be justified to the international community against the will of the majority Greek population of the island. Dr. Fazil Küçük in 1954 had already proposed Cyprus be divided in two at the 35° parallel.

 

Lindley Dan, from Notre Dame University, spotted the roots of intercommunal violence to different visions among the two communities of Cyprus (enosis for Greek Cypriots, taksim for Turkish Cypriots). Also, Lindlay wrote that "the merging of church, schools/education, and politics in divisive and nationalistic ways" had played a crucial role in creation of havoc in Cyprus' history. Attalides Michael also pointed to the opposing nationalisms as the cause of the Cyprus problem.

 

By the mid-1950's, the "Cyprus is Turkish" party, movement, and slogan gained force in both Cyprus and Turkey. In a 1954 editorial, Turkish Cypriot leader Dr. Fazil Kuchuk expressed the sentiment that the Turkish youth had grown up with the idea that "as soon as Great Britain leaves the island, it will be taken over by the Turks", and that "Turkey cannot tolerate otherwise". This perspective contributed to the willingness of Turkish Cypriots to align themselves with the British, who started recruiting Turkish Cypriots into the police force that patrolled Cyprus to fight EOKA, a Greek Cypriot nationalist organisation that sought to rid the island of British rule.

 

EOKA targeted colonial authorities, including police, but Georgios Grivas, the leader of EOKA, did not initially wish to open up a new front by fighting Turkish Cypriots and reassured them that EOKA would not harm their people. In 1956, some Turkish Cypriot policemen were killed by EOKA members and this provoked some intercommunal violence in the spring and summer, but these attacks on policemen were not motivated by the fact that they were Turkish Cypriots.

 

However, in January 1957, Grivas changed his policy as his forces in the mountains became increasingly pressured by the British Crown forces. In order to divert the attention of the Crown forces, EOKA members started to target Turkish Cypriot policemen intentionally in the towns, so that Turkish Cypriots would riot against the Greek Cypriots and the security forces would have to be diverted to the towns to restore order. The killing of a Turkish Cypriot policeman on 19 January, when a power station was bombed, and the injury of three others, provoked three days of intercommunal violence in Nicosia. The two communities targeted each other in reprisals, at least one Greek Cypriot was killed and the British Army was deployed in the streets. Greek Cypriot stores were burned and their neighbourhoods attacked. Following the events, the Greek Cypriot leadership spread the propaganda that the riots had merely been an act of Turkish Cypriot aggression. Such events created chaos and drove the communities apart both in Cyprus and in Turkey.

 

On 22 October 1957 Sir Hugh Mackintosh Foot replaced Sir John Harding as the British Governor of Cyprus. Foot suggested five to seven years of self-government before any final decision. His plan rejected both enosis and taksim. The Turkish Cypriot response to this plan was a series of anti-British demonstrations in Nicosia on 27 and 28 January 1958 rejecting the proposed plan because the plan did not include partition. The British then withdrew the plan.

 

In 1957, Black Gang, a Turkish Cypriot pro-taksim paramilitary organisation, was formed to patrol a Turkish Cypriot enclave, the Tahtakale district of Nicosia, against activities of EOKA. The organisation later attempted to grow into a national scale, but failed to gain public support.

 

By 1958, signs of dissatisfaction with the British increased on both sides, with a group of Turkish Cypriots forming Volkan (later renamed to the Turkish Resistance Organisation) paramilitary group to promote partition and the annexation of Cyprus to Turkey as dictated by the Menderes plan. Volkan initially consisted of roughly 100 members, with the stated aim of raising awareness in Turkey of the Cyprus issue and courting military training and support for Turkish Cypriot fighters from the Turkish government.

 

In June 1958, the British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, was expected to propose a plan to resolve the Cyprus issue. In light of the new development, the Turks rioted in Nicosia to promote the idea that Greek and Turkish Cypriots could not live together and therefore any plan that did not include partition would not be viable. This violence was soon followed by bombing, Greek Cypriot deaths and looting of Greek Cypriot-owned shops and houses. Greek and Turkish Cypriots started to flee mixed population villages where they were a minority in search of safety. This was effectively the beginning of the segregation of the two communities. On 7 June 1958, a bomb exploded at the entrance of the Turkish Embassy in Cyprus. Following the bombing, Turkish Cypriots looted Greek Cypriot properties. On 26 June 1984, the Turkish Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktaş, admitted on British channel ITV that the bomb was placed by the Turks themselves in order to create tension. On 9 January 1995, Rauf Denktaş repeated his claim to the famous Turkish newspaper Milliyet in Turkey.

 

The crisis reached a climax on 12 June 1958, when eight Greeks, out of an armed group of thirty five arrested by soldiers of the Royal Horse Guards on suspicion of preparing an attack on the Turkish quarter of Skylloura, were killed in a suspected attack by Turkish Cypriot locals, near the village of Geunyeli, having been ordered to walk back to their village of Kondemenos.

 

After the EOKA campaign had begun, the British government successfully began to turn the Cyprus issue from a British colonial problem into a Greek-Turkish issue. British diplomacy exerted backstage influence on the Adnan Menderes government, with the aim of making Turkey active in Cyprus. For the British, the attempt had a twofold objective. The EOKA campaign would be silenced as quickly as possible, and Turkish Cypriots would not side with Greek Cypriots against the British colonial claims over the island, which would thus remain under the British. The Turkish Cypriot leadership visited Menderes to discuss the Cyprus issue. When asked how the Turkish Cypriots should respond to the Greek Cypriot claim of enosis, Menderes replied: "You should go to the British foreign minister and request the status quo be prolonged, Cyprus to remain as a British colony". When the Turkish Cypriots visited the British Foreign Secretary and requested for Cyprus to remain a colony, he replied: "You should not be asking for colonialism at this day and age, you should be asking for Cyprus be returned to Turkey, its former owner".

 

As Turkish Cypriots began to look to Turkey for protection, Greek Cypriots soon understood that enosis was extremely unlikely. The Greek Cypriot leader, Archbishop Makarios III, now set independence for the island as his objective.

 

Britain resolved to solve the dispute by creating an independent Cyprus. In 1959, all involved parties signed the Zurich Agreements: Britain, Turkey, Greece, and the Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders, Makarios and Dr. Fazil Kucuk, respectively. The new constitution drew heavily on the ethnic composition of the island. The President would be a Greek Cypriot, and the Vice-President a Turkish Cypriot with an equal veto. The contribution to the public service would be set at a ratio of 70:30, and the Supreme Court would consist of an equal number of judges from both communities as well as an independent judge who was not Greek, Turkish or British. The Zurich Agreements were supplemented by a number of treaties. The Treaty of Guarantee stated that secession or union with any state was forbidden, and that Greece, Turkey and Britain would be given guarantor status to intervene if that was violated. The Treaty of Alliance allowed for two small Greek and Turkish military contingents to be stationed on the island, and the Treaty of Establishment gave Britain sovereignty over two bases in Akrotiri and Dhekelia.

 

On 15 August 1960, the Colony of Cyprus became fully independent as the Republic of Cyprus. The new republic remained within the Commonwealth of Nations.

 

The new constitution brought dissatisfaction to Greek Cypriots, who felt it to be highly unjust for them for historical, demographic and contributional reasons. Although 80% of the island's population were Greek Cypriots and these indigenous people had lived on the island for thousands of years and paid 94% of taxes, the new constitution was giving the 17% of the population that was Turkish Cypriots, who paid 6% of taxes, around 30% of government jobs and 40% of national security jobs.

 

Within three years tensions between the two communities in administrative affairs began to show. In particular disputes over separate municipalities and taxation created a deadlock in government. A constitutional court ruled in 1963 Makarios had failed to uphold article 173 of the constitution which called for the establishment of separate municipalities for Turkish Cypriots. Makarios subsequently declared his intention to ignore the judgement, resulting in the West German judge resigning from his position. Makarios proposed thirteen amendments to the constitution, which would have had the effect of resolving most of the issues in the Greek Cypriot favour. Under the proposals, the President and Vice-President would lose their veto, the separate municipalities as sought after by the Turkish Cypriots would be abandoned, the need for separate majorities by both communities in passing legislation would be discarded and the civil service contribution would be set at actual population ratios (82:18) instead of the slightly higher figure for Turkish Cypriots.

 

The intention behind the amendments has long been called into question. The Akritas plan, written in the height of the constitutional dispute by the Greek Cypriot interior minister Polycarpos Georkadjis, called for the removal of undesirable elements of the constitution so as to allow power-sharing to work. The plan envisaged a swift retaliatory attack on Turkish Cypriot strongholds should Turkish Cypriots resort to violence to resist the measures, stating "In the event of a planned or staged Turkish attack, it is imperative to overcome it by force in the shortest possible time, because if we succeed in gaining command of the situation (in one or two days), no outside, intervention would be either justified or possible." Whether Makarios's proposals were part of the Akritas plan is unclear, however it remains that sentiment towards enosis had not completely disappeared with independence. Makarios described independence as "a step on the road to enosis".[31] Preparations for conflict were not entirely absent from Turkish Cypriots either, with right wing elements still believing taksim (partition) the best safeguard against enosis.

 

Greek Cypriots however believe the amendments were a necessity stemming from a perceived attempt by Turkish Cypriots to frustrate the working of government. Turkish Cypriots saw it as a means to reduce their status within the state from one of co-founder to that of minority, seeing it as a first step towards enosis. The security situation deteriorated rapidly.

 

Main articles: Bloody Christmas (1963) and Battle of Tillyria

An armed conflict was triggered after December 21, 1963, a period remembered by Turkish Cypriots as Bloody Christmas, when a Greek Cypriot policemen that had been called to help deal with a taxi driver refusing officers already on the scene access to check the identification documents of his customers, took out his gun upon arrival and shot and killed the taxi driver and his partner. Eric Solsten summarised the events as follows: "a Greek Cypriot police patrol, ostensibly checking identification documents, stopped a Turkish Cypriot couple on the edge of the Turkish quarter. A hostile crowd gathered, shots were fired, and two Turkish Cypriots were killed."

 

In the morning after the shooting, crowds gathered in protest in Northern Nicosia, likely encouraged by the TMT, without incident. On the evening of the 22nd, gunfire broke out, communication lines to the Turkish neighbourhoods were cut, and the Greek Cypriot police occupied the nearby airport. On the 23rd, a ceasefire was negotiated, but did not hold. Fighting, including automatic weapons fire, between Greek and Turkish Cypriots and militias increased in Nicosia and Larnaca. A force of Greek Cypriot irregulars led by Nikos Sampson entered the Nicosia suburb of Omorphita and engaged in heavy firing on armed, as well as by some accounts unarmed, Turkish Cypriots. The Omorphita clash has been described by Turkish Cypriots as a massacre, while this view has generally not been acknowledged by Greek Cypriots.

 

Further ceasefires were arranged between the two sides, but also failed. By Christmas Eve, the 24th, Britain, Greece, and Turkey had joined talks, with all sides calling for a truce. On Christmas day, Turkish fighter jets overflew Nicosia in a show of support. Finally it was agreed to allow a force of 2,700 British soldiers to help enforce a ceasefire. In the next days, a "buffer zone" was created in Nicosia, and a British officer marked a line on a map with green ink, separating the two sides of the city, which was the beginning of the "Green Line". Fighting continued across the island for the next several weeks.

 

In total 364 Turkish Cypriots and 174 Greek Cypriots were killed during the violence. 25,000 Turkish Cypriots from 103-109 villages fled and were displaced into enclaves and thousands of Turkish Cypriot houses were ransacked or completely destroyed.

 

Contemporary newspapers also reported on the forceful exodus of the Turkish Cypriots from their homes. According to The Times in 1964, threats, shootings and attempts of arson were committed against the Turkish Cypriots to force them out of their homes. The Daily Express wrote that "25,000 Turks have already been forced to leave their homes". The Guardian reported a massacre of Turks at Limassol on 16 February 1964.

 

Turkey had by now readied its fleet and its fighter jets appeared over Nicosia. Turkey was dissuaded from direct involvement by the creation of a United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) in 1964. Despite the negotiated ceasefire in Nicosia, attacks on the Turkish Cypriot persisted, particularly in Limassol. Concerned about the possibility of a Turkish invasion, Makarios undertook the creation of a Greek Cypriot conscript-based army called the "National Guard". A general from Greece took charge of the army, whilst a further 20,000 well-equipped officers and men were smuggled from Greece into Cyprus. Turkey threatened to intervene once more, but was prevented by a strongly worded letter from the American President Lyndon B. Johnson, anxious to avoid a conflict between NATO allies Greece and Turkey at the height of the Cold War.

 

Turkish Cypriots had by now established an important bridgehead at Kokkina, provided with arms, volunteers and materials from Turkey and abroad. Seeing this incursion of foreign weapons and troops as a major threat, the Cypriot government invited George Grivas to return from Greece as commander of the Greek troops on the island and launch a major attack on the bridgehead. Turkey retaliated by dispatching its fighter jets to bomb Greek positions, causing Makarios to threaten an attack on every Turkish Cypriot village on the island if the bombings did not cease. The conflict had now drawn in Greece and Turkey, with both countries amassing troops on their Thracian borders. Efforts at mediation by Dean Acheson, a former U.S. Secretary of State, and UN-appointed mediator Galo Plaza had failed, all the while the division of the two communities becoming more apparent. Greek Cypriot forces were estimated at some 30,000, including the National Guard and the large contingent from Greece. Defending the Turkish Cypriot enclaves was a force of approximately 5,000 irregulars, led by a Turkish colonel, but lacking the equipment and organisation of the Greek forces.

 

The Secretary-General of the United Nations in 1964, U Thant, reported the damage during the conflicts:

 

UNFICYP carried out a detailed survey of all damage to properties throughout the island during the disturbances; it shows that in 109 villages, most of them Turkish-Cypriot or mixed villages, 527 houses have been destroyed while 2,000 others have suffered damage from looting.

 

The situation worsened in 1967, when a military junta overthrew the democratically elected government of Greece, and began applying pressure on Makarios to achieve enosis. Makarios, not wishing to become part of a military dictatorship or trigger a Turkish invasion, began to distance himself from the goal of enosis. This caused tensions with the junta in Greece as well as George Grivas in Cyprus. Grivas's control over the National Guard and Greek contingent was seen as a threat to Makarios's position, who now feared a possible coup.[citation needed] The National Guard and Cyprus Police began patrolling the Turkish Cypriot enclaves of Ayios Theodoros and Kophinou, and on November 15 engaged in heavy fighting with the Turkish Cypriots.

 

By the time of his withdrawal 26 Turkish Cypriots had been killed. Turkey replied with an ultimatum demanding that Grivas be removed from the island, that the troops smuggled from Greece in excess of the limits of the Treaty of Alliance be removed, and that the economic blockades on the Turkish Cypriot enclaves be lifted. Grivas was recalled by the Athens Junta and the 12,000 Greek troops were withdrawn. Makarios now attempted to consolidate his position by reducing the number of National Guard troops, and by creating a paramilitary force loyal to Cypriot independence. In 1968, acknowledging that enosis was now all but impossible, Makarios stated, "A solution by necessity must be sought within the limits of what is feasible which does not always coincide with the limits of what is desirable."

 

After 1967 tensions between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots subsided. Instead, the main source of tension on the island came from factions within the Greek Cypriot community. Although Makarios had effectively abandoned enosis in favour of an 'attainable solution', many others continued to believe that the only legitimate political aspiration for Greek Cypriots was union with Greece.

 

On his arrival, Grivas began by establishing a nationalist paramilitary group known as the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston B or EOKA-B), drawing comparisons with the EOKA struggle for enosis under the British colonial administration of the 1950s.

 

The military junta in Athens saw Makarios as an obstacle. Makarios's failure to disband the National Guard, whose officer class was dominated by mainland Greeks, had meant the junta had practical control over the Cypriot military establishment, leaving Makarios isolated and a vulnerable target.

 

During the first Turkish invasion, Turkish troops invaded Cyprus territory on 20 July 1974, invoking its rights under the Treaty of Guarantee. This expansion of Turkish-occupied zone violated International Law as well as the Charter of the United Nations. Turkish troops managed to capture 3% of the island which was accompanied by the burning of the Turkish Cypriot quarter, as well as the raping and killing of women and children. A temporary cease-fire followed which was mitigated by the UN Security Council. Subsequently, the Greek military Junta collapsed on July 23, 1974, and peace talks commenced in which a democratic government was installed. The Resolution 353 was broken after Turkey attacked a second time and managed to get a hold of 37% of Cyprus territory. The Island of Cyprus was appointed a Buffer Zone by the United Nations, which divided the island into two zones through the 'Green Line' and put an end to the Turkish invasion. Although Turkey announced that the occupied areas of Cyprus to be called the Federated Turkish State in 1975, it is not legitimised on a worldwide political scale. The United Nations called for the international recognition of independence for the Republic of Cyprus in the Security Council Resolution 367.

 

In the years after the Turkish invasion of northern Cyprus one can observe a history of failed talks between the two parties. The 1983 declaration of the independent Turkish Republic of Cyprus resulted in a rise of inter-communal tensions and made it increasingly hard to find mutual understanding. With Cyprus' interest of a possible EU membership and a new UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 1997 new hopes arose for a fresh start. International involvement from sides of the US and UK, wanting a solution to the Cyprus dispute prior to the EU accession led to political pressures for new talks. The believe that an accession without a solution would threaten Greek-Turkish relations and acknowledge the partition of the island would direct the coming negotiations.

 

Over the course of two years a concrete plan, the Annan plan was formulated. In 2004 the fifth version agreed upon from both sides and with the endorsement of Turkey, US, UK and EU then was presented to the public and was given a referendum in both Cypriot communities to assure the legitimisation of the resolution. The Turkish Cypriots voted with 65% for the plan, however the Greek Cypriots voted with a 76% majority against. The Annan plan contained multiple important topics. Firstly it established a confederation of two separate states called the United Cyprus Republic. Both communities would have autonomous states combined under one unified government. The members of parliament would be chosen according to the percentage in population numbers to ensure a just involvement from both communities. The paper proposed a demilitarisation of the island over the next years. Furthermore it agreed upon a number of 45000 Turkish settlers that could remain on the island. These settlers became a very important issue concerning peace talks. Originally the Turkish government encouraged Turks to settle in Cyprus providing transfer and property, to establish a counterpart to the Greek Cypriot population due to their 1 to 5 minority. With the economic situation many Turkish-Cypriot decided to leave the island, however their departure is made up by incoming Turkish settlers leaving the population ratio between Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots stable. However all these points where criticised and as seen in the vote rejected mainly by the Greek Cypriots. These name the dissolution of the „Republic of Cyprus", economic consequences of a reunion and the remaining Turkish settlers as reason. Many claim that the plan was indeed drawing more from Turkish-Cypriot demands then Greek-Cypriot interests. Taking in consideration that the US wanted to keep Turkey as a strategic partner in future Middle Eastern conflicts.

 

A week after the failed referendum the Republic of Cyprus joined the EU. In multiple instances the EU tried to promote trade with Northern Cyprus but without internationally recognised ports this spiked a grand debate. Both side endure their intention of negotiations, however without the prospect of any new compromises or agreements the UN is unwilling to start the process again. Since 2004 negotiations took place in numbers but without any results, both sides are strongly holding on to their position without an agreeable solution in sight that would suit both parties.

Hyderabad (Listeni/ˈhaɪdərəˌbæd/ HY-dər-ə-bad; often /ˈhaɪdrəˌbæd/) is the capital of the southern Indian state of Telangana and de jure capital of Andhra Pradesh. Occupying 625 square kilometres along the banks of the Musi River, it has a population of about 6.8 million and a metropolitan population of about 7.75 million, making it the fourth most populous city and sixth most populous urban agglomeration in India. At an average altitude of 542 metres, much of Hyderabad is situated on hilly terrain around artificial lakes, including Hussain Sagar - predating the city's founding - north of the city centre.

 

Established in 1591 by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, Hyderabad remained under the rule of the Qutb Shahi dynasty for nearly a century before the Mughals captured the region. In 1724, Mughal viceroy Asif Jah I declared his sovereignty and created his own dynasty, known as the Nizams of Hyderabad. The Nizam's dominions became a princely state during the British Raj, and remained so for 150 years, with the city serving as its capital. The city continued as the capital of Hyderabad State after it was brought into the Indian Union in 1948, and became the capital of Andhra Pradesh after the States Reorganisation Act, 1956. Since 1956, Rashtrapati Nilayam in the city has been the winter office of the President of India. In 2014, the newly formed state of Telangana split from Andhra Pradesh and the city became joint capital of the two states, a transitional arrangement scheduled to end by 2025.

 

Relics of Qutb Shahi and Nizam rule remain visible today, with the Charminar - commissioned by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah - coming to symbolise Hyderabad. Golconda fort is another major landmark. The influence of Mughlai culture is also evident in the city's distinctive cuisine, which includes Hyderabadi biryani and Hyderabadi haleem. The Qutb Shahis and Nizams established Hyderabad as a cultural hub, attracting men of letters from different parts of the world. Hyderabad emerged as the foremost centre of culture in India with the decline of the Mughal Empire in the mid-19th century, with artists migrating to the city from the rest of the Indian subcontinent. While Hyderabad is losing its cultural pre-eminence, it is today, due to the Telugu film industry, the country's second-largest producer of motion pictures.

 

Hyderabad was historically known as a pearl and diamond trading centre, and it continues to be known as the City of Pearls. Many of the city's traditional bazaars, including Laad Bazaar, Begum Bazaar and Sultan Bazaar, have remained open for centuries. However, industrialisation throughout the 20th century attracted major Indian manufacturing, research and financial institutions, including Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, the National Geophysical Research Institute and the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology. Special economic zones dedicated to information technology have encouraged companies from across India and around the world to set up operations and the emergence of pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries in the 1990s led to the area's naming as India's "Genome Valley". With an output of US$74 billion, Hyderabad is the fifth-largest contributor to India's overall gross domestic product.

 

HISTORY

TOPONYMY

According to John Everett-Heath, the author of Oxford Concise Dictionary of World Place Names, Hyderabad means "Haydar's city" or "lion city", from haydar (lion) and ābād (city). It was named to honour the Caliph Ali Ibn Abi Talib, who was also known as Haydar because of his lion-like valour in battles. Andrew Petersen, a scholar of Islamic architecture, says the city was originally called Baghnagar (city of gardens). One popular theory suggests that Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, the founder of the city, named it "Bhaganagar" or "Bhāgnagar" after Bhagmati, a local nautch (dancing) girl with whom he had fallen in love. She converted to Islam and adopted the title Hyder Mahal. The city was renamed Hyderabad in her honour. According to another source, the city was named after Haidar, the son of Quli Qutb Shah.

 

EARLY AND MEDIEVAL HISTORY

Archaeologists excavating near the city have unearthed Iron Age sites that may date from 500 BCE. The region comprising modern Hyderabad and its surroundings was known as Golkonda ("shepherd's hill"), and was ruled by the Chalukya dynasty from 624 CE to 1075 CE. Following the dissolution of the Chalukya empire into four parts in the 11th century, Golkonda came under the control of the Kakatiya dynasty from 1158, whose seat of power was at Warangal, 148 km northeast of modern Hyderabad.

 

The Kakatiya dynasty was reduced to a vassal of the Khilji dynasty in 1310 after its defeat by Sultan Alauddin Khilji of the Delhi Sultanate. This lasted until 1321, when the Kakatiya dynasty was annexed by Malik Kafur, Allaudin Khilji's general. During this period, Alauddin Khilji took the Koh-i-Noor diamond, which is said to have been mined from the Kollur Mines of Golkonda, to Delhi. Muhammad bin Tughluq succeeded to the Delhi sultanate in 1325, bringing Warangal under the rule of the Tughlaq dynasty until 1347 when Ala-ud-Din Bahman Shah, a governor under bin Tughluq, rebelled against Delhi and established the Bahmani Sultanate in the Deccan Plateau, with Gulbarga, 200 km west of Hyderabad, as its capital. The Bahmani kings ruled the region until 1518 and were the first independent Muslim rulers of the Deccan.

 

Sultan Quli, a governor of Golkonda, revolted against the Bahmani Sultanate and established the Qutb Shahi dynasty in 1518; he rebuilt the mud-fort of Golconda and named the city "Muhammad nagar". The fifth sultan, Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, established Hyderabad on the banks of the Musi River in 1591, to avoid the water shortages experienced at Golkonda. During his rule, he had the Charminar and Mecca Masjid built in the city. On 21 September 1687, the Golkonda Sultanate came under the rule of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb after a year-long siege of the Golkonda fort. The annexed area was renamed Deccan Suba (Deccan province) and the capital was moved from Golkonda to Aurangabad, about 550 km northwest of Hyderabad.

 

MODERN HISTORY

In 1713 Farrukhsiyar, the Mughal emperor, appointed Asif Jah I to be Viceroy of the Deccan, with the title Nizam-ul-Mulk (Administrator of the Realm). In 1724, Asif Jah I defeated Mubariz Khan to establish autonomy over the Deccan Suba, named the region Hyderabad Deccan, and started what came to be known as the Asif Jahi dynasty. Subsequent rulers retained the title Nizam ul-Mulk and were referred to as Asif Jahi Nizams, or Nizams of Hyderabad. The death of Asif Jah I in 1748 resulted in a period of political unrest as his sons, backed by opportunistic neighbouring states and colonial foreign forces, contended for the throne. The accession of Asif Jah II, who reigned from 1762 to 1803, ended the instability. In 1768 he signed the treaty of Masulipatnam, surrendering the coastal region to the East India Company in return for a fixed annual rent.

 

In 1769 Hyderabad city became the formal capital of the Nizams. In response to regular threats from Hyder Ali (Dalwai of Mysore), Baji Rao I (Peshwa of the Maratha Empire), and Basalath Jung (Asif Jah II's elder brother, who was supported by the Marquis de Bussy-Castelnau), the Nizam signed a subsidiary alliance with the East India Company in 1798, allowing the British Indian Army to occupy Bolarum (modern Secunderabad) to protect the state's borders, for which the Nizams paid an annual maintenance to the British.

 

Until 1874 there were no modern industries in Hyderabad. With the introduction of railways in the 1880s, four factories were built to the south and east of Hussain Sagar lake, and during the early 20th century, Hyderabad was transformed into a modern city with the establishment of transport services, underground drainage, running water, electricity, telecommunications, universities, industries, and Begumpet Airport. The Nizams ruled their princely state from Hyderabad during the British Raj.

 

After India gained independence, the Nizam declared his intention to remain independent rather than become part of the Indian Union. The Hyderabad State Congress, with the support of the Indian National Congress and the Communist Party of India, began agitating against Nizam VII in 1948. On 17 September that year, the Indian Army took control of Hyderabad State after an invasion codenamed Operation Polo. With the defeat of his forces, Nizam VII capitulated to the Indian Union by signing an Instrument of Accession, which made him the Rajpramukh (Princely Governor) of the state until 31 October 1956. Between 1946 and 1951, the Communist Party of India fomented the Telangana uprising against the feudal lords of the Telangana region. The Constitution of India, which became effective on 26 January 1950, made Hyderabad State one of the part B states of India, with Hyderabad city continuing to be the capital. In his 1955 report Thoughts on Linguistic States, B. R. Ambedkar, then chairman of the Drafting Committee of the Indian Constitution, proposed designating the city of Hyderabad as the second capital of India because of its amenities and strategic central location. Since 1956, the Rashtrapati Nilayam in Hyderabad has been the second official residence and business office of the President of India; the President stays once a year in winter and conducts official business particularly relating to Southern India.

 

On 1 November 1956 the states of India were reorganised by language. Hyderabad state was split into three parts, which were merged with neighbouring states to form the modern states of Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. The nine Telugu- and Urdu-speaking districts of Hyderabad State in the Telangana region were merged with the Telugu-speaking Andhra State to create Andhra Pradesh,with Hyderabad as its capital. Several protests, known collectively as the Telangana movement, attempted to invalidate the merger and demanded the creation of a new Telangana state. Major actions took place in 1969 and 1972, and a third began in 2010. The city suffered several explosions: one at Dilsukhnagar in 2002 claimed two lives; terrorist bombs in May and August 2007 caused communal tension and riots; and two bombs exploded in February 2013. On 30 July 2013 the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government of India declared that part of Andhra Pradesh would be split off to form a new Telangana state, and that Hyderabad city would be the capital city and part of Telangana, while the city would also remain the capital of Andhra Pradesh for no more than ten years. On 3 October 2013 the Union Cabinet approved the proposal, and in February 2014 both houses of Parliament passed the Telangana Bill. With the final assent of the President of India in June 2014, Telangana state was formed.

 

GEOGRAPHY

TOPOGRAPHY

Situated in the southern part of Telangana in southeastern India, Hyderabad is 1,566 kilometres south of Delhi, 699 kilometres southeast of Mumbai, and 570 kilometres north of Bangalore by road. It lies on the banks of the Musi River, in the northern part of the Deccan Plateau. Greater Hyderabad covers 625 km2, making it one of the largest metropolitan areas in India. With an average altitude of 542 metres, Hyderabad lies on predominantly sloping terrain of grey and pink granite, dotted with small hills, the highest being Banjara Hills at 672 metres. The city has numerous lakes referred to as sagar, meaning "sea". Examples include artificial lakes created by dams on the Musi, such as Hussain Sagar (built in 1562 near the city centre), Osman Sagar and Himayat Sagar. As of 1996, the city had 140 lakes and 834 water tanks (ponds).

 

CLIMATE

Hyderabad has a tropical wet and dry climate (Köppen Aw) bordering on a hot semi-arid climate (Köppen BSh). The annual mean temperature is 26.6 °C; monthly mean temperatures are 21–33 °C. Summers (March–June) are hot and humid, with average highs in the mid-to-high 30s Celsius; maximum temperatures often exceed 40 °C between April and June. The coolest temperatures occur in December and January, when the lowest temperature occasionally dips to 10 °C. May is the hottest month, when daily temperatures range from 26 to 39 °C; December, the coldest, has temperatures varying from 14.5 to 28 °C.

 

Heavy rain from the south-west summer monsoon falls between June and September, supplying Hyderabad with most of its mean annual rainfall. Since records began in November 1891, the heaviest rainfall recorded in a 24-hour period was 241.5 mm on 24 August 2000. The highest temperature ever recorded was 45.5 °C on 2 June 1966, and the lowest was 6.1 °C on 8 January 1946. The city receives 2,731 hours of sunshine per year; maximum daily sunlight exposure occurs in February.

 

CONSERVATION

Hyderabad's lakes and the sloping terrain of its low-lying hills provide habitat for an assortment of flora and fauna. The forest region in and around the city encompasses areas of ecological and biological importance, which are preserved in the form of national parks, zoos, mini-zoos and a wildlife sanctuary. Nehru Zoological Park, the city's one large zoo, is the first in India to have a lion and tiger safari park. Hyderabad has three national parks (Mrugavani National Park, Mahavir Harina Vanasthali National Park and Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park), and the Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is about 50 km from the city. Hyderabad's other environmental reserves are: Kotla Vijayabhaskara Reddy Botanical Gardens, Shamirpet Lake, Hussain Sagar, Fox Sagar Lake, Mir Alam Tank and Patancheru Lake, which is home to regional birds and attracts seasonal migratory birds from different parts of the world. Organisations engaged in environmental and wildlife preservation include the Telangana Forest Department, Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education, the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), the Animal Welfare Board of India, the Blue Cross of Hyderabad and the University of Hyderabad.

 

ADMINISTRATION

COMMON CAPITAL OF TELANGANA AND ANDHRA PRADESH

According to the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 part 2 Section 5: "On and from the appointed day, Hyderabad in the existing State of Andhra Pradesh, shall be the common capital of the State of Telangana and the State of Andhra Pradesh for such period not exceeding ten years. After expiry of the period referred to in sub-section, Hyderabad shall be the capital of the State of Telangana and there shall be a new capital for the State of Andhra Pradesh."

 

The same sections also define that the common capital includes the existing area designated as the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation under the Hyderabad Municipal Corporation Act, 1955. As stipulated in sections 3 and 18 of the Reorganisation Act, city MLAs are members of Telangana state assembly.

 

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) oversees the civic infrastructure of the city's 18 "circles", which together encompass 150 municipal wards. Each ward is represented by a corporator, elected by popular vote. The corporators elect the Mayor, who is the titular head of GHMC; executive powers rest with the Municipal Commissioner, appointed by the state government. The GHMC carries out the city's infrastructural work such as building and maintenance of roads and drains, town planning including construction regulation, maintenance of municipal markets and parks, solid waste management, the issuing of birth and death certificates, the issuing of trade licences, collection of property tax, and community welfare services such as mother and child healthcare, and pre-school and non-formal education. The GHMC was formed in April 2007 by merging the Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad (MCH) with 12 municipalities of the Hyderabad, Ranga Reddy and Medak districts covering a total area of 625 km2. In the 2009 municipal election, an alliance of the Indian National Congress and Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen formed the majority. The Secunderabad Cantonment Board is a civic administration agency overseeing an area of 40.1 km2, where there are several military camps. The Osmania University campus is administered independently by the university authority.

 

Law and order in Hyderabad city is supervised by the governor of Telangana. The jurisdiction is divided into two police commissionerates: Hyderabad and Cyberabad, which are again divided into four and five police zones respectively. Each zone is headed by a deputy commissioner.

 

The jurisdictions of the city's administrative agencies are, in ascending order of size: the Hyderabad Police area, Hyderabad district, the GHMC area ("Hyderabad city") and the area under the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA). The HMDA is an apolitical urban planning agency that covers the GHMC and its suburbs, extending to 54 mandals in five districts encircling the city. It coordinates the development activities of GHMC and suburban municipalities and manages the administration of bodies such as the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB).

 

As the seat of the government of Telangana, Hyderabad is home to the state's legislature, secretariat and high court, as well as various local government agencies. The Lower City Civil Court and the Metropolitan Criminal Court are under the jurisdiction of the High Court. The GHMC area contains 24 State Legislative Assembly constituencies, which form five constituencies of the Lok Sabha (the lower house of the Parliament of India).

 

UTILITY SERVICES

The HMWSSB regulates rainwater harvesting, sewerage services and water supply, which is sourced from several dams located in the suburbs. In 2005, the HMWSSB started operating a 116-kilometre-long water supply pipeline from Nagarjuna Sagar Dam to meet increasing demand. The Telangana Southern Power Distribution Company Limited manages electricity supply. As of October 2014, there were 15 fire stations in the city, operated by the Telangana State Disaster and Fire Response Department. The government-owned India Post has five head post offices and many sub-post offices in Hyderabad, which are complemented by private courier services.

 

POLLUTION CONTROL

Hyderabad produces around 4,500 tonnes of solid waste daily, which is transported from collection units in Imlibun, Yousufguda and Lower Tank Bund to the dumpsite in Jawaharnagar. Disposal is managed by the Integrated Solid Waste Management project which was started by the GHMC in 2010. Rapid urbanisation and increased economic activity has also led to increased industrial waste, air, noise and water pollution, which is regulated by the Telangana Pollution Control Board (TPCB). The contribution of different sources to air pollution in 2006 was: 20–50% from vehicles, 40–70% from a combination of vehicle discharge and road dust, 10–30% from industrial discharges and 3–10% from the burning of household rubbish. Deaths resulting from atmospheric particulate matter are estimated at 1,700–3,000 each year. Ground water around Hyderabad, which has a hardness of up to 1000 ppm, around three times higher than is desirable, is the main source of drinking water but the increasing population and consequent increase in demand has led to a decline in not only ground water but also river and lake levels. This shortage is further exacerbated by inadequately treated effluent discharged from industrial treatment plants polluting the water sources of the city.

 

HEALTHCARE

The Commissionerate of Health and Family Welfare is responsible for planning, implementation and monitoring of all facilities related to health and preventive services. As of 2010–11, the city had 50 government hospitals, 300 private and charity hospitals and 194 nursing homes providing around 12,000 hospital beds, fewer than half the required 25,000. For every 10,000 people in the city, there are 17.6 hospital beds, 9 specialist doctors, 14 nurses and 6 physicians. The city also has about 4,000 individual clinics and 500 medical diagnostic centres. Private clinics are preferred by many residents because of the distance to, poor quality of care at and long waiting times in government facilities, despite the high proportion of the city's residents being covered by government health insurance: 24% according to a National Family Health Survey in 2005. As of 2012, many new private hospitals of various sizes were opened or being built. Hyderabad also has outpatient and inpatient facilities that use Unani, homeopathic and Ayurvedic treatments.

 

In the 2005 National Family Health Survey, it was reported that the city's total fertility rate is 1.8, which is below the replacement rate. Only 61% of children had been provided with all basic vaccines (BCG, measles and full courses of polio and DPT), fewer than in all other surveyed cities except Meerut. The infant mortality rate was 35 per 1,000 live births, and the mortality rate for children under five was 41 per 1,000 live births. The survey also reported that a third of women and a quarter of men are overweight or obese, 49% of children below 5 years are anaemic, and up to 20% of children are underweight, while more than 2% of women and 3% of men suffer from diabetes.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

When the GHMC was created in 2007, the area occupied by the municipality increased from 175 km2 to 625 km2. Consequently, the population increased by 87%, from 3,637,483 in the 2001 census to 6,809,970 in the 2011 census, 24% of which are migrants from elsewhere in India, making Hyderabad the nation's fourth most populous city. As of 2011, the population density is 18,480/km2. At the same 2011 census, the Hyderabad Urban Agglomeration had a population of 7,749,334, making it the sixth most populous urban agglomeration in the country. The population of the Hyderabad urban agglomeration has since been estimated by electoral officials to be 9.1 million as of early 2013 but is expected to exceed 10 million by the end of the year. There are 3,500,802 male and 3,309,168 female citizens - a sex ratio of 945 females per 1000 males, higher than the national average of 926 per 1000. Among children aged 0–6 years, 373,794 are boys and 352,022 are girls - a ratio of 942 per 1000. Literacy stands at 82.96% (male 85.96%; female 79.79%), higher than the national average of 74.04%. The socio-economic strata consist of 20% upper class, 50% middle class and 30% working class.

 

ETHNIC GROUPS, LANGUAGE AND RELIGION

Referred to as "Hyderabadi", residents of Hyderabad are predominantly Telugu and Urdu speaking people, with minority Bengali, Gujarati (including Memon), Kannada (including Nawayathi), Malayalam, Marathi, Marwari, Odia, Punjabi, Tamil and Uttar Pradeshi communities. Hadhrami Arabs, African Arabs, Armenians, Abyssinians, Iranians, Pathans and Turkish people are also present; these communities, of which the Hadhrami are the largest, declined after Hyderabad State became part of the Indian Union, as they lost the patronage of the Nizams.

 

Telugu is the official language of Hyderabad and Urdu is its second language. The Telugu dialect spoken in Hyderabad is called Telangana, and the Urdu spoken is called Dakhani. English is also used. A significant minority speak other languages, including Hindi, Marathi, Odia, Tamil, Bengali and Kannada.

 

Hindus are in the majority. Muslims are present throughout the city and predominate in and around the Old City. There are also Christian, Sikh, Jain, Buddhist and Parsi communities and iconic temples, mosques and churches can be seen. According to the 2001 census, Hyderabad district's religious make-up was: Hindus (55.41%), Muslims (41.17%), Christians (2.43%), Jains (0.43%), Sikhs (0.29%) and Buddhists (0.02%); 0.23% did not state any religion.

