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The Chinese Room was dedicated in 1939, interestingly in the midst of the Sino-Japanese War that would later become part of the much larger World War II. Also, as Communist China was only created in 1949, this room was funded by the original Republic of China established in 1911, which today is commonly known as Taiwan.
The Chinese room is inspired by an 18th century reception hall in Beijing's Forbidden City (Imperial Palace). Upon entering the room one cannot help but notice the central round seminar table, which is very different from all other rooms' professor desk and elongated student benches or chairs. The Chinese value familial gatherings and reunions, and believe that a round table allows everyone to chat with each other easily, and that no one is more important than another. Here, the round table also aims to encourage discussion by professor and students alike.
The room is painted in a rich orangy red coat of lacquer, an auspicious colour in the East. One side of the wall is dominated by a slate carving of philosopher Confucius, whose teachings have been the heart of Chinese traditions for many centuries. The ceiling frieze features the names of famous and respected Chinese leaders. Overlooking and protecting the earthly world is an ornate Golden Heavenly Dragon on the ceiling. Below the blackboard is a stone carving of the Yin-Yang motif, symbols of the importance of nature and equilibrium.
Two Imperial Guardian Lions (also known as Foo Dogs) keep the evil spirits out of the room, and traditions call for those who pass the room to touch the head to receive good luck. Finally, carved into stone above the room's door reminds departing students that "Humility is a true virtue".
xxxx
The Nationality Rooms are located in the University of Pittsburgh's Cathedral of Learning building. The rooms are gifts to the university from Pittsburgh's ethnic communities. Each room has been designed to represent the culture of the nation represented. The rooms function as university classrooms and are not open all the time for the public to explore particularly during school terms. Visitors are advised to contact the University for opening times and guided tours.
www.nationalityrooms.pitt.edu/
The very first Nationality Room opened in 1938, and new rooms are still being planned now. There are currently 30 Nationality Rooms at the Cathedral of Learning.
Arch of Antoninus Pius and Capitoline temples. The entrance to the forum is through the magnificent triple-arched Antonine Gate, built in AD 139 and dedicated to the emperor Antoninus Pius and his adopted sons Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus. It opens onto a large paved forum surrounded by two rows of chopped-off columns that lead up to the three 2nd-century temples, each dedicated to one of the main gods of the Roman pantheon.
One of North Africa's best-preserved ancient Roman cities, Sufetula is awash with temples, monumental arches and bath complexes that speak of an ancient civilisation that knew how to live.
Archaeological site of Sbeïtla , ancient Sufetula. Sbeïtla is renowned for its three temples dedicated to the gods of the Capitoline Triad: Jupiter, Juno and Minerva. In addition, the place has a theater, a bath complex, churches, a triumphal arch and forts from the Byzantine era.
The surrounding countryside proved ideal for olive growing, and Sufetula quickly waxed wealthy, building its finest temples in the 2nd century, when the town – like all of Roman Tunisia – was at the height of its prosperity. Fortuitously, its olive groves ensured that Sufetula continued to prosper long after other Roman towns slipped into decline, helping it to become an important Christian centre in the 4th century.
The Byzantines made Sufetula their regional capital, transforming it into a military stronghold from where they could tackle the area’s rebellious local tribes. It was here in AD 647 that Prefect Gregory declared himself independent of Constantinople. However, his moment of glory lasted only a few months before he was killed by the Arabs, who simultaneously destroyed much of Sufetula.
Dedicated to a fallen brother; a friend to all and a man any one of you would have been proud to know. He fought the good fight for longer than many others could have. Despite his personal troubles, he was always there with his whole heart and soul caring and supporting those around him. He would have given me a serious dressing down had I posted anything somber or depressing, not in his honor. So here's my tribute to you friend, a beautiful autumn scene that I think you would have appreciated. Ride in peace, until that day when we ride together