 

SLUMS

In the greater metropolitan area, 13% of the population live below the poverty line. According to a 2012 report submitted by GHMC to the World Bank, Hyderabad has 1,476 slums with a total population of 1.7 million, of whom 66% live in 985 slums in the "core" of the city (the part that formed Hyderabad before the April 2007 expansion) and the remaining 34% live in 491 suburban tenements. About 22% of the slum-dwelling households had migrated from different parts of India in the last decade of the 20th century, and 63% claimed to have lived in the slums for more than 10 years. Overall literacy in the slums is 60–80% and female literacy is 52–73%. A third of the slums have basic service connections, and the remainder depend on general public services provided by the government. There are 405 government schools, 267 government aided schools, 175 private schools and 528 community halls in the slum areas. According to a 2008 survey by the Centre for Good Governance, 87.6% of the slum-dwelling households are nuclear families, 18% are very poor, with an income up to ₹20000 (US$300) per annum, 73% live below the poverty line (a standard poverty line recognised by the Andhra Pradesh Government is ₹24000 (US$360) per annum), 27% of the chief wage earners (CWE) are casual labour and 38% of the CWE are illiterate. About 3.72% of the slum children aged 5–14 do not go to school and 3.17% work as child labour, of whom 64% are boys and 36% are girls. The largest employers of child labour are street shops and construction sites. Among the working children, 35% are engaged in hazardous jobs.

 

NEIGHBOURHOODS

The historic city established by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah on the southern side of the Musi River forms the "Old City", while the "New City" encompasses the urbanised area on the northern banks. The two are connected by many bridges across the river, the oldest of which is Purana Pul ("old bridge"). Hyderabad is twinned with neighbouring Secunderabad, to which it is connected by Hussain Sagar.

 

Many historic and tourist sites lie in south central Hyderabad, such as the Charminar, the Mecca Masjid, the Salar Jung Museum, the Nizam's Museum, the Falaknuma Palace, and the traditional retail corridor comprising the Pearl Market, Laad Bazaar and Madina Circle. North of the river are hospitals, colleges, major railway stations and business areas such as Begum Bazaar, Koti, Abids, Sultan Bazaar and Moazzam Jahi Market, along with administrative and recreational establishments such as the Reserve Bank of India, the Telangana Secretariat, the Hyderabad Mint, the Telangana Legislature, the Public Gardens, the Nizam Club, the Ravindra Bharathi, the State Museum, the Birla Temple and the Birla Planetarium.

 

North of central Hyderabad lie Hussain Sagar, Tank Bund Road, Rani Gunj and the Secunderabad Railway Station. Most of the city's parks and recreational centres, such as Sanjeevaiah Park, Indira Park, Lumbini Park, NTR Gardens, the Buddha statue and Tankbund Park are located here. In the northwest part of the city there are upscale residential and commercial areas such as Banjara Hills, Jubilee Hills, Begumpet, Khairatabad and Miyapur. The northern end contains industrial areas such as Sanathnagar, Moosapet, Balanagar, Patancheru and Chanda Nagar. The northeast end is dotted with residential areas. In the eastern part of the city lie many defence research centres and Ramoji Film City. The "Cyberabad" area in the southwest and west of the city has grown rapidly since the 1990s. It is home to information technology and bio-pharmaceutical companies and to landmarks such as Hyderabad Airport, Osman Sagar, Himayath Sagar and Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park.

 

LANDMARKS

Heritage buildings constructed during the Qutb Shahi and Nizam eras showcase Indo-Islamic architecture influenced by Medieval, Mughal and European styles. After the 1908 flooding of the Musi River, the city was expanded and civic monuments constructed, particularly during the rule of Mir Osman Ali Khan (the VIIth Nizam), whose patronage of architecture led to him being referred to as the maker of modern Hyderabad. In 2012, the government of India declared Hyderabad the first "Best heritage city of India".

 

Qutb Shahi architecture of the 16th and early 17th centuries followed classical Persian architecture featuring domes and colossal arches. The oldest surviving Qutb Shahi structure in Hyderabad is the ruins of Golconda fort built in the 16th century. The Charminar, Mecca Masjid, Charkaman and Qutb Shahi tombs are other existing structures of this period. Among these the Charminar has become an icon of the city; located in the centre of old Hyderabad, it is a square structure with sides 20 m long and four grand arches each facing a road. At each corner stands a 56 m-high minaret. Most of the historical bazaars that still exist were constructed on the street north of Charminar towards Golconda fort. The Charminar, Qutb Shahi tombs and Golconda fort are considered to be monuments of national importance in India; in 2010 the Indian government proposed that the sites be listed for UNESCO World Heritage status.

 

Among the oldest surviving examples of Nizam architecture in Hyderabad is the Chowmahalla Palace, which was the seat of royal power. It showcases a diverse array of architectural styles, from the Baroque Harem to its Neoclassical royal court. The other palaces include Falaknuma Palace (inspired by the style of Andrea Palladio), Purani Haveli, King Kothi and Bella Vista Palace all of which were built at the peak of Nizam rule in the 19th century. During Mir Osman Ali Khan's rule, European styles, along with Indo-Islamic, became prominent. These styles are reflected in the Falaknuma Palace and many civic monuments such as the Hyderabad High Court, Osmania Hospital, Osmania University, the State Central Library, City College, the Telangana Legislature, the State Archaeology Museum, Jubilee Hall, and Hyderabad and Kachiguda railway stations. Other landmarks of note are Paigah Palace, Asman Garh Palace, Basheer Bagh Palace, Errum Manzil and the Spanish Mosque, all constructed by the Paigah family.

 

ECONOMY

Hyderabad is the largest contributor to the gross domestic product (GDP), tax and other revenues, of Telangana, and the sixth largest deposit centre and fourth largest credit centre nationwide, as ranked by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in June 2012. Its US$74 billion GDP made it the fifth-largest contributor city to India's overall GDP in 2011–12. Its per capita annual income in 2011 was ₹44300 (US$670). As of 2006, the largest employers in the city were the governments of Andhra Pradesh (113,098 employees) and India (85,155). According to a 2005 survey, 77% of males and 19% of females in the city were employed. The service industry remains dominant in the city, and 90% of the employed workforce is engaged in this sector.

 

Hyderabad's role in the pearl trade has given it the name "City of Pearls" and up until the 18th century, the city was also the only global trading centre for large diamonds. Industrialisation began under the Nizams in the late 19th century, helped by railway expansion that connected the city with major ports. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Indian enterprises, such as Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL), Nuclear Fuel Complex (NFC), National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC), Bharat Electronics (BEL), Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL), Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Centre for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics (CDFD), State Bank of Hyderabad (SBH) and Andhra Bank (AB) were established in the city. The city is home to Hyderabad Securities formerly known as Hyderabad Stock Exchange (HSE), and houses the regional office of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). In 2013, the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) facility in Hyderabad was forecasted to provide operations and transactions services to BSE-Mumbai by the end of 2014. The growth of the financial services sector has helped Hyderabad evolve from a traditional manufacturing city to a cosmopolitan industrial service centre. Since the 1990s, the growth of information technology (IT), IT-enabled services (ITES), insurance and financial institutions has expanded the service sector, and these primary economic activities have boosted the ancillary sectors of trade and commerce, transport, storage, communication, real estate and retail.

 

Hyderabad's commercial markets are divided into four sectors: central business districts, sub-central business centres, neighbourhood business centres and local business centres. Many traditional and historic bazaars are located throughout the city, Laad Bazaar being the prominent among all is popular for selling a variety of traditional and cultural antique wares, along with gems and pearls.

 

The establishment of Indian Drugs and Pharmaceuticals Limited (IDPL), a public sector undertaking, in 1961 was followed over the decades by many national and global companies opening manufacturing and research facilities in the city. As of 2010, the city manufactured one third of India's bulk drugs and 16% of biotechnology products, contributing to its reputation as "India's pharmaceutical capital" and the "Genome Valley of India". Hyderabad is a global centre of information technology, for which it is known as Cyberabad (Cyber City). As of 2013, it contributed 15% of India's and 98% of Andhra Pradesh's exports in IT and ITES sectors and 22% of NASSCOM's total membership is from the city. The development of HITEC City, a township with extensive technological infrastructure, prompted multinational companies to establish facilities in Hyderabad. The city is home to more than 1300 IT and ITES firms, including global conglomerates such as Microsoft (operating its largest R&D campus outside the US), Google, IBM, Yahoo!, Dell, Facebook, and major Indian firms including Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Polaris and Wipro. In 2009 the World Bank Group ranked the city as the second best Indian city for doing business. The city and its suburbs contain the highest number of special economic zones of any Indian city.

 

Like the rest of India, Hyderabad has a large informal economy that employs 30% of the labour force. According to a survey published in 2007, it had 40–50,000 street vendors, and their numbers were increasing. Among the street vendors, 84% are male and 16% female, and four fifths are "stationary vendors" operating from a fixed pitch, often with their own stall. Most are financed through personal savings; only 8% borrow from moneylenders. Vendor earnings vary from ₹50 (75¢ US) to ₹800 (US$12) per day. Other unorganised economic sectors include dairy, poultry farming, brick manufacturing, casual labour and domestic help. Those involved in the informal economy constitute a major portion of urban poor.

 

CULTURE

Hyderabad emerged as the foremost centre of culture in India with the decline of the Mughal Empire. After the fall of Delhi in 1857, the migration of performing artists to the city particularly from the north and west of the Indian sub continent, under the patronage of the Nizam, enriched the cultural milieu. This migration resulted in a mingling of North and South Indian languages, cultures and religions, which has since led to a co-existence of Hindu and Muslim traditions, for which the city has become noted. A further consequence of this north–south mix is that both Telugu and Urdu are official languages of Telangana.[164] The mixing of religions has also resulted in many festivals being celebrated in Hyderabad such as Ganesh Chaturthi, Diwali and Bonalu of Hindu tradition and Eid ul-Fitr and Eid al-Adha by Muslims.

 

Traditional Hyderabadi garb also reveals a mix of Muslim and South Asian influences with men wearing sherwani and kurta - paijama and women wearing khara dupatta and salwar kameez. Muslim women also commonly wear burqas and hijabs in public. In addition to the traditional Indian and Muslim garments, increasing exposure to western cultures has led to a rise in the wearing of western style clothing among youths.

 

LITERATURE

In the past, Qutb Shahi rulers and Nizams attracted artists, architects and men of letters from different parts of the world through patronage. The resulting ethnic mix popularised cultural events such as mushairas (poetic symposia). The Qutb Shahi dynasty particularly encouraged the growth of Deccani Urdu literature leading to works such as the Deccani Masnavi and Diwan poetry, which are among the earliest available manuscripts in Urdu. Lazzat Un Nisa, a book compiled in the 15th century at Qutb Shahi courts, contains erotic paintings with diagrams for secret medicines and stimulants in the eastern form of ancient sexual arts. The reign of the Nizams saw many literary reforms and the introduction of Urdu as a language of court, administration and education. In 1824, a collection of Urdu Ghazal poetry, named Gulzar-e-Mahlaqa, authored by Mah Laqa Bai - the first female Urdu poet to produce a Diwan - was published in Hyderabad.

 

Hyderabad has continued with these traditions in its annual Hyderabad Literary Festival, held since 2010, showcasing the city's literary and cultural creativity. Organisations engaged in the advancement of literature include the Sahitya Akademi, the Urdu Academy, the Telugu Academy, the National Council for Promotion of Urdu Language, the Comparative Literature Association of India, and the Andhra Saraswata Parishad. Literary development is further aided by state institutions such as the State Central Library, the largest public library in the state which was established in 1891, and other major libraries including the Sri Krishna Devaraya Andhra Bhasha Nilayam, the British Library and the Sundarayya Vignana Kendram.

 

MUSIC AND FILMS

South Indian music and dances such as the Kuchipudi and Kathakali styles are popular in the Deccan region. As a result of their culture policies, North Indian music and dance gained popularity during the rule of the Mughals and Nizams, and it was also during their reign that it became a tradition among the nobility to associate themselves with tawaif (courtesans). These courtesans were revered as the epitome of etiquette and culture, and were appointed to teach singing, poetry and classical dance to many children of the aristocracy. This gave rise to certain styles of court music, dance and poetry. Besides western and Indian popular music genres such as filmi music, the residents of Hyderabad play city-based marfa music, dholak ke geet (household songs based on local Folklore), and qawwali, especially at weddings, festivals and other celebratory events. The state government organises the Golconda Music and Dance Festival, the Taramati Music Festival and the Premavathi Dance Festival to further encourage the development of music.

 

Although the city is not particularly noted for theatre and drama, the state government promotes theatre with multiple programmes and festivals in such venues as the Ravindra Bharati, Shilpakala Vedika and Lalithakala Thoranam. Although not a purely music oriented event, Numaish, a popular annual exhibition of local and national consumer products, does feature some musical performances. The city is home to the Telugu film industry, popularly known as Tollywood and as of 2012, produces the second largest number of films in India with the largest number being produced by Bollywood. Films in the local Hyderabadi dialect are also produced and have been gaining popularity since 2005. The city has also hosted international film festivals such as the International Children's Film Festival and the Hyderabad International Film Festival. In 2005, Guinness World Records declared Ramoji Film City to be the world's largest film studio.

 

ART AND HANDICRAFTS

The region is well known for its Golconda and Hyderabad painting styles which are branches of Deccani painting. Developed during the 16th century, the Golconda style is a native style blending foreign techniques and bears some similarity to the Vijayanagara paintings of neighbouring Mysore. A significant use of luminous gold and white colours is generally found in the Golconda style. The Hyderabad style originated in the 17th century under the Nizams. Highly influenced by Mughal painting, this style makes use of bright colours and mostly depicts regional landscape, culture, costumes and jewellery.

 

Although not a centre for handicrafts itself, the patronage of the arts by the Mughals and Nizams attracted artisans from the region to Hyderabad. Such crafts include: Bidriware, a metalwork handicraft from neighbouring Karnataka, which was popularised during the 18th century and has since been granted a Geographical Indication (GI) tag under the auspices of the WTO act; and Zari and Zardozi, embroidery works on textile that involve making elaborate designs using gold, silver and other metal threads. Another example of a handicraft drawn to Hyderabad is Kalamkari, a hand-painted or block-printed cotton textile that comes from cities in Andhra Pradesh. This craft is distinguished in having both a Hindu style, known as Srikalahasti and entirely done by hand, and an Islamic style, known as Machilipatnam that uses both hand and block techniques. Examples of Hyderabad's arts and crafts are housed in various museums including the Salar Jung Museum (housing "one of the largest one-man-collections in the world"), the AP State Archaeology Museum, the Nizam Museum, the City Museum and the Birla Science Museum.

 

CUISINE

Hyderabadi cuisine comprises a broad repertoire of rice, wheat and meat dishes and the skilled use of various spices. Hyderabadi biryani and Hyderabadi haleem, with their blend of Mughlai and Arab cuisines, have become iconic dishes of India. Hyderabadi cuisine is highly influenced by Mughlai and to some extent by French, Arabic, Turkish, Iranian and native Telugu and Marathwada cuisines. Other popular native dishes include nihari, chakna, baghara baingan and the desserts qubani ka meetha, double ka meetha and kaddu ki kheer (a sweet porridge made with sweet gourd).

 

MEDIA

One of Hyderabad's earliest newspapers, The Deccan Times, was established in the 1780s. In modern times, the major Telugu dailies published in Hyderabad are Eenadu, Andhra Jyothy, Sakshi and Namaste Telangana, while the major English papers are The Times of India, The Hindu and The Deccan Chronicle, and the major Urdu papers include The Siasat Daily, The Munsif Daily and Etemaad. Many coffee table magazines, professional magazines and research journals are also regularly published. The Secunderabad Cantonment Board established the first radio station in Hyderabad State around 1919. Deccan Radio was the first radio public broadcast station in the city starting on 3 February 1935, with FM broadcasting beginning in 2000. The available channels in Hyderabad include All India Radio, Radio Mirchi, Radio City, Red FM and Big FM.

 

Television broadcasting in Hyderabad began in 1974 with the launch of Doordarshan, the Government of India's public service broadcaster, which transmits two free-to-air terrestrial television channels and one satellite channel. Private satellite channels started in July 1992 with the launch of Star TV. Satellite TV channels are accessible via cable subscription, direct-broadcast satellite services or internet-based television. Hyderabad's first dial-up internet access became available in the early 1990s and was limited to software development companies. The first public internet access service began in 1995, with the first private sector internet service provider (ISP) starting operations in 1998. In 2015, high-speed public WiFi was introduced in parts of the city.

 

EDUCATION

Public and private schools in Hyderabad are governed by the Central Board of Secondary Education and follow a "10+2+3" plan. About two-thirds of pupils attend privately run institutions. Languages of instruction include English, Hindi, Telugu and Urdu. Depending on the institution, students are required to sit the Secondary School Certificate or the Indian Certificate of Secondary Education. After completing secondary education, students enroll in schools or junior colleges with a higher secondary facility. Admission to professional graduation colleges in Hyderabad, many of which are affiliated with either Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Hyderabad (JNTUH) or Osmania University (OU), is through the Engineering Agricultural and Medical Common Entrance Test (EAM-CET).There are 13 universities in Hyderabad: two private universities, two deemed universities, six state universities and three central universities. The central universities are the University of Hyderabad, Maulana Azad National Urdu University and the English and Foreign Languages University. Osmania University, established in 1918, was the first university in Hyderabad and as of 2012 is India's second most popular institution for international students. The Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Open University, established in 1982, is the first distance learning open university in India.

 

Hyderabad is also home to a number of centres specialising in particular fields such as biomedical sciences, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, such as the National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER) and National Institute of Nutrition (NIN). Hyderabad has five major medical schools - Osmania Medical College, Gandhi Medical College, Nizam's Institute of Medical Sciences, Deccan College of Medical Sciences and Shadan Institute of Medical Sciences - and many affiliated teaching hospitals. The Government Nizamia Tibbi College is a college of Unani medicine. Hyderabad is also the headquarters of the Indian Heart Association, a non-profit foundation for cardiovascular education.

 

Institutes in Hyderabad include the National Institute of Rural Development, the Indian School of Business, the Institute of Public Enterprise, the Administrative Staff College of India and the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy. Technical and engineering schools include the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad (IIITH), Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani – Hyderabad (BITS Hyderabad) and Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad (IIT-H) as well as agricultural engineering institutes such as the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and the Acharya N. G. Ranga Agricultural University. Hyderabad also has schools of fashion design including Raffles Millennium International, NIFT Hyderabad and Wigan and Leigh College. The National Institute of Design, Hyderabad (NID-H), will offer undergraduate and postgraduate courses from 2015.

 

SPORTS

The most popular sports played in Hyderabad are cricket and association football. At the professional level, the city has hosted national and international sports events such as the 2002 National Games of India, the 2003 Afro-Asian Games, the 2004 AP Tourism Hyderabad Open women's tennis tournament, the 2007 Military World Games, the 2009 World Badminton Championships and the 2009 IBSF World Snooker Championship. The city hosts a number of venues suitable for professional competition such as the Swarnandhra Pradesh Sports Complex for field hockey, the G. M. C. Balayogi Stadium in Gachibowli for athletics and football, and for cricket, the Lal Bahadur Shastri Stadium and Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium, home ground of the Hyderabad Cricket Association. Hyderabad has hosted many international cricket matches, including matches in the 1987 and the 1996 ICC Cricket World Cups. The Hyderabad cricket team represents the city in the Ranji Trophy - a first-class cricket tournament among India's states and cities. Hyderabad is also home to the Indian Premier League franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad. A previous franchise was the Deccan Chargers, which won the 2009 Indian Premier League held in South Africa.

 

During British rule, Secunderabad became a well-known sporting centre and many race courses, parade grounds and polo fields were built. Many elite clubs formed by the Nizams and the British such as the Secunderabad Club, the Nizam Club and the Hyderabad Race Club, which is known for its horse racing especially the annual Deccan derby, still exist. In more recent times, motorsports has become popular with the Andhra Pradesh Motor Sports Club organising popular events such as the Deccan 1/4 Mile Drag, TSD Rallies and 4x4 off-road rallying.

 

International-level sportspeople from Hyderabad include: cricketers Ghulam Ahmed, M. L. Jaisimha, Mohammed Azharuddin, V. V. S. Laxman, Venkatapathy Raju, Shivlal Yadav, Arshad Ayub and Noel David; football players Syed Abdul Rahim, Syed Nayeemuddin and Shabbir Ali; tennis player Sania Mirza; badminton players S. M. Arif, Pullela Gopichand, Saina Nehwal, P. V. Sindhu, Jwala Gutta and Chetan Anand; hockey players Syed Mohammad Hadi and Mukesh Kumar; rifle shooters Gagan Narang and Asher Noria and bodybuilder Mir Mohtesham Ali Khan.

 

TRANSPORT

The most commonly used forms of medium distance transport in Hyderabad include government owned services such as light railways and buses, as well as privately operated taxis and auto rickshaws. Bus services operate from the Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station in the city centre and carry over 130 million passengers daily across the entire network. Hyderabad's light rail transportation system, the Multi-Modal Transport System (MMTS), is a three line suburban rail service used by over 160,000 passengers daily. Complementing these government services are minibus routes operated by Setwin (Society for Employment Promotion & Training in Twin Cities). Intercity rail services also operate from Hyderabad; the main, and largest, station is Secunderabad Railway Station, which serves as Indian Railways' South Central Railway zone headquarters and a hub for both buses and MMTS light rail services connecting Secunderabad and Hyderabad. Other major railway stations in Hyderabad are Hyderabad Deccan Station, Kachiguda Railway Station, Begumpet Railway Station, Malkajgiri Railway Station and Lingampally Railway Station. The Hyderabad Metro, a new rapid transit system, is to be added to the existing public transport infrastructure and is scheduled to operate three lines by 2015. As of 2012, there are over 3.5 million vehicles operating in the city, of which 74% are two-wheelers, 15% cars and 3% three-wheelers. The remaining 8% include buses, goods vehicles and taxis. The large number of vehicles coupled with relatively low road coverage - roads occupy only 9.5% of the total city area - has led to widespread traffic congestion especially since 80% of passengers and 60% of freight are transported by road. The Inner Ring Road, the Outer Ring Road, the Hyderabad Elevated Expressway, the longest flyover in India, and various interchanges, overpasses and underpasses were built to ease the congestion. Maximum speed limits within the city are 50 km/h for two-wheelers and cars, 35 km/h for auto rickshaws and 40 km/h for light commercial vehicles and buses.

 

Hyderabad sits at the junction of three National Highways linking it to six other states: NH-7 runs 2,369 km from Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, in the north to Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu, in the south; NH-9, runs 841 km east-west between Machilipatnam, Andhra Pradesh, and Pune, Maharashtra; and the 280 km NH-163 links Hyderabad to Bhopalpatnam, Chhattisgarh. Five state highways, SH-1, SH-2, SH-4, SH-5 and SH-6, either start from, or pass through, Hyderabad.

 

Air traffic was previously handled via Begumpet Airport, but this was replaced by Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA) (IATA: HYD, ICAO: VOHS) in 2008, with the capacity of handling 12 million passengers and 100,000 tonnes of cargo per annum. In 2011, Airports Council International, an autonomous body representing the world's airports, judged RGIA the world's best airport in the 5–15 million passenger category and the world's fifth best airport for service quality.

 

WIKIPEDIA

A Blue Footed Booby on North Seymour Island.

 

Blue Footed Booby

The natural breeding habitat of the Blue-footed Booby (Sula nebouxii) is tropical and subtropical islands off the Pacific Ocean, most famously, the Galápagos Islands, Ecuador. The name “booby” comes from the Spanish term bobo, which means "Stupid" or "Fool"/"Clown". This is because the Blue-footed Booby is clumsy on the land. Like other seabirds, they can be very tame. The Blue-footed Booby is on average 81 cm (32”) long and weighs 1.5 kilograms (3.3 lb), with the females slightly larger than the males. It has long pointed wings and a wedge shaped tail. They have strong, thick necks. The booby's eyes are placed on either side of their bill and oriented towards the front. They have excellent binocular vision. The Blue-footed Booby's eyes are yellow. The male has more yellow on its iris than the female does. The Blue-footed Booby has permanently closed nostrils specialized for diving. They breathe through the corners of their mouths. Their feet range from a pale turquoise to a deep aquamarine. Males and younger birds have lighter feet than females do. Blue-footed Boobies are distributed among the continental coasts of the eastern Pacific Ocean to the Galapagos Islands and California. The Blue-footed Booby is strictly a marine bird. Their only need for land is to breed, which they do along rocky coasts. The courtship of the Blue-footed Booby consists of the male flaunting his blue feet and dancing to impress the female. During the dance, the male will spread his wings and stamp his feet on the ground. The Blue-footed Booby is a monogamous animal although they do have the potential to be bigamous. They reunite at their breeding grounds. The breeding cycle of the booby is every 8 to 9 months. When mating, the female parades and the male points his head and tail high to the sky and his wings are back to show off to the female. The male blue-footed booby also makes a high-piping whistle noise. Males do a dance to attract the females. The dance includes the males lifting their blue feet high and throwing their heads up. The blue-footed booby is not a seasonally reproducing species. They are opportunistic in their breeding. The female Blue-footed Booby lays two or three eggs. Both male and female take turns incubating the eggs, while the non-sitting bird keeps a watch. Since the Blue-footed Booby does not have a brooding patch (a patch of bare skin on the underbelly) it uses its feet to keep the eggs warm. The chicks cannot control their body temperature up until about one month old. Eggs are laid about 5 days apart. Blue-foots are one of only two species of booby that raise more than one chick. This may be because of the males specialized diving in shallow waters. They must be fed frequently, so the adults constantly hunt for fish. The chicks feed off the regurgitated fish in the adult's mouth. If the parent Blue-footed Booby does not have enough food for all of the chicks, it will only feed the biggest chick, ensuring that at least one will survive. Boobies may use and defend two or three nesting sites until they develop a preference a few weeks before the eggs are laid. Usually 2 to 3 eggs are laid and 1 to 2 chicks are hatched. The incubation period is 41–45 days. They nest on bare black lava in a small dip in the ground. The female will turn to face the sun throughout the day so the nest is surrounded by excretion. These nests are done in large colonies. The male and female share quite a bit of their responsibilities. The male will provide food for the young in the first part of their life because of his specialized diving and the female will take over when the demand is higher. The Blue-footed Booby's diet consists entirely of fish. Blue-footed Boobies are specialized fish eaters feeding on school fish like sardines, anchovies, mackerel, and flying fish. They also feed on squid and offal. It dives into the ocean, sometimes from a great height, and swims underwater in pursuit of its prey. It hunts singly, in pairs or in larger flocks. They travel in parties of 12 or so to areas of water with large schools of small fish. When the lead bird sees a fish shoal in the water, it will signal the rest of the group and they will all dive together to catch the fish. Surprisingly, individuals do not eat with the hunting group, preferring to eat on their own, usually in the early morning or late afternoon. When they spot a school they will all dive in unison. They will point their bodies down like a torpedo and dive into the water. Plunge diving can be done from heights of 33-100ft and even up to 330 ft (100 m). These birds hit the water around 60 mph (97 km/h) and can go to depths of 82 ft (25 m) below the water surface. The prey is usually eaten while the bird is still under water. Males and females fish differently which could contribute to the reasons that blue foots, unlike other boobies raise more than one young. The male is smaller and the tail is larger for its body which enables the male to fish in shallow areas instead of just deep waters. The tail can flatten out easier enabling him to change direction in the shallow water. The female is larger and can carry more food. The food is then regurgitated to the young. The males feed the young for the first part of the incubation period. This is done because the males can bring back food quicker than the female. When the demand for more food takes over the female provides the food to the young. Blue-foots will make raucous or polysyllabic grunts or shouts and thin whistle noise. The males of the species have been known to throw up their head and whistle at a female flying by. Their ritual displays are also a form of communication.

 

North Seymour Island.

Separated by a thin strait north of Isla Baltra and Isla Santa Cruz, Isla Seymour is often referred to as North Seymour Island, while Isla Baltra is often called the South Seymour Island. Having similar flora and vegetation such as the Prickly Pear Cacti and salt bushes, Isla Seymour is very similar to Isla Baltra because they have both been created from a geological uplift. Quite a small island in terms of land mass, Isla Seymour is definitely worth visiting. To explore the island, follow a circular trail roughly 2 km long leading inland and along the rocky coast that will take you through some of the biggest sea bird breeding colonies in the entire Galapagos. Here you will find birds nesting, mating and rearing their chicks all year round. Blue-footed Boobies and Frigate birds are the main attractions here. Since most of the wildlife and birds in the Galapagos Islands are quite fearless, it is possible for visitors to get an up close view of the nests of many of the birds here, including the lovely Swallow-tailed Gulls and bright Yellow Warblers.

 

Galapagos Islands

The Galápagos Islands (official name: Archipiélago de Colón; other Spanish names: Islas de Colón or Islas Galápagos) are an archipelago of volcanic islands distributed around the equator in the Pacific Ocean, some 900 km west of Ecuador. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site: wildlife is its most notable feature. Because of the only very recent arrival of man the majority of the wildlife has no fear of humans and will allow visitors to walk right up them, often having to step over Iguanas or Sea Lions.The Galápagos islands and its surrounding waters are part of a province, a national park, and a biological marine reserve. The principal language on the islands is Spanish. The islands have a population of around 40,000, which is a 40-fold expansion in 50 years. The islands are geologically young and famed for their vast number of endemic species, which were studied by Charles Darwin during the voyage of the Beagle. His observations and collections contributed to the inception of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection.

Lee, Russell,, 1903-1986,, photographer.

 

Butter in churn of the Dairymen's Cooperative Creamery. Caldwell, Canyon County, Idaho. Average price paid to members in 1940 was 32.43 cents (including cash dividend) per pound for butter fat. Average price for U.S. was twenty-eight cents

 

1941 June.

 

1 negative : safety ; 3 1/4 x 4 1/4 inches or smaller.

 

Notes:

Title and other information from caption card.

Transfer; United States. Office of War Information. Overseas Picture Division. Washington Division; 1944.

 

Subjects:

United States--Idaho--Canyon County--Caldwell.

 

Format: Safety film negatives.

 

Rights Info: No known restrictions. For information, see U.S. Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Black & White Photographs www.loc.gov/rr/print/res/071_fsab.html

 

Repository: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA, hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.print

 

Part Of: Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection (Library of Congress) (DLC) 2002708960

 

More information about the FSA/OWI Collection is available at hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.fsaowi

 

Higher resolution image is available (Persistent URL): hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/fsa.8c01714

 

Call Number: LC-USF34- 039652-D

 

Up in the air closing the course at go ape!

Not your average herald on the nose of this SD70M. 10E approaches Bellevue Terminal, passing by the tower that used to protect the diamond here, now long gone.

Day 235. A very average photo but I'm not going to push for better because it documents my day. My husband dragged me out for a mountain bike ride and I seem to be the only one who has mastered ending up over a bank while riding uphill. I now have a nice graze on my leg as a memento.

Aarhus, Denmark.

October 2015.

Another average bluebell shot :P It's my birthday today, and on the way to town I saw these at Quakers Walk and thankfully had brought my camera as it was a nice day out :)

Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is surrounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York, whose water boundaries, along the international border, meet in the middle of the lake.

 

The Canadian cities of Toronto, Kingston, Mississauga, and Hamilton are located on the lake's northern and western shorelines, while the American city of Rochester is located on the south shore. In the Huron language, the name Ontarí'io means "great lake". Its primary inlet is the Niagara River from Lake Erie. The last in the Great Lakes chain, Lake Ontario serves as the outlet to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River, comprising the eastern end of the Saint Lawrence Seaway. The Moses-Saunders Power Dam regulates the water level of the lake.

 

Lake Ontario is the easternmost of the Great Lakes and the smallest in surface area (7,340 sq mi, 18,960 km2), although it exceeds Lake Erie in volume (393 cu mi, 1,639 km3). It is the 13th largest lake in the world. When its islands are included, the lake's shoreline is 712 miles (1,146 km) long. As the last lake in the Great Lakes' hydrologic chain, Lake Ontario has the lowest mean surface elevation of the lakes at 243 feet (74 m) above sea level; 326 feet (99 m) lower than its neighbor upstream. Its maximum length is 193 statute miles (311 kilometres; 168 nautical miles), and its maximum width is 53 statute miles (85 km; 46 nmi). The lake's average depth is 47 fathoms 1 foot (283 ft; 86 m), with a maximum depth of 133 fathoms 4 feet (802 ft; 244 m). The lake's primary source is the Niagara River, draining Lake Erie, with the Saint Lawrence River serving as the outlet. The drainage basin covers 24,720 square miles (64,030 km2). As with all the Great Lakes, water levels change both within the year (owing to seasonal changes in water input) and among years (owing to longer-term trends in precipitation). These water level fluctuations are an integral part of lake ecology and produce and maintain extensive wetlands. The lake also has an important freshwater fishery, although it has been negatively affected by factors including overfishing, water pollution and invasive species.

 

Baymouth bars built by prevailing winds and currents have created a significant number of lagoons and sheltered harbors, mostly near (but not limited to) Prince Edward County, Ontario, and the easternmost shores. Perhaps the best-known example is Toronto Bay, chosen as the site of the Upper Canada capital for its strategic harbor. Other prominent examples include Hamilton Harbour, Irondequoit Bay, Presqu'ile Bay, and Sodus Bay. The bars themselves are the sites of long beaches, such as Sandbanks Provincial Park and Sandy Island Beach State Park. These sand bars are often associated with large wetlands, which support large numbers of plant and animal species, as well as providing important rest areas for migratory birds. Presqu'ile, on the north shore of Lake Ontario, is particularly significant in this regard. One unique feature of the lake is the Z-shaped Bay of Quinte which separates Prince Edward County from the Ontario mainland, save for a 2-mile (3.2 km) isthmus near Trenton; this feature also supports many wetlands and aquatic plants, as well as associated fisheries.

 

Major rivers draining into Lake Ontario include the Niagara River, Don River, Humber River, Rouge River, Trent River, Cataraqui River, Genesee River, Oswego River, Black River, Little Salmon River, and the Salmon River.

 

The name Ontario is derived from the Huron word Ontarí'io, which means "great lake". In Colonial times, the lake was also called Cataraqui, a French spelling of the Mohawk Katarokwi. The lake was a border between the Huron people and the Iroquois Confederacy in the pre-Columbian era. In the 15th century, the Iroquois drove out the Huron from southern Ontario and settled the northern shores of Lake Ontario. When the Iroquois withdrew and the Anishnabeg / Ojibwa / Mississaugas moved in from the north to southern Ontario, they retained the Iroquois name. Artifacts believed to be of Norse origin have been found in the area of Sodus Bay, indicating the possibility of trading by the indigenous peoples with Norse explorers on the east coast of North America.

 

It is believed the first European to reach the lake was Étienne Brûlé in 1615. As was their practice, the French explorers introduced other names for the lake. In 1632 and 1656, the lake was referred to as Lac de St. Louis or Lake St. Louis by Samuel de Champlain and cartographer Nicolas Sanson respectively (likely for Louis XIV of France) In 1660, Jesuit historian Francis Creuxius coined the name Lacus Ontarius. In a map drawn in the Relation des Jésuites (1662–1663), the lake bears the legend "Lac Ontario ou des Iroquois" with the name "Ondiara" in smaller type. A French map produced in 1712 (currently in the Canadian Museum of History), created by military engineer Jean-Baptiste de Couagne, identified Lake Ontario as "Lac Frontenac" named after Louis de Buade, Comte de Frontenac et de Palluau. He was a French soldier, courtier, and Governor General of New France from 1672 to 1682 and from 1689 to his death in 1698.

 

In the 17th century, reports of an alleged creature named Gaasyendietha, similar to the so-called Loch Ness Monster, being sighted in the lake. The creature is described as large with a long neck, green in colour, and generally causes a break in the surface waves.

 

A series of trading posts were established by both the British and French, such as Fort Frontenac in 1673, Fort Oswego in 1722, and Fort Rouillé in 1750. As the easternmost and nearest lake to the Atlantic seaboard of Canada and the United States, population centres here are among the oldest in the Great Lakes basin, with Kingston, Ontario, formerly the capital of Canada, dating to the establishment of Fort Frontenac in 1673.

 

After the French and Indian War, all forts around the lake were under British control. The United States took possession of the forts along the American side of the lake at the signing of the Jay Treaty in 1794. Permanent, non-military European settlement began during the American Revolution with the influx of Loyalist settlers. During the War of 1812, the Royal Navy and US Navy had fought in several engagements for control of Lake Ontario. The Great Lakes, including Lake Ontario, were largely demilitarized after the Rush–Bagot Treaty was ratified in 1818.

 

The lake became a hub of commercial activity following the War of 1812 with canal building on both sides of the border and heavy travel by lake steamers. Steamer activity peaked in the mid-19th century before competition from railway lines.

 

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a type of scow known as a stone hooker was in operation on the northwest shore, particularly around Port Credit and Bronte. Stonehooking was the practice of raking flat fragments of Dundas shale from the shallow lake floor of the area for use in construction, particularly in the growing city of Toronto.

 

New York, sometimes called New York State, is a state in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. It borders New Jersey and Pennsylvania to its south, New England and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec to its north, and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. With almost 19.6 million residents, it is the fourth-most populous state in the United States and eighth-most densely populated as of 2023. New York is the 27th-largest U.S. state by area, with a total area of 54,556 square miles (141,300 km2).

 

New York has a varied geography. The southeastern part of the state, known as Downstate, encompasses New York City, the most populous city in the United States, Long Island, the most populous island in the United States, and the lower Hudson Valley. These areas are the center of the New York metropolitan area, a sprawling urban landmass, and account for approximately two-thirds of the state's population. The much larger Upstate area spreads from the Great Lakes to Lake Champlain, and includes the Adirondack Mountains and the Catskill Mountains (part of the wider Appalachian Mountains). The east–west Mohawk River Valley bisects the more mountainous regions of Upstate, and flows into the north–south Hudson River valley near the state capital of Albany. Western New York, home to the cities of Buffalo and Rochester, is part of the Great Lakes region and borders Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. Central New York is anchored by the city of Syracuse; between the central and western parts of the state, New York is dominated by the Finger Lakes, a popular tourist destination. To the south, along the state border with Pennsylvania, the Southern Tier sits atop the Allegheny Plateau, representing the northernmost reaches of Appalachia.

 

New York was one of the original Thirteen Colonies that went on to form the United States. The area of present-day New York had been inhabited by tribes of the Algonquians and the Iroquois Confederacy Native Americans for several thousand years by the time the earliest Europeans arrived. Stemming from Henry Hudson's expedition in 1609, the Dutch established the multiethnic colony of New Netherland in 1621. England seized the colony from the Dutch in 1664, renaming it the Province of New York. During the American Revolutionary War, a group of colonists eventually succeeded in establishing independence, and the former colony was officially admitted into the United States in 1788. From the early 19th century, New York's development of its interior, beginning with the construction of the Erie Canal, gave it incomparable advantages over other regions of the United States. The state built its political, cultural, and economic ascendancy over the next century, earning it the nickname of the "Empire State." Although deindustrialization eroded a significant portion of the state's economy in the second half of the 20th century, New York in the 21st century continues to be considered as a global node of creativity and entrepreneurship, social tolerance, and environmental sustainability.

 

The state attracts visitors from all over the globe, with the highest count of any U.S. state in 2022. Many of its landmarks are well known, including four of the world's ten most-visited tourist attractions in 2013: Times Square, Central Park, Niagara Falls and Grand Central Terminal. New York is home to approximately 200 colleges and universities, including two Ivy League universities, Columbia University and Cornell University, and the expansive State University of New York, which is among the largest university systems in the nation. New York City is home to the headquarters of the United Nations, and it is sometimes described as the world's most important city, the cultural, financial, and media epicenter, and the capital of the world.

 

The history of New York begins around 10,000 B.C. when the first people arrived. By 1100 A.D. two main cultures had become dominant as the Iroquoian and Algonquian developed. European discovery of New York was led by the Italian Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524 followed by the first land claim in 1609 by the Dutch. As part of New Netherland, the colony was important in the fur trade and eventually became an agricultural resource thanks to the patroon system. In 1626, the Dutch thought they had bought the island of Manhattan from Native Americans.[1] In 1664, England renamed the colony New York, after the Duke of York and Albany, brother of King Charles II. New York City gained prominence in the 18th century as a major trading port in the Thirteen Colonies.

 

New York played a pivotal role during the American Revolution and subsequent war. The Stamp Act Congress in 1765 brought together representatives from across the Thirteen Colonies to form a unified response to British policies. The Sons of Liberty were active in New York City to challenge British authority. After a major loss at the Battle of Long Island, the Continental Army suffered a series of additional defeats that forced a retreat from the New York City area, leaving the strategic port and harbor to the British army and navy as their North American base of operations for the rest of the war. The Battle of Saratoga was the turning point of the war in favor of the Americans, convincing France to formally ally with them. New York's constitution was adopted in 1777, and strongly influenced the United States Constitution. New York City was the national capital at various times between 1788 and 1790, where the Bill of Rights was drafted. Albany became the permanent state capital in 1797. In 1787, New York became the eleventh state to ratify the United States Constitution.

 

New York hosted significant transportation advancements in the 19th century, including the first steamboat line in 1807, the Erie Canal in 1825, and America's first regularly scheduled rail service in 1831. These advancements led to the expanded settlement of western New York and trade ties to the Midwest settlements around the Great Lakes.

 

Due to New York City's trade ties to the South, there were numerous southern sympathizers in the early days of the American Civil War and the mayor proposed secession. Far from any of the battles, New York ultimately sent the most soldiers and money to support the Union cause. Thereafter, the state helped create the industrial age and consequently was home to some of the first labor unions.

 

During the 19th century, New York City became the main entry point for European immigrants to the United States, beginning with a wave of Irish during their Great Famine. Millions came through Castle Clinton in Battery Park before Ellis Island opened in 1892 to welcome millions more, increasingly from eastern and southern Europe. The Statue of Liberty opened in 1886 and became a symbol of hope. New York boomed during the Roaring Twenties, before the Wall Street Crash of 1929, and skyscrapers expressed the energy of the city. New York City was the site of successive tallest buildings in the world from 1913 to 1974.

 

The buildup of defense industries for World War II turned around the state's economy from the Great Depression, as hundreds of thousands worked to defeat the Axis powers. Following the war, the state experienced significant suburbanization around all the major cities, and most central cities shrank. The Thruway system opened in 1956, signaling another era of transportation advances.

 

Following a period of near-bankruptcy in the late 1970s, New York City renewed its stature as a cultural center, attracted more immigration, and hosted the development of new music styles. The city developed from publishing to become a media capital over the second half of the 20th century, hosting most national news channels and broadcasts. Some of its newspapers became nationally and globally renowned. The state's manufacturing base eroded with the restructuring of industry, and the state transitioned into service industries.

 

The first peoples of New York are estimated to have arrived around 10,000 BC. Around AD 800, Iroquois ancestors moved into the area from the Appalachian region. The people of the Point Peninsula complex were the predecessors of the Algonquian peoples of New York. By around 1100, the distinct Iroquoian-speaking and Algonquian-speaking cultures that would eventually be encountered by Europeans had developed. The five nations of the Iroquois League developed a powerful confederacy about the 15th century that controlled territory throughout present-day New York, into Pennsylvania around the Great Lakes. For centuries, the Mohawk cultivated maize fields in the lowlands of the Mohawk River, which were later taken over by Dutch settlers at Schenectady, New York when they bought this territory. The Iroquois nations to the west also had well-cultivated areas and orchards.

 

The Iroquois established dominance over the fur trade throughout their territory, bargaining with European colonists. Other New York tribes were more subject to either European destruction or assimilation within the Iroquoian confederacy. Situated at major Native trade routes in the Northeast and positioned between French and English zones of settlement, the Iroquois were intensely caught up with the onrush of Europeans, which is also to say that the settlers, whether Dutch, French or English, were caught up with the Iroquois as well. Algonquian tribes were less united among their tribes; they typically lived along rivers, streams, or the Atlantic Coast. But, both groups of natives were well-established peoples with highly sophisticated cultural systems; these were little understood or appreciated by the European colonists who encountered them. The natives had "a complex and elaborate native economy that included hunting, gathering, manufacturing, and farming...[and were] a mosaic of Native American tribes, nations, languages, and political associations." The Iroquois usually met at an Onondaga in Northern New York, which changed every century or so, where they would coordinate policies on how to deal with Europeans and strengthen the bond between the Five Nations.

 

Tribes who have managed to call New York home have been the Iroquois, Mohawk, Mohican, Susquehannock, Petun, Chonnonton, Ontario and Nanticoke.

 

In 1524, Giovanni da Verrazzano, an Italian explorer in the service of the French crown, explored the Atlantic coast of North America between the Carolinas and Newfoundland, including New York Harbor and Narragansett Bay. On April 17, 1524, Verrazzano entered New York Bay, by way of the Strait now called the Narrows. He described "a vast coastline with a deep delta in which every kind of ship could pass" and he adds: "that it extends inland for a league and opens up to form a beautiful lake. This vast sheet of water swarmed with native boats". He landed on the tip of Manhattan and perhaps on the furthest point of Long Island.

 

In 1535, Jacques Cartier, a French explorer, became the first European to describe and map the Saint Lawrence River from the Atlantic Ocean, sailing as far upriver as the site of Montreal.

 

On April 4, 1609, Henry Hudson, in the employ of the Dutch East India Company, departed Amsterdam in command of the ship Halve Maen (Half Moon). On September 3 he reached the estuary of the Hudson River. He sailed up the Hudson River to about Albany near the confluence of the Mohawk River and the Hudson. His voyage was used to establish Dutch claims to the region and to the fur trade that prospered there after a trading post was established at Albany in 1614.

 

In 1614, the Dutch under the command of Hendrick Christiaensen, built Fort Nassau (now Albany) the first Dutch settlement in North America and the first European settlement in what would become New York. It was replaced by nearby Fort Orange in 1623. In 1625, Fort Amsterdam was built on the southern tip of Manhattan Island to defend the Hudson River. This settlement grew to become the city New Amsterdam.

 

The British conquered New Netherland in 1664; Lenient terms of surrender most likely kept local resistance to a minimum. The colony and New Amsterdam were both renamed New York (and "Beverwijck" was renamed Albany) after its new proprietor, James II later King of England, Ireland and Scotland, who was at the time Duke of York and Duke of Albany The population of New Netherland at the time of English takeover was 7,000–8,000.

 

Thousands of poor German farmers, chiefly from the Palatine region of Germany, migrated to upstate districts after 1700. They kept to themselves, married their own, spoke German, attended Lutheran churches, and retained their own customs and foods. They emphasized farm ownership. Some mastered English to become conversant with local legal and business opportunities. They ignored the Indians and tolerated slavery (although few were rich enough to own a slave).

 

Large manors were developed along the Hudson River by elite colonists during the 18th century, including Livingston, Cortlandt, Philipsburg, and Rensselaerswyck. The manors represented more than half of the colony's undeveloped land. The Province of New York thrived during this time, its economy strengthened by Long Island and Hudson Valley agriculture, in conjunction with trade and artisanal activity at the Port of New York; the colony was a breadbasket and lumberyard for the British sugar colonies in the Caribbean. New York's population grew substantially during this century: from the first colonial census (1698) to the last (1771), the province grew ninefold, from 18,067 to 168,007.

 

New York in the American Revolution

Further information: John Peter Zenger, Stamp Act Congress, Invasion of Canada (1775), New York and New Jersey campaign, Prisoners of war in the American Revolutionary War, and Intelligence in the American Revolutionary War

 

New York played a pivotal role in the Revolutionary War. The colony verged on revolt following the Stamp Act of 1765, advancing the New York City–based Sons of Liberty to the forefront of New York politics. The Act exacerbated the depression the province experienced after unsuccessfully invading Canada in 1760. Even though New York City merchants lost out on lucrative military contracts, the group sought common ground between the King and the people; however, compromise became impossible as of April 1775 Battles of Lexington and Concord. In that aftermath the New York Provincial Congress on June 9, 1775, for five pounds sterling for each hundredweight of gunpowder delivered to each county's committee.

 

Two powerful families had for decades assembled colony-wide coalitions of supporters. With few exceptions, members long associated with the DeLancey faction went along when its leadership decided to support the crown, while members of the Livingston faction became Patriots.

 

New York's strategic central location and port made it key to controlling the colonies. The British assembled the century's largest fleet: at one point 30,000 British sailors and soldiers anchored off Staten Island. General George Washington barely escaped New York City with his army in November 1776; General Sir William Howe was successful in driving Washington out, but erred by expanding into New Jersey. By January 1777, he retained only a few outposts near New York City. The British held the city for the duration, using it as a base for expeditions against other targets.

 

In October 1777, American General Horatio Gates won the Battle of Saratoga, later regarded as the war's turning point. Had Gates not held, the rebellion might well have broken down: losing Saratoga would have cost the entire Hudson–Champlain corridor, which would have separated New England from the rest of the colonies and split the future union.

 

Upon war's end, New York's borders became well–defined: the counties east of Lake Champlain became Vermont and the state's western borders were settled by 1786.

 

Many Iroquois supported the British (typically fearing future American ambitions). Many were killed during the war; others went into exile with the British. Those remaining lived on twelve reservations; by 1826 only eight reservations remained, all of which survived into the 21st century.

 

The state adopted its constitution in April 1777, creating a strong executive and strict separation of powers. It strongly influenced the federal constitution a decade later. Debate over the federal constitution in 1787 led to formation of the groups known as Federalists—mainly "downstaters" (those who lived in or near New York City) who supported a strong national government—and Antifederalists—mainly upstaters (those who lived to the city's north and west) who opposed large national institutions. In 1787, Alexander Hamilton, a leading Federalist from New York and signatory to the Constitution, wrote the first essay of the Federalist Papers. He published and wrote most of the series in New York City newspapers in support of the proposed United States Constitution. Antifederalists were not swayed by the arguments, but the state ratified it in 1788.

 

In 1785, New York City became the national capital and continued as such on and off until 1790; George Washington was inaugurated as the first President of the United States in front of Federal Hall in 1789. The United States Bill of Rights was drafted there, and the United States Supreme Court sat for the first time. From statehood to 1797, the Legislature frequently moved the state capital between Albany, Kingston, Poughkeepsie, and New York City. Thereafter, Albany retained that role.

 

In the early 19th century, New York became a center for advancement in transportation. In 1807, Robert Fulton initiated a steamboat line from New York to Albany, the first successful enterprise of its kind. By 1815, Albany was the state's turnpike center, which established the city as the hub for pioneers migrating west to Buffalo and the Michigan Territory.

 

In 1825 the Erie Canal opened, securing the state's economic dominance. Its impact was enormous: one source stated, "Linking the Atlantic Ocean and the Great Lakes, the canal was an act of political will that joined the regions of the state, created a vast economic hinterland for New York City, and established a ready market for agricultural products from the state's interior." In that year western New York transitioned from "frontier" to settled area. By this time, all counties and most municipalities had incorporated, approximately matching the state's is organized today. In 1831, the Mohawk and Hudson Railroad started the country's first successful regularly–scheduled steam railroad service.

 

Advancing transportation quickly led to settlement of the fertile Mohawk and Gennessee valleys and the Niagara Frontier. Buffalo and Rochester became boomtowns. Significant migration of New England "Yankees" (mainly of English descent) to the central and western parts of the state led to minor conflicts with the more settled "Yorkers" (mainly of German, Dutch, and Scottish descent). More than 15% of the state's 1850 population had been born in New England[citation needed]. The western part of the state grew fastest at this time. By 1840, New York was home to seven of the nation's thirty largest cities.

 

During this period, towns established academies for education, including for girls. The western area of the state was a center of progressive causes, including support of abolitionism, temperance, and women's rights. Religious enthusiasms flourished and the Latter Day Saint movement was founded in the area by Joseph Smith and his vision. Some supporters of abolition participated in the Underground Railroad, helping fugitive slaves reach freedom in Canada or in New York.

 

In addition, in the early 1840s the state legislature and Governor William H. Seward expanded rights for free blacks and fugitive slaves in New York: in 1840 the legislature passed laws protecting the rights of African Americans against Southern slave-catchers. One guaranteed alleged fugitive slaves the right of a jury trial in New York to establish whether they were slaves, and another pledged the aid of the state to recover free blacks kidnapped into slavery, (as happened to Solomon Northup of Saratoga Springs in 1841, who did not regain freedom until 1853.) In 1841 Seward signed legislation to repeal a "nine-month law" that allowed slaveholders to bring their slaves into the state for a period of nine months before they were considered free. After this, slaves brought to the state were immediately considered freed, as was the case in some other free states. Seward also signed legislation to establish public education for all children, leaving it up to local jurisdictions as to how that would be supplied (some had segregated schools).

 

New York culture bloomed in the first half of the 19th century: in 1809 Washington Irving wrote the satirical A History of New York under the pen name Diedrich Knickerbocker, and in 1819 he based Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in Hudson Valley towns. Thomas Cole's Hudson River School was established in the 1830s by showcasing dramatic landscapes of the Hudson Valley. The first baseball teams formed in New York City in the 1840s, including the New York Knickerbockers. Professional baseball later located its Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. Saratoga Race Course, an annual summer attraction in Saratoga Springs, opened in 1847.

 

A civil war was not in the best interest of business, because New York had strong ties to the Deep South, both through the port of New York and manufacture of cotton goods in upstate textile mills. Half of New York City's exports were related to cotton before the war. Southern businessmen so frequently traveled to the city that they established favorite hotels and restaurants. Trade was based on moving Southern goods. The city's large Democrat community feared the impact of Abraham Lincoln's election in 1860 and the mayor urged secession of New York.

 

By the time of the 1861 Battle of Fort Sumter, such political differences decreased and the state quickly met Lincoln's request for soldiers and supplies. More soldiers fought from New York than any other Northern state. While no battles were waged in New York, the state was not immune to Confederate conspiracies, including one to burn various New York cities and another to invade the state via Canada.

 

In January 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed the slaves in states that were still in rebellion against the union. In March 1863, the federal draft law was changed so that male citizens between 20 and 35 and unmarried citizens to age 45 were subject to conscription. Those who could afford to hire a substitute or pay $300 were exempt. Antiwar newspaper editors attacked the law, and many immigrants and their descendants resented being drafted in place of people who could buy their way out. Democratic Party leaders raised the specter of a deluge of freed southern blacks competing with the white working class, then dominated by ethnic Irish and immigrants. On the lottery's first day, July 11, 1863, the first lottery draw was held. On Monday, July 13, 1863, five days of large-scale riots began, which were dominated by ethnic Irish, who targeted blacks in the city, their neighborhoods, and known abolitionist sympathizers. As a result, many blacks left Manhattan permanently, moving to Brooklyn or other areas.

 

In the following decades, New York strengthened its dominance of the financial and banking industries. Manufacturing continued to rise: Eastman Kodak founded in 1888 in Rochester, General Electric in Schenectady, and Endicott-Johnson Shoe Company in the Triple Cities are some of the well-known companies founded during this period. Buffalo and Niagara Falls attracted numerous factories following the advent of hydroelectric power in the area. With industry blooming, workers began to unite in New York as early as the 1820s. By 1882, the Knights of Labor in New York City had 60,000 members. Trade unions used political influence to limit working hours as early as 1867. At the same time, New York's agricultural output peaked. Focus changed from crop-based to dairy-based agriculture. The cheese industry became established in the Mohawk Valley. By 1881, the state had more than 241,000 farms. In the same period, the area around New York harbor became the world's oyster capital, retaining that title into the early twentieth century.

 

Immigration increased throughout the latter half of the 19th century. Starting with refugees from the Great Famine of Ireland in the 1840s, New York became a prominent entry point for those seeking a new life in the United States. Between 1855 and 1890, an estimated 8 million immigrants passed through Castle Clinton at Battery Park in Manhattan. Early in this period, most immigrants came from Ireland and Germany. Ellis Island opened in 1892, and between 1880 and 1920, most immigrants were German and Eastern European Jews, Poles, and other Eastern and Southern Europeans, including many Italians. By 1925, New York City's population outnumbered that of London, making it the most populous city in the world. Arguably New York's most identifiable symbol, Liberty Enlightening the World (the Statue of Liberty), a gift from France for the American centennial, was completed in 1886. By the early 20th century, the statue was regarded as the "Mother of Exiles"—a symbol of hope to immigrants.

 

New York's political pattern changed little after the mid–19th century. New York City and its metropolitan area was already heavily Democrat; Upstate was aligned with the Republican Party and was a center of abolitionist activists. In the 1850s, Democratic Tammany Hall became one of the most powerful and durable political machines in United States history. Boss William Tweed brought the organization to the forefront of city and then state politics in the 1860s. Based on its command of a large population, Tammany maintained influence until at least the 1930s. Outside the city, Republicans were able to influence the redistricting process enough to constrain New York City and capture control of the Legislature in 1894. Both parties have seen national political success: in the 39 presidential elections between 1856 and 2010, Republicans won 19 times and Democrats 20 times.

 

By 1901, New York was the richest and most populous state. Two years prior, the five boroughs of New York City became one city. Within decades, the city's emblem had become the skyscraper: the Woolworth Building was the tallest building in the world from 1913, surpassed by 40 Wall Street in April 1930, the Chrysler Building in 1930, the Empire State Building in 1931, and the World Trade Center in 1972 before losing the title in 1974.

 

The state was serviced by over a dozen major railroads and at the start of the 20th century and electric Interurban rail networks began to spring up around Syracuse, Rochester and other cities in New York during this period.

 

In the late 1890s governor Theodore Roosevelt and fellow Republicans such as Charles Evans Hughes worked with many Democrats such as Al Smith to promote Progressivism. They battled trusts and monopolies (especially in the insurance industry), promoted efficiency, fought waste, and called for more democracy in politics. Democrats focused more on the benefits of progressivism for their own ethnic working class base and for labor unions.

 

Democratic political machines, especially Tammany Hall in Manhattan, opposed woman suffrage because they feared that the addition of female voters would dilute the control they had established over groups of male voters. By the time of the New York State referendum on women's suffrage in 1917, however, some wives and daughters of Tammany Hall leaders were working for suffrage, leading it to take a neutral position that was crucial to the referendum's passage.

 

Following a sharp but short-lived Depression at the beginning of the decade, New York enjoyed a booming economy during the Roaring Twenties. New York suffered during the Great Depression, which began with the Wall Street crash on Black Tuesday in 1929. The Securities and Exchange Commission opened in 1934 to regulate the stock market. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected governor in 1928, and the state faced upwards of 25% unemployment. His Temporary Emergency Relief Agency, established in 1931, was the first work relief program in the nation and influenced the national Federal Emergency Relief Administration. Roosevelt was elected President in 1932 in part because of his promises to extend New York–style relief programs across the country via his New Deal. In 1932, Lake Placid was host to the III Olympic Winter Games.

 

As the largest state, New York again supplied the most resources during World War II. New York manufactured 11 percent of total United States military armaments produced during the war and suffered 31,215 casualties. The war affected the state both socially and economically. For example, to overcome discriminatory labor practices, Governor Herbert H. Lehman created the Committee on Discrimination in Employment in 1941 and Governor Thomas E. Dewey signed the Ives-Quinn Act in 1945, banning employment discrimination. The G.I. Bill of 1944, which offered returning soldiers the opportunity of affordable higher education, forced New York to create a public university system since its private universities could not handle the influx; the State University of New York was created by Governor Dewey in 1948.

 

World War II constituted New York's last great industrial era. At its conclusion, the defense industry shrank and the economy shifted towards producing services rather than goods. Returning soldiers disproportionately displaced female and minority workers who had entered the industrial workforce only when the war left employers no other choice. Companies moved to the south and west, seeking lower taxes and a less costly, non–union workforce. Many workers followed the jobs. The middle class expanded and created suburbs such as the one on Long Island. The automobile accelerated this decentralization; planned communities like Levittown offered affordable middle-class housing.

 

Larger cities stopped growing around 1950. Growth resumed only in New York City, in the 1980s. Buffalo's population fell by half between 1950 and 2000. Reduced immigration and worker migration led New York State's population to decline for the first time between 1970 and 1980. California and Texas both surpassed it in population.

 

New York entered its third era of massive transportation projects by building highways, notably the New York State Thruway. The project was unpopular with New York City Democrats, who referred to it as "Dewey's ditch" and the "enemy of schools", because the Thruway disproportionately benefited upstate. The highway was based on the German Autobahn and was unlike anything seen at that point in the United States. It was within 30 miles (50 km) of 90% of the population at its conception. Costing $600 million, the full 427-mile (687 km) project opened in 1956.

 

Nelson Rockefeller was governor from 1959 to 1973 and changed New York politics. He began as a liberal, but grew more conservative: he limited SUNY's growth, responded aggressively to the Attica Prison riot, and promulgated the uniquely severe Rockefeller Drug Laws. The World Trade Center and other profligate projects nearly drove New York City into bankruptcy in 1975. The state took substantial budgetary control, which eventually led to improved fiscal prudence.

 

The Executive Mansion was retaken by Democrats in 1974 and remained under Democratic control for 20 years under Hugh Carey and Mario Cuomo. Late–century Democrats became more centrist, including US Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1977–2001) and New York City Mayor Ed Koch (1978–1989), while state Republicans began to align themselves with the more conservative national party. They gained power through the elections of Senator Alfonse D'Amato in 1980, Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in 1993, and Governor George Pataki in 1994. New York remained one of the most liberal states. In 1984, Ronald Reagan was the last Republican to carry the state, although Republican Michael Bloomberg served as New York City mayor in the early 21st century.

 

In the late 20th century, telecommunication and high technology industries employed many New Yorkers. New York City was especially successful at this transition. Entrepreneurs created many small companies, as industrial firms such as Polaroid withered. This success drew many young professionals into the still–dwindling cities. New York City was the exception and has continued to draw new residents. The energy of the city created attractions and new businesses. Some people believe that changes in policing created a less threatening environment; crime rates dropped, and urban development reduced urban decay.

 

This in turn led to a surge in culture. New York City became, once again, "the center for all things chic and trendy". Hip-hop and rap music, led by New York City, became the most popular pop genre. Immigration to both the city and state rose. New York City, with a large gay and lesbian community, suffered many deaths from AIDS beginning in the 1980s.

 

New York City increased its already large share of television programming, home to the network news broadcasts, as well as two of the three major cable news networks. The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times became two of the three "national" newspapers, read throughout the country. New York also increased its dominance of the financial services industry centered on Wall Street, led by banking expansion, a rising stock market, innovations in investment banking, including junk bond trading and accelerated by the savings and loan crisis that decimated competitors elsewhere in New York.

 

Upstate did not fare as well as downstate; the major industries that began to reinvigorate New York City did not typically spread to other regions. The number of farms in the state had fallen to 30,000 by 1997. City populations continued to decline while suburbs grew in area, but did not increase proportionately in population. High-tech industry grew in cities such as Corning and Rochester. Overall New York entered the new millennium "in a position of economic strength and optimism".

 

In 2001, New York entered a new era following the 9/11 attacks, the worst terrorist attack ever to take place on American soil. Two of the four hijacked passenger jets crashed into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, destroying them, and killing almost 3,000 people. One flew into the Pentagon demolishing the walls. The final one was almost taken back over by the passengers aboard and crashed into an open grassland with 296 out of the 500 people dead. Thousands of New Yorkers volunteered their time to search the ruin for survivors and remains in the following weeks.

 

Following the attacks, plans were announced to rebuild the World Trade Center site. 7 World Trade Center became the first World Trade Center skyscraper to be rebuilt in five years after the attacks. One World Trade Center, four more office towers, and a memorial to the casualties of the September 11 attacks are under construction as of 2011. One World Trade Center opened on November 3, 2014.

 

On October 29 and 30, 2012, Hurricane Sandy caused extensive destruction of the state's shorelines, ravaging portions of New York City, Long Island, and southern Westchester with record-high storm surge, with severe flooding and high winds causing power outages for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers, and leading to gasoline shortages and disruption of mass transit systems. The storm and its profound effects have prompted the discussion of constructing seawalls and other coastal barriers around the shorelines of New York City and Long Island to minimize the risk from another such future event. Such risk is considered highly probable due to global warming and rising sea levels.

www.magazinetoday.org/7-possible-reasons-why-youre-coughing/

Feel like you’ve been coughing for-ev-er? The truth is, the average cough lasts 18 days (what the what?), and while it’s the season for passing germs, there’s lots of other reasons you could be hacking up a lung. Ahead, your 101 class on distinguishing between the most common types of cou...

2012 MINI Cooper and 2002 RENAULT Avantime.

 

Facts & Figures

Cars in the European Union are on average 9.65 years old. Cars in the United States are on average 11.4 years old.

 

Passenger car fleet by age in the Netherlands:

- 40.77% 10 years or older

- 29.40% from 5 to 10 years

- 16.71% from 2 to 5 years

- 13.12% less than 2 years

 

Old passenger car fleets in the Baltic States and in Poland

 

Several Member States reported a large share of ‘old’ passenger cars (10 years or older). The Member States with the highest shares were Lithuania (85%), Poland (75%), Latvia (72%) and Estonia (64%). More than half of the passenger cars were older than 10 years also in Portugal, Malta, the Czech Republic, Romania, Finland, Croatia and Hungary. In contrast, the shares of the ‘youngest’ passenger cars (less than 2 years old) were highest in Belgium (23%), Austria (20%), Ireland (18%) and Sweden (17%).

This photo was taken on the Milford Track, a 4-day / 3-night walk in northern Fiordland, on New Zealand's South Island.

 

Wet? Well, yes.

 

To get things into perspective, you have to know that the nearby town of Milford received a mean of 6.75 metres of rain per year between 1971 and 2000. We were frequently told that the Milford track area gets around 7m a year, while some of the western slopes of the mountains in Fiordland get up to 9m. The day before this photo was taken, we spent much of the walk being refreshed by most of the day's near-negligible 214mm, of which 40mm fell in one 30-minute period.

 

Measuring rainfall in metres may seem quaint; and yet Fiordland is positively parched by comparison with some of the soggier parts of the world.

 

Lloro in Columbia is thought to get 13m a year, though this is a modelled figure that has never been measured.

Mount Wai‘ale‘ale, on the Hawai'an island of Kauai, gets 11.5 to 13m a year.

Mawsynram, in north-eastern India, receives 11.9m annually.

Mount Tutenendo in Columbia gets 12m a year.

Cherrapunji, near Mawsynram, gets 11m a year – almost all of it between June and August. It holds the record for the wettest 6 months ever recorded, with 22.5m between April and September 1861. In July that year 9.3m fell, making it the wettest month ever recorded anywhere.

Debundscha in Cameroon gets 10m a year.

Quibdo in Columbia gets 9m.

Bellenden Ker, in Queensland, Australia, gets 8.6m a year.

And last among these sodden spots, Andagoya in Colombia gets 7m. All of the above are towns and villages; Fiordland is a wonderful wilderness.

 

The most rain ever recorded in a 3-day period – 3.9m – is held by La Réunion. Now that's wet.

 

It rained and rained and rained and rained,

The average fall was well maintained,

And when the tracks were simply bogs

It started raining cats and dogs.

 

After a drought of half an hour

we had a most refreshing shower,

then the most curious thing of all:

a gentle rain began to fall.

 

Next day was also fairly dry

save for the deluge from the sky

which wet the party to the skin:

and after that, the rain set in.

 

This poem is found in many websites in a variety of slightly different versions. On those sites, it is variously linked with the west coast of Scotland and with the west coast of New Zealand's South Island. Setting aside those few individuals who pass it off as their own invention, is invariably attributed to "Anon", with associated dates often in the 1980s. I first saw it framed on the wall of a mountain hut on the Millford Track, where it is attributed to an anonymous tramper who left it there in 1989.

 

I have found one source that may be the root of it all. A certain Ho-Fang, from what must then have been the villagethe city (sorry, Nelson - see Andrew's comment under this shot) of Nelson (located in the north of South Island), published it on 15 September 1931, under the title West Coast Weather in the Otautau Standard and Wallace County Chronicle, Volume XXVII, Issue 1336, where it was printed on page 3.

 

"Fang" is quite a common family name in China and Taiwan, so the author might be Chinese, though in normal Chinese usage the given name, "Ho", would follow the family name. Somehow it sounds like a nom de plume. I can't find any obvious name for which this would be an anagram, though.

 

There is something about Ho-Fang's printed introduction to the poem that does not quite ring true, and I wonder whether Ho-Fang cribbed it from some earlier source - perhaps (who knows?) even from some saturated scribbler in Scotland.

 

Scotland? Saturated? Kinlochewe, the wettest met station in Scotland, gets a paltry 2.2m a year. Almost sahelian, if you ask me.

 

A B&W conversion.

Picture taken with Sony Alpha 700 Camera and Sony 70-200 F2.8 G (D) SSM Zoom Lens at 135mm focal length, F/4 and 1/250 sec exposure time. ISO speed set at 400. Metering Mode Center Weighted Average.

Hyderabad (Listeni/ˈhaɪdərəˌbæd/ HY-dər-ə-bad; often /ˈhaɪdrəˌbæd/) is the capital of the southern Indian state of Telangana and de jure capital of Andhra Pradesh. Occupying 625 square kilometres along the banks of the Musi River, it has a population of about 6.8 million and a metropolitan population of about 7.75 million, making it the fourth most populous city and sixth most populous urban agglomeration in India. At an average altitude of 542 metres, much of Hyderabad is situated on hilly terrain around artificial lakes, including Hussain Sagar - predating the city's founding - north of the city centre.

 

Established in 1591 by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, Hyderabad remained under the rule of the Qutb Shahi dynasty for nearly a century before the Mughals captured the region. In 1724, Mughal viceroy Asif Jah I declared his sovereignty and created his own dynasty, known as the Nizams of Hyderabad. The Nizam's dominions became a princely state during the British Raj, and remained so for 150 years, with the city serving as its capital. The city continued as the capital of Hyderabad State after it was brought into the Indian Union in 1948, and became the capital of Andhra Pradesh after the States Reorganisation Act, 1956. Since 1956, Rashtrapati Nilayam in the city has been the winter office of the President of India. In 2014, the newly formed state of Telangana split from Andhra Pradesh and the city became joint capital of the two states, a transitional arrangement scheduled to end by 2025.

 

Relics of Qutb Shahi and Nizam rule remain visible today, with the Charminar - commissioned by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah - coming to symbolise Hyderabad. Golconda fort is another major landmark. The influence of Mughlai culture is also evident in the city's distinctive cuisine, which includes Hyderabadi biryani and Hyderabadi haleem. The Qutb Shahis and Nizams established Hyderabad as a cultural hub, attracting men of letters from different parts of the world. Hyderabad emerged as the foremost centre of culture in India with the decline of the Mughal Empire in the mid-19th century, with artists migrating to the city from the rest of the Indian subcontinent. While Hyderabad is losing its cultural pre-eminence, it is today, due to the Telugu film industry, the country's second-largest producer of motion pictures.

 

Hyderabad was historically known as a pearl and diamond trading centre, and it continues to be known as the City of Pearls. Many of the city's traditional bazaars, including Laad Bazaar, Begum Bazaar and Sultan Bazaar, have remained open for centuries. However, industrialisation throughout the 20th century attracted major Indian manufacturing, research and financial institutions, including Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, the National Geophysical Research Institute and the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology. Special economic zones dedicated to information technology have encouraged companies from across India and around the world to set up operations and the emergence of pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries in the 1990s led to the area's naming as India's "Genome Valley". With an output of US$74 billion, Hyderabad is the fifth-largest contributor to India's overall gross domestic product.

 

HISTORY

TOPONYMY

According to John Everett-Heath, the author of Oxford Concise Dictionary of World Place Names, Hyderabad means "Haydar's city" or "lion city", from haydar (lion) and ābād (city). It was named to honour the Caliph Ali Ibn Abi Talib, who was also known as Haydar because of his lion-like valour in battles. Andrew Petersen, a scholar of Islamic architecture, says the city was originally called Baghnagar (city of gardens). One popular theory suggests that Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, the founder of the city, named it "Bhaganagar" or "Bhāgnagar" after Bhagmati, a local nautch (dancing) girl with whom he had fallen in love. She converted to Islam and adopted the title Hyder Mahal. The city was renamed Hyderabad in her honour. According to another source, the city was named after Haidar, the son of Quli Qutb Shah.

 

EARLY AND MEDIEVAL HISTORY

Archaeologists excavating near the city have unearthed Iron Age sites that may date from 500 BCE. The region comprising modern Hyderabad and its surroundings was known as Golkonda ("shepherd's hill"), and was ruled by the Chalukya dynasty from 624 CE to 1075 CE. Following the dissolution of the Chalukya empire into four parts in the 11th century, Golkonda came under the control of the Kakatiya dynasty from 1158, whose seat of power was at Warangal, 148 km northeast of modern Hyderabad.

 

The Kakatiya dynasty was reduced to a vassal of the Khilji dynasty in 1310 after its defeat by Sultan Alauddin Khilji of the Delhi Sultanate. This lasted until 1321, when the Kakatiya dynasty was annexed by Malik Kafur, Allaudin Khilji's general. During this period, Alauddin Khilji took the Koh-i-Noor diamond, which is said to have been mined from the Kollur Mines of Golkonda, to Delhi. Muhammad bin Tughluq succeeded to the Delhi sultanate in 1325, bringing Warangal under the rule of the Tughlaq dynasty until 1347 when Ala-ud-Din Bahman Shah, a governor under bin Tughluq, rebelled against Delhi and established the Bahmani Sultanate in the Deccan Plateau, with Gulbarga, 200 km west of Hyderabad, as its capital. The Bahmani kings ruled the region until 1518 and were the first independent Muslim rulers of the Deccan.

 

Sultan Quli, a governor of Golkonda, revolted against the Bahmani Sultanate and established the Qutb Shahi dynasty in 1518; he rebuilt the mud-fort of Golconda and named the city "Muhammad nagar". The fifth sultan, Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, established Hyderabad on the banks of the Musi River in 1591, to avoid the water shortages experienced at Golkonda. During his rule, he had the Charminar and Mecca Masjid built in the city. On 21 September 1687, the Golkonda Sultanate came under the rule of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb after a year-long siege of the Golkonda fort. The annexed area was renamed Deccan Suba (Deccan province) and the capital was moved from Golkonda to Aurangabad, about 550 km northwest of Hyderabad.

 

MODERN HISTORY

In 1713 Farrukhsiyar, the Mughal emperor, appointed Asif Jah I to be Viceroy of the Deccan, with the title Nizam-ul-Mulk (Administrator of the Realm). In 1724, Asif Jah I defeated Mubariz Khan to establish autonomy over the Deccan Suba, named the region Hyderabad Deccan, and started what came to be known as the Asif Jahi dynasty. Subsequent rulers retained the title Nizam ul-Mulk and were referred to as Asif Jahi Nizams, or Nizams of Hyderabad. The death of Asif Jah I in 1748 resulted in a period of political unrest as his sons, backed by opportunistic neighbouring states and colonial foreign forces, contended for the throne. The accession of Asif Jah II, who reigned from 1762 to 1803, ended the instability. In 1768 he signed the treaty of Masulipatnam, surrendering the coastal region to the East India Company in return for a fixed annual rent.

 

In 1769 Hyderabad city became the formal capital of the Nizams. In response to regular threats from Hyder Ali (Dalwai of Mysore), Baji Rao I (Peshwa of the Maratha Empire), and Basalath Jung (Asif Jah II's elder brother, who was supported by the Marquis de Bussy-Castelnau), the Nizam signed a subsidiary alliance with the East India Company in 1798, allowing the British Indian Army to occupy Bolarum (modern Secunderabad) to protect the state's borders, for which the Nizams paid an annual maintenance to the British.

 

Until 1874 there were no modern industries in Hyderabad. With the introduction of railways in the 1880s, four factories were built to the south and east of Hussain Sagar lake, and during the early 20th century, Hyderabad was transformed into a modern city with the establishment of transport services, underground drainage, running water, electricity, telecommunications, universities, industries, and Begumpet Airport. The Nizams ruled their princely state from Hyderabad during the British Raj.

 

After India gained independence, the Nizam declared his intention to remain independent rather than become part of the Indian Union. The Hyderabad State Congress, with the support of the Indian National Congress and the Communist Party of India, began agitating against Nizam VII in 1948. On 17 September that year, the Indian Army took control of Hyderabad State after an invasion codenamed Operation Polo. With the defeat of his forces, Nizam VII capitulated to the Indian Union by signing an Instrument of Accession, which made him the Rajpramukh (Princely Governor) of the state until 31 October 1956. Between 1946 and 1951, the Communist Party of India fomented the Telangana uprising against the feudal lords of the Telangana region. The Constitution of India, which became effective on 26 January 1950, made Hyderabad State one of the part B states of India, with Hyderabad city continuing to be the capital. In his 1955 report Thoughts on Linguistic States, B. R. Ambedkar, then chairman of the Drafting Committee of the Indian Constitution, proposed designating the city of Hyderabad as the second capital of India because of its amenities and strategic central location. Since 1956, the Rashtrapati Nilayam in Hyderabad has been the second official residence and business office of the President of India; the President stays once a year in winter and conducts official business particularly relating to Southern India.

 

On 1 November 1956 the states of India were reorganised by language. Hyderabad state was split into three parts, which were merged with neighbouring states to form the modern states of Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. The nine Telugu- and Urdu-speaking districts of Hyderabad State in the Telangana region were merged with the Telugu-speaking Andhra State to create Andhra Pradesh,with Hyderabad as its capital. Several protests, known collectively as the Telangana movement, attempted to invalidate the merger and demanded the creation of a new Telangana state. Major actions took place in 1969 and 1972, and a third began in 2010. The city suffered several explosions: one at Dilsukhnagar in 2002 claimed two lives; terrorist bombs in May and August 2007 caused communal tension and riots; and two bombs exploded in February 2013. On 30 July 2013 the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government of India declared that part of Andhra Pradesh would be split off to form a new Telangana state, and that Hyderabad city would be the capital city and part of Telangana, while the city would also remain the capital of Andhra Pradesh for no more than ten years. On 3 October 2013 the Union Cabinet approved the proposal, and in February 2014 both houses of Parliament passed the Telangana Bill. With the final assent of the President of India in June 2014, Telangana state was formed.

 

GEOGRAPHY

TOPOGRAPHY

Situated in the southern part of Telangana in southeastern India, Hyderabad is 1,566 kilometres south of Delhi, 699 kilometres southeast of Mumbai, and 570 kilometres north of Bangalore by road. It lies on the banks of the Musi River, in the northern part of the Deccan Plateau. Greater Hyderabad covers 625 km2, making it one of the largest metropolitan areas in India. With an average altitude of 542 metres, Hyderabad lies on predominantly sloping terrain of grey and pink granite, dotted with small hills, the highest being Banjara Hills at 672 metres. The city has numerous lakes referred to as sagar, meaning "sea". Examples include artificial lakes created by dams on the Musi, such as Hussain Sagar (built in 1562 near the city centre), Osman Sagar and Himayat Sagar. As of 1996, the city had 140 lakes and 834 water tanks (ponds).

 

CLIMATE

Hyderabad has a tropical wet and dry climate (Köppen Aw) bordering on a hot semi-arid climate (Köppen BSh). The annual mean temperature is 26.6 °C; monthly mean temperatures are 21–33 °C. Summers (March–June) are hot and humid, with average highs in the mid-to-high 30s Celsius; maximum temperatures often exceed 40 °C between April and June. The coolest temperatures occur in December and January, when the lowest temperature occasionally dips to 10 °C. May is the hottest month, when daily temperatures range from 26 to 39 °C; December, the coldest, has temperatures varying from 14.5 to 28 °C.

 

Heavy rain from the south-west summer monsoon falls between June and September, supplying Hyderabad with most of its mean annual rainfall. Since records began in November 1891, the heaviest rainfall recorded in a 24-hour period was 241.5 mm on 24 August 2000. The highest temperature ever recorded was 45.5 °C on 2 June 1966, and the lowest was 6.1 °C on 8 January 1946. The city receives 2,731 hours of sunshine per year; maximum daily sunlight exposure occurs in February.

 

CONSERVATION

Hyderabad's lakes and the sloping terrain of its low-lying hills provide habitat for an assortment of flora and fauna. The forest region in and around the city encompasses areas of ecological and biological importance, which are preserved in the form of national parks, zoos, mini-zoos and a wildlife sanctuary. Nehru Zoological Park, the city's one large zoo, is the first in India to have a lion and tiger safari park. Hyderabad has three national parks (Mrugavani National Park, Mahavir Harina Vanasthali National Park and Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park), and the Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is about 50 km from the city. Hyderabad's other environmental reserves are: Kotla Vijayabhaskara Reddy Botanical Gardens, Shamirpet Lake, Hussain Sagar, Fox Sagar Lake, Mir Alam Tank and Patancheru Lake, which is home to regional birds and attracts seasonal migratory birds from different parts of the world. Organisations engaged in environmental and wildlife preservation include the Telangana Forest Department, Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education, the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), the Animal Welfare Board of India, the Blue Cross of Hyderabad and the University of Hyderabad.

 

ADMINISTRATION

COMMON CAPITAL OF TELANGANA AND ANDHRA PRADESH

According to the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 part 2 Section 5: "On and from the appointed day, Hyderabad in the existing State of Andhra Pradesh, shall be the common capital of the State of Telangana and the State of Andhra Pradesh for such period not exceeding ten years. After expiry of the period referred to in sub-section, Hyderabad shall be the capital of the State of Telangana and there shall be a new capital for the State of Andhra Pradesh."

 

The same sections also define that the common capital includes the existing area designated as the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation under the Hyderabad Municipal Corporation Act, 1955. As stipulated in sections 3 and 18 of the Reorganisation Act, city MLAs are members of Telangana state assembly.

 

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) oversees the civic infrastructure of the city's 18 "circles", which together encompass 150 municipal wards. Each ward is represented by a corporator, elected by popular vote. The corporators elect the Mayor, who is the titular head of GHMC; executive powers rest with the Municipal Commissioner, appointed by the state government. The GHMC carries out the city's infrastructural work such as building and maintenance of roads and drains, town planning including construction regulation, maintenance of municipal markets and parks, solid waste management, the issuing of birth and death certificates, the issuing of trade licences, collection of property tax, and community welfare services such as mother and child healthcare, and pre-school and non-formal education. The GHMC was formed in April 2007 by merging the Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad (MCH) with 12 municipalities of the Hyderabad, Ranga Reddy and Medak districts covering a total area of 625 km2. In the 2009 municipal election, an alliance of the Indian National Congress and Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen formed the majority. The Secunderabad Cantonment Board is a civic administration agency overseeing an area of 40.1 km2, where there are several military camps. The Osmania University campus is administered independently by the university authority.

 

Law and order in Hyderabad city is supervised by the governor of Telangana. The jurisdiction is divided into two police commissionerates: Hyderabad and Cyberabad, which are again divided into four and five police zones respectively. Each zone is headed by a deputy commissioner.

 

The jurisdictions of the city's administrative agencies are, in ascending order of size: the Hyderabad Police area, Hyderabad district, the GHMC area ("Hyderabad city") and the area under the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA). The HMDA is an apolitical urban planning agency that covers the GHMC and its suburbs, extending to 54 mandals in five districts encircling the city. It coordinates the development activities of GHMC and suburban municipalities and manages the administration of bodies such as the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB).

 

As the seat of the government of Telangana, Hyderabad is home to the state's legislature, secretariat and high court, as well as various local government agencies. The Lower City Civil Court and the Metropolitan Criminal Court are under the jurisdiction of the High Court. The GHMC area contains 24 State Legislative Assembly constituencies, which form five constituencies of the Lok Sabha (the lower house of the Parliament of India).

 

UTILITY SERVICES

The HMWSSB regulates rainwater harvesting, sewerage services and water supply, which is sourced from several dams located in the suburbs. In 2005, the HMWSSB started operating a 116-kilometre-long water supply pipeline from Nagarjuna Sagar Dam to meet increasing demand. The Telangana Southern Power Distribution Company Limited manages electricity supply. As of October 2014, there were 15 fire stations in the city, operated by the Telangana State Disaster and Fire Response Department. The government-owned India Post has five head post offices and many sub-post offices in Hyderabad, which are complemented by private courier services.

 

POLLUTION CONTROL

Hyderabad produces around 4,500 tonnes of solid waste daily, which is transported from collection units in Imlibun, Yousufguda and Lower Tank Bund to the dumpsite in Jawaharnagar. Disposal is managed by the Integrated Solid Waste Management project which was started by the GHMC in 2010. Rapid urbanisation and increased economic activity has also led to increased industrial waste, air, noise and water pollution, which is regulated by the Telangana Pollution Control Board (TPCB). The contribution of different sources to air pollution in 2006 was: 20–50% from vehicles, 40–70% from a combination of vehicle discharge and road dust, 10–30% from industrial discharges and 3–10% from the burning of household rubbish. Deaths resulting from atmospheric particulate matter are estimated at 1,700–3,000 each year. Ground water around Hyderabad, which has a hardness of up to 1000 ppm, around three times higher than is desirable, is the main source of drinking water but the increasing population and consequent increase in demand has led to a decline in not only ground water but also river and lake levels. This shortage is further exacerbated by inadequately treated effluent discharged from industrial treatment plants polluting the water sources of the city.

 

HEALTHCARE

The Commissionerate of Health and Family Welfare is responsible for planning, implementation and monitoring of all facilities related to health and preventive services. As of 2010–11, the city had 50 government hospitals, 300 private and charity hospitals and 194 nursing homes providing around 12,000 hospital beds, fewer than half the required 25,000. For every 10,000 people in the city, there are 17.6 hospital beds, 9 specialist doctors, 14 nurses and 6 physicians. The city also has about 4,000 individual clinics and 500 medical diagnostic centres. Private clinics are preferred by many residents because of the distance to, poor quality of care at and long waiting times in government facilities, despite the high proportion of the city's residents being covered by government health insurance: 24% according to a National Family Health Survey in 2005. As of 2012, many new private hospitals of various sizes were opened or being built. Hyderabad also has outpatient and inpatient facilities that use Unani, homeopathic and Ayurvedic treatments.

 

In the 2005 National Family Health Survey, it was reported that the city's total fertility rate is 1.8, which is below the replacement rate. Only 61% of children had been provided with all basic vaccines (BCG, measles and full courses of polio and DPT), fewer than in all other surveyed cities except Meerut. The infant mortality rate was 35 per 1,000 live births, and the mortality rate for children under five was 41 per 1,000 live births. The survey also reported that a third of women and a quarter of men are overweight or obese, 49% of children below 5 years are anaemic, and up to 20% of children are underweight, while more than 2% of women and 3% of men suffer from diabetes.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

When the GHMC was created in 2007, the area occupied by the municipality increased from 175 km2 to 625 km2. Consequently, the population increased by 87%, from 3,637,483 in the 2001 census to 6,809,970 in the 2011 census, 24% of which are migrants from elsewhere in India, making Hyderabad the nation's fourth most populous city. As of 2011, the population density is 18,480/km2. At the same 2011 census, the Hyderabad Urban Agglomeration had a population of 7,749,334, making it the sixth most populous urban agglomeration in the country. The population of the Hyderabad urban agglomeration has since been estimated by electoral officials to be 9.1 million as of early 2013 but is expected to exceed 10 million by the end of the year. There are 3,500,802 male and 3,309,168 female citizens - a sex ratio of 945 females per 1000 males, higher than the national average of 926 per 1000. Among children aged 0–6 years, 373,794 are boys and 352,022 are girls - a ratio of 942 per 1000. Literacy stands at 82.96% (male 85.96%; female 79.79%), higher than the national average of 74.04%. The socio-economic strata consist of 20% upper class, 50% middle class and 30% working class.

 

ETHNIC GROUPS, LANGUAGE AND RELIGION

Referred to as "Hyderabadi", residents of Hyderabad are predominantly Telugu and Urdu speaking people, with minority Bengali, Gujarati (including Memon), Kannada (including Nawayathi), Malayalam, Marathi, Marwari, Odia, Punjabi, Tamil and Uttar Pradeshi communities. Hadhrami Arabs, African Arabs, Armenians, Abyssinians, Iranians, Pathans and Turkish people are also present; these communities, of which the Hadhrami are the largest, declined after Hyderabad State became part of the Indian Union, as they lost the patronage of the Nizams.

 

Telugu is the official language of Hyderabad and Urdu is its second language. The Telugu dialect spoken in Hyderabad is called Telangana, and the Urdu spoken is called Dakhani. English is also used. A significant minority speak other languages, including Hindi, Marathi, Odia, Tamil, Bengali and Kannada.

 

Hindus are in the majority. Muslims are present throughout the city and predominate in and around the Old City. There are also Christian, Sikh, Jain, Buddhist and Parsi communities and iconic temples, mosques and churches can be seen. According to the 2001 census, Hyderabad district's religious make-up was: Hindus (55.41%), Muslims (41.17%), Christians (2.43%), Jains (0.43%), Sikhs (0.29%) and Buddhists (0.02%); 0.23% did not state any religion.

 

SLUMS

In the greater metropolitan area, 13% of the population live below the poverty line. According to a 2012 report submitted by GHMC to the World Bank, Hyderabad has 1,476 slums with a total population of 1.7 million, of whom 66% live in 985 slums in the "core" of the city (the part that formed Hyderabad before the April 2007 expansion) and the remaining 34% live in 491 suburban tenements. About 22% of the slum-dwelling households had migrated from different parts of India in the last decade of the 20th century, and 63% claimed to have lived in the slums for more than 10 years. Overall literacy in the slums is 60–80% and female literacy is 52–73%. A third of the slums have basic service connections, and the remainder depend on general public services provided by the government. There are 405 government schools, 267 government aided schools, 175 private schools and 528 community halls in the slum areas. According to a 2008 survey by the Centre for Good Governance, 87.6% of the slum-dwelling households are nuclear families, 18% are very poor, with an income up to ₹20000 (US$300) per annum, 73% live below the poverty line (a standard poverty line recognised by the Andhra Pradesh Government is ₹24000 (US$360) per annum), 27% of the chief wage earners (CWE) are casual labour and 38% of the CWE are illiterate. About 3.72% of the slum children aged 5–14 do not go to school and 3.17% work as child labour, of whom 64% are boys and 36% are girls. The largest employers of child labour are street shops and construction sites. Among the working children, 35% are engaged in hazardous jobs.

 

NEIGHBOURHOODS

The historic city established by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah on the southern side of the Musi River forms the "Old City", while the "New City" encompasses the urbanised area on the northern banks. The two are connected by many bridges across the river, the oldest of which is Purana Pul ("old bridge"). Hyderabad is twinned with neighbouring Secunderabad, to which it is connected by Hussain Sagar.

 

Many historic and tourist sites lie in south central Hyderabad, such as the Charminar, the Mecca Masjid, the Salar Jung Museum, the Nizam's Museum, the Falaknuma Palace, and the traditional retail corridor comprising the Pearl Market, Laad Bazaar and Madina Circle. North of the river are hospitals, colleges, major railway stations and business areas such as Begum Bazaar, Koti, Abids, Sultan Bazaar and Moazzam Jahi Market, along with administrative and recreational establishments such as the Reserve Bank of India, the Telangana Secretariat, the Hyderabad Mint, the Telangana Legislature, the Public Gardens, the Nizam Club, the Ravindra Bharathi, the State Museum, the Birla Temple and the Birla Planetarium.

 

North of central Hyderabad lie Hussain Sagar, Tank Bund Road, Rani Gunj and the Secunderabad Railway Station. Most of the city's parks and recreational centres, such as Sanjeevaiah Park, Indira Park, Lumbini Park, NTR Gardens, the Buddha statue and Tankbund Park are located here. In the northwest part of the city there are upscale residential and commercial areas such as Banjara Hills, Jubilee Hills, Begumpet, Khairatabad and Miyapur. The northern end contains industrial areas such as Sanathnagar, Moosapet, Balanagar, Patancheru and Chanda Nagar. The northeast end is dotted with residential areas. In the eastern part of the city lie many defence research centres and Ramoji Film City. The "Cyberabad" area in the southwest and west of the city has grown rapidly since the 1990s. It is home to information technology and bio-pharmaceutical companies and to landmarks such as Hyderabad Airport, Osman Sagar, Himayath Sagar and Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park.

 

LANDMARKS

Heritage buildings constructed during the Qutb Shahi and Nizam eras showcase Indo-Islamic architecture influenced by Medieval, Mughal and European styles. After the 1908 flooding of the Musi River, the city was expanded and civic monuments constructed, particularly during the rule of Mir Osman Ali Khan (the VIIth Nizam), whose patronage of architecture led to him being referred to as the maker of modern Hyderabad. In 2012, the government of India declared Hyderabad the first "Best heritage city of India".

 

Qutb Shahi architecture of the 16th and early 17th centuries followed classical Persian architecture featuring domes and colossal arches. The oldest surviving Qutb Shahi structure in Hyderabad is the ruins of Golconda fort built in the 16th century. The Charminar, Mecca Masjid, Charkaman and Qutb Shahi tombs are other existing structures of this period. Among these the Charminar has become an icon of the city; located in the centre of old Hyderabad, it is a square structure with sides 20 m long and four grand arches each facing a road. At each corner stands a 56 m-high minaret. Most of the historical bazaars that still exist were constructed on the street north of Charminar towards Golconda fort. The Charminar, Qutb Shahi tombs and Golconda fort are considered to be monuments of national importance in India; in 2010 the Indian government proposed that the sites be listed for UNESCO World Heritage status.

 

Among the oldest surviving examples of Nizam architecture in Hyderabad is the Chowmahalla Palace, which was the seat of royal power. It showcases a diverse array of architectural styles, from the Baroque Harem to its Neoclassical royal court. The other palaces include Falaknuma Palace (inspired by the style of Andrea Palladio), Purani Haveli, King Kothi and Bella Vista Palace all of which were built at the peak of Nizam rule in the 19th century. During Mir Osman Ali Khan's rule, European styles, along with Indo-Islamic, became prominent. These styles are reflected in the Falaknuma Palace and many civic monuments such as the Hyderabad High Court, Osmania Hospital, Osmania University, the State Central Library, City College, the Telangana Legislature, the State Archaeology Museum, Jubilee Hall, and Hyderabad and Kachiguda railway stations. Other landmarks of note are Paigah Palace, Asman Garh Palace, Basheer Bagh Palace, Errum Manzil and the Spanish Mosque, all constructed by the Paigah family.

 

ECONOMY

Hyderabad is the largest contributor to the gross domestic product (GDP), tax and other revenues, of Telangana, and the sixth largest deposit centre and fourth largest credit centre nationwide, as ranked by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in June 2012. Its US$74 billion GDP made it the fifth-largest contributor city to India's overall GDP in 2011–12. Its per capita annual income in 2011 was ₹44300 (US$670). As of 2006, the largest employers in the city were the governments of Andhra Pradesh (113,098 employees) and India (85,155). According to a 2005 survey, 77% of males and 19% of females in the city were employed. The service industry remains dominant in the city, and 90% of the employed workforce is engaged in this sector.

 

Hyderabad's role in the pearl trade has given it the name "City of Pearls" and up until the 18th century, the city was also the only global trading centre for large diamonds. Industrialisation began under the Nizams in the late 19th century, helped by railway expansion that connected the city with major ports. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Indian enterprises, such as Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL), Nuclear Fuel Complex (NFC), National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC), Bharat Electronics (BEL), Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL), Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Centre for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics (CDFD), State Bank of Hyderabad (SBH) and Andhra Bank (AB) were established in the city. The city is home to Hyderabad Securities formerly known as Hyderabad Stock Exchange (HSE), and houses the regional office of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). In 2013, the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) facility in Hyderabad was forecasted to provide operations and transactions services to BSE-Mumbai by the end of 2014. The growth of the financial services sector has helped Hyderabad evolve from a traditional manufacturing city to a cosmopolitan industrial service centre. Since the 1990s, the growth of information technology (IT), IT-enabled services (ITES), insurance and financial institutions has expanded the service sector, and these primary economic activities have boosted the ancillary sectors of trade and commerce, transport, storage, communication, real estate and retail.

 

Hyderabad's commercial markets are divided into four sectors: central business districts, sub-central business centres, neighbourhood business centres and local business centres. Many traditional and historic bazaars are located throughout the city, Laad Bazaar being the prominent among all is popular for selling a variety of traditional and cultural antique wares, along with gems and pearls.

 

The establishment of Indian Drugs and Pharmaceuticals Limited (IDPL), a public sector undertaking, in 1961 was followed over the decades by many national and global companies opening manufacturing and research facilities in the city. As of 2010, the city manufactured one third of India's bulk drugs and 16% of biotechnology products, contributing to its reputation as "India's pharmaceutical capital" and the "Genome Valley of India". Hyderabad is a global centre of information technology, for which it is known as Cyberabad (Cyber City). As of 2013, it contributed 15% of India's and 98% of Andhra Pradesh's exports in IT and ITES sectors and 22% of NASSCOM's total membership is from the city. The development of HITEC City, a township with extensive technological infrastructure, prompted multinational companies to establish facilities in Hyderabad. The city is home to more than 1300 IT and ITES firms, including global conglomerates such as Microsoft (operating its largest R&D campus outside the US), Google, IBM, Yahoo!, Dell, Facebook, and major Indian firms including Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Polaris and Wipro. In 2009 the World Bank Group ranked the city as the second best Indian city for doing business. The city and its suburbs contain the highest number of special economic zones of any Indian city.

 

Like the rest of India, Hyderabad has a large informal economy that employs 30% of the labour force. According to a survey published in 2007, it had 40–50,000 street vendors, and their numbers were increasing. Among the street vendors, 84% are male and 16% female, and four fifths are "stationary vendors" operating from a fixed pitch, often with their own stall. Most are financed through personal savings; only 8% borrow from moneylenders. Vendor earnings vary from ₹50 (75¢ US) to ₹800 (US$12) per day. Other unorganised economic sectors include dairy, poultry farming, brick manufacturing, casual labour and domestic help. Those involved in the informal economy constitute a major portion of urban poor.

 

CULTURE

Hyderabad emerged as the foremost centre of culture in India with the decline of the Mughal Empire. After the fall of Delhi in 1857, the migration of performing artists to the city particularly from the north and west of the Indian sub continent, under the patronage of the Nizam, enriched the cultural milieu. This migration resulted in a mingling of North and South Indian languages, cultures and religions, which has since led to a co-existence of Hindu and Muslim traditions, for which the city has become noted. A further consequence of this north–south mix is that both Telugu and Urdu are official languages of Telangana.[164] The mixing of religions has also resulted in many festivals being celebrated in Hyderabad such as Ganesh Chaturthi, Diwali and Bonalu of Hindu tradition and Eid ul-Fitr and Eid al-Adha by Muslims.

 

Traditional Hyderabadi garb also reveals a mix of Muslim and South Asian influences with men wearing sherwani and kurta - paijama and women wearing khara dupatta and salwar kameez. Muslim women also commonly wear burqas and hijabs in public. In addition to the traditional Indian and Muslim garments, increasing exposure to western cultures has led to a rise in the wearing of western style clothing among youths.

 

LITERATURE

In the past, Qutb Shahi rulers and Nizams attracted artists, architects and men of letters from different parts of the world through patronage. The resulting ethnic mix popularised cultural events such as mushairas (poetic symposia). The Qutb Shahi dynasty particularly encouraged the growth of Deccani Urdu literature leading to works such as the Deccani Masnavi and Diwan poetry, which are among the earliest available manuscripts in Urdu. Lazzat Un Nisa, a book compiled in the 15th century at Qutb Shahi courts, contains erotic paintings with diagrams for secret medicines and stimulants in the eastern form of ancient sexual arts. The reign of the Nizams saw many literary reforms and the introduction of Urdu as a language of court, administration and education. In 1824, a collection of Urdu Ghazal poetry, named Gulzar-e-Mahlaqa, authored by Mah Laqa Bai - the first female Urdu poet to produce a Diwan - was published in Hyderabad.

 

Hyderabad has continued with these traditions in its annual Hyderabad Literary Festival, held since 2010, showcasing the city's literary and cultural creativity. Organisations engaged in the advancement of literature include the Sahitya Akademi, the Urdu Academy, the Telugu Academy, the National Council for Promotion of Urdu Language, the Comparative Literature Association of India, and the Andhra Saraswata Parishad. Literary development is further aided by state institutions such as the State Central Library, the largest public library in the state which was established in 1891, and other major libraries including the Sri Krishna Devaraya Andhra Bhasha Nilayam, the British Library and the Sundarayya Vignana Kendram.

 

MUSIC AND FILMS

South Indian music and dances such as the Kuchipudi and Kathakali styles are popular in the Deccan region. As a result of their culture policies, North Indian music and dance gained popularity during the rule of the Mughals and Nizams, and it was also during their reign that it became a tradition among the nobility to associate themselves with tawaif (courtesans). These courtesans were revered as the epitome of etiquette and culture, and were appointed to teach singing, poetry and classical dance to many children of the aristocracy. This gave rise to certain styles of court music, dance and poetry. Besides western and Indian popular music genres such as filmi music, the residents of Hyderabad play city-based marfa music, dholak ke geet (household songs based on local Folklore), and qawwali, especially at weddings, festivals and other celebratory events. The state government organises the Golconda Music and Dance Festival, the Taramati Music Festival and the Premavathi Dance Festival to further encourage the development of music.

 

Although the city is not particularly noted for theatre and drama, the state government promotes theatre with multiple programmes and festivals in such venues as the Ravindra Bharati, Shilpakala Vedika and Lalithakala Thoranam. Although not a purely music oriented event, Numaish, a popular annual exhibition of local and national consumer products, does feature some musical performances. The city is home to the Telugu film industry, popularly known as Tollywood and as of 2012, produces the second largest number of films in India with the largest number being produced by Bollywood. Films in the local Hyderabadi dialect are also produced and have been gaining popularity since 2005. The city has also hosted international film festivals such as the International Children's Film Festival and the Hyderabad International Film Festival. In 2005, Guinness World Records declared Ramoji Film City to be the world's largest film studio.

 

ART AND HANDICRAFTS

The region is well known for its Golconda and Hyderabad painting styles which are branches of Deccani painting. Developed during the 16th century, the Golconda style is a native style blending foreign techniques and bears some similarity to the Vijayanagara paintings of neighbouring Mysore. A significant use of luminous gold and white colours is generally found in the Golconda style. The Hyderabad style originated in the 17th century under the Nizams. Highly influenced by Mughal painting, this style makes use of bright colours and mostly depicts regional landscape, culture, costumes and jewellery.

 

Although not a centre for handicrafts itself, the patronage of the arts by the Mughals and Nizams attracted artisans from the region to Hyderabad. Such crafts include: Bidriware, a metalwork handicraft from neighbouring Karnataka, which was popularised during the 18th century and has since been granted a Geographical Indication (GI) tag under the auspices of the WTO act; and Zari and Zardozi, embroidery works on textile that involve making elaborate designs using gold, silver and other metal threads. Another example of a handicraft drawn to Hyderabad is Kalamkari, a hand-painted or block-printed cotton textile that comes from cities in Andhra Pradesh. This craft is distinguished in having both a Hindu style, known as Srikalahasti and entirely done by hand, and an Islamic style, known as Machilipatnam that uses both hand and block techniques. Examples of Hyderabad's arts and crafts are housed in various museums including the Salar Jung Museum (housing "one of the largest one-man-collections in the world"), the AP State Archaeology Museum, the Nizam Museum, the City Museum and the Birla Science Museum.

 

CUISINE

Hyderabadi cuisine comprises a broad repertoire of rice, wheat and meat dishes and the skilled use of various spices. Hyderabadi biryani and Hyderabadi haleem, with their blend of Mughlai and Arab cuisines, have become iconic dishes of India. Hyderabadi cuisine is highly influenced by Mughlai and to some extent by French, Arabic, Turkish, Iranian and native Telugu and Marathwada cuisines. Other popular native dishes include nihari, chakna, baghara baingan and the desserts qubani ka meetha, double ka meetha and kaddu ki kheer (a sweet porridge made with sweet gourd).

 

MEDIA

One of Hyderabad's earliest newspapers, The Deccan Times, was established in the 1780s. In modern times, the major Telugu dailies published in Hyderabad are Eenadu, Andhra Jyothy, Sakshi and Namaste Telangana, while the major English papers are The Times of India, The Hindu and The Deccan Chronicle, and the major Urdu papers include The Siasat Daily, The Munsif Daily and Etemaad. Many coffee table magazines, professional magazines and research journals are also regularly published. The Secunderabad Cantonment Board established the first radio station in Hyderabad State around 1919. Deccan Radio was the first radio public broadcast station in the city starting on 3 February 1935, with FM broadcasting beginning in 2000. The available channels in Hyderabad include All India Radio, Radio Mirchi, Radio City, Red FM and Big FM.

 

Television broadcasting in Hyderabad began in 1974 with the launch of Doordarshan, the Government of India's public service broadcaster, which transmits two free-to-air terrestrial television channels and one satellite channel. Private satellite channels started in July 1992 with the launch of Star TV. Satellite TV channels are accessible via cable subscription, direct-broadcast satellite services or internet-based television. Hyderabad's first dial-up internet access became available in the early 1990s and was limited to software development companies. The first public internet access service began in 1995, with the first private sector internet service provider (ISP) starting operations in 1998. In 2015, high-speed public WiFi was introduced in parts of the city.

 

EDUCATION

Public and private schools in Hyderabad are governed by the Central Board of Secondary Education and follow a "10+2+3" plan. About two-thirds of pupils attend privately run institutions. Languages of instruction include English, Hindi, Telugu and Urdu. Depending on the institution, students are required to sit the Secondary School Certificate or the Indian Certificate of Secondary Education. After completing secondary education, students enroll in schools or junior colleges with a higher secondary facility. Admission to professional graduation colleges in Hyderabad, many of which are affiliated with either Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Hyderabad (JNTUH) or Osmania University (OU), is through the Engineering Agricultural and Medical Common Entrance Test (EAM-CET).There are 13 universities in Hyderabad: two private universities, two deemed universities, six state universities and three central universities. The central universities are the University of Hyderabad, Maulana Azad National Urdu University and the English and Foreign Languages University. Osmania University, established in 1918, was the first university in Hyderabad and as of 2012 is India's second most popular institution for international students. The Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Open University, established in 1982, is the first distance learning open university in India.

 

Hyderabad is also home to a number of centres specialising in particular fields such as biomedical sciences, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, such as the National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER) and National Institute of Nutrition (NIN). Hyderabad has five major medical schools - Osmania Medical College, Gandhi Medical College, Nizam's Institute of Medical Sciences, Deccan College of Medical Sciences and Shadan Institute of Medical Sciences - and many affiliated teaching hospitals. The Government Nizamia Tibbi College is a college of Unani medicine. Hyderabad is also the headquarters of the Indian Heart Association, a non-profit foundation for cardiovascular education.

 

Institutes in Hyderabad include the National Institute of Rural Development, the Indian School of Business, the Institute of Public Enterprise, the Administrative Staff College of India and the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy. Technical and engineering schools include the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad (IIITH), Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani – Hyderabad (BITS Hyderabad) and Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad (IIT-H) as well as agricultural engineering institutes such as the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and the Acharya N. G. Ranga Agricultural University. Hyderabad also has schools of fashion design including Raffles Millennium International, NIFT Hyderabad and Wigan and Leigh College. The National Institute of Design, Hyderabad (NID-H), will offer undergraduate and postgraduate courses from 2015.

 

SPORTS

The most popular sports played in Hyderabad are cricket and association football. At the professional level, the city has hosted national and international sports events such as the 2002 National Games of India, the 2003 Afro-Asian Games, the 2004 AP Tourism Hyderabad Open women's tennis tournament, the 2007 Military World Games, the 2009 World Badminton Championships and the 2009 IBSF World Snooker Championship. The city hosts a number of venues suitable for professional competition such as the Swarnandhra Pradesh Sports Complex for field hockey, the G. M. C. Balayogi Stadium in Gachibowli for athletics and football, and for cricket, the Lal Bahadur Shastri Stadium and Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium, home ground of the Hyderabad Cricket Association. Hyderabad has hosted many international cricket matches, including matches in the 1987 and the 1996 ICC Cricket World Cups. The Hyderabad cricket team represents the city in the Ranji Trophy - a first-class cricket tournament among India's states and cities. Hyderabad is also home to the Indian Premier League franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad. A previous franchise was the Deccan Chargers, which won the 2009 Indian Premier League held in South Africa.

 

During British rule, Secunderabad became a well-known sporting centre and many race courses, parade grounds and polo fields were built. Many elite clubs formed by the Nizams and the British such as the Secunderabad Club, the Nizam Club and the Hyderabad Race Club, which is known for its horse racing especially the annual Deccan derby, still exist. In more recent times, motorsports has become popular with the Andhra Pradesh Motor Sports Club organising popular events such as the Deccan 1/4 Mile Drag, TSD Rallies and 4x4 off-road rallying.

 

International-level sportspeople from Hyderabad include: cricketers Ghulam Ahmed, M. L. Jaisimha, Mohammed Azharuddin, V. V. S. Laxman, Venkatapathy Raju, Shivlal Yadav, Arshad Ayub and Noel David; football players Syed Abdul Rahim, Syed Nayeemuddin and Shabbir Ali; tennis player Sania Mirza; badminton players S. M. Arif, Pullela Gopichand, Saina Nehwal, P. V. Sindhu, Jwala Gutta and Chetan Anand; hockey players Syed Mohammad Hadi and Mukesh Kumar; rifle shooters Gagan Narang and Asher Noria and bodybuilder Mir Mohtesham Ali Khan.

 

TRANSPORT

The most commonly used forms of medium distance transport in Hyderabad include government owned services such as light railways and buses, as well as privately operated taxis and auto rickshaws. Bus services operate from the Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station in the city centre and carry over 130 million passengers daily across the entire network. Hyderabad's light rail transportation system, the Multi-Modal Transport System (MMTS), is a three line suburban rail service used by over 160,000 passengers daily. Complementing these government services are minibus routes operated by Setwin (Society for Employment Promotion & Training in Twin Cities). Intercity rail services also operate from Hyderabad; the main, and largest, station is Secunderabad Railway Station, which serves as Indian Railways' South Central Railway zone headquarters and a hub for both buses and MMTS light rail services connecting Secunderabad and Hyderabad. Other major railway stations in Hyderabad are Hyderabad Deccan Station, Kachiguda Railway Station, Begumpet Railway Station, Malkajgiri Railway Station and Lingampally Railway Station. The Hyderabad Metro, a new rapid transit system, is to be added to the existing public transport infrastructure and is scheduled to operate three lines by 2015. As of 2012, there are over 3.5 million vehicles operating in the city, of which 74% are two-wheelers, 15% cars and 3% three-wheelers. The remaining 8% include buses, goods vehicles and taxis. The large number of vehicles coupled with relatively low road coverage - roads occupy only 9.5% of the total city area - has led to widespread traffic congestion especially since 80% of passengers and 60% of freight are transported by road. The Inner Ring Road, the Outer Ring Road, the Hyderabad Elevated Expressway, the longest flyover in India, and various interchanges, overpasses and underpasses were built to ease the congestion. Maximum speed limits within the city are 50 km/h for two-wheelers and cars, 35 km/h for auto rickshaws and 40 km/h for light commercial vehicles and buses.

 

Hyderabad sits at the junction of three National Highways linking it to six other states: NH-7 runs 2,369 km from Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, in the north to Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu, in the south; NH-9, runs 841 km east-west between Machilipatnam, Andhra Pradesh, and Pune, Maharashtra; and the 280 km NH-163 links Hyderabad to Bhopalpatnam, Chhattisgarh. Five state highways, SH-1, SH-2, SH-4, SH-5 and SH-6, either start from, or pass through, Hyderabad.

 

Air traffic was previously handled via Begumpet Airport, but this was replaced by Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA) (IATA: HYD, ICAO: VOHS) in 2008, with the capacity of handling 12 million passengers and 100,000 tonnes of cargo per annum. In 2011, Airports Council International, an autonomous body representing the world's airports, judged RGIA the world's best airport in the 5–15 million passenger category and the world's fifth best airport for service quality.

 

WIKIPEDIA

 

Once land was surveyed and sold, the first farmers started arriving in the area around 1875 settling their 640 acre blocks. Fortunately in that year 29 inches of rain fell (725 mm) and the season was excellent. Goyder’s Line seemed unnecessary and restrictive. On average Orroroo has 325 mm of rain a year. Unlike other places further north the rainfall is more reliable in Orroroo than places like Carrieton or Cradock. The nearby Pekina Ranges help with this.

 

Orroroo township had some early origins. It was a stopping point on the early Blinman to Burra copper route for transporting Blinman copper down to Burra for smelting. A small refreshment structure was built on Pekina Creek in the mid 1860s. The current township was surveyed in 1875 and named at the suggestion of this refreshment shanty owner. It is an Aboriginal word meaning “wind in the trees.” Land sales started in 1876 and the erection of buildings began in 1878. The Orroroo Hotel opened around 1877 followed by the Commercial Hotel in 1878. A general store opened and a three storey flour mill was also erected in 1878. Wheat from the Orroroo area was always highly prized as the high altitude (528 metres or 1,735 feet), cold winters, and dry spring made for a hard, high protein wheat. (Today this wheat is used for frozen products like frozen bread dough etc). The flour mill in Orroroo was modernized as the years went by and it survived until 1945 before being destroyed by fire. Flour from Orroroo was later sent by rail to Broken Hill for sale there. The town progressed quickly and in the 1881 census Orroroo had 314 residents. Today Orroroo has a population of 550 people.

 

1881 was a crucial year in the town’s development for the government was considering options for rail routes in the north for the new farmers. One option was a rail line from Port Germein up through the Germein Gorge to Murraytown and across the plains to Booleroo Centre and Orroroo. This line would have continued the government policy of sending lines inland from the ports such as Augusta, Pirie, Broughton, Wakefield, Robe etc. In the end the government took a different option with a line from Peterborough north to Orroroo in 1881. This line went further north to Eurelia and Carrieton before travelling via Hammond and Bruce (both now ghost towns) to Quorn where it linked with the rail line already linking Quorn with Port Augusta through Pichi Richi Gorge. The advantage of this line was that it linked several inland routes with a rail line to Port Adelaide.

 

Apart from wheat the other industry which provided much wealth (and population) to the town and immediate district was dairying. In 1906 Pekina Creek was dammed and an irrigation scheme established. Water was piped to 40 dairy farms on the eastern flats below the town of Orroroo. Lucerne was irrigated for fodder for the dairy cows. This explains the wealth and prosperity of Orroroo in the 1920s and 1930s. Some dairies still existed in the 1970s but they are gone now. Because of this scheme the butter factory, a fine stone structure, was opened in 1907 and the product produced was known as Walloway Butter. Butter was exported to London, but about 70% of it went to Broken Hill. In 1919 the factory was taken over by South Australian Farmers’ Cooperative Union, later Farmers Union. The factory you can still see today was built at this time for £8,000. It opened in 1921. The butter factory closed in 1971 and milk was then dispatched to Gawler by road.

 

The other major town industries were the Enterprise Newspaper and printing works established in 1892, (it ceased production in Orroroo in 1970 and was then produced in Peterborough) and Richard Parnell’s blacksmith and wheelwright business. Parnell’s started producing agricultural implements in Orroroo and Walloway in 1880. Their forge was always busy producing carriages, bullock drays, buggies, sulkies and wagons. Keeping abreast of the times Parnell’s established a motor garage in 1914 and began selling Model T Fords. Eventually Parnell’s moved into road transportation. All these businesses in the town were boosted greatly with the arrival of the railway in 1881 as it pushed its way north to Quorn. Until 1937 and the completion of the new line from Adelaide to Port Pirie, Orroroo was on the main rail line to Perth and Alice Springs. Leigh Creek brown coal was also shipped through the town until the early 1950s and the establishment of the first power station in Port Augusta.

 

Back in the main street department stores were established in the 1890s and the Institute opened in 1880 and at the same time a Post Office opened. The Institute was upgraded and renamed as the Soldiers Memorial Hall in 1924. Orroroo School opened in 1880. It eventually became a higher Primary school in 1916 and an Area School in 1962. The main street businesses included stock and station agents because Orroroo had a large regional livestock market. A branch of the National Bank opened in 1878 in a house. Next came the Savings Bank of SA in 1881. Like many SA towns Orroroo got a new Savings Bank in 1936 as part of the SA centenary celebrations. One well known business was that of the misses Toop. The three sister carried on a dressmaking extraordinaire business for many years. They had clients across SA. Other members of the Toop family established a Buick car agency in the town in 1922.

 

Like all growing towns Orroroo soon had its own churches. The Primitive Methodists built the first church in 1876 but soon proposed to sell it to the Baptist Church in 1878. This fell through and it was sold to the Catholic Church in 1881. The first Wesleyan Methodist Church was opened in 1882. The present day Uniting Church was constructed as the Methodist Church in 1911, The Sunday School was built in 1934 in a classical revival style which is unusual for Orroroo. The present day Catholic Church was opened in 1926. The almost strange Anglican Church in Mediterranean style was opened in 1920. Prior to this the Anglicans had a small church that had been built in 1879.

 

Orroroo was unusual in that it had a Light Horse Troop based in the town. Prior to Federation SA was responsible for its own armed services. The Orroroo Light Horse Troop become part of the 17th Australian Light Horse Regiment and many members from Orroroo served in the First World War. After World War One the Orroroo troop became a part of the 9th Light Horse Regiment.

 

Three Maasai Men in Maasai Mara in Kenya.

 

Maasai are a Nilotic ethnic group inhabiting central and southern Kenya and northern Tanzania. They are among the best known local populations due to their residence near the many game parks of the African Great Lakes, and their distinctive customs and dress. The Maasai speak the Maa language (ɔl Maa), a member of the Nilo-Saharan family that is related to Dinka and Nuer languages. Some have become educated in the official languages of Kenya and Tanzania, Swahili and English. The Maasai population has been reported as numbering 841,622 in Kenya in the 2009 census, compared to 377,089 in the 1989 census.

 

The Tanzanian and Kenyan governments have instituted programs to encourage the Maasai to abandon their traditional semi-nomadic lifestyle, but the people have continued their age-old customs. An Oxfam study has suggested that the Maasai could pass on traditional survival skills such as the ability to produce food in deserts and scrublands that could help populations adapt to climate change. Many Maasai tribes throughout Tanzania and Kenya welcome visits to their villages to experience their culture, traditions, and lifestyle, in return for a fee. They are considered one of the tallest people in the world, with an average height of 6 ft 3 inches according to some reports. Wikipedia.

 

A Ferrari F430 outside the Ferrari dealership in Geneva.

Our Fiat hire car was not quite this good.

Many 20 second exposures, averaged

July 2011 Update: Due to popular demand, I am building this ecommerce dashboard into a subscription based product anyone can use for their ecommerce site. Launch details at edash.tv

 

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Older:

 

A work in progress, this is a real-time sales dashboard for cincottachemist.com.au

 

The goal is to provide an at-a-glance view on where sales are for the day, trending product and searches and visibility over order queues.

 

Note: I have set numbers to zero or blurred terms for confidentiality reasons.

 

Check out the notes above for information on what we're tracking.

 

I should also give props to Panic. While I have done a few dashboards in my time I definitely took some inspiration from their status screen -- it also motivated me to make some progress on this project.

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway , is a Nordic , European country and an independent state in the west of the Scandinavian Peninsula . Geographically speaking, the country is long and narrow, and on the elongated coast towards the North Atlantic are Norway's well-known fjords . The Kingdom of Norway includes the main country (the mainland with adjacent islands within the baseline ), Jan Mayen and Svalbard . With these two Arctic areas, Norway covers a land area of ​​385,000 km² and has a population of approximately 5.5 million (2023). Mainland Norway borders Sweden in the east , Finland and Russia in the northeast .

 

Norway is a parliamentary democracy and constitutional monarchy , where Harald V has been king and head of state since 1991 , and Jonas Gahr Støre ( Ap ) has been prime minister since 2021 . Norway is a unitary state , with two administrative levels below the state: counties and municipalities . The Sami part of the population has, through the Sami Parliament and the Finnmark Act , to a certain extent self-government and influence over traditionally Sami areas. Although Norway has rejected membership of the European Union through two referendums , through the EEA Agreement Norway has close ties with the Union, and through NATO with the United States . Norway is a significant contributor to the United Nations (UN), and has participated with soldiers in several foreign operations mandated by the UN. Norway is among the states that have participated from the founding of the UN , NATO , the Council of Europe , the OSCE and the Nordic Council , and in addition to these is a member of the EEA , the World Trade Organization , the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and is part of the Schengen area .

 

Norway is rich in many natural resources such as oil , gas , minerals , timber , seafood , fresh water and hydropower . Since the beginning of the 20th century, these natural conditions have given the country the opportunity for an increase in wealth that few other countries can now enjoy, and Norwegians have the second highest average income in the world, measured in GDP per capita, as of 2022. The petroleum industry accounts for around 14% of Norway's gross domestic product as of 2018. Norway is the world's largest producer of oil and gas per capita outside the Middle East. However, the number of employees linked to this industry fell from approx. 232,000 in 2013 to 207,000 in 2015.

 

In Norway, these natural resources have been managed for socially beneficial purposes. The country maintains a welfare model in line with the other Nordic countries. Important service areas such as health and higher education are state-funded, and the country has an extensive welfare system for its citizens. Public expenditure in 2018 is approx. 50% of GDP, and the majority of these expenses are related to education, healthcare, social security and welfare. Since 2001 and until 2021, when the country took second place, the UN has ranked Norway as the world's best country to live in . From 2010, Norway is also ranked at the top of the EIU's democracy index . Norway ranks third on the UN's World Happiness Report for the years 2016–2018, behind Finland and Denmark , a report published in March 2019.

 

The majority of the population is Nordic. In the last couple of years, immigration has accounted for more than half of population growth. The five largest minority groups are Norwegian-Poles , Lithuanians , Norwegian-Swedes , Norwegian-Syrians including Syrian Kurds and Norwegian-Pakistani .

 

Norway's national day is 17 May, on this day in 1814 the Norwegian Constitution was dated and signed by the presidency of the National Assembly at Eidsvoll . It is stipulated in the law of 26 April 1947 that 17 May are national public holidays. The Sami national day is 6 February. "Yes, we love this country" is Norway's national anthem, the song was written in 1859 by Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (1832–1910).

 

Norway's history of human settlement goes back at least 10,000 years, to the Late Paleolithic , the first period of the Stone Age . Archaeological finds of settlements along the entire Norwegian coast have so far been dated back to 10,400 before present (BP), the oldest find is today considered to be a settlement at Pauler in Brunlanes , Vestfold .

For a period these settlements were considered to be the remains of settlers from Doggerland , an area which today lies beneath the North Sea , but which was once a land bridge connecting today's British Isles with Danish Jutland . But the archaeologists who study the initial phase of the settlement in what is today Norway reckon that the first people who came here followed the coast along what is today Bohuslân. That they arrived in some form of boat is absolutely certain, and there is much evidence that they could easily move over large distances.

 

Since the last Ice Age, there has been continuous settlement in Norway. It cannot be ruled out that people lived in Norway during the interglacial period , but no trace of such a population or settlement has been found.

 

The Stone Age lasted a long time; half of the time that our country has been populated. There are no written accounts of what life was like back then. The knowledge we have has been painstakingly collected through investigations of places where people have stayed and left behind objects that we can understand have been processed by human hands. This field of knowledge is called archaeology . The archaeologists interpret their findings and the history of the surrounding landscape. In our country, the uplift after the Ice Age is fundamental. The history of the settlements at Pauler is no more than fifteen years old.

 

The Fosna culture settled parts of Norway sometime between 10,000–8,000 BC. (see Stone Age in Norway ). The dating of rock carvings is set to Neolithic times (in Norway between 4000 BC to 1700 BC) and show activities typical of hunters and gatherers .

 

Agriculture with livestock and arable farming was introduced in the Neolithic. Swad farming where the farmers move when the field does not produce the expected yield.

 

More permanent and persistent farm settlements developed in the Bronze Age (1700 BC to 500 BC) and the Iron Age . The earliest runes have been found on an arrowhead dated to around 200 BC. Many more inscriptions are dated to around 800, and a number of petty kingdoms developed during these centuries. In prehistoric times, there were no fixed national borders in the Nordic countries and Norway did not exist as a state. The population in Norway probably fell to year 0.

 

Events in this time period, the centuries before the year 1000, are glimpsed in written sources. Although the sagas were written down in the 13th century, many hundreds of years later, they provide a glimpse into what was already a distant past. The story of the fimbul winter gives us a historical picture of something that happened and which in our time, with the help of dendrochronology , can be interpreted as a natural disaster in the year 536, created by a volcanic eruption in El Salvador .

 

In the period between 800 and 1066 there was a significant expansion and it is referred to as the Viking Age . During this period, Norwegians, as Swedes and Danes also did, traveled abroad in longships with sails as explorers, traders, settlers and as Vikings (raiders and pirates ). By the middle of the 11th century, the Norwegian kingship had been firmly established, building its right as descendants of Harald Hårfagre and then as heirs of Olav the Holy . The Norwegian kings, and their subjects, now professed Christianity . In the time around Håkon Håkonsson , in the time after the civil war , there was a small renaissance in Norway with extensive literary activity and diplomatic activity with Europe. The black dew came to Norway in 1349 and killed around half of the population. The entire state apparatus and Norway then entered a period of decline.

 

Between 1396 and 1536, Norway was part of the Kalmar Union , and from 1536 until 1814 Norway had been reduced to a tributary part of Denmark , named as the Personal Union of Denmark-Norway . This staff union entered into an alliance with Napoléon Bonaparte with a war that brought bad times and famine in 1812 . In 1814, Denmark-Norway lost the Anglophone Wars , part of the Napoleonic Wars , and the Danish king was forced to cede Norway to the king of Sweden in the Treaty of Kiel on 14 January of that year. After a Norwegian attempt at independence, Norway was forced into a loose union with Sweden, but where Norway was allowed to create its own constitution, the Constitution of 1814 . In this period, Norwegian, romantic national feeling flourished, and the Norwegians tried to develop and establish their own national self-worth. The union with Sweden was broken in 1905 after it had been threatened with war, and Norway became an independent kingdom with its own monarch, Haakon VII .

 

Norway remained neutral during the First World War , and at the outbreak of the Second World War, Norway again declared itself neutral, but was invaded by National Socialist Germany on 9 April 1940 .

 

Norway became a member of the Western defense alliance NATO in 1949 . Two attempts to join the EU were voted down in referendums by small margins in 1972 and 1994 . Norway has been a close ally of the United States in the post-war period. Large discoveries of oil and natural gas in the North Sea at the end of the 1960s led to tremendous economic growth in the country, which is still ongoing. Traditional industries such as fishing are also part of Norway's economy.

 

Stone Age (before 1700 BC)

When most of the ice disappeared, vegetation spread over the landscape and due to a warm climate around 2000-3000 BC. the forest grew much taller than in modern times. Land uplift after the ice age led to a number of fjords becoming lakes and dry land. The first people probably came from the south along the coast of the Kattegat and overland into Finnmark from the east. The first people probably lived by gathering, hunting and trapping. A good number of Stone Age settlements have been found which show that such hunting and trapping people stayed for a long time in the same place or returned to the same place regularly. Large amounts of gnawed bones show that they lived on, among other things, reindeer, elk, small game and fish.

 

Flintstone was imported from Denmark and apart from small natural deposits along the southern coast, all flintstone in Norway is transported by people. At Espevær, greenstone was quarried for tools in the Stone Age, and greenstone tools from Espevær have been found over large parts of Western Norway. Around 2000-3000 BC the usual farm animals such as cows and sheep were introduced to Norway. Livestock probably meant a fundamental change in society in that part of the people had to be permanent residents or live a semi-nomadic life. Livestock farming may also have led to conflict with hunters.

 

The oldest traces of people in what is today Norway have been found at Pauler , a farm in Brunlanes in Larvik municipality in Vestfold . In 2007 and 2008, the farm has given its name to a number of Stone Age settlements that have been excavated and examined by archaeologists from the Cultural History Museum at UiO. The investigations have been carried out in connection with the new route for the E18 motorway west of Farris. The oldest settlement, located more than 127 m above sea level, is dated to be about 10,400 years old (uncalibrated, more than 11,000 years in real calendar years). From here, the ice sheet was perhaps visible when people settled here. This locality has been named Pauler I, and is today considered to be the oldest confirmed human traces in Norway to date. The place is in the mountains above the Pauler tunnel on the E18 between Larvik and Porsgrunn . The pioneer settlement is a term archaeologists have adopted for the oldest settlement. The archaeologists have speculated about where they came from, the first people in what is today Norway. It has been suggested that they could come by boat or perhaps across the ice from Doggerland or the North Sea, but there is now a large consensus that they came north along what is today the Bohuslän coast. The Fosna culture , the Komsa culture and the Nøstvet culture are the traditional terms for hunting cultures from the Stone Age. One thing is certain - getting to the water was something they mastered, the first people in our country. Therefore, within a short time they were able to use our entire long coast.

 

In the New Stone Age (4000 BC–1700 BC) there is a theory that a new people immigrated to the country, the so-called Stone Ax People . Rock carvings from this period show motifs from hunting and fishing , which were still important industries. From this period, a megalithic tomb has been found in Østfold .

It is uncertain whether there were organized societies or state-like associations in the Stone Age in Norway. Findings from settlements indicate that many lived together and that this was probably more than one family so that it was a slightly larger, organized herd.

 

Finnmark

In prehistoric times, animal husbandry and agriculture were of little economic importance in Finnmark. Livelihoods in Finnmark were mainly based on fish, gathering, hunting and trapping, and eventually domestic reindeer herding became widespread in the Middle Ages. Archaeological finds from the Stone Age have been referred to as the Komsa culture and comprise around 5,000 years of settlement. Finnmark probably got its first settlement around 8000 BC. It is believed that the coastal areas became ice-free 11,000 years BC and the fjord areas around 9,000 years BC. after which willows, grass, heather, birch and pine came into being. Finnmarksvidda was covered by pine forest around 6000 BC. After the Ice Age, the land rose around 80 meters in the inner fjord areas (Alta, Tana, Varanger). Due to ice melting in the polar region, the sea rose in the period 6400–3800 BC. and in areas with little land elevation, some settlements from the first part of the Stone Age were flooded. On Sørøya, the net sea level rise was 12 to 14 meters and many residential areas were flooded.

 

According to Bjørnar Olsen , there are many indications of a connection between the oldest settlement in Western Norway (the " Fosnakulturen ") and that in Finnmark, but it is uncertain in which direction the settlement took place. In the earliest part of the Stone Age, settlement in Finnmark was probably concentrated in the coastal areas, and these only reflected a lifestyle with great mobility and no permanent dwellings. The inner regions, such as Pasvik, were probably used seasonally. The archaeologically proven settlements from the Stone Age in inner Finnmark and Troms are linked to lakes and large watercourses. The oldest petroglyphs in Alta are usually dated to 4200 BC, that is, the Neolithic . Bjørnar Olsen believes that the oldest can be up to 2,000 years older than this.

 

From around 4000 BC a slow deforestation of Finnmark began and around 1800 BC the vegetation distribution was roughly the same as in modern times. The change in vegetation may have increased the distance between the reindeer's summer and winter grazing. The uplift continued slowly from around 4000 BC. at the same time as sea level rise stopped.

 

According to Gutorm Gjessing, the settlement in Finnmark and large parts of northern Norway in the Neolithic was semi-nomadic with movement between four seasonal settlements (following the pattern of life in Sami siida in historical times): On the outer coast in summer (fishing and seal catching) and inland in winter (hunting for reindeer, elk and bear). Povl Simonsen believed instead that the winter residence was in the inner fjord area in a village-like sod house settlement. Bjørnar Olsen believes that at the end of the Stone Age there was a relatively settled population along the coast, while inland there was less settlement and a more mobile lifestyle.

 

Bronze Age (1700 BC–500 BC)

Bronze was used for tools in Norway from around 1500 BC. Bronze is a mixture of tin and copper , and these metals were introduced because they were not mined in the country at the time. Bronze is believed to have been a relatively expensive material. The Bronze Age in Norway can be divided into two phases:

 

Early Bronze Age (1700–1100 BC)

Younger Bronze Age (1100–500 BC)

For the prehistoric (unwritten) era, there is limited knowledge about social conditions and possible state formations. From the Bronze Age, there are large burial mounds of stone piles along the coast of Vestfold and Agder, among others. It is likely that only chieftains or other great men could erect such grave monuments and there was probably some form of organized society linked to these. In the Bronze Age, society was more organized and stratified than in the Stone Age. Then a rich class of chieftains emerged who had close connections with southern Scandinavia. The settlements became more permanent and people adopted horses and ard . They acquired bronze status symbols, lived in longhouses and people were buried in large burial mounds . Petroglyphs from the Bronze Age indicate that humans practiced solar cultivation.

 

Finnmark

In the last millennium BC the climate became cooler and the pine forest disappears from the coast; pine forests, for example, were only found in the innermost part of the Altafjord, while the outer coast was almost treeless. Around the year 0, the limit for birch forest was south of Kirkenes. Animals with forest habitats (elk, bear and beaver) disappeared and the reindeer probably established their annual migration routes sometime at that time. In the period 1800–900 BC there were significantly more settlements in and utilization of the hinterland was particularly noticeable on Finnmarksvidda. From around 1800 BC until year 0 there was a significant increase in contact between Finnmark and areas in the east including Karelia (where metals were produced including copper) and central and eastern Russia. The youngest petroglyphs in Alta show far more boats than the earlier phases and the boats are reminiscent of types depicted in petroglyphs in southern Scandinavia. It is unclear what influence southern Scandinavian societies had as far north as Alta before the year 0. Many of the cultural features that are considered typical Sami in modern times were created or consolidated in the last millennium BC, this applies, among other things, to the custom of burying in brick chambers in stone urns. The Mortensnes burial ground may have been used for 2000 years until around 1600 AD.

 

Iron Age (c. 500 BC–c. 1050 AD)

 

The Einangsteinen is one of the oldest Norwegian runestones; it is from the 4th century

 

Simultaneous production of Vikings

Around 500 years BC the researchers reckon that the Bronze Age will be replaced by the Iron Age as iron takes over as the most important material for weapons and tools. Bronze, wood and stone were still used. Iron was cheaper than bronze, easier to work than flint , and could be used for many purposes; iron probably became common property. Iron could, among other things, be used to make solid and sharp axes which made it much easier to fell trees. In the Iron Age, gold and silver were also used partly for decoration and partly as means of payment. It is unknown which language was used in Norway before our era. From around the year 0 until around the year 800, everyone in Scandinavia (except the Sami) spoke Old Norse , a North Germanic language. Subsequently, several different languages ​​developed in this area that were only partially mutually intelligible. The Iron Age is divided into several periods:

 

Early Iron Age

Pre-Roman Iron Age (c. 500 BC–c. 0)

Roman Iron Age (c. 0–c. AD 400)

Migration period (approx. 400–600). In the migration period (approx. 400–600), new peoples came to Norway, and ruins of fortress buildings etc. are interpreted as signs that there has been talk of a violent invasion.

Younger Iron Age

Merovingian period (500–800)

 

The Viking Age (793–1066)

Norwegian Vikings go on plundering expeditions and trade voyages around the coastal countries of Western Europe . Large groups of Norwegians emigrate to the British Isles , Iceland and Greenland . Harald Hårfagre starts a unification process of Norway late in the 8th century , which was completed by Harald Hardråde in the 1060s . The country was Christianized under the kings Olav Tryggvason , fell in the battle of Svolder ( 1000 ) and Olav Haraldsson (the saint), fell in the battle of Stiklestad in 1030 .

 

Sources of prehistoric times

Shrinking glaciers in the high mountains, including in Jotunheimen and Breheimen , have from around the year 2000 uncovered objects from the Viking Age and earlier. These are objects of organic material that have been preserved by the ice and that elsewhere in nature are broken down in a few months. The finds are getting older as the melting makes the archaeologists go deeper into the ice. About half of all archaeological discoveries on glaciers in the world are made in Oppland . In 2013, a 3,400-year-old shoe and a robe from the year 300 were found. Finds at Lomseggen in Lom published in 2020 revealed, among other things, well-preserved horseshoes used on a mountain pass. Many hundreds of items include preserved clothing, knives, whisks, mittens, leather shoes, wooden chests and horse equipment. A piece of cloth dated to the year 1000 has preserved its original colour. In 2014, a wooden ski from around the year 700 was found in Reinheimen . The ski is 172 cm long and 14 cm wide, with preserved binding of leather and wicker.

 

Pytheas from Massalia is the oldest known account of what was probably the coast of Norway, perhaps somewhere on the coast of Møre. Pytheas visited Britannia around 325 BC. and traveled further north to a country by the "Ice Sea". Pytheas described the short summer night and the midnight sun farther north. He wrote, among other things, that people there made a drink from grain and honey. Caesar wrote in his work about the Gallic campaign about the Germanic tribe Haruders. Other Roman sources around the year 0 mention the land of the Cimbri (Jutland) and the Cimbri headlands ( Skagen ) and that the sources stated that Cimbri and Charyds lived in this area. Some of these peoples may have immigrated to Norway and there become known as hordes (as in Hordaland). Sources from the Mediterranean area referred to the islands of Scandia, Scandinavia and Thule ("the outermost of all islands"). The Roman historian Tacitus wrote around the year 100 a work about Germania and mentioned the people of Scandia, the Sviones. Ptolemy wrote around the year 150 that the Kharudes (Hordes) lived further north than all the Cimbri, in the north lived the Finnoi (Finns or Sami) and in the south the Gutai (Goths). The Nordic countries and Norway were outside the Roman Empire , which dominated Europe at the time. The Gothic-born historian Jordanes wrote in the 5th century about 13 tribes or people groups in Norway, including raumaricii (probably Romerike ), ragnaricii ( Ranrike ) and finni or skretefinni (skrid finner or ski finner, i.e. Sami) as well as a number of unclear groups. Prokopios wrote at the same time about Thule north of the land of the Danes and Slavs, Thule was ten times as big as Britannia and the largest of all the islands. In Thule, the sun was up 40 days straight in the summer. After the migration period , southern Europeans' accounts of northern Europe became fuller and more reliable.

 

Settlement in prehistoric times

Norway has around 50,000 farms with their own names. Farm names have persisted for a long time, over 1000 years, perhaps as much as 2000 years. The name researchers have arranged different types of farm names chronologically, which provides a basis for determining when the place was used by people or received a permanent settlement. Uncompounded landscape names such as Haug, Eid, Vik and Berg are believed to be the oldest. Archaeological traces indicate that some areas have been inhabited earlier than assumed from the farm name. Burial mounds also indicate permanent settlement. For example, the burial ground at Svartelva in Løten was used from around the year 0 to the year 1000 when Christianity took over. The first farmers probably used large areas for inland and outland, and new farms were probably established based on some "mother farms". Names such as By (or Bø) show that it is an old place of residence. From the older Iron Age, names with -heim (a common Germanic word meaning place of residence) and -stad tell of settlement, while -vin and -land tell of the use of the place. Farm names in -heim are often found as -um , -eim or -em as in Lerum and Seim, there are often large farms in the center of the village. New farm names with -city and -country were also established in the Viking Age . The first farmers probably used the best areas. The largest burial grounds, the oldest archaeological finds and the oldest farm names are found where the arable land is richest and most spacious.

 

It is unclear whether the settlement expansion in Roman times, migrations and the Iron Age is due to immigration or internal development and population growth. Among other things, it is difficult to demonstrate where in Europe the immigrants have come from. The permanent residents had both fields (where grain was grown) and livestock that grazed in the open fields, but it is uncertain which of these was more important. Population growth from around the year 200 led to more utilization of open land, for example in the form of settlements in the mountains. During the migration period, it also seems that in parts of the country it became common to have cluster gardens or a form of village settlement.

 

Norwegian expansion northwards

From around the year 200, there was a certain migration by sea from Rogaland and Hordaland to Nordland and Sør-Troms. Those who moved settled down as a settled Iron Age population and became dominant over the original population which may have been Sami . The immigrant Norwegians, Bumen , farmed with livestock that were fed inside in the winter as well as some grain cultivation and fishing. The northern border of the Norwegians' settlement was originally at the Toppsundet near Harstad and around the year 500 there was a Norwegian settlement to Malangsgapet. That was as far north as it was possible to grow grain at the time. Malangen was considered the border between Hålogaland and Finnmork until around 1400 . Further into the Viking Age and the Middle Ages, there was immigration and settlement of Norwegian speakers along the coast north of Malangen. Around the year 800, Norwegians lived along the entire outer coast to Vannøy . The Norwegians partly copied Sami livelihoods such as whaling, fur hunting and reindeer husbandry. It was probably this area between Malangen and Vannøy that was Ottar from the Hålogaland area. In the Viking Age, there were also some Norwegian settlements further north and east. East of the North Cape are the scattered archaeological finds of Norwegian settlement in the Viking Age. There are Norwegian names for fjords and islands from the Viking Age, including fjord names with "-anger". Around the year 1050, there were Norwegian settlements on the outer coast of Western Finnmark. Traders and tax collectors traveled even further.

 

North of Malangen there were Norse farming settlements in the Iron Age. Malangen was considered Finnmark's western border until 1300. There are some archaeological traces of Norse activity around the coast from Tromsø to Kirkenes in the Viking Age. Around Tromsø, the research indicates a Norse/Sami mixed culture on the coast.

 

From the year 1100 and the next 200–300 years, there are no traces of Norwegian settlement north and east of Tromsø. It is uncertain whether this is due to depopulation, whether it is because the Norwegians further north were not Christianized or because there were no churches north of Lenvik or Tromsø . Norwegian settlement in the far north appears from sources from the 14th century. In the Hanseatic period , the settlement was developed into large areas specialized in commercial fishing, while earlier (in the Viking Age) there had been farms with a combination of fishing and agriculture. In 1307 , a fortress and the first church east of Tromsø were built in Vardø . Vardø became a small Norwegian town, while Vadsø remained Sami. Norwegian settlements and churches appeared along the outermost coast in the Middle Ages. After the Reformation, perhaps as a result of a decline in fish stocks or fish prices, there were Norwegian settlements in the inner fjord areas such as Lebesby in Laksefjord. Some fishing villages at the far end of the coast were abandoned for good. In the interior of Finnmark, there was no national border for a long time and Kautokeino and Karasjok were joint Norwegian-Swedish areas with strong Swedish influence. The border with Finland was established in 1751 and with Russia in 1826.

 

On a Swedish map from 1626, Norway's border is indicated at Malangen, while Sweden with this map showed a desire to control the Sami area which had been a common area.

 

The term Northern Norway only came into use at the end of the 19th century and administratively the area was referred to as Tromsø Diocese when Tromsø became a bishopric in 1840. There had been different designations previously: Hålogaland originally included only Helgeland and when Norse settlement spread north in the Viking Age and the Middle Ages, Hålogaland was used for the area north approximately to Malangen , while Finnmark or "Finnmarken", "the land of the Sami", lay outside. The term Northern Norway was coined at a cafe table in Kristiania in 1884 by members of the Nordlændingernes Forening and was first commonly used in the interwar period as it eventually supplanted "Hålogaland".

 

State formation

The battle in Hafrsfjord in the year 872 has long been regarded as the day when Norway became a kingdom. The year of the battle is uncertain (may have been 10-20 years later). The whole of Norway was not united in that battle: the process had begun earlier and continued a couple of hundred years later. This means that the geographical area became subject to a political authority and became a political unit. The geographical area was perceived as an area as it is known, among other things, from Ottar from Hålogaland's account for King Alfred of Wessex around the year 880. Ottar described "the land of the Norwegians" as very long and narrow, and it was narrowest in the far north. East of the wasteland in the south lay Sveoland and in the north lay Kvenaland in the east. When Ottar sailed south along the land from his home ( Malangen ) to Skiringssal, he always had Norway ("Nordveg") on his port side and the British Isles on his starboard side. The journey took a good month. Ottar perceived "Nordveg" as a geographical unit, but did not imply that it was a political unit. Ottar separated Norwegians from Swedes and Danes. It is unclear why Ottar perceived the population spread over such a large area as a whole. It is unclear whether Norway as a geographical term or Norwegians as the name of a ethnic group is the oldest. The Norwegians had a common language which in the centuries before Ottar did not differ much from the language of Denmark and Sweden.

 

According to Sverre Steen, it is unlikely that Harald Hårfagre was able to control this entire area as one kingdom. The saga of Harald was written 300 years later and at his death Norway was several smaller kingdoms. Harald probably controlled a larger area than anyone before him and at most Harald's kingdom probably included the coast from Trøndelag to Agder and Vestfold as well as parts of Viken . There were probably several smaller kingdoms of varying extent before Harald and some of these are reflected in traditional landscape names such as Ranrike and Ringerike . Landscape names of "-land" (Rogaland) and "-mark" (Hedmark) as well as names such as Agder and Sogn may have been political units before Harald.

 

According to Sverre Steen, the national assembly was completed at the earliest at the battle of Stiklestad in 1030 and the introduction of Christianity was probably a significant factor in the establishment of Norway as a state. Håkon I the good Adalsteinsfostre introduced the leasehold system where the "coastal land" (as far as the salmon went up the rivers) was divided into ship raiders who were to provide a longship with soldiers and supplies. The leidange was probably introduced as a defense against the Danes. The border with the Danes was traditionally at the Göta älv and several times before and after Harald Hårfagre the Danes had control over central parts of Norway.

 

Christianity was known and existed in Norway before Olav Haraldson's time. The spread occurred both from the south (today's Denmark and northern Germany) and from the west (England and Ireland). Ansgar of Bremen , called the "Apostle of the North", worked in Sweden, but he was never in Norway and probably had little influence in the country. Viking expeditions brought the Norwegians of that time into contact with Christian countries and some were baptized in England, Ireland and northern France. Olav Tryggvason and Olav Haraldson were Vikings who returned home. The first Christians in Norway were also linked to pre-Christian local religion, among other things, by mixing Christian symbols with symbols of Odin and other figures from Norse religion.

 

According to Sverre Steen, the introduction of Christianity in Norway should not be perceived as a nationwide revival. At Mostratinget, Christian law was introduced as law in the country and later incorporated into the laws of the individual jurisdictions. Christianity primarily involved new forms in social life, among other things exposure and images of gods were prohibited, it was forbidden to "put out" unwanted infants (to let them die), and it was forbidden to have multiple wives. The church became a nationwide institution with a special group of officials tasked with protecting the church and consolidating the new religion. According to Sverre Steen, Christianity and the church in the Middle Ages should therefore be considered together, and these became a new unifying factor in the country. The church and Christianity linked Norway to Roman Catholic Europe with Church Latin as the common language, the same time reckoning as the rest of Europe and the church in Norway was arranged much like the churches in Denmark, Sweden and England. Norway received papal approval in 1070 and became its own church province in 1152 with Archbishop Nidaros .

 

With Christianity, the country got three social powers: the peasants (organized through the things), the king with his officials and the church with the clergy. The things are the oldest institution: At allthings all armed men had the right to attend (in part an obligation to attend) and at lagthings met emissaries from an area (that is, the lagthings were representative assemblies). The Thing both ruled in conflicts and established laws. The laws were memorized by the participants and written down around the year 1000 or later in the Gulationsloven , Frostatingsloven , Eidsivatingsloven and Borgartingsloven . The person who had been successful at the hearing had to see to the implementation of the judgment themselves.

 

Early Middle Ages (1050s–1184)

The early Middle Ages is considered in Norwegian history to be the period between the end of the Viking Age around 1050 and the coronation of King Sverre in 1184 . The beginning of the period can be dated differently, from around the year 1000 when the Christianization of the country took place and up to 1100 when the Viking Age was over from an archaeological point of view. From 1035 to 1130 it was a time of (relative) internal peace in Norway, even several of the kings attempted campaigns abroad, including in 1066 and 1103 .

 

During this period, the church's organization was built up. This led to a gradual change in religious customs. Religion went from being a domestic matter to being regulated by common European Christian law and the royal power gained increased power and influence. Slavery (" servitude ") was gradually abolished. The population grew rapidly during this period, as the thousands of farm names ending in -rud show.

 

The urbanization of Norway is a historical process that has slowly but surely changed Norway from the early Viking Age to today, from a country based on agriculture and sea salvage, to increasingly trade and industry. As early as the ninth century, the country got its first urban community, and in the eleventh century we got the first permanent cities.

 

In the 1130s, civil war broke out . This was due to a power struggle and that anyone who claimed to be the king's son could claim the right to the throne. The disputes escalated into extensive year-round warfare when Sverre Sigurdsson started a rebellion against the church's and the landmen's candidate for the throne , Magnus Erlingsson .

 

Emergence of cities

The oldest Norwegian cities probably emerged from the end of the 9th century. Oslo, Bergen and Nidaros became episcopal seats, which stimulated urban development there, and the king built churches in Borg , Konghelle and Tønsberg. Hamar and Stavanger became new episcopal seats and are referred to in the late 12th century as towns together with the trading places Veøy in Romsdal and Kaupanger in Sogn. In the late Middle Ages, Borgund (on Sunnmøre), Veøy (in Romsdalsfjorden) and Vågan (in Lofoten) were referred to as small trading places. Urbanization in Norway occurred in few places compared to the neighboring countries, only 14 places appear as cities before 1350. Stavanger became a bishopric around 1120–1130, but it is unclear whether the place was already a city then. The fertile Jæren and outer Ryfylke were probably relatively densely populated at that time. A particularly large concentration of Irish artefacts from the Viking Age has been found in Stavanger and Nord-Jæren.

 

It has been difficult to estimate the population in the Norwegian medieval cities, but it is considered certain that the cities grew rapidly in the Middle Ages. Oscar Albert Johnsen estimated the city's population before the Black Death at 20,000, of which 7,000 in Bergen, 3,000 in Nidaros, 2,000 in Oslo and 1,500 in Tunsberg. Based on archaeological research, Lunden estimates that Oslo had around 1,500 inhabitants in 250 households in the year 1300. Bergen was built up more densely and, with the concentration of exports there, became Norway's largest city in a special position for several hundred years. Knut Helle suggests a city population of 20,000 at most in the High Middle Ages, of which almost half in Bergen.

 

The Bjarkøyretten regulated the conditions in cities (especially Bergen and Nidaros) and in trading places, and for Nidaros had many of the same provisions as the Frostating Act . Magnus Lagabøte's city law replaced the bjarkøretten and from 1276 regulated the settlement in Bergen and with corresponding laws also drawn up for Oslo, Nidaros and Tunsberg. The city law applied within the city's roof area . The City Act determined that the city's public streets consisted of wide commons (perpendicular to the shoreline) and ran parallel to the shoreline, similarly in Nidaros and Oslo. The roads were small streets of up to 3 cubits (1.4 metres) and linked to the individual property. From the Middle Ages, the Norwegian cities were usually surrounded by wooden fences. The urban development largely consisted of low wooden houses which stood in contrast to the relatively numerous and dominant churches and monasteries built in stone.

 

The City Act and supplementary provisions often determined where in the city different goods could be traded, in Bergen, for example, cattle and sheep could only be traded on the Square, and fish only on the Square or directly from the boats at the quayside. In Nidaros, the blacksmiths were required to stay away from the densely populated areas due to the risk of fire, while the tanners had to stay away from the settlements due to the strong smell. The City Act also attempted to regulate the influx of people into the city (among other things to prevent begging in the streets) and had provisions on fire protection. In Oslo, from the 13th century or earlier, it was common to have apartment buildings consisting of single buildings on a couple of floors around a courtyard with access from the street through a gate room. Oslo's medieval apartment buildings were home to one to four households. In the urban farms, livestock could be kept, including pigs and cows, while pastures and fields were found in the city's rooftops . In the apartment buildings there could be several outbuildings such as warehouses, barns and stables. Archaeological excavations show that much of the buildings in medieval Oslo, Trondheim and Tønsberg resembled the oblong farms that have been preserved at Bryggen in Bergen . The land boundaries in Oslo appear to have persisted for many hundreds of years, in Bergen right from the Middle Ages to modern times.

 

High Middle Ages (1184–1319)

After civil wars in the 12th century, the country had a relative heyday in the 13th century. Iceland and Greenland came under the royal authority in 1262 , and the Norwegian Empire reached its greatest extent under Håkon IV Håkonsson . The last king of Haraldsätten, Håkon V Magnusson , died sonless in 1319 . Until the 17th century, Norway stretched all the way down to the mouth of Göta älv , which was then Norway's border with Sweden and Denmark.

 

Just before the Black Death around 1350, there were between 65,000 and 85,000 farms in the country, and there had been a strong growth in the number of farms from 1050, especially in Eastern Norway. In the High Middle Ages, the church or ecclesiastical institutions controlled 40% of the land in Norway, while the aristocracy owned around 20% and the king owned 7%. The church and monasteries received land through gifts from the king and nobles, or through inheritance and gifts from ordinary farmers.

 

Settlement and demography in the Middle Ages

Before the Black Death, there were more and more farms in Norway due to farm division and clearing. The settlement spread to more marginal agricultural areas higher inland and further north. Eastern Norway had the largest areas to take off and had the most population growth towards the High Middle Ages. Along the coast north of Stad, settlement probably increased in line with the extent of fishing. The Icelandic Rimbegla tells around the year 1200 that the border between Finnmark (the land of the Sami) and resident Norwegians in the interior was at Malangen , while the border all the way out on the coast was at Kvaløya . From the end of the High Middle Ages, there were more Norwegians along the coast of Finnmark and Nord-Troms. In the inner forest and mountain tracts along the current border between Norway and Sweden, the Sami exploited the resources all the way down to Hedmark.

 

There are no censuses or other records of population and settlement in the Middle Ages. At the time of the Reformation, the population was below 200,000 and only in 1650 was the population at the same level as before the Black Death. When Christianity was introduced after the year 1000, the population was around 200,000. After the Black Death, many farms and settlements were abandoned and deserted, in the most marginal agricultural areas up to 80% of the farms were abandoned. Places such as Skien, Veøy and Borgund (Ålesund) went out of use as trading towns. By the year 1300, the population was somewhere between 300,000 and 560,000 depending on the calculation method. Common methods start from detailed information about farms in each village and compare this with the situation in 1660 when there are good headcounts. From 1300 to 1660, there was a change in the economic base so that the coastal villages received a larger share of the population. The inland areas of Eastern Norway had a relatively larger population in the High Middle Ages than after the Reformation. Kåre Lunden concludes that the population in the year 1300 was close to 500,000, of which 15,000 lived in cities. Lunden believes that the population in 1660 was still slightly lower than the peak before the Black Death and points out that farm settlement in 1660 did not reach the same extent as in the High Middle Ages. In 1660, the population in Troms and Finnmark was 6,000 and 3,000 respectively (2% of the total population), in 1300 these areas had an even smaller share of the country's population and in Finnmark there were hardly any Norwegian-speaking inhabitants. In the High Middle Ages, the climate was more favorable for grain cultivation in the north. Based on the number of farms, the population increased 162% from 1000 to 1300, in Northern and Western Europe as a whole the growth was 200% in the same period.

 

Late Middle Ages (1319–1537)

Due to repeated plague epidemics, the population was roughly halved and the least productive of the country's farms were laid waste. It took several hundred years before the population again reached the level before 1349 . However, those who survived the epidemics gained more financial resources by sharing. Tax revenues for the state almost collapsed, and a large part of the noble families died out or sank into peasant status due to the fall in national debt . The Hanseatic League took over trade and shipping and dominated fish exports. The Archbishop of Nidaros was the country's most powerful man economically and politically, as the royal dynasty married into the Swedish in 1319 and died out in 1387 . Eventually, Copenhagen became the political center of the kingdom and Bergen the commercial center, while Trondheim remained the religious center.

 

From Reformation to Autocracy (1537–1660)

In 1537 , the Reformation was carried out in Norway. With that, almost half of the country's property was confiscated by the royal power at the stroke of a pen. The large seizure increased the king's income and was able, among other things, to expand his military power and consolidated his power in the kingdom. From roughly the time of the Reformation and in the following centuries, the state increased its power and importance in people's lives. Until around 1620, the state administration was fairly simple and unspecialised: in Copenhagen, the central administration mainly consisted of a chancellery and an interest chamber ; and sheriffs ruled the civil (including bailiffs and sheriffs) and the military in their district, the sheriffs collected taxes and oversaw business. The accounts were not clear and without summaries. The clergy, which had great power as a separate organization, was appointed by the state church after the Reformation, administered from Copenhagen. In this period, Norway was ruled by (mainly) Danish noble sheriffs, who acted as intermediaries between the peasants and the Oldenborg king in the field of justice, tax and customs collection.

 

From 1620, the state apparatus went through major changes where specialization of functions was a main issue. The sheriff's tasks were divided between several, more specialized officials - the sheriffs retained the formal authority over these, who in practice were under the national administration in Copenhagen. Among other things, a separate military officer corps was established, a separate customs office was established and separate treasurers for taxes and fees were appointed. The Overbergamtet, the central governing body for overseeing mining operations in Norway, was established in 1654 with an office in Christiania and this agency was to oversee the mining chiefs in the Nordenfjeld and Sønnenfjeld areas (the mines at Kongsberg and Røros were established in the previous decades). The formal transition from county government to official government with fixed-paid county officials took place after 1660, but the real changes had taken place from around 1620. The increased specialization and transition to official government meant that experts, not amateurs, were in charge of each area, and this civil service meant, according to Sverre Steen that the dictatorship was not a personal dictatorship.

 

From 1570 until 1721, the Oldenborg dynasty was in repeated wars with the Vasa dynasty in Sweden. The financing of these wars led to a severe increase in taxation which caused great distress.

 

Politically-geographically, the Oldenborg kings had to cede to Sweden the Norwegian provinces of Jemtland , Herjedalen , Idre and Särna , as well as Båhuslen . As part of the financing of the wars, the state apparatus was expanded. Royal power began to assert itself to a greater extent in the administration of justice. Until this period, cases of violence and defamation had been treated as civil cases between citizens. The level of punishment was greatly increased. During this period, at least 307 people were also executed for witchcraft in Norway. Culturally, the country was marked by the fact that the written language became Danish because of the Bible translation and the University of Copenhagen's educational monopoly.

 

From the 16th century, business became more marked by production for sale and not just own consumption. In the past, it was particularly the fisheries that had produced such a large surplus of goods that it was sold to markets far away, the dried fish trade via Bergen is known from around the year 1100. In the 16th century, the yield from the fisheries multiplied, especially due to the introduction of herring in Western Norway and in Trøndelag and because new tools made fishing for herring and skre more efficient. Line fishing and cod nets that were introduced in the 17th century were controversial because the small fishermen believed it favored citizens in the cities.

 

Forestry and the timber trade became an important business, particularly because of the boom saw which made it possible to saw all kinds of tables and planks for sale abroad. The demand for timber increased at the same time in Europe, Norway had plenty of forests and in the 17th century timber became the country's most important export product. There were hundreds of sawmills in the country and the largest had the feel of factories . In 1680, the king regulated the timber trade by allowing exports only from privileged sawmills and in a certain quantity.

 

From the 1520s, some silver was mined in Telemark. When the peasants chased the German miners whereupon the king executed five peasants and demanded compensation from the other rebellious peasants. The background for the harsh treatment was that the king wanted to assert his authority over the extraction of precious metals. The search for metals led to the silver works at Kongsberg after 1624, copper in the mountain villages between Trøndelag and Eastern Norway, and iron, among other things, in Agder and lower Telemark. The financial gain of the quarries at that time is unclear because there are no reliable accounts. Kongsberg made Denmark-Norway self-sufficient in silver and the copper works produced a good deal more than the domestic demand and became an important export commodity. Kongsberg and Røros were the only Norwegian towns established because of the quarries.

 

In addition to the sawmills, in the 17th century, industrial production ( manufactures ) was established in, among other things, wool weaving, soap production, tea boiling , nail production and the manufacture of gunpowder .

 

The monopoly until the Peace of Kiel (1660–1814)

Until 1660, the king had been elected by the Danish Riksråd, while he inherited the kingdom of Norway, which was a tradition in Norway. After a series of military defeats, the king committed a coup d'état and deposed the Riksdag. King Frederik III introduced absolute power, which meant that there were hardly any legal restrictions on the king's power. This reinforced the expansion of the state apparatus that had been going on for a few decades, and the civil administration was controlled to a greater extent from the central administration in Copenhagen. According to Sverre Steen, the more specialized and expanded civil service meant that the period of autocracy was not essentially a personal dictatorship: The changing monarchs had the formal last word on important matters, but higher officials set the conditions. According to Steen, the autocracy was not tyrannical where the citizens were treated arbitrarily by the king and officials: the laws were strict and the punishments harsh, but there was legal certainty. The king rarely used his right to punish outside the judiciary and often used his right to commute sentences or pardons. It almost never happened that the king intervened in a court case before a verdict had been passed.

 

In 1662, the sheriff system (in which the nobility played an important role) was abolished and replaced with amt . Norway was divided into four main counties (Akershus, Kristiansands, Bergenhus and Trondhjems) which were later called stiftamt led by stiftamtmen with a number of county marshals and bailiffs (futer) under them. The county administrator in Akershus also had other roles such as governor. The former sheriffs were almost absolute within their fiefs, while the new stifamtmen and amtmen had more limited authority; among other things, they did not have military equipment like the sheriffs. The county officials had no control over state income and could not enrich themselves privately as the sheriffs could, taxes and fees were instead handled by their own officials. County officials were employed by the king and, unlike the sheriffs, had a fixed salary. Officials appointed by the king were responsible for local government. Before 1662, the sheriffs themselves appointed low officials such as bailiffs, mayors and councillors. A church commissioner was given responsibility for overseeing the churchwardens' accounts. In 1664, two general road masters were appointed for Norway, one for Sonnafjelske (Eastland and Sørlandet) and one for Nordafjelske (Westlandet and Trøndelag; Northern Norway had no roads).

 

Both Denmark and Norway got new law books. The wretched state finances led to an extensive sale of crown property, first to the state's creditors. Further sales meant that many farmers became self-owned at the end of the 18th century. Industrial exploitation of Norwegian natural resources began, and trade and shipping and especially increasing timber exports led to economic growth in the latter part of the 1700s.

 

From 1500 to 1814, Norway did not have its own foreign policy. After the dissolution of the Kalmar Union in 1523, Denmark remained the leading power in the Nordic region and dominated the Baltic Sea, while Sweden sought to expand geographically in all directions and strengthened its position. From 1625 to 1660, Denmark lost its dominance: Christian IV lost to the emperor in the Thirty Years' War and ceded Skåne, Blekinge, Halland, Båhuslen , Jemtland and Herjedalen as well as all the islands in the inner part of the Baltic Sea. With this, Norway got its modern borders, which have remained in place ever since. Sweden was no longer confined by Norway and Denmark, and Sweden became the great power in the Nordic region. At the same time, Norway remained far from Denmark (until 1660 there was an almost continuous land connection between Norway and Denmark). During the Great Nordic War, Danish forces moved towards Scania and ended with Charles the 12th falling at Fredriksten . From 1720 to 1807 there was peace except for the short Cranberry War in 1788. In August 1807, the British navy surrounded Denmark and demanded that the Danish fleet be handed over. After bombing 2-7. On September 1807, the Danes capitulated and handed over the fleet (known as the "fleet robbery") and the arsenal. Two weeks later, Denmark entered into an alliance with Napoleon and Great Britain declared war on Denmark in November 1807. The Danish leadership had originally envisioned an alliance with Great Britain. Anger at the fleet robbery and fear of French occupation of Denmark itself (and thus breaking the connection with Norway) were probably the motive for the alliance with France. According to Sverre Steen, the period 1807-1814 was the most significant in Norway's history (before the Second World War). Foreign trade was paralyzed and hundreds of Norwegian ships were seized by the British. British ships, both warships and privateers , blocked the sea route between Norway and Denmark as described in " Terje Vigen " by Henrik Ibsen . During the Napoleonic Wars , there was a food shortage and famine in Norway, between 20 and 30 thousand people out of a population of around 900 thousand died from sheer lack of food or diseases related to malnutrition.

 

From the late summer of 1807, Norway was governed by a government commission led by the governor and commander-in-chief, Prince Christian August . Christian August was considered an honorable and capable leader. In 1808, a joint Russian and Danish/Norwegian attack on Sweden was planned; the campaign fails completely and Christian August concludes a truce with the Swedes. The Swedish king was deposed, the country got a new constitution with a limited monarchy and in the summer of 1808, Christian August was elected heir to the throne in Sweden. Christian August died a few months after he moved to Sweden and the French general Jean Baptiste Bernadotte became the new heir to the throne with the name "Karl Johan". After Napoleon was defeated at Leipzig in 1813, Bernadotte entered Holstein with Swedish forces and forced the Danish king to the Peace of Kiel .

 

Colonies and slave trade

Denmark-Norway acquired overseas colonies: St. Thomas (1665), St. Jan and St. Croix (18th century). At the same time, the kingdom entered into an agreement with rulers on the Gold Coast (Ghana) regarding the establishment of slave forts, including Christiansborg in Accra . The trade was triangular from Copenhagen to the Gold Coast with weapons, gunpowder and liquor which were exchanged for gold, ivory and slaves . The slaves were transported across the Atlantic to the Caribbean, among other things to the Danish-Norwegian colonies where St. Croix was most important. The ships returned to Copenhagen with sugar, tobacco, cotton and other goods. About 100,000 slaves were transported across the sea on Danish and Norwegian ships from 1660 to 1802. About 10% of the slaves died during the crossing. At least two of the slave ships ("Cornelia" and "Friderich") were in Norwegian ownership. Engelbret Hesselberg was a fut on St. Croix and after a slave rebellion in 1759, he had some of the rebels executed, among other things, by burning them alive, hanging them by their feet or putting them naked in a cage in the sun. At the end of the 18th century, opposition to the slave trade grew in Denmark-Norway, among others the Norwegian Claus Fasting promoted strong criticism. The slave trade was banned from 1803, while slavery itself was banned in Denmark from 1848.

 

Immigration to Norway

In the 1500s and 1600s, many people moved within Europe. From Germany, France and the Netherlands, enterprising people came to Sweden and Denmark, and gave rise to influential families. Danes in particular came to Norway who, formally speaking, were not foreigners, but were probably perceived as strangers by the local population. There was some immigration of ethnic Germans, some from areas under the Danish crown and others. Some immigrated from the Netherlands, England and Scotland. For example, half of those who applied for citizenship in Bergen in the 17th century were foreigners and they were often founders of new businesses. Immigrants from the Netherlands brought knowledge of line fishing and the preparation of herring; the Scot came with knowledge of the production of cuttlefish ; and Germans engaged in mining. Some foreigners ran large farms they bought near the cities, for example Frogner near Christiania and Lade near Trondheim. A large part of the country's leading echelon of officials and merchants were around 1,800 descendants of immigrants, and family names of foreign origin had a higher status. According to Sverre Steen, it was special for Norway that the immigrants and their descendants were given such a much stronger position than other residents.

 

Social and cultural conditions

Around 1800, most people, both women and men, in Norway could read and many could write. Foreigners traveling in Norway were surprised at how well-informed and interested Norwegian farmers were about the situation outside the country. In the 17th century, Peder Claussøn Friis translated Snorre Sturlason's royal sagas from Old Norse, and in a new edition this book became important in nation-building in later centuries. Early in the 18th century, Tormod Torfæus wrote Norway's history to 1387 in 4 volumes in Latin ; the preparation is considered to be scientifically unsustainable. In the 1730s, Ludvig Holberg wrote the popular scientific Danmarks Reges Historie , which is considered to maintain a high standard. According to Holberg, Norway emerged as a kingdom after the "nomenclature union in 1380". Holberg was the most important Norwegian cultural figure in the Danish era. Gerhard Schøning wrote Norges Reges Historie (in Danish) in the 1770s ; Schøning claimed that the Norwegians were a separate people from the dawn of time and had immigrated from the north-east without visiting Denmark.

 

1814

Norway remained the hereditary kingdom of the Oldenborg kings until 1814 , when the king had to renounce Norway at the Peace of Kiel on 14 January 1814 after being on the losing side during the Napoleonic Wars . Greenland, the Faroe Islands and Iceland were not included in the transfer to Sweden. The King of Sweden undertook to maintain the laws and freedoms the Norwegians had and Norway was to take over its share of the national debt. At the same time, the Swedish king ceded Rügen and Swedish Pomerania as well as 1 million dalers. Norway was ceded to the king of Sweden and the Treaty of Kiel established that Norway was a separate kingdom. Prince Christian Frederik traveled to Trondheim to calm the mood. Sixty leading citizens of Trondheim signed a letter in which they supported the prince's policy of independence and at the same time asked that a congress should be convened to lay the foundations for Norway's future constitution. On his return from Trondheim, he gathered 15 civil servants and 6 businessmen for the Stormannsmøetet at Eidsvoll 16-17. February where it was agreed on a constitutional assembly in the same place from 10 April. Until then, the prince was to rule the country as regent with the support of a government council. After the meeting, the prince announced that the Norwegian people had been released from their oath to Frederik VI and, as a free and independent people, had the right to decide their own government constitution.

 

Sverre Steen describes these as revolutionary ideas: It involved a transition from princely sovereignty to popular sovereignty as was known from the US Constitution and from the French Revolution. Georg Sverdrup stated at the nobles' meeting in February that the Norwegian krone had thus "returned home" to the Norwegian people and that the people could, by their own decision, transfer the krone to whoever was deemed most suitable. The transition was not prepared in Norway except as an idea as individuals. In the previous years, there had been dissatisfaction (especially in Eastern Norway) with the Danish government, but no stated demands for secession from Denmark. When the rumor spread in 1813 that Denmark would probably have to cede Norway, there was talk of independence. At the elders' meeting, it was agreed that the congregations should gather in the churches and swear allegiance to Norway, as a simple referendum on independence and against union with Sweden. At the same time, the priests organized elections for the National Assembly, which was to convene later.

 

In public, there was overwhelming support for independence, while those who wanted union with Sweden advanced their views in silence. The mood of the people was for full independence.

\_|_/ Average Holiday Moors and Christians Elda 2012 * Mitja Festa Moros i Cristians Elda 2012 \_|_/

 

Art Digital

 

♪♫♫♪

Sony a1 + Contax Zeiss 35-70mm f/3.4

Rose-ringed parakeets measure on average 40 cm (16 in) in length including the tail feathers. Their average single wing length is about 15–17.5 cm (5.9–6.9 in). The tail accounts for a large portion of their total length.

 

The Rose-ringed parakeet is sexually dimorphic. The adult male sports a red neck-ring and the hen and immature birds of both sexes either show no neck rings, or display shadow-like pale to dark grey neck rings

 

Picture was captured at Mumbai..

“Ain't no man can avoid being born average, but there ain't no man got to be common.”

~ Satchel Paige

 

p.s. This is a real fetus and i took this picture at the science museum in LA. This is the negative with orange hue.

SCFE FPT-22 w/ USSC 6325 & USSC 4204

January 2025.Joe’s Junk on Fair Park Boulevard Little Rock, Arkansas.KodakTX400.Pentax KX-silver.Pentax120mm.OrangeFilter.CaffenolCH@20minutes.Scanned:FujifilmXH1

The average mass for an adult male giraffe is 1,191 kilograms while the average mass for an adult female is 828 kilograms. It is approximately 4.3 metres to 5.2 metres tall, although the tallest male recorded stood almost 6 metres. The giraffe has one of the shortest sleep requirements of any mammal, which is between ten minutes and two hours in a 24-hour period, averaging 1.9 hours per day.

 

Males often engage in necking, which has been described as having various functions. One of these is combat. Battles can be fatal, but are more often less severe. The longer the neck, and the heavier the head at the end of the neck, the greater the force a giraffe is able to deliver in a blow. It has also been observed that males that are successful in necking have greater access to estrous females, so the length of the neck may be a product of sexual selection.

After a necking duel, a giraffe can land a powerful blow with his head — occasionally knocking a male opponent to the ground. These fights rarely last more than a few minutes or end in physical harm.

Another function of necking is sexual, in which two males caress and court each other, leading up to mounting and climax. Such interactions between males are more frequent than heterosexual coupling. In one study, up to 94% of observed mounting incidents took place between two males. The proportion of same sex activities varied between 30 and 75%, and at any given time one in twenty males were engaged in non-combative necking behaviour with another male. Only 1% of same-sex mounting incidents occurred between females.

 

The average distance from the earth to the sun is ninety-three million miles. During the winter months the tilt of the our planet is tilted at an angle of 23.44º to the plane of its orbit. and this causes different lattitues of the Earth to directly face the Sun as the Earth moves through its orbit. It is this variation that primarily brings the onset of winter. It's hard to believe, that at such a distance from Earth, the Sun can even reach us and beautifully illuminate our world. The Sun has been around for four and a half billion years. Don't worry, it's estimated that its going to last another six billion years.

 

Its in average condition although its still very presentable in my opinion i never really found these that often thats not the case anymore! On the rear its all complete

Many bouquet agates will have this type of blunted plume or flowers, and without any oustanding color but nice contrast. This one is shown wet and was one of the first 20 or so I cut, from the lot I collected on a ranch near Marfa, Presidio County, Texas on January 2, 2010.

The brown bear (Ursus arctos) is a large bear native to Eurasia and North America. It is one of the largest land carnivorans, rivaled in size only by its closest relative, the polar bear, which is much less variable in size and slightly bigger on average. The brown bear is a sexually dimorphic species, as adult males are larger and more compactly built than females. The pelage ranges from reddish to yellowish-brown, and dark brown to cream in color. It evolved large hump muscles, unique among bears, and wide 21 to 36 cm (8.3 to 14.2 in) long paws to effectively dig through dirt. Its teeth are similar to those of other bears and reflect its dietary plasticity.

 

Throughout the brown bear's range, it inhabits mainly forested habitats in elevations of up to 5,000 m (16,000 ft). It is omnivorous, and consumes a variety of plant and animal species. Contrary to popular belief, the brown bear derives 90% of its diet from plants. When hunting, it will target animals as small as rodents, to those as large as moose or muskoxen. In parts of coastal Alaska, brown bears predominately feed on spawning salmon that come near shore to lay their eggs. For most of the year, it is a solitary animal that only associates when mating or raising cubs. Females give birth to an average of one to three cubs that remain with their mother for 1.5 to 4.5 years. It is a long lived animal, with an average lifespan of 25 years in the wild. Relative to its body size, the brown bear has an exceptionally large brain for a land carnivore. This large brain allows for high cognitive abilities, such as tool use. Attacks on humans, though widely reported, are generally rare.

 

While the brown bear's range has shrunk, and it has faced local extinctions across its wide range, it remains listed as a least concern species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) with a total estimated population in 2017 of 110,000. Populations that were hunted to extinction in the 19th and 20th centuries are the Atlas bear of North Africa and the Californian, Ungavan and Mexican populations of the grizzly bear of North America. Many of the populations in the southern parts of Eurasia are highly endangered as well. One of the smaller-bodied forms, the Himalayan brown bear, is critically endangered, occupying only 2% of its former range and threatened by uncontrolled poaching for its body parts. The Marsican brown bear of central Italy is one of several currently isolated populations of the Eurasian brown bear and is believed to have a population of just c. 50 bears.

 

The brown bear is considered to be one of the most popular of the world's charismatic megafauna. It has been kept in zoos since ancient times, and has been tamed and trained to perform in circuses and other acts. For thousands of years, the brown bear has found a predominant role in human culture, and is often featured in literature, art, folklore and mythology.

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway , is a Nordic , European country and an independent state in the west of the Scandinavian Peninsula . Geographically speaking, the country is long and narrow, and on the elongated coast towards the North Atlantic are Norway's well-known fjords . The Kingdom of Norway includes the main country (the mainland with adjacent islands within the baseline ), Jan Mayen and Svalbard . With these two Arctic areas, Norway covers a land area of ​​385,000 km² and has a population of approximately 5.5 million (2023). Mainland Norway borders Sweden in the east , Finland and Russia in the northeast .

 

Norway is a parliamentary democracy and constitutional monarchy , where Harald V has been king and head of state since 1991 , and Jonas Gahr Støre ( Ap ) has been prime minister since 2021 . Norway is a unitary state , with two administrative levels below the state: counties and municipalities . The Sami part of the population has, through the Sami Parliament and the Finnmark Act , to a certain extent self-government and influence over traditionally Sami areas. Although Norway has rejected membership of the European Union through two referendums , through the EEA Agreement Norway has close ties with the Union, and through NATO with the United States . Norway is a significant contributor to the United Nations (UN), and has participated with soldiers in several foreign operations mandated by the UN. Norway is among the states that have participated from the founding of the UN , NATO , the Council of Europe , the OSCE and the Nordic Council , and in addition to these is a member of the EEA , the World Trade Organization , the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and is part of the Schengen area .

 

Norway is rich in many natural resources such as oil , gas , minerals , timber , seafood , fresh water and hydropower . Since the beginning of the 20th century, these natural conditions have given the country the opportunity for an increase in wealth that few other countries can now enjoy, and Norwegians have the second highest average income in the world, measured in GDP per capita, as of 2022. The petroleum industry accounts for around 14% of Norway's gross domestic product as of 2018. Norway is the world's largest producer of oil and gas per capita outside the Middle East. However, the number of employees linked to this industry fell from approx. 232,000 in 2013 to 207,000 in 2015.

 

In Norway, these natural resources have been managed for socially beneficial purposes. The country maintains a welfare model in line with the other Nordic countries. Important service areas such as health and higher education are state-funded, and the country has an extensive welfare system for its citizens. Public expenditure in 2018 is approx. 50% of GDP, and the majority of these expenses are related to education, healthcare, social security and welfare. Since 2001 and until 2021, when the country took second place, the UN has ranked Norway as the world's best country to live in . From 2010, Norway is also ranked at the top of the EIU's democracy index . Norway ranks third on the UN's World Happiness Report for the years 2016–2018, behind Finland and Denmark , a report published in March 2019.

 

The majority of the population is Nordic. In the last couple of years, immigration has accounted for more than half of population growth. The five largest minority groups are Norwegian-Poles , Lithuanians , Norwegian-Swedes , Norwegian-Syrians including Syrian Kurds and Norwegian-Pakistani .

 

Norway's national day is 17 May, on this day in 1814 the Norwegian Constitution was dated and signed by the presidency of the National Assembly at Eidsvoll . It is stipulated in the law of 26 April 1947 that 17 May are national public holidays. The Sami national day is 6 February. "Yes, we love this country" is Norway's national anthem, the song was written in 1859 by Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (1832–1910).

 

Norway's history of human settlement goes back at least 10,000 years, to the Late Paleolithic , the first period of the Stone Age . Archaeological finds of settlements along the entire Norwegian coast have so far been dated back to 10,400 before present (BP), the oldest find is today considered to be a settlement at Pauler in Brunlanes , Vestfold .

For a period these settlements were considered to be the remains of settlers from Doggerland , an area which today lies beneath the North Sea , but which was once a land bridge connecting today's British Isles with Danish Jutland . But the archaeologists who study the initial phase of the settlement in what is today Norway reckon that the first people who came here followed the coast along what is today Bohuslân. That they arrived in some form of boat is absolutely certain, and there is much evidence that they could easily move over large distances.

 

Since the last Ice Age, there has been continuous settlement in Norway. It cannot be ruled out that people lived in Norway during the interglacial period , but no trace of such a population or settlement has been found.

 

The Stone Age lasted a long time; half of the time that our country has been populated. There are no written accounts of what life was like back then. The knowledge we have has been painstakingly collected through investigations of places where people have stayed and left behind objects that we can understand have been processed by human hands. This field of knowledge is called archaeology . The archaeologists interpret their findings and the history of the surrounding landscape. In our country, the uplift after the Ice Age is fundamental. The history of the settlements at Pauler is no more than fifteen years old.

 

The Fosna culture settled parts of Norway sometime between 10,000–8,000 BC. (see Stone Age in Norway ). The dating of rock carvings is set to Neolithic times (in Norway between 4000 BC to 1700 BC) and show activities typical of hunters and gatherers .

 

Agriculture with livestock and arable farming was introduced in the Neolithic. Swad farming where the farmers move when the field does not produce the expected yield.

 

More permanent and persistent farm settlements developed in the Bronze Age (1700 BC to 500 BC) and the Iron Age . The earliest runes have been found on an arrowhead dated to around 200 BC. Many more inscriptions are dated to around 800, and a number of petty kingdoms developed during these centuries. In prehistoric times, there were no fixed national borders in the Nordic countries and Norway did not exist as a state. The population in Norway probably fell to year 0.

 

Events in this time period, the centuries before the year 1000, are glimpsed in written sources. Although the sagas were written down in the 13th century, many hundreds of years later, they provide a glimpse into what was already a distant past. The story of the fimbul winter gives us a historical picture of something that happened and which in our time, with the help of dendrochronology , can be interpreted as a natural disaster in the year 536, created by a volcanic eruption in El Salvador .

 

In the period between 800 and 1066 there was a significant expansion and it is referred to as the Viking Age . During this period, Norwegians, as Swedes and Danes also did, traveled abroad in longships with sails as explorers, traders, settlers and as Vikings (raiders and pirates ). By the middle of the 11th century, the Norwegian kingship had been firmly established, building its right as descendants of Harald Hårfagre and then as heirs of Olav the Holy . The Norwegian kings, and their subjects, now professed Christianity . In the time around Håkon Håkonsson , in the time after the civil war , there was a small renaissance in Norway with extensive literary activity and diplomatic activity with Europe. The black dew came to Norway in 1349 and killed around half of the population. The entire state apparatus and Norway then entered a period of decline.

 

Between 1396 and 1536, Norway was part of the Kalmar Union , and from 1536 until 1814 Norway had been reduced to a tributary part of Denmark , named as the Personal Union of Denmark-Norway . This staff union entered into an alliance with Napoléon Bonaparte with a war that brought bad times and famine in 1812 . In 1814, Denmark-Norway lost the Anglophone Wars , part of the Napoleonic Wars , and the Danish king was forced to cede Norway to the king of Sweden in the Treaty of Kiel on 14 January of that year. After a Norwegian attempt at independence, Norway was forced into a loose union with Sweden, but where Norway was allowed to create its own constitution, the Constitution of 1814 . In this period, Norwegian, romantic national feeling flourished, and the Norwegians tried to develop and establish their own national self-worth. The union with Sweden was broken in 1905 after it had been threatened with war, and Norway became an independent kingdom with its own monarch, Haakon VII .

 

Norway remained neutral during the First World War , and at the outbreak of the Second World War, Norway again declared itself neutral, but was invaded by National Socialist Germany on 9 April 1940 .

 

Norway became a member of the Western defense alliance NATO in 1949 . Two attempts to join the EU were voted down in referendums by small margins in 1972 and 1994 . Norway has been a close ally of the United States in the post-war period. Large discoveries of oil and natural gas in the North Sea at the end of the 1960s led to tremendous economic growth in the country, which is still ongoing. Traditional industries such as fishing are also part of Norway's economy.

 

Stone Age (before 1700 BC)

When most of the ice disappeared, vegetation spread over the landscape and due to a warm climate around 2000-3000 BC. the forest grew much taller than in modern times. Land uplift after the ice age led to a number of fjords becoming lakes and dry land. The first people probably came from the south along the coast of the Kattegat and overland into Finnmark from the east. The first people probably lived by gathering, hunting and trapping. A good number of Stone Age settlements have been found which show that such hunting and trapping people stayed for a long time in the same place or returned to the same place regularly. Large amounts of gnawed bones show that they lived on, among other things, reindeer, elk, small game and fish.

 

Flintstone was imported from Denmark and apart from small natural deposits along the southern coast, all flintstone in Norway is transported by people. At Espevær, greenstone was quarried for tools in the Stone Age, and greenstone tools from Espevær have been found over large parts of Western Norway. Around 2000-3000 BC the usual farm animals such as cows and sheep were introduced to Norway. Livestock probably meant a fundamental change in society in that part of the people had to be permanent residents or live a semi-nomadic life. Livestock farming may also have led to conflict with hunters.

 

The oldest traces of people in what is today Norway have been found at Pauler , a farm in Brunlanes in Larvik municipality in Vestfold . In 2007 and 2008, the farm has given its name to a number of Stone Age settlements that have been excavated and examined by archaeologists from the Cultural History Museum at UiO. The investigations have been carried out in connection with the new route for the E18 motorway west of Farris. The oldest settlement, located more than 127 m above sea level, is dated to be about 10,400 years old (uncalibrated, more than 11,000 years in real calendar years). From here, the ice sheet was perhaps visible when people settled here. This locality has been named Pauler I, and is today considered to be the oldest confirmed human traces in Norway to date. The place is in the mountains above the Pauler tunnel on the E18 between Larvik and Porsgrunn . The pioneer settlement is a term archaeologists have adopted for the oldest settlement. The archaeologists have speculated about where they came from, the first people in what is today Norway. It has been suggested that they could come by boat or perhaps across the ice from Doggerland or the North Sea, but there is now a large consensus that they came north along what is today the Bohuslän coast. The Fosna culture , the Komsa culture and the Nøstvet culture are the traditional terms for hunting cultures from the Stone Age. One thing is certain - getting to the water was something they mastered, the first people in our country. Therefore, within a short time they were able to use our entire long coast.

 

In the New Stone Age (4000 BC–1700 BC) there is a theory that a new people immigrated to the country, the so-called Stone Ax People . Rock carvings from this period show motifs from hunting and fishing , which were still important industries. From this period, a megalithic tomb has been found in Østfold .

It is uncertain whether there were organized societies or state-like associations in the Stone Age in Norway. Findings from settlements indicate that many lived together and that this was probably more than one family so that it was a slightly larger, organized herd.

 

Finnmark

In prehistoric times, animal husbandry and agriculture were of little economic importance in Finnmark. Livelihoods in Finnmark were mainly based on fish, gathering, hunting and trapping, and eventually domestic reindeer herding became widespread in the Middle Ages. Archaeological finds from the Stone Age have been referred to as the Komsa culture and comprise around 5,000 years of settlement. Finnmark probably got its first settlement around 8000 BC. It is believed that the coastal areas became ice-free 11,000 years BC and the fjord areas around 9,000 years BC. after which willows, grass, heather, birch and pine came into being. Finnmarksvidda was covered by pine forest around 6000 BC. After the Ice Age, the land rose around 80 meters in the inner fjord areas (Alta, Tana, Varanger). Due to ice melting in the polar region, the sea rose in the period 6400–3800 BC. and in areas with little land elevation, some settlements from the first part of the Stone Age were flooded. On Sørøya, the net sea level rise was 12 to 14 meters and many residential areas were flooded.

 

According to Bjørnar Olsen , there are many indications of a connection between the oldest settlement in Western Norway (the " Fosnakulturen ") and that in Finnmark, but it is uncertain in which direction the settlement took place. In the earliest part of the Stone Age, settlement in Finnmark was probably concentrated in the coastal areas, and these only reflected a lifestyle with great mobility and no permanent dwellings. The inner regions, such as Pasvik, were probably used seasonally. The archaeologically proven settlements from the Stone Age in inner Finnmark and Troms are linked to lakes and large watercourses. The oldest petroglyphs in Alta are usually dated to 4200 BC, that is, the Neolithic . Bjørnar Olsen believes that the oldest can be up to 2,000 years older than this.

 

From around 4000 BC a slow deforestation of Finnmark began and around 1800 BC the vegetation distribution was roughly the same as in modern times. The change in vegetation may have increased the distance between the reindeer's summer and winter grazing. The uplift continued slowly from around 4000 BC. at the same time as sea level rise stopped.

 

According to Gutorm Gjessing, the settlement in Finnmark and large parts of northern Norway in the Neolithic was semi-nomadic with movement between four seasonal settlements (following the pattern of life in Sami siida in historical times): On the outer coast in summer (fishing and seal catching) and inland in winter (hunting for reindeer, elk and bear). Povl Simonsen believed instead that the winter residence was in the inner fjord area in a village-like sod house settlement. Bjørnar Olsen believes that at the end of the Stone Age there was a relatively settled population along the coast, while inland there was less settlement and a more mobile lifestyle.

 

Bronze Age (1700 BC–500 BC)

Bronze was used for tools in Norway from around 1500 BC. Bronze is a mixture of tin and copper , and these metals were introduced because they were not mined in the country at the time. Bronze is believed to have been a relatively expensive material. The Bronze Age in Norway can be divided into two phases:

 

Early Bronze Age (1700–1100 BC)

Younger Bronze Age (1100–500 BC)

For the prehistoric (unwritten) era, there is limited knowledge about social conditions and possible state formations. From the Bronze Age, there are large burial mounds of stone piles along the coast of Vestfold and Agder, among others. It is likely that only chieftains or other great men could erect such grave monuments and there was probably some form of organized society linked to these. In the Bronze Age, society was more organized and stratified than in the Stone Age. Then a rich class of chieftains emerged who had close connections with southern Scandinavia. The settlements became more permanent and people adopted horses and ard . They acquired bronze status symbols, lived in longhouses and people were buried in large burial mounds . Petroglyphs from the Bronze Age indicate that humans practiced solar cultivation.

 

Finnmark

In the last millennium BC the climate became cooler and the pine forest disappears from the coast; pine forests, for example, were only found in the innermost part of the Altafjord, while the outer coast was almost treeless. Around the year 0, the limit for birch forest was south of Kirkenes. Animals with forest habitats (elk, bear and beaver) disappeared and the reindeer probably established their annual migration routes sometime at that time. In the period 1800–900 BC there were significantly more settlements in and utilization of the hinterland was particularly noticeable on Finnmarksvidda. From around 1800 BC until year 0 there was a significant increase in contact between Finnmark and areas in the east including Karelia (where metals were produced including copper) and central and eastern Russia. The youngest petroglyphs in Alta show far more boats than the earlier phases and the boats are reminiscent of types depicted in petroglyphs in southern Scandinavia. It is unclear what influence southern Scandinavian societies had as far north as Alta before the year 0. Many of the cultural features that are considered typical Sami in modern times were created or consolidated in the last millennium BC, this applies, among other things, to the custom of burying in brick chambers in stone urns. The Mortensnes burial ground may have been used for 2000 years until around 1600 AD.

 

Iron Age (c. 500 BC–c. 1050 AD)

 

The Einangsteinen is one of the oldest Norwegian runestones; it is from the 4th century

 

Simultaneous production of Vikings

Around 500 years BC the researchers reckon that the Bronze Age will be replaced by the Iron Age as iron takes over as the most important material for weapons and tools. Bronze, wood and stone were still used. Iron was cheaper than bronze, easier to work than flint , and could be used for many purposes; iron probably became common property. Iron could, among other things, be used to make solid and sharp axes which made it much easier to fell trees. In the Iron Age, gold and silver were also used partly for decoration and partly as means of payment. It is unknown which language was used in Norway before our era. From around the year 0 until around the year 800, everyone in Scandinavia (except the Sami) spoke Old Norse , a North Germanic language. Subsequently, several different languages ​​developed in this area that were only partially mutually intelligible. The Iron Age is divided into several periods:

 

Early Iron Age

Pre-Roman Iron Age (c. 500 BC–c. 0)

Roman Iron Age (c. 0–c. AD 400)

Migration period (approx. 400–600). In the migration period (approx. 400–600), new peoples came to Norway, and ruins of fortress buildings etc. are interpreted as signs that there has been talk of a violent invasion.

Younger Iron Age

Merovingian period (500–800)

 

The Viking Age (793–1066)

Norwegian Vikings go on plundering expeditions and trade voyages around the coastal countries of Western Europe . Large groups of Norwegians emigrate to the British Isles , Iceland and Greenland . Harald Hårfagre starts a unification process of Norway late in the 8th century , which was completed by Harald Hardråde in the 1060s . The country was Christianized under the kings Olav Tryggvason , fell in the battle of Svolder ( 1000 ) and Olav Haraldsson (the saint), fell in the battle of Stiklestad in 1030 .

 

Sources of prehistoric times

Shrinking glaciers in the high mountains, including in Jotunheimen and Breheimen , have from around the year 2000 uncovered objects from the Viking Age and earlier. These are objects of organic material that have been preserved by the ice and that elsewhere in nature are broken down in a few months. The finds are getting older as the melting makes the archaeologists go deeper into the ice. About half of all archaeological discoveries on glaciers in the world are made in Oppland . In 2013, a 3,400-year-old shoe and a robe from the year 300 were found. Finds at Lomseggen in Lom published in 2020 revealed, among other things, well-preserved horseshoes used on a mountain pass. Many hundreds of items include preserved clothing, knives, whisks, mittens, leather shoes, wooden chests and horse equipment. A piece of cloth dated to the year 1000 has preserved its original colour. In 2014, a wooden ski from around the year 700 was found in Reinheimen . The ski is 172 cm long and 14 cm wide, with preserved binding of leather and wicker.

 

Pytheas from Massalia is the oldest known account of what was probably the coast of Norway, perhaps somewhere on the coast of Møre. Pytheas visited Britannia around 325 BC. and traveled further north to a country by the "Ice Sea". Pytheas described the short summer night and the midnight sun farther north. He wrote, among other things, that people there made a drink from grain and honey. Caesar wrote in his work about the Gallic campaign about the Germanic tribe Haruders. Other Roman sources around the year 0 mention the land of the Cimbri (Jutland) and the Cimbri headlands ( Skagen ) and that the sources stated that Cimbri and Charyds lived in this area. Some of these peoples may have immigrated to Norway and there become known as hordes (as in Hordaland). Sources from the Mediterranean area referred to the islands of Scandia, Scandinavia and Thule ("the outermost of all islands"). The Roman historian Tacitus wrote around the year 100 a work about Germania and mentioned the people of Scandia, the Sviones. Ptolemy wrote around the year 150 that the Kharudes (Hordes) lived further north than all the Cimbri, in the north lived the Finnoi (Finns or Sami) and in the south the Gutai (Goths). The Nordic countries and Norway were outside the Roman Empire , which dominated Europe at the time. The Gothic-born historian Jordanes wrote in the 5th century about 13 tribes or people groups in Norway, including raumaricii (probably Romerike ), ragnaricii ( Ranrike ) and finni or skretefinni (skrid finner or ski finner, i.e. Sami) as well as a number of unclear groups. Prokopios wrote at the same time about Thule north of the land of the Danes and Slavs, Thule was ten times as big as Britannia and the largest of all the islands. In Thule, the sun was up 40 days straight in the summer. After the migration period , southern Europeans' accounts of northern Europe became fuller and more reliable.

 

Settlement in prehistoric times

Norway has around 50,000 farms with their own names. Farm names have persisted for a long time, over 1000 years, perhaps as much as 2000 years. The name researchers have arranged different types of farm names chronologically, which provides a basis for determining when the place was used by people or received a permanent settlement. Uncompounded landscape names such as Haug, Eid, Vik and Berg are believed to be the oldest. Archaeological traces indicate that some areas have been inhabited earlier than assumed from the farm name. Burial mounds also indicate permanent settlement. For example, the burial ground at Svartelva in Løten was used from around the year 0 to the year 1000 when Christianity took over. The first farmers probably used large areas for inland and outland, and new farms were probably established based on some "mother farms". Names such as By (or Bø) show that it is an old place of residence. From the older Iron Age, names with -heim (a common Germanic word meaning place of residence) and -stad tell of settlement, while -vin and -land tell of the use of the place. Farm names in -heim are often found as -um , -eim or -em as in Lerum and Seim, there are often large farms in the center of the village. New farm names with -city and -country were also established in the Viking Age . The first farmers probably used the best areas. The largest burial grounds, the oldest archaeological finds and the oldest farm names are found where the arable land is richest and most spacious.

 

It is unclear whether the settlement expansion in Roman times, migrations and the Iron Age is due to immigration or internal development and population growth. Among other things, it is difficult to demonstrate where in Europe the immigrants have come from. The permanent residents had both fields (where grain was grown) and livestock that grazed in the open fields, but it is uncertain which of these was more important. Population growth from around the year 200 led to more utilization of open land, for example in the form of settlements in the mountains. During the migration period, it also seems that in parts of the country it became common to have cluster gardens or a form of village settlement.

 

Norwegian expansion northwards

From around the year 200, there was a certain migration by sea from Rogaland and Hordaland to Nordland and Sør-Troms. Those who moved settled down as a settled Iron Age population and became dominant over the original population which may have been Sami . The immigrant Norwegians, Bumen , farmed with livestock that were fed inside in the winter as well as some grain cultivation and fishing. The northern border of the Norwegians' settlement was originally at the Toppsundet near Harstad and around the year 500 there was a Norwegian settlement to Malangsgapet. That was as far north as it was possible to grow grain at the time. Malangen was considered the border between Hålogaland and Finnmork until around 1400 . Further into the Viking Age and the Middle Ages, there was immigration and settlement of Norwegian speakers along the coast north of Malangen. Around the year 800, Norwegians lived along the entire outer coast to Vannøy . The Norwegians partly copied Sami livelihoods such as whaling, fur hunting and reindeer husbandry. It was probably this area between Malangen and Vannøy that was Ottar from the Hålogaland area. In the Viking Age, there were also some Norwegian settlements further north and east. East of the North Cape are the scattered archaeological finds of Norwegian settlement in the Viking Age. There are Norwegian names for fjords and islands from the Viking Age, including fjord names with "-anger". Around the year 1050, there were Norwegian settlements on the outer coast of Western Finnmark. Traders and tax collectors traveled even further.

 

North of Malangen there were Norse farming settlements in the Iron Age. Malangen was considered Finnmark's western border until 1300. There are some archaeological traces of Norse activity around the coast from Tromsø to Kirkenes in the Viking Age. Around Tromsø, the research indicates a Norse/Sami mixed culture on the coast.

 

From the year 1100 and the next 200–300 years, there are no traces of Norwegian settlement north and east of Tromsø. It is uncertain whether this is due to depopulation, whether it is because the Norwegians further north were not Christianized or because there were no churches north of Lenvik or Tromsø . Norwegian settlement in the far north appears from sources from the 14th century. In the Hanseatic period , the settlement was developed into large areas specialized in commercial fishing, while earlier (in the Viking Age) there had been farms with a combination of fishing and agriculture. In 1307 , a fortress and the first church east of Tromsø were built in Vardø . Vardø became a small Norwegian town, while Vadsø remained Sami. Norwegian settlements and churches appeared along the outermost coast in the Middle Ages. After the Reformation, perhaps as a result of a decline in fish stocks or fish prices, there were Norwegian settlements in the inner fjord areas such as Lebesby in Laksefjord. Some fishing villages at the far end of the coast were abandoned for good. In the interior of Finnmark, there was no national border for a long time and Kautokeino and Karasjok were joint Norwegian-Swedish areas with strong Swedish influence. The border with Finland was established in 1751 and with Russia in 1826.

 

On a Swedish map from 1626, Norway's border is indicated at Malangen, while Sweden with this map showed a desire to control the Sami area which had been a common area.

 

The term Northern Norway only came into use at the end of the 19th century and administratively the area was referred to as Tromsø Diocese when Tromsø became a bishopric in 1840. There had been different designations previously: Hålogaland originally included only Helgeland and when Norse settlement spread north in the Viking Age and the Middle Ages, Hålogaland was used for the area north approximately to Malangen , while Finnmark or "Finnmarken", "the land of the Sami", lay outside. The term Northern Norway was coined at a cafe table in Kristiania in 1884 by members of the Nordlændingernes Forening and was first commonly used in the interwar period as it eventually supplanted "Hålogaland".

 

State formation

The battle in Hafrsfjord in the year 872 has long been regarded as the day when Norway became a kingdom. The year of the battle is uncertain (may have been 10-20 years later). The whole of Norway was not united in that battle: the process had begun earlier and continued a couple of hundred years later. This means that the geographical area became subject to a political authority and became a political unit. The geographical area was perceived as an area as it is known, among other things, from Ottar from Hålogaland's account for King Alfred of Wessex around the year 880. Ottar described "the land of the Norwegians" as very long and narrow, and it was narrowest in the far north. East of the wasteland in the south lay Sveoland and in the north lay Kvenaland in the east. When Ottar sailed south along the land from his home ( Malangen ) to Skiringssal, he always had Norway ("Nordveg") on his port side and the British Isles on his starboard side. The journey took a good month. Ottar perceived "Nordveg" as a geographical unit, but did not imply that it was a political unit. Ottar separated Norwegians from Swedes and Danes. It is unclear why Ottar perceived the population spread over such a large area as a whole. It is unclear whether Norway as a geographical term or Norwegians as the name of a ethnic group is the oldest. The Norwegians had a common language which in the centuries before Ottar did not differ much from the language of Denmark and Sweden.

 

According to Sverre Steen, it is unlikely that Harald Hårfagre was able to control this entire area as one kingdom. The saga of Harald was written 300 years later and at his death Norway was several smaller kingdoms. Harald probably controlled a larger area than anyone before him and at most Harald's kingdom probably included the coast from Trøndelag to Agder and Vestfold as well as parts of Viken . There were probably several smaller kingdoms of varying extent before Harald and some of these are reflected in traditional landscape names such as Ranrike and Ringerike . Landscape names of "-land" (Rogaland) and "-mark" (Hedmark) as well as names such as Agder and Sogn may have been political units before Harald.

 

According to Sverre Steen, the national assembly was completed at the earliest at the battle of Stiklestad in 1030 and the introduction of Christianity was probably a significant factor in the establishment of Norway as a state. Håkon I the good Adalsteinsfostre introduced the leasehold system where the "coastal land" (as far as the salmon went up the rivers) was divided into ship raiders who were to provide a longship with soldiers and supplies. The leidange was probably introduced as a defense against the Danes. The border with the Danes was traditionally at the Göta älv and several times before and after Harald Hårfagre the Danes had control over central parts of Norway.

 

Christianity was known and existed in Norway before Olav Haraldson's time. The spread occurred both from the south (today's Denmark and northern Germany) and from the west (England and Ireland). Ansgar of Bremen , called the "Apostle of the North", worked in Sweden, but he was never in Norway and probably had little influence in the country. Viking expeditions brought the Norwegians of that time into contact with Christian countries and some were baptized in England, Ireland and northern France. Olav Tryggvason and Olav Haraldson were Vikings who returned home. The first Christians in Norway were also linked to pre-Christian local religion, among other things, by mixing Christian symbols with symbols of Odin and other figures from Norse religion.

 

According to Sverre Steen, the introduction of Christianity in Norway should not be perceived as a nationwide revival. At Mostratinget, Christian law was introduced as law in the country and later incorporated into the laws of the individual jurisdictions. Christianity primarily involved new forms in social life, among other things exposure and images of gods were prohibited, it was forbidden to "put out" unwanted infants (to let them die), and it was forbidden to have multiple wives. The church became a nationwide institution with a special group of officials tasked with protecting the church and consolidating the new religion. According to Sverre Steen, Christianity and the church in the Middle Ages should therefore be considered together, and these became a new unifying factor in the country. The church and Christianity linked Norway to Roman Catholic Europe with Church Latin as the common language, the same time reckoning as the rest of Europe and the church in Norway was arranged much like the churches in Denmark, Sweden and England. Norway received papal approval in 1070 and became its own church province in 1152 with Archbishop Nidaros .

 

With Christianity, the country got three social powers: the peasants (organized through the things), the king with his officials and the church with the clergy. The things are the oldest institution: At allthings all armed men had the right to attend (in part an obligation to attend) and at lagthings met emissaries from an area (that is, the lagthings were representative assemblies). The Thing both ruled in conflicts and established laws. The laws were memorized by the participants and written down around the year 1000 or later in the Gulationsloven , Frostatingsloven , Eidsivatingsloven and Borgartingsloven . The person who had been successful at the hearing had to see to the implementation of the judgment themselves.

 

Early Middle Ages (1050s–1184)

The early Middle Ages is considered in Norwegian history to be the period between the end of the Viking Age around 1050 and the coronation of King Sverre in 1184 . The beginning of the period can be dated differently, from around the year 1000 when the Christianization of the country took place and up to 1100 when the Viking Age was over from an archaeological point of view. From 1035 to 1130 it was a time of (relative) internal peace in Norway, even several of the kings attempted campaigns abroad, including in 1066 and 1103 .

 

During this period, the church's organization was built up. This led to a gradual change in religious customs. Religion went from being a domestic matter to being regulated by common European Christian law and the royal power gained increased power and influence. Slavery (" servitude ") was gradually abolished. The population grew rapidly during this period, as the thousands of farm names ending in -rud show.

 

The urbanization of Norway is a historical process that has slowly but surely changed Norway from the early Viking Age to today, from a country based on agriculture and sea salvage, to increasingly trade and industry. As early as the ninth century, the country got its first urban community, and in the eleventh century we got the first permanent cities.

 

In the 1130s, civil war broke out . This was due to a power struggle and that anyone who claimed to be the king's son could claim the right to the throne. The disputes escalated into extensive year-round warfare when Sverre Sigurdsson started a rebellion against the church's and the landmen's candidate for the throne , Magnus Erlingsson .

 

Emergence of cities

The oldest Norwegian cities probably emerged from the end of the 9th century. Oslo, Bergen and Nidaros became episcopal seats, which stimulated urban development there, and the king built churches in Borg , Konghelle and Tønsberg. Hamar and Stavanger became new episcopal seats and are referred to in the late 12th century as towns together with the trading places Veøy in Romsdal and Kaupanger in Sogn. In the late Middle Ages, Borgund (on Sunnmøre), Veøy (in Romsdalsfjorden) and Vågan (in Lofoten) were referred to as small trading places. Urbanization in Norway occurred in few places compared to the neighboring countries, only 14 places appear as cities before 1350. Stavanger became a bishopric around 1120–1130, but it is unclear whether the place was already a city then. The fertile Jæren and outer Ryfylke were probably relatively densely populated at that time. A particularly large concentration of Irish artefacts from the Viking Age has been found in Stavanger and Nord-Jæren.

 

It has been difficult to estimate the population in the Norwegian medieval cities, but it is considered certain that the cities grew rapidly in the Middle Ages. Oscar Albert Johnsen estimated the city's population before the Black Death at 20,000, of which 7,000 in Bergen, 3,000 in Nidaros, 2,000 in Oslo and 1,500 in Tunsberg. Based on archaeological research, Lunden estimates that Oslo had around 1,500 inhabitants in 250 households in the year 1300. Bergen was built up more densely and, with the concentration of exports there, became Norway's largest city in a special position for several hundred years. Knut Helle suggests a city population of 20,000 at most in the High Middle Ages, of which almost half in Bergen.

 

The Bjarkøyretten regulated the conditions in cities (especially Bergen and Nidaros) and in trading places, and for Nidaros had many of the same provisions as the Frostating Act . Magnus Lagabøte's city law replaced the bjarkøretten and from 1276 regulated the settlement in Bergen and with corresponding laws also drawn up for Oslo, Nidaros and Tunsberg. The city law applied within the city's roof area . The City Act determined that the city's public streets consisted of wide commons (perpendicular to the shoreline) and ran parallel to the shoreline, similarly in Nidaros and Oslo. The roads were small streets of up to 3 cubits (1.4 metres) and linked to the individual property. From the Middle Ages, the Norwegian cities were usually surrounded by wooden fences. The urban development largely consisted of low wooden houses which stood in contrast to the relatively numerous and dominant churches and monasteries built in stone.

 

The City Act and supplementary provisions often determined where in the city different goods could be traded, in Bergen, for example, cattle and sheep could only be traded on the Square, and fish only on the Square or directly from the boats at the quayside. In Nidaros, the blacksmiths were required to stay away from the densely populated areas due to the risk of fire, while the tanners had to stay away from the settlements due to the strong smell. The City Act also attempted to regulate the influx of people into the city (among other things to prevent begging in the streets) and had provisions on fire protection. In Oslo, from the 13th century or earlier, it was common to have apartment buildings consisting of single buildings on a couple of floors around a courtyard with access from the street through a gate room. Oslo's medieval apartment buildings were home to one to four households. In the urban farms, livestock could be kept, including pigs and cows, while pastures and fields were found in the city's rooftops . In the apartment buildings there could be several outbuildings such as warehouses, barns and stables. Archaeological excavations show that much of the buildings in medieval Oslo, Trondheim and Tønsberg resembled the oblong farms that have been preserved at Bryggen in Bergen . The land boundaries in Oslo appear to have persisted for many hundreds of years, in Bergen right from the Middle Ages to modern times.

 

High Middle Ages (1184–1319)

After civil wars in the 12th century, the country had a relative heyday in the 13th century. Iceland and Greenland came under the royal authority in 1262 , and the Norwegian Empire reached its greatest extent under Håkon IV Håkonsson . The last king of Haraldsätten, Håkon V Magnusson , died sonless in 1319 . Until the 17th century, Norway stretched all the way down to the mouth of Göta älv , which was then Norway's border with Sweden and Denmark.

 

Just before the Black Death around 1350, there were between 65,000 and 85,000 farms in the country, and there had been a strong growth in the number of farms from 1050, especially in Eastern Norway. In the High Middle Ages, the church or ecclesiastical institutions controlled 40% of the land in Norway, while the aristocracy owned around 20% and the king owned 7%. The church and monasteries received land through gifts from the king and nobles, or through inheritance and gifts from ordinary farmers.

 

Settlement and demography in the Middle Ages

Before the Black Death, there were more and more farms in Norway due to farm division and clearing. The settlement spread to more marginal agricultural areas higher inland and further north. Eastern Norway had the largest areas to take off and had the most population growth towards the High Middle Ages. Along the coast north of Stad, settlement probably increased in line with the extent of fishing. The Icelandic Rimbegla tells around the year 1200 that the border between Finnmark (the land of the Sami) and resident Norwegians in the interior was at Malangen , while the border all the way out on the coast was at Kvaløya . From the end of the High Middle Ages, there were more Norwegians along the coast of Finnmark and Nord-Troms. In the inner forest and mountain tracts along the current border between Norway and Sweden, the Sami exploited the resources all the way down to Hedmark.

 

There are no censuses or other records of population and settlement in the Middle Ages. At the time of the Reformation, the population was below 200,000 and only in 1650 was the population at the same level as before the Black Death. When Christianity was introduced after the year 1000, the population was around 200,000. After the Black Death, many farms and settlements were abandoned and deserted, in the most marginal agricultural areas up to 80% of the farms were abandoned. Places such as Skien, Veøy and Borgund (Ålesund) went out of use as trading towns. By the year 1300, the population was somewhere between 300,000 and 560,000 depending on the calculation method. Common methods start from detailed information about farms in each village and compare this with the situation in 1660 when there are good headcounts. From 1300 to 1660, there was a change in the economic base so that the coastal villages received a larger share of the population. The inland areas of Eastern Norway had a relatively larger population in the High Middle Ages than after the Reformation. Kåre Lunden concludes that the population in the year 1300 was close to 500,000, of which 15,000 lived in cities. Lunden believes that the population in 1660 was still slightly lower than the peak before the Black Death and points out that farm settlement in 1660 did not reach the same extent as in the High Middle Ages. In 1660, the population in Troms and Finnmark was 6,000 and 3,000 respectively (2% of the total population), in 1300 these areas had an even smaller share of the country's population and in Finnmark there were hardly any Norwegian-speaking inhabitants. In the High Middle Ages, the climate was more favorable for grain cultivation in the north. Based on the number of farms, the population increased 162% from 1000 to 1300, in Northern and Western Europe as a whole the growth was 200% in the same period.

 

Late Middle Ages (1319–1537)

Due to repeated plague epidemics, the population was roughly halved and the least productive of the country's farms were laid waste. It took several hundred years before the population again reached the level before 1349 . However, those who survived the epidemics gained more financial resources by sharing. Tax revenues for the state almost collapsed, and a large part of the noble families died out or sank into peasant status due to the fall in national debt . The Hanseatic League took over trade and shipping and dominated fish exports. The Archbishop of Nidaros was the country's most powerful man economically and politically, as the royal dynasty married into the Swedish in 1319 and died out in 1387 . Eventually, Copenhagen became the political center of the kingdom and Bergen the commercial center, while Trondheim remained the religious center.

 

From Reformation to Autocracy (1537–1660)

In 1537 , the Reformation was carried out in Norway. With that, almost half of the country's property was confiscated by the royal power at the stroke of a pen. The large seizure increased the king's income and was able, among other things, to expand his military power and consolidated his power in the kingdom. From roughly the time of the Reformation and in the following centuries, the state increased its power and importance in people's lives. Until around 1620, the state administration was fairly simple and unspecialised: in Copenhagen, the central administration mainly consisted of a chancellery and an interest chamber ; and sheriffs ruled the civil (including bailiffs and sheriffs) and the military in their district, the sheriffs collected taxes and oversaw business. The accounts were not clear and without summaries. The clergy, which had great power as a separate organization, was appointed by the state church after the Reformation, administered from Copenhagen. In this period, Norway was ruled by (mainly) Danish noble sheriffs, who acted as intermediaries between the peasants and the Oldenborg king in the field of justice, tax and customs collection.

 

From 1620, the state apparatus went through major changes where specialization of functions was a main issue. The sheriff's tasks were divided between several, more specialized officials - the sheriffs retained the formal authority over these, who in practice were under the national administration in Copenhagen. Among other things, a separate military officer corps was established, a separate customs office was established and separate treasurers for taxes and fees were appointed. The Overbergamtet, the central governing body for overseeing mining operations in Norway, was established in 1654 with an office in Christiania and this agency was to oversee the mining chiefs in the Nordenfjeld and Sønnenfjeld areas (the mines at Kongsberg and Røros were established in the previous decades). The formal transition from county government to official government with fixed-paid county officials took place after 1660, but the real changes had taken place from around 1620. The increased specialization and transition to official government meant that experts, not amateurs, were in charge of each area, and this civil service meant, according to Sverre Steen that the dictatorship was not a personal dictatorship.

 

From 1570 until 1721, the Oldenborg dynasty was in repeated wars with the Vasa dynasty in Sweden. The financing of these wars led to a severe increase in taxation which caused great distress.

 

Politically-geographically, the Oldenborg kings had to cede to Sweden the Norwegian provinces of Jemtland , Herjedalen , Idre and Särna , as well as Båhuslen . As part of the financing of the wars, the state apparatus was expanded. Royal power began to assert itself to a greater extent in the administration of justice. Until this period, cases of violence and defamation had been treated as civil cases between citizens. The level of punishment was greatly increased. During this period, at least 307 people were also executed for witchcraft in Norway. Culturally, the country was marked by the fact that the written language became Danish because of the Bible translation and the University of Copenhagen's educational monopoly.

 

From the 16th century, business became more marked by production for sale and not just own consumption. In the past, it was particularly the fisheries that had produced such a large surplus of goods that it was sold to markets far away, the dried fish trade via Bergen is known from around the year 1100. In the 16th century, the yield from the fisheries multiplied, especially due to the introduction of herring in Western Norway and in Trøndelag and because new tools made fishing for herring and skre more efficient. Line fishing and cod nets that were introduced in the 17th century were controversial because the small fishermen believed it favored citizens in the cities.

 

Forestry and the timber trade became an important business, particularly because of the boom saw which made it possible to saw all kinds of tables and planks for sale abroad. The demand for timber increased at the same time in Europe, Norway had plenty of forests and in the 17th century timber became the country's most important export product. There were hundreds of sawmills in the country and the largest had the feel of factories . In 1680, the king regulated the timber trade by allowing exports only from privileged sawmills and in a certain quantity.

 

From the 1520s, some silver was mined in Telemark. When the peasants chased the German miners whereupon the king executed five peasants and demanded compensation from the other rebellious peasants. The background for the harsh treatment was that the king wanted to assert his authority over the extraction of precious metals. The search for metals led to the silver works at Kongsberg after 1624, copper in the mountain villages between Trøndelag and Eastern Norway, and iron, among other things, in Agder and lower Telemark. The financial gain of the quarries at that time is unclear because there are no reliable accounts. Kongsberg made Denmark-Norway self-sufficient in silver and the copper works produced a good deal more than the domestic demand and became an important export commodity. Kongsberg and Røros were the only Norwegian towns established because of the quarries.

 

In addition to the sawmills, in the 17th century, industrial production ( manufactures ) was established in, among other things, wool weaving, soap production, tea boiling , nail production and the manufacture of gunpowder .

 

The monopoly until the Peace of Kiel (1660–1814)

Until 1660, the king had been elected by the Danish Riksråd, while he inherited the kingdom of Norway, which was a tradition in Norway. After a series of military defeats, the king committed a coup d'état and deposed the Riksdag. King Frederik III introduced absolute power, which meant that there were hardly any legal restrictions on the king's power. This reinforced the expansion of the state apparatus that had been going on for a few decades, and the civil administration was controlled to a greater extent from the central administration in Copenhagen. According to Sverre Steen, the more specialized and expanded civil service meant that the period of autocracy was not essentially a personal dictatorship: The changing monarchs had the formal last word on important matters, but higher officials set the conditions. According to Steen, the autocracy was not tyrannical where the citizens were treated arbitrarily by the king and officials: the laws were strict and the punishments harsh, but there was legal certainty. The king rarely used his right to punish outside the judiciary and often used his right to commute sentences or pardons. It almost never happened that the king intervened in a court case before a verdict had been passed.

 

In 1662, the sheriff system (in which the nobility played an important role) was abolished and replaced with amt . Norway was divided into four main counties (Akershus, Kristiansands, Bergenhus and Trondhjems) which were later called stiftamt led by stiftamtmen with a number of county marshals and bailiffs (futer) under them. The county administrator in Akershus also had other roles such as governor. The former sheriffs were almost absolute within their fiefs, while the new stifamtmen and amtmen had more limited authority; among other things, they did not have military equipment like the sheriffs. The county officials had no control over state income and could not enrich themselves privately as the sheriffs could, taxes and fees were instead handled by their own officials. County officials were employed by the king and, unlike the sheriffs, had a fixed salary. Officials appointed by the king were responsible for local government. Before 1662, the sheriffs themselves appointed low officials such as bailiffs, mayors and councillors. A church commissioner was given responsibility for overseeing the churchwardens' accounts. In 1664, two general road masters were appointed for Norway, one for Sonnafjelske (Eastland and Sørlandet) and one for Nordafjelske (Westlandet and Trøndelag; Northern Norway had no roads).

 

Both Denmark and Norway got new law books. The wretched state finances led to an extensive sale of crown property, first to the state's creditors. Further sales meant that many farmers became self-owned at the end of the 18th century. Industrial exploitation of Norwegian natural resources began, and trade and shipping and especially increasing timber exports led to economic growth in the latter part of the 1700s.

 

From 1500 to 1814, Norway did not have its own foreign policy. After the dissolution of the Kalmar Union in 1523, Denmark remained the leading power in the Nordic region and dominated the Baltic Sea, while Sweden sought to expand geographically in all directions and strengthened its position. From 1625 to 1660, Denmark lost its dominance: Christian IV lost to the emperor in the Thirty Years' War and ceded Skåne, Blekinge, Halland, Båhuslen , Jemtland and Herjedalen as well as all the islands in the inner part of the Baltic Sea. With this, Norway got its modern borders, which have remained in place ever since. Sweden was no longer confined by Norway and Denmark, and Sweden became the great power in the Nordic region. At the same time, Norway remained far from Denmark (until 1660 there was an almost continuous land connection between Norway and Denmark). During the Great Nordic War, Danish forces moved towards Scania and ended with Charles the 12th falling at Fredriksten . From 1720 to 1807 there was peace except for the short Cranberry War in 1788. In August 1807, the British navy surrounded Denmark and demanded that the Danish fleet be handed over. After bombing 2-7. On September 1807, the Danes capitulated and handed over the fleet (known as the "fleet robbery") and the arsenal. Two weeks later, Denmark entered into an alliance with Napoleon and Great Britain declared war on Denmark in November 1807. The Danish leadership had originally envisioned an alliance with Great Britain. Anger at the fleet robbery and fear of French occupation of Denmark itself (and thus breaking the connection with Norway) were probably the motive for the alliance with France. According to Sverre Steen, the period 1807-1814 was the most significant in Norway's history (before the Second World War). Foreign trade was paralyzed and hundreds of Norwegian ships were seized by the British. British ships, both warships and privateers , blocked the sea route between Norway and Denmark as described in " Terje Vigen " by Henrik Ibsen . During the Napoleonic Wars , there was a food shortage and famine in Norway, between 20 and 30 thousand people out of a population of around 900 thousand died from sheer lack of food or diseases related to malnutrition.

 

From the late summer of 1807, Norway was governed by a government commission led by the governor and commander-in-chief, Prince Christian August . Christian August was considered an honorable and capable leader. In 1808, a joint Russian and Danish/Norwegian attack on Sweden was planned; the campaign fails completely and Christian August concludes a truce with the Swedes. The Swedish king was deposed, the country got a new constitution with a limited monarchy and in the summer of 1808, Christian August was elected heir to the throne in Sweden. Christian August died a few months after he moved to Sweden and the French general Jean Baptiste Bernadotte became the new heir to the throne with the name "Karl Johan". After Napoleon was defeated at Leipzig in 1813, Bernadotte entered Holstein with Swedish forces and forced the Danish king to the Peace of Kiel .

 

Colonies and slave trade

Denmark-Norway acquired overseas colonies: St. Thomas (1665), St. Jan and St. Croix (18th century). At the same time, the kingdom entered into an agreement with rulers on the Gold Coast (Ghana) regarding the establishment of slave forts, including Christiansborg in Accra . The trade was triangular from Copenhagen to the Gold Coast with weapons, gunpowder and liquor which were exchanged for gold, ivory and slaves . The slaves were transported across the Atlantic to the Caribbean, among other things to the Danish-Norwegian colonies where St. Croix was most important. The ships returned to Copenhagen with sugar, tobacco, cotton and other goods. About 100,000 slaves were transported across the sea on Danish and Norwegian ships from 1660 to 1802. About 10% of the slaves died during the crossing. At least two of the slave ships ("Cornelia" and "Friderich") were in Norwegian ownership. Engelbret Hesselberg was a fut on St. Croix and after a slave rebellion in 1759, he had some of the rebels executed, among other things, by burning them alive, hanging them by their feet or putting them naked in a cage in the sun. At the end of the 18th century, opposition to the slave trade grew in Denmark-Norway, among others the Norwegian Claus Fasting promoted strong criticism. The slave trade was banned from 1803, while slavery itself was banned in Denmark from 1848.

 

Immigration to Norway

In the 1500s and 1600s, many people moved within Europe. From Germany, France and the Netherlands, enterprising people came to Sweden and Denmark, and gave rise to influential families. Danes in particular came to Norway who, formally speaking, were not foreigners, but were probably perceived as strangers by the local population. There was some immigration of ethnic Germans, some from areas under the Danish crown and others. Some immigrated from the Netherlands, England and Scotland. For example, half of those who applied for citizenship in Bergen in the 17th century were foreigners and they were often founders of new businesses. Immigrants from the Netherlands brought knowledge of line fishing and the preparation of herring; the Scot came with knowledge of the production of cuttlefish ; and Germans engaged in mining. Some foreigners ran large farms they bought near the cities, for example Frogner near Christiania and Lade near Trondheim. A large part of the country's leading echelon of officials and merchants were around 1,800 descendants of immigrants, and family names of foreign origin had a higher status. According to Sverre Steen, it was special for Norway that the immigrants and their descendants were given such a much stronger position than other residents.

 

Social and cultural conditions

Around 1800, most people, both women and men, in Norway could read and many could write. Foreigners traveling in Norway were surprised at how well-informed and interested Norwegian farmers were about the situation outside the country. In the 17th century, Peder Claussøn Friis translated Snorre Sturlason's royal sagas from Old Norse, and in a new edition this book became important in nation-building in later centuries. Early in the 18th century, Tormod Torfæus wrote Norway's history to 1387 in 4 volumes in Latin ; the preparation is considered to be scientifically unsustainable. In the 1730s, Ludvig Holberg wrote the popular scientific Danmarks Reges Historie , which is considered to maintain a high standard. According to Holberg, Norway emerged as a kingdom after the "nomenclature union in 1380". Holberg was the most important Norwegian cultural figure in the Danish era. Gerhard Schøning wrote Norges Reges Historie (in Danish) in the 1770s ; Schøning claimed that the Norwegians were a separate people from the dawn of time and had immigrated from the north-east without visiting Denmark.

 

1814

Norway remained the hereditary kingdom of the Oldenborg kings until 1814 , when the king had to renounce Norway at the Peace of Kiel on 14 January 1814 after being on the losing side during the Napoleonic Wars . Greenland, the Faroe Islands and Iceland were not included in the transfer to Sweden. The King of Sweden undertook to maintain the laws and freedoms the Norwegians had and Norway was to take over its share of the national debt. At the same time, the Swedish king ceded Rügen and Swedish Pomerania as well as 1 million dalers. Norway was ceded to the king of Sweden and the Treaty of Kiel established that Norway was a separate kingdom. Prince Christian Frederik traveled to Trondheim to calm the mood. Sixty leading citizens of Trondheim signed a letter in which they supported the prince's policy of independence and at the same time asked that a congress should be convened to lay the foundations for Norway's future constitution. On his return from Trondheim, he gathered 15 civil servants and 6 businessmen for the Stormannsmøetet at Eidsvoll 16-17. February where it was agreed on a constitutional assembly in the same place from 10 April. Until then, the prince was to rule the country as regent with the support of a government council. After the meeting, the prince announced that the Norwegian people had been released from their oath to Frederik VI and, as a free and independent people, had the right to decide their own government constitution.

 

Sverre Steen describes these as revolutionary ideas: It involved a transition from princely sovereignty to popular sovereignty as was known from the US Constitution and from the French Revolution. Georg Sverdrup stated at the nobles' meeting in February that the Norwegian krone had thus "returned home" to the Norwegian people and that the people could, by their own decision, transfer the krone to whoever was deemed most suitable. The transition was not prepared in Norway except as an idea as individuals. In the previous years, there had been dissatisfaction (especially in Eastern Norway) with the Danish government, but no stated demands for secession from Denmark. When the rumor spread in 1813 that Denmark would probably have to cede Norway, there was talk of independence. At the elders' meeting, it was agreed that the congregations should gather in the churches and swear allegiance to Norway, as a simple referendum on independence and against union with Sweden. At the same time, the priests organized elections for the National Assembly, which was to convene later.

 

In public, there was overwhelming support for independence, while those who wanted union with Sweden advanced their views in silence. The mood of the people was for full independence.

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Raintrees Native and Rainforest Gardens, Diamond Beach, NSW

 

2019 was the driest year that the Mid North Coast of NSW had experienced in many many years with just 478mm of rain recorded in that year, well down on the 1221.7mm average for the area (Mean rainy days = 102.2 per annum)

 

2019 will be remembered for its widespread and damaging bushfires along the Australian east coast from Victoria and NSW to SE Queensland most notably during September, October and November of that year.

 

On February 8th 2020 that crippling drought finally broke when good rains arrived courtesy of La Nina. Most of 2020 had been characterised by regular good rain which kept coming just at the right time.

 

During 2020 we saw our local forests gradually recover, although arguably, that will take a good many years yet.

We unfortunately did see a massive increase in land clearing in response to those fires. Landholders everywhere engaged contractors to underscrub massive amounts of formerly forested land. Many landholders simply clear felled large areas of forest further endangering animal populations in the area, especially Koalas.

 

With the regularity of rain in 2020 came regrowth like we've never seen before. Weed species which had been suppressed by the drought became rampant as did native pioneer species. Epicormic growth on Eucalypts was prolific and coppicing from the base of drought impacted trees was prevalent.

 

By the end of 2020 the forests that had been burned to a cinder in 2019 were again looking unbelievably lush and green with understorey species like Dodonaea triquetra (Hop Bush), completely covering the floor of the forest.

We were indeed fortunate that the spring and summer of 2020 was characterised by regular good rainfall, without flooding rains, which meant there was almost no threat of any bushfires.

 

With the forests being so lush, had we had a long dry period over spring and summer of 2020, there was no doubt, given the regrowth in our local forests, that any fire event could have potentially been even more devastating than the 2019 fires.

 

Given the vast amount of regular rain received during January and February of 2021, at the time of writing, in late February 2021, this threat potential now appears to have been pushed out till the spring and summer of 2021/22.

We've received more rain in early 2021 than in the same period of 2020, yet no flooding events have to date occurred.

 

At Raintrees Native and Rainforest Gardens at Diamond Beach many trees that all but died have shot new coppicing growth from low down on their trunks however we've had to do a lot of pruning of dead wood and that process is ongoing.

We were forced to cut down around 100 Bangalow Palms which had suffered crown collapse during the 2019 drought. Those areas where palms were removed have been replanted with hardy rainforest trees giving many areas of the forest a completely different look.

In view of the prevailing currency of numerous conspiracy theories, about everything from the 'deep state' to Bill Gates, 911, Covid19 and to a supposed stolen US 2020 Election, we've named the new area of rainforest plantings 'The Forest of Conspiracy'.

Many of these often ridiculous conspiracy theories were actively encouraged during the 2020 USA Presidential elections with the aim of securing political capital among vulnerable groups.

At the same time we created a campfire area that we've named 'Cove 19'.

 

As we move into March 2021 amazingly we are seeing quite a few species that we thought had died in the 2019 drought now shooting coppicing growth and vigorously coming back demonstrating just how tough some of Australia's rainforest plants really are.

The 2019 drought set much of the forest back many years however 2020 and so far in 2021 things are looking very much brighter with a solid recovery underway.

Lets just hope that La Nina hangs around for many more months.

 

Footnote - During the 19th 21st March 2021 a major flood, the biggest in our 28 years on the property, swept through the forest here moving logs that have never before moved. The flood did a lot of damage and the newly planted seedlings seen in this image suffered badly eroded root zones as well as being pushed over and in some cases were stripped from their planting holes and washed downstream. Many trees, large and small, were broken or pushed over by moving logs and accumulating mulch.

The ground was so saturated that at least 8 larger trees simply fell over in the wet ground.

All this damage has meant a lot of work has been needed to restore the forest. A decision was taken to remove all large logs from the most flood prone areas to avoid the damage happening again. Much of the restoration work was completed by early May 2021.

 

Hyderabad (Listeni/ˈhaɪdərəˌbæd/ HY-dər-ə-bad; often /ˈhaɪdrəˌbæd/) is the capital of the southern Indian state of Telangana and de jure capital of Andhra Pradesh. Occupying 625 square kilometres along the banks of the Musi River, it has a population of about 6.8 million and a metropolitan population of about 7.75 million, making it the fourth most populous city and sixth most populous urban agglomeration in India. At an average altitude of 542 metres, much of Hyderabad is situated on hilly terrain around artificial lakes, including Hussain Sagar - predating the city's founding - north of the city centre.

 

Established in 1591 by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, Hyderabad remained under the rule of the Qutb Shahi dynasty for nearly a century before the Mughals captured the region. In 1724, Mughal viceroy Asif Jah I declared his sovereignty and created his own dynasty, known as the Nizams of Hyderabad. The Nizam's dominions became a princely state during the British Raj, and remained so for 150 years, with the city serving as its capital. The city continued as the capital of Hyderabad State after it was brought into the Indian Union in 1948, and became the capital of Andhra Pradesh after the States Reorganisation Act, 1956. Since 1956, Rashtrapati Nilayam in the city has been the winter office of the President of India. In 2014, the newly formed state of Telangana split from Andhra Pradesh and the city became joint capital of the two states, a transitional arrangement scheduled to end by 2025.

 

Relics of Qutb Shahi and Nizam rule remain visible today, with the Charminar - commissioned by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah - coming to symbolise Hyderabad. Golconda fort is another major landmark. The influence of Mughlai culture is also evident in the city's distinctive cuisine, which includes Hyderabadi biryani and Hyderabadi haleem. The Qutb Shahis and Nizams established Hyderabad as a cultural hub, attracting men of letters from different parts of the world. Hyderabad emerged as the foremost centre of culture in India with the decline of the Mughal Empire in the mid-19th century, with artists migrating to the city from the rest of the Indian subcontinent. While Hyderabad is losing its cultural pre-eminence, it is today, due to the Telugu film industry, the country's second-largest producer of motion pictures.

 

Hyderabad was historically known as a pearl and diamond trading centre, and it continues to be known as the City of Pearls. Many of the city's traditional bazaars, including Laad Bazaar, Begum Bazaar and Sultan Bazaar, have remained open for centuries. However, industrialisation throughout the 20th century attracted major Indian manufacturing, research and financial institutions, including Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, the National Geophysical Research Institute and the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology. Special economic zones dedicated to information technology have encouraged companies from across India and around the world to set up operations and the emergence of pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries in the 1990s led to the area's naming as India's "Genome Valley". With an output of US$74 billion, Hyderabad is the fifth-largest contributor to India's overall gross domestic product.

 

HISTORY

TOPONYMY

According to John Everett-Heath, the author of Oxford Concise Dictionary of World Place Names, Hyderabad means "Haydar's city" or "lion city", from haydar (lion) and ābād (city). It was named to honour the Caliph Ali Ibn Abi Talib, who was also known as Haydar because of his lion-like valour in battles. Andrew Petersen, a scholar of Islamic architecture, says the city was originally called Baghnagar (city of gardens). One popular theory suggests that Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, the founder of the city, named it "Bhaganagar" or "Bhāgnagar" after Bhagmati, a local nautch (dancing) girl with whom he had fallen in love. She converted to Islam and adopted the title Hyder Mahal. The city was renamed Hyderabad in her honour. According to another source, the city was named after Haidar, the son of Quli Qutb Shah.

 

EARLY AND MEDIEVAL HISTORY

Archaeologists excavating near the city have unearthed Iron Age sites that may date from 500 BCE. The region comprising modern Hyderabad and its surroundings was known as Golkonda ("shepherd's hill"), and was ruled by the Chalukya dynasty from 624 CE to 1075 CE. Following the dissolution of the Chalukya empire into four parts in the 11th century, Golkonda came under the control of the Kakatiya dynasty from 1158, whose seat of power was at Warangal, 148 km northeast of modern Hyderabad.

 

The Kakatiya dynasty was reduced to a vassal of the Khilji dynasty in 1310 after its defeat by Sultan Alauddin Khilji of the Delhi Sultanate. This lasted until 1321, when the Kakatiya dynasty was annexed by Malik Kafur, Allaudin Khilji's general. During this period, Alauddin Khilji took the Koh-i-Noor diamond, which is said to have been mined from the Kollur Mines of Golkonda, to Delhi. Muhammad bin Tughluq succeeded to the Delhi sultanate in 1325, bringing Warangal under the rule of the Tughlaq dynasty until 1347 when Ala-ud-Din Bahman Shah, a governor under bin Tughluq, rebelled against Delhi and established the Bahmani Sultanate in the Deccan Plateau, with Gulbarga, 200 km west of Hyderabad, as its capital. The Bahmani kings ruled the region until 1518 and were the first independent Muslim rulers of the Deccan.

 

Sultan Quli, a governor of Golkonda, revolted against the Bahmani Sultanate and established the Qutb Shahi dynasty in 1518; he rebuilt the mud-fort of Golconda and named the city "Muhammad nagar". The fifth sultan, Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, established Hyderabad on the banks of the Musi River in 1591, to avoid the water shortages experienced at Golkonda. During his rule, he had the Charminar and Mecca Masjid built in the city. On 21 September 1687, the Golkonda Sultanate came under the rule of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb after a year-long siege of the Golkonda fort. The annexed area was renamed Deccan Suba (Deccan province) and the capital was moved from Golkonda to Aurangabad, about 550 km northwest of Hyderabad.

 

MODERN HISTORY

In 1713 Farrukhsiyar, the Mughal emperor, appointed Asif Jah I to be Viceroy of the Deccan, with the title Nizam-ul-Mulk (Administrator of the Realm). In 1724, Asif Jah I defeated Mubariz Khan to establish autonomy over the Deccan Suba, named the region Hyderabad Deccan, and started what came to be known as the Asif Jahi dynasty. Subsequent rulers retained the title Nizam ul-Mulk and were referred to as Asif Jahi Nizams, or Nizams of Hyderabad. The death of Asif Jah I in 1748 resulted in a period of political unrest as his sons, backed by opportunistic neighbouring states and colonial foreign forces, contended for the throne. The accession of Asif Jah II, who reigned from 1762 to 1803, ended the instability. In 1768 he signed the treaty of Masulipatnam, surrendering the coastal region to the East India Company in return for a fixed annual rent.

 

In 1769 Hyderabad city became the formal capital of the Nizams. In response to regular threats from Hyder Ali (Dalwai of Mysore), Baji Rao I (Peshwa of the Maratha Empire), and Basalath Jung (Asif Jah II's elder brother, who was supported by the Marquis de Bussy-Castelnau), the Nizam signed a subsidiary alliance with the East India Company in 1798, allowing the British Indian Army to occupy Bolarum (modern Secunderabad) to protect the state's borders, for which the Nizams paid an annual maintenance to the British.

 

Until 1874 there were no modern industries in Hyderabad. With the introduction of railways in the 1880s, four factories were built to the south and east of Hussain Sagar lake, and during the early 20th century, Hyderabad was transformed into a modern city with the establishment of transport services, underground drainage, running water, electricity, telecommunications, universities, industries, and Begumpet Airport. The Nizams ruled their princely state from Hyderabad during the British Raj.

 

After India gained independence, the Nizam declared his intention to remain independent rather than become part of the Indian Union. The Hyderabad State Congress, with the support of the Indian National Congress and the Communist Party of India, began agitating against Nizam VII in 1948. On 17 September that year, the Indian Army took control of Hyderabad State after an invasion codenamed Operation Polo. With the defeat of his forces, Nizam VII capitulated to the Indian Union by signing an Instrument of Accession, which made him the Rajpramukh (Princely Governor) of the state until 31 October 1956. Between 1946 and 1951, the Communist Party of India fomented the Telangana uprising against the feudal lords of the Telangana region. The Constitution of India, which became effective on 26 January 1950, made Hyderabad State one of the part B states of India, with Hyderabad city continuing to be the capital. In his 1955 report Thoughts on Linguistic States, B. R. Ambedkar, then chairman of the Drafting Committee of the Indian Constitution, proposed designating the city of Hyderabad as the second capital of India because of its amenities and strategic central location. Since 1956, the Rashtrapati Nilayam in Hyderabad has been the second official residence and business office of the President of India; the President stays once a year in winter and conducts official business particularly relating to Southern India.

 

On 1 November 1956 the states of India were reorganised by language. Hyderabad state was split into three parts, which were merged with neighbouring states to form the modern states of Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. The nine Telugu- and Urdu-speaking districts of Hyderabad State in the Telangana region were merged with the Telugu-speaking Andhra State to create Andhra Pradesh,with Hyderabad as its capital. Several protests, known collectively as the Telangana movement, attempted to invalidate the merger and demanded the creation of a new Telangana state. Major actions took place in 1969 and 1972, and a third began in 2010. The city suffered several explosions: one at Dilsukhnagar in 2002 claimed two lives; terrorist bombs in May and August 2007 caused communal tension and riots; and two bombs exploded in February 2013. On 30 July 2013 the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government of India declared that part of Andhra Pradesh would be split off to form a new Telangana state, and that Hyderabad city would be the capital city and part of Telangana, while the city would also remain the capital of Andhra Pradesh for no more than ten years. On 3 October 2013 the Union Cabinet approved the proposal, and in February 2014 both houses of Parliament passed the Telangana Bill. With the final assent of the President of India in June 2014, Telangana state was formed.

 

GEOGRAPHY

TOPOGRAPHY

Situated in the southern part of Telangana in southeastern India, Hyderabad is 1,566 kilometres south of Delhi, 699 kilometres southeast of Mumbai, and 570 kilometres north of Bangalore by road. It lies on the banks of the Musi River, in the northern part of the Deccan Plateau. Greater Hyderabad covers 625 km2, making it one of the largest metropolitan areas in India. With an average altitude of 542 metres, Hyderabad lies on predominantly sloping terrain of grey and pink granite, dotted with small hills, the highest being Banjara Hills at 672 metres. The city has numerous lakes referred to as sagar, meaning "sea". Examples include artificial lakes created by dams on the Musi, such as Hussain Sagar (built in 1562 near the city centre), Osman Sagar and Himayat Sagar. As of 1996, the city had 140 lakes and 834 water tanks (ponds).

 

CLIMATE

Hyderabad has a tropical wet and dry climate (Köppen Aw) bordering on a hot semi-arid climate (Köppen BSh). The annual mean temperature is 26.6 °C; monthly mean temperatures are 21–33 °C. Summers (March–June) are hot and humid, with average highs in the mid-to-high 30s Celsius; maximum temperatures often exceed 40 °C between April and June. The coolest temperatures occur in December and January, when the lowest temperature occasionally dips to 10 °C. May is the hottest month, when daily temperatures range from 26 to 39 °C; December, the coldest, has temperatures varying from 14.5 to 28 °C.

 

Heavy rain from the south-west summer monsoon falls between June and September, supplying Hyderabad with most of its mean annual rainfall. Since records began in November 1891, the heaviest rainfall recorded in a 24-hour period was 241.5 mm on 24 August 2000. The highest temperature ever recorded was 45.5 °C on 2 June 1966, and the lowest was 6.1 °C on 8 January 1946. The city receives 2,731 hours of sunshine per year; maximum daily sunlight exposure occurs in February.

 

CONSERVATION

Hyderabad's lakes and the sloping terrain of its low-lying hills provide habitat for an assortment of flora and fauna. The forest region in and around the city encompasses areas of ecological and biological importance, which are preserved in the form of national parks, zoos, mini-zoos and a wildlife sanctuary. Nehru Zoological Park, the city's one large zoo, is the first in India to have a lion and tiger safari park. Hyderabad has three national parks (Mrugavani National Park, Mahavir Harina Vanasthali National Park and Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park), and the Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is about 50 km from the city. Hyderabad's other environmental reserves are: Kotla Vijayabhaskara Reddy Botanical Gardens, Shamirpet Lake, Hussain Sagar, Fox Sagar Lake, Mir Alam Tank and Patancheru Lake, which is home to regional birds and attracts seasonal migratory birds from different parts of the world. Organisations engaged in environmental and wildlife preservation include the Telangana Forest Department, Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education, the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), the Animal Welfare Board of India, the Blue Cross of Hyderabad and the University of Hyderabad.

 

ADMINISTRATION

COMMON CAPITAL OF TELANGANA AND ANDHRA PRADESH

According to the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 part 2 Section 5: "On and from the appointed day, Hyderabad in the existing State of Andhra Pradesh, shall be the common capital of the State of Telangana and the State of Andhra Pradesh for such period not exceeding ten years. After expiry of the period referred to in sub-section, Hyderabad shall be the capital of the State of Telangana and there shall be a new capital for the State of Andhra Pradesh."

 

The same sections also define that the common capital includes the existing area designated as the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation under the Hyderabad Municipal Corporation Act, 1955. As stipulated in sections 3 and 18 of the Reorganisation Act, city MLAs are members of Telangana state assembly.

 

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) oversees the civic infrastructure of the city's 18 "circles", which together encompass 150 municipal wards. Each ward is represented by a corporator, elected by popular vote. The corporators elect the Mayor, who is the titular head of GHMC; executive powers rest with the Municipal Commissioner, appointed by the state government. The GHMC carries out the city's infrastructural work such as building and maintenance of roads and drains, town planning including construction regulation, maintenance of municipal markets and parks, solid waste management, the issuing of birth and death certificates, the issuing of trade licences, collection of property tax, and community welfare services such as mother and child healthcare, and pre-school and non-formal education. The GHMC was formed in April 2007 by merging the Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad (MCH) with 12 municipalities of the Hyderabad, Ranga Reddy and Medak districts covering a total area of 625 km2. In the 2009 municipal election, an alliance of the Indian National Congress and Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen formed the majority. The Secunderabad Cantonment Board is a civic administration agency overseeing an area of 40.1 km2, where there are several military camps. The Osmania University campus is administered independently by the university authority.

 

Law and order in Hyderabad city is supervised by the governor of Telangana. The jurisdiction is divided into two police commissionerates: Hyderabad and Cyberabad, which are again divided into four and five police zones respectively. Each zone is headed by a deputy commissioner.

 

The jurisdictions of the city's administrative agencies are, in ascending order of size: the Hyderabad Police area, Hyderabad district, the GHMC area ("Hyderabad city") and the area under the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA). The HMDA is an apolitical urban planning agency that covers the GHMC and its suburbs, extending to 54 mandals in five districts encircling the city. It coordinates the development activities of GHMC and suburban municipalities and manages the administration of bodies such as the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB).

 

As the seat of the government of Telangana, Hyderabad is home to the state's legislature, secretariat and high court, as well as various local government agencies. The Lower City Civil Court and the Metropolitan Criminal Court are under the jurisdiction of the High Court. The GHMC area contains 24 State Legislative Assembly constituencies, which form five constituencies of the Lok Sabha (the lower house of the Parliament of India).

 

UTILITY SERVICES

The HMWSSB regulates rainwater harvesting, sewerage services and water supply, which is sourced from several dams located in the suburbs. In 2005, the HMWSSB started operating a 116-kilometre-long water supply pipeline from Nagarjuna Sagar Dam to meet increasing demand. The Telangana Southern Power Distribution Company Limited manages electricity supply. As of October 2014, there were 15 fire stations in the city, operated by the Telangana State Disaster and Fire Response Department. The government-owned India Post has five head post offices and many sub-post offices in Hyderabad, which are complemented by private courier services.

 

POLLUTION CONTROL

Hyderabad produces around 4,500 tonnes of solid waste daily, which is transported from collection units in Imlibun, Yousufguda and Lower Tank Bund to the dumpsite in Jawaharnagar. Disposal is managed by the Integrated Solid Waste Management project which was started by the GHMC in 2010. Rapid urbanisation and increased economic activity has also led to increased industrial waste, air, noise and water pollution, which is regulated by the Telangana Pollution Control Board (TPCB). The contribution of different sources to air pollution in 2006 was: 20–50% from vehicles, 40–70% from a combination of vehicle discharge and road dust, 10–30% from industrial discharges and 3–10% from the burning of household rubbish. Deaths resulting from atmospheric particulate matter are estimated at 1,700–3,000 each year. Ground water around Hyderabad, which has a hardness of up to 1000 ppm, around three times higher than is desirable, is the main source of drinking water but the increasing population and consequent increase in demand has led to a decline in not only ground water but also river and lake levels. This shortage is further exacerbated by inadequately treated effluent discharged from industrial treatment plants polluting the water sources of the city.

 

HEALTHCARE

The Commissionerate of Health and Family Welfare is responsible for planning, implementation and monitoring of all facilities related to health and preventive services. As of 2010–11, the city had 50 government hospitals, 300 private and charity hospitals and 194 nursing homes providing around 12,000 hospital beds, fewer than half the required 25,000. For every 10,000 people in the city, there are 17.6 hospital beds, 9 specialist doctors, 14 nurses and 6 physicians. The city also has about 4,000 individual clinics and 500 medical diagnostic centres. Private clinics are preferred by many residents because of the distance to, poor quality of care at and long waiting times in government facilities, despite the high proportion of the city's residents being covered by government health insurance: 24% according to a National Family Health Survey in 2005. As of 2012, many new private hospitals of various sizes were opened or being built. Hyderabad also has outpatient and inpatient facilities that use Unani, homeopathic and Ayurvedic treatments.

 

In the 2005 National Family Health Survey, it was reported that the city's total fertility rate is 1.8, which is below the replacement rate. Only 61% of children had been provided with all basic vaccines (BCG, measles and full courses of polio and DPT), fewer than in all other surveyed cities except Meerut. The infant mortality rate was 35 per 1,000 live births, and the mortality rate for children under five was 41 per 1,000 live births. The survey also reported that a third of women and a quarter of men are overweight or obese, 49% of children below 5 years are anaemic, and up to 20% of children are underweight, while more than 2% of women and 3% of men suffer from diabetes.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

When the GHMC was created in 2007, the area occupied by the municipality increased from 175 km2 to 625 km2. Consequently, the population increased by 87%, from 3,637,483 in the 2001 census to 6,809,970 in the 2011 census, 24% of which are migrants from elsewhere in India, making Hyderabad the nation's fourth most populous city. As of 2011, the population density is 18,480/km2. At the same 2011 census, the Hyderabad Urban Agglomeration had a population of 7,749,334, making it the sixth most populous urban agglomeration in the country. The population of the Hyderabad urban agglomeration has since been estimated by electoral officials to be 9.1 million as of early 2013 but is expected to exceed 10 million by the end of the year. There are 3,500,802 male and 3,309,168 female citizens - a sex ratio of 945 females per 1000 males, higher than the national average of 926 per 1000. Among children aged 0–6 years, 373,794 are boys and 352,022 are girls - a ratio of 942 per 1000. Literacy stands at 82.96% (male 85.96%; female 79.79%), higher than the national average of 74.04%. The socio-economic strata consist of 20% upper class, 50% middle class and 30% working class.

 

ETHNIC GROUPS, LANGUAGE AND RELIGION

Referred to as "Hyderabadi", residents of Hyderabad are predominantly Telugu and Urdu speaking people, with minority Bengali, Gujarati (including Memon), Kannada (including Nawayathi), Malayalam, Marathi, Marwari, Odia, Punjabi, Tamil and Uttar Pradeshi communities. Hadhrami Arabs, African Arabs, Armenians, Abyssinians, Iranians, Pathans and Turkish people are also present; these communities, of which the Hadhrami are the largest, declined after Hyderabad State became part of the Indian Union, as they lost the patronage of the Nizams.

 

Telugu is the official language of Hyderabad and Urdu is its second language. The Telugu dialect spoken in Hyderabad is called Telangana, and the Urdu spoken is called Dakhani. English is also used. A significant minority speak other languages, including Hindi, Marathi, Odia, Tamil, Bengali and Kannada.

 

Hindus are in the majority. Muslims are present throughout the city and predominate in and around the Old City. There are also Christian, Sikh, Jain, Buddhist and Parsi communities and iconic temples, mosques and churches can be seen. According to the 2001 census, Hyderabad district's religious make-up was: Hindus (55.41%), Muslims (41.17%), Christians (2.43%), Jains (0.43%), Sikhs (0.29%) and Buddhists (0.02%); 0.23% did not state any religion.

 

SLUMS

In the greater metropolitan area, 13% of the population live below the poverty line. According to a 2012 report submitted by GHMC to the World Bank, Hyderabad has 1,476 slums with a total population of 1.7 million, of whom 66% live in 985 slums in the "core" of the city (the part that formed Hyderabad before the April 2007 expansion) and the remaining 34% live in 491 suburban tenements. About 22% of the slum-dwelling households had migrated from different parts of India in the last decade of the 20th century, and 63% claimed to have lived in the slums for more than 10 years. Overall literacy in the slums is 60–80% and female literacy is 52–73%. A third of the slums have basic service connections, and the remainder depend on general public services provided by the government. There are 405 government schools, 267 government aided schools, 175 private schools and 528 community halls in the slum areas. According to a 2008 survey by the Centre for Good Governance, 87.6% of the slum-dwelling households are nuclear families, 18% are very poor, with an income up to ₹20000 (US$300) per annum, 73% live below the poverty line (a standard poverty line recognised by the Andhra Pradesh Government is ₹24000 (US$360) per annum), 27% of the chief wage earners (CWE) are casual labour and 38% of the CWE are illiterate. About 3.72% of the slum children aged 5–14 do not go to school and 3.17% work as child labour, of whom 64% are boys and 36% are girls. The largest employers of child labour are street shops and construction sites. Among the working children, 35% are engaged in hazardous jobs.

 

NEIGHBOURHOODS

The historic city established by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah on the southern side of the Musi River forms the "Old City", while the "New City" encompasses the urbanised area on the northern banks. The two are connected by many bridges across the river, the oldest of which is Purana Pul ("old bridge"). Hyderabad is twinned with neighbouring Secunderabad, to which it is connected by Hussain Sagar.

 

Many historic and tourist sites lie in south central Hyderabad, such as the Charminar, the Mecca Masjid, the Salar Jung Museum, the Nizam's Museum, the Falaknuma Palace, and the traditional retail corridor comprising the Pearl Market, Laad Bazaar and Madina Circle. North of the river are hospitals, colleges, major railway stations and business areas such as Begum Bazaar, Koti, Abids, Sultan Bazaar and Moazzam Jahi Market, along with administrative and recreational establishments such as the Reserve Bank of India, the Telangana Secretariat, the Hyderabad Mint, the Telangana Legislature, the Public Gardens, the Nizam Club, the Ravindra Bharathi, the State Museum, the Birla Temple and the Birla Planetarium.

 

North of central Hyderabad lie Hussain Sagar, Tank Bund Road, Rani Gunj and the Secunderabad Railway Station. Most of the city's parks and recreational centres, such as Sanjeevaiah Park, Indira Park, Lumbini Park, NTR Gardens, the Buddha statue and Tankbund Park are located here. In the northwest part of the city there are upscale residential and commercial areas such as Banjara Hills, Jubilee Hills, Begumpet, Khairatabad and Miyapur. The northern end contains industrial areas such as Sanathnagar, Moosapet, Balanagar, Patancheru and Chanda Nagar. The northeast end is dotted with residential areas. In the eastern part of the city lie many defence research centres and Ramoji Film City. The "Cyberabad" area in the southwest and west of the city has grown rapidly since the 1990s. It is home to information technology and bio-pharmaceutical companies and to landmarks such as Hyderabad Airport, Osman Sagar, Himayath Sagar and Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park.

 

LANDMARKS

Heritage buildings constructed during the Qutb Shahi and Nizam eras showcase Indo-Islamic architecture influenced by Medieval, Mughal and European styles. After the 1908 flooding of the Musi River, the city was expanded and civic monuments constructed, particularly during the rule of Mir Osman Ali Khan (the VIIth Nizam), whose patronage of architecture led to him being referred to as the maker of modern Hyderabad. In 2012, the government of India declared Hyderabad the first "Best heritage city of India".

 

Qutb Shahi architecture of the 16th and early 17th centuries followed classical Persian architecture featuring domes and colossal arches. The oldest surviving Qutb Shahi structure in Hyderabad is the ruins of Golconda fort built in the 16th century. The Charminar, Mecca Masjid, Charkaman and Qutb Shahi tombs are other existing structures of this period. Among these the Charminar has become an icon of the city; located in the centre of old Hyderabad, it is a square structure with sides 20 m long and four grand arches each facing a road. At each corner stands a 56 m-high minaret. Most of the historical bazaars that still exist were constructed on the street north of Charminar towards Golconda fort. The Charminar, Qutb Shahi tombs and Golconda fort are considered to be monuments of national importance in India; in 2010 the Indian government proposed that the sites be listed for UNESCO World Heritage status.

 

Among the oldest surviving examples of Nizam architecture in Hyderabad is the Chowmahalla Palace, which was the seat of royal power. It showcases a diverse array of architectural styles, from the Baroque Harem to its Neoclassical royal court. The other palaces include Falaknuma Palace (inspired by the style of Andrea Palladio), Purani Haveli, King Kothi and Bella Vista Palace all of which were built at the peak of Nizam rule in the 19th century. During Mir Osman Ali Khan's rule, European styles, along with Indo-Islamic, became prominent. These styles are reflected in the Falaknuma Palace and many civic monuments such as the Hyderabad High Court, Osmania Hospital, Osmania University, the State Central Library, City College, the Telangana Legislature, the State Archaeology Museum, Jubilee Hall, and Hyderabad and Kachiguda railway stations. Other landmarks of note are Paigah Palace, Asman Garh Palace, Basheer Bagh Palace, Errum Manzil and the Spanish Mosque, all constructed by the Paigah family.

 

ECONOMY

Hyderabad is the largest contributor to the gross domestic product (GDP), tax and other revenues, of Telangana, and the sixth largest deposit centre and fourth largest credit centre nationwide, as ranked by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in June 2012. Its US$74 billion GDP made it the fifth-largest contributor city to India's overall GDP in 2011–12. Its per capita annual income in 2011 was ₹44300 (US$670). As of 2006, the largest employers in the city were the governments of Andhra Pradesh (113,098 employees) and India (85,155). According to a 2005 survey, 77% of males and 19% of females in the city were employed. The service industry remains dominant in the city, and 90% of the employed workforce is engaged in this sector.

 

Hyderabad's role in the pearl trade has given it the name "City of Pearls" and up until the 18th century, the city was also the only global trading centre for large diamonds. Industrialisation began under the Nizams in the late 19th century, helped by railway expansion that connected the city with major ports. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Indian enterprises, such as Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL), Nuclear Fuel Complex (NFC), National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC), Bharat Electronics (BEL), Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL), Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Centre for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics (CDFD), State Bank of Hyderabad (SBH) and Andhra Bank (AB) were established in the city. The city is home to Hyderabad Securities formerly known as Hyderabad Stock Exchange (HSE), and houses the regional office of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). In 2013, the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) facility in Hyderabad was forecasted to provide operations and transactions services to BSE-Mumbai by the end of 2014. The growth of the financial services sector has helped Hyderabad evolve from a traditional manufacturing city to a cosmopolitan industrial service centre. Since the 1990s, the growth of information technology (IT), IT-enabled services (ITES), insurance and financial institutions has expanded the service sector, and these primary economic activities have boosted the ancillary sectors of trade and commerce, transport, storage, communication, real estate and retail.

 

Hyderabad's commercial markets are divided into four sectors: central business districts, sub-central business centres, neighbourhood business centres and local business centres. Many traditional and historic bazaars are located throughout the city, Laad Bazaar being the prominent among all is popular for selling a variety of traditional and cultural antique wares, along with gems and pearls.

 

The establishment of Indian Drugs and Pharmaceuticals Limited (IDPL), a public sector undertaking, in 1961 was followed over the decades by many national and global companies opening manufacturing and research facilities in the city. As of 2010, the city manufactured one third of India's bulk drugs and 16% of biotechnology products, contributing to its reputation as "India's pharmaceutical capital" and the "Genome Valley of India". Hyderabad is a global centre of information technology, for which it is known as Cyberabad (Cyber City). As of 2013, it contributed 15% of India's and 98% of Andhra Pradesh's exports in IT and ITES sectors and 22% of NASSCOM's total membership is from the city. The development of HITEC City, a township with extensive technological infrastructure, prompted multinational companies to establish facilities in Hyderabad. The city is home to more than 1300 IT and ITES firms, including global conglomerates such as Microsoft (operating its largest R&D campus outside the US), Google, IBM, Yahoo!, Dell, Facebook, and major Indian firms including Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Polaris and Wipro. In 2009 the World Bank Group ranked the city as the second best Indian city for doing business. The city and its suburbs contain the highest number of special economic zones of any Indian city.

 

Like the rest of India, Hyderabad has a large informal economy that employs 30% of the labour force. According to a survey published in 2007, it had 40–50,000 street vendors, and their numbers were increasing. Among the street vendors, 84% are male and 16% female, and four fifths are "stationary vendors" operating from a fixed pitch, often with their own stall. Most are financed through personal savings; only 8% borrow from moneylenders. Vendor earnings vary from ₹50 (75¢ US) to ₹800 (US$12) per day. Other unorganised economic sectors include dairy, poultry farming, brick manufacturing, casual labour and domestic help. Those involved in the informal economy constitute a major portion of urban poor.

 

CULTURE

Hyderabad emerged as the foremost centre of culture in India with the decline of the Mughal Empire. After the fall of Delhi in 1857, the migration of performing artists to the city particularly from the north and west of the Indian sub continent, under the patronage of the Nizam, enriched the cultural milieu. This migration resulted in a mingling of North and South Indian languages, cultures and religions, which has since led to a co-existence of Hindu and Muslim traditions, for which the city has become noted. A further consequence of this north–south mix is that both Telugu and Urdu are official languages of Telangana.[164] The mixing of religions has also resulted in many festivals being celebrated in Hyderabad such as Ganesh Chaturthi, Diwali and Bonalu of Hindu tradition and Eid ul-Fitr and Eid al-Adha by Muslims.

 

Traditional Hyderabadi garb also reveals a mix of Muslim and South Asian influences with men wearing sherwani and kurta - paijama and women wearing khara dupatta and salwar kameez. Muslim women also commonly wear burqas and hijabs in public. In addition to the traditional Indian and Muslim garments, increasing exposure to western cultures has led to a rise in the wearing of western style clothing among youths.

 

LITERATURE

In the past, Qutb Shahi rulers and Nizams attracted artists, architects and men of letters from different parts of the world through patronage. The resulting ethnic mix popularised cultural events such as mushairas (poetic symposia). The Qutb Shahi dynasty particularly encouraged the growth of Deccani Urdu literature leading to works such as the Deccani Masnavi and Diwan poetry, which are among the earliest available manuscripts in Urdu. Lazzat Un Nisa, a book compiled in the 15th century at Qutb Shahi courts, contains erotic paintings with diagrams for secret medicines and stimulants in the eastern form of ancient sexual arts. The reign of the Nizams saw many literary reforms and the introduction of Urdu as a language of court, administration and education. In 1824, a collection of Urdu Ghazal poetry, named Gulzar-e-Mahlaqa, authored by Mah Laqa Bai - the first female Urdu poet to produce a Diwan - was published in Hyderabad.

 

Hyderabad has continued with these traditions in its annual Hyderabad Literary Festival, held since 2010, showcasing the city's literary and cultural creativity. Organisations engaged in the advancement of literature include the Sahitya Akademi, the Urdu Academy, the Telugu Academy, the National Council for Promotion of Urdu Language, the Comparative Literature Association of India, and the Andhra Saraswata Parishad. Literary development is further aided by state institutions such as the State Central Library, the largest public library in the state which was established in 1891, and other major libraries including the Sri Krishna Devaraya Andhra Bhasha Nilayam, the British Library and the Sundarayya Vignana Kendram.

 

MUSIC AND FILMS

South Indian music and dances such as the Kuchipudi and Kathakali styles are popular in the Deccan region. As a result of their culture policies, North Indian music and dance gained popularity during the rule of the Mughals and Nizams, and it was also during their reign that it became a tradition among the nobility to associate themselves with tawaif (courtesans). These courtesans were revered as the epitome of etiquette and culture, and were appointed to teach singing, poetry and classical dance to many children of the aristocracy. This gave rise to certain styles of court music, dance and poetry. Besides western and Indian popular music genres such as filmi music, the residents of Hyderabad play city-based marfa music, dholak ke geet (household songs based on local Folklore), and qawwali, especially at weddings, festivals and other celebratory events. The state government organises the Golconda Music and Dance Festival, the Taramati Music Festival and the Premavathi Dance Festival to further encourage the development of music.

 

Although the city is not particularly noted for theatre and drama, the state government promotes theatre with multiple programmes and festivals in such venues as the Ravindra Bharati, Shilpakala Vedika and Lalithakala Thoranam. Although not a purely music oriented event, Numaish, a popular annual exhibition of local and national consumer products, does feature some musical performances. The city is home to the Telugu film industry, popularly known as Tollywood and as of 2012, produces the second largest number of films in India with the largest number being produced by Bollywood. Films in the local Hyderabadi dialect are also produced and have been gaining popularity since 2005. The city has also hosted international film festivals such as the International Children's Film Festival and the Hyderabad International Film Festival. In 2005, Guinness World Records declared Ramoji Film City to be the world's largest film studio.

 

ART AND HANDICRAFTS

The region is well known for its Golconda and Hyderabad painting styles which are branches of Deccani painting. Developed during the 16th century, the Golconda style is a native style blending foreign techniques and bears some similarity to the Vijayanagara paintings of neighbouring Mysore. A significant use of luminous gold and white colours is generally found in the Golconda style. The Hyderabad style originated in the 17th century under the Nizams. Highly influenced by Mughal painting, this style makes use of bright colours and mostly depicts regional landscape, culture, costumes and jewellery.

 

Although not a centre for handicrafts itself, the patronage of the arts by the Mughals and Nizams attracted artisans from the region to Hyderabad. Such crafts include: Bidriware, a metalwork handicraft from neighbouring Karnataka, which was popularised during the 18th century and has since been granted a Geographical Indication (GI) tag under the auspices of the WTO act; and Zari and Zardozi, embroidery works on textile that involve making elaborate designs using gold, silver and other metal threads. Another example of a handicraft drawn to Hyderabad is Kalamkari, a hand-painted or block-printed cotton textile that comes from cities in Andhra Pradesh. This craft is distinguished in having both a Hindu style, known as Srikalahasti and entirely done by hand, and an Islamic style, known as Machilipatnam that uses both hand and block techniques. Examples of Hyderabad's arts and crafts are housed in various museums including the Salar Jung Museum (housing "one of the largest one-man-collections in the world"), the AP State Archaeology Museum, the Nizam Museum, the City Museum and the Birla Science Museum.

 

CUISINE

Hyderabadi cuisine comprises a broad repertoire of rice, wheat and meat dishes and the skilled use of various spices. Hyderabadi biryani and Hyderabadi haleem, with their blend of Mughlai and Arab cuisines, have become iconic dishes of India. Hyderabadi cuisine is highly influenced by Mughlai and to some extent by French, Arabic, Turkish, Iranian and native Telugu and Marathwada cuisines. Other popular native dishes include nihari, chakna, baghara baingan and the desserts qubani ka meetha, double ka meetha and kaddu ki kheer (a sweet porridge made with sweet gourd).

 

MEDIA

One of Hyderabad's earliest newspapers, The Deccan Times, was established in the 1780s. In modern times, the major Telugu dailies published in Hyderabad are Eenadu, Andhra Jyothy, Sakshi and Namaste Telangana, while the major English papers are The Times of India, The Hindu and The Deccan Chronicle, and the major Urdu papers include The Siasat Daily, The Munsif Daily and Etemaad. Many coffee table magazines, professional magazines and research journals are also regularly published. The Secunderabad Cantonment Board established the first radio station in Hyderabad State around 1919. Deccan Radio was the first radio public broadcast station in the city starting on 3 February 1935, with FM broadcasting beginning in 2000. The available channels in Hyderabad include All India Radio, Radio Mirchi, Radio City, Red FM and Big FM.

 

Television broadcasting in Hyderabad began in 1974 with the launch of Doordarshan, the Government of India's public service broadcaster, which transmits two free-to-air terrestrial television channels and one satellite channel. Private satellite channels started in July 1992 with the launch of Star TV. Satellite TV channels are accessible via cable subscription, direct-broadcast satellite services or internet-based television. Hyderabad's first dial-up internet access became available in the early 1990s and was limited to software development companies. The first public internet access service began in 1995, with the first private sector internet service provider (ISP) starting operations in 1998. In 2015, high-speed public WiFi was introduced in parts of the city.

 

EDUCATION

Public and private schools in Hyderabad are governed by the Central Board of Secondary Education and follow a "10+2+3" plan. About two-thirds of pupils attend privately run institutions. Languages of instruction include English, Hindi, Telugu and Urdu. Depending on the institution, students are required to sit the Secondary School Certificate or the Indian Certificate of Secondary Education. After completing secondary education, students enroll in schools or junior colleges with a higher secondary facility. Admission to professional graduation colleges in Hyderabad, many of which are affiliated with either Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Hyderabad (JNTUH) or Osmania University (OU), is through the Engineering Agricultural and Medical Common Entrance Test (EAM-CET).There are 13 universities in Hyderabad: two private universities, two deemed universities, six state universities and three central universities. The central universities are the University of Hyderabad, Maulana Azad National Urdu University and the English and Foreign Languages University. Osmania University, established in 1918, was the first university in Hyderabad and as of 2012 is India's second most popular institution for international students. The Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Open University, established in 1982, is the first distance learning open university in India.

 

Hyderabad is also home to a number of centres specialising in particular fields such as biomedical sciences, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, such as the National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER) and National Institute of Nutrition (NIN). Hyderabad has five major medical schools - Osmania Medical College, Gandhi Medical College, Nizam's Institute of Medical Sciences, Deccan College of Medical Sciences and Shadan Institute of Medical Sciences - and many affiliated teaching hospitals. The Government Nizamia Tibbi College is a college of Unani medicine. Hyderabad is also the headquarters of the Indian Heart Association, a non-profit foundation for cardiovascular education.

 

Institutes in Hyderabad include the National Institute of Rural Development, the Indian School of Business, the Institute of Public Enterprise, the Administrative Staff College of India and the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy. Technical and engineering schools include the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad (IIITH), Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani – Hyderabad (BITS Hyderabad) and Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad (IIT-H) as well as agricultural engineering institutes such as the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and the Acharya N. G. Ranga Agricultural University. Hyderabad also has schools of fashion design including Raffles Millennium International, NIFT Hyderabad and Wigan and Leigh College. The National Institute of Design, Hyderabad (NID-H), will offer undergraduate and postgraduate courses from 2015.

 

SPORTS

The most popular sports played in Hyderabad are cricket and association football. At the professional level, the city has hosted national and international sports events such as the 2002 National Games of India, the 2003 Afro-Asian Games, the 2004 AP Tourism Hyderabad Open women's tennis tournament, the 2007 Military World Games, the 2009 World Badminton Championships and the 2009 IBSF World Snooker Championship. The city hosts a number of venues suitable for professional competition such as the Swarnandhra Pradesh Sports Complex for field hockey, the G. M. C. Balayogi Stadium in Gachibowli for athletics and football, and for cricket, the Lal Bahadur Shastri Stadium and Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium, home ground of the Hyderabad Cricket Association. Hyderabad has hosted many international cricket matches, including matches in the 1987 and the 1996 ICC Cricket World Cups. The Hyderabad cricket team represents the city in the Ranji Trophy - a first-class cricket tournament among India's states and cities. Hyderabad is also home to the Indian Premier League franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad. A previous franchise was the Deccan Chargers, which won the 2009 Indian Premier League held in South Africa.

 

During British rule, Secunderabad became a well-known sporting centre and many race courses, parade grounds and polo fields were built. Many elite clubs formed by the Nizams and the British such as the Secunderabad Club, the Nizam Club and the Hyderabad Race Club, which is known for its horse racing especially the annual Deccan derby, still exist. In more recent times, motorsports has become popular with the Andhra Pradesh Motor Sports Club organising popular events such as the Deccan 1/4 Mile Drag, TSD Rallies and 4x4 off-road rallying.

 

International-level sportspeople from Hyderabad include: cricketers Ghulam Ahmed, M. L. Jaisimha, Mohammed Azharuddin, V. V. S. Laxman, Venkatapathy Raju, Shivlal Yadav, Arshad Ayub and Noel David; football players Syed Abdul Rahim, Syed Nayeemuddin and Shabbir Ali; tennis player Sania Mirza; badminton players S. M. Arif, Pullela Gopichand, Saina Nehwal, P. V. Sindhu, Jwala Gutta and Chetan Anand; hockey players Syed Mohammad Hadi and Mukesh Kumar; rifle shooters Gagan Narang and Asher Noria and bodybuilder Mir Mohtesham Ali Khan.

 

TRANSPORT

The most commonly used forms of medium distance transport in Hyderabad include government owned services such as light railways and buses, as well as privately operated taxis and auto rickshaws. Bus services operate from the Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station in the city centre and carry over 130 million passengers daily across the entire network. Hyderabad's light rail transportation system, the Multi-Modal Transport System (MMTS), is a three line suburban rail service used by over 160,000 passengers daily. Complementing these government services are minibus routes operated by Setwin (Society for Employment Promotion & Training in Twin Cities). Intercity rail services also operate from Hyderabad; the main, and largest, station is Secunderabad Railway Station, which serves as Indian Railways' South Central Railway zone headquarters and a hub for both buses and MMTS light rail services connecting Secunderabad and Hyderabad. Other major railway stations in Hyderabad are Hyderabad Deccan Station, Kachiguda Railway Station, Begumpet Railway Station, Malkajgiri Railway Station and Lingampally Railway Station. The Hyderabad Metro, a new rapid transit system, is to be added to the existing public transport infrastructure and is scheduled to operate three lines by 2015. As of 2012, there are over 3.5 million vehicles operating in the city, of which 74% are two-wheelers, 15% cars and 3% three-wheelers. The remaining 8% include buses, goods vehicles and taxis. The large number of vehicles coupled with relatively low road coverage - roads occupy only 9.5% of the total city area - has led to widespread traffic congestion especially since 80% of passengers and 60% of freight are transported by road. The Inner Ring Road, the Outer Ring Road, the Hyderabad Elevated Expressway, the longest flyover in India, and various interchanges, overpasses and underpasses were built to ease the congestion. Maximum speed limits within the city are 50 km/h for two-wheelers and cars, 35 km/h for auto rickshaws and 40 km/h for light commercial vehicles and buses.

 

Hyderabad sits at the junction of three National Highways linking it to six other states: NH-7 runs 2,369 km from Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, in the north to Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu, in the south; NH-9, runs 841 km east-west between Machilipatnam, Andhra Pradesh, and Pune, Maharashtra; and the 280 km NH-163 links Hyderabad to Bhopalpatnam, Chhattisgarh. Five state highways, SH-1, SH-2, SH-4, SH-5 and SH-6, either start from, or pass through, Hyderabad.

 

Air traffic was previously handled via Begumpet Airport, but this was replaced by Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA) (IATA: HYD, ICAO: VOHS) in 2008, with the capacity of handling 12 million passengers and 100,000 tonnes of cargo per annum. In 2011, Airports Council International, an autonomous body representing the world's airports, judged RGIA the world's best airport in the 5–15 million passenger category and the world's fifth best airport for service quality.

 

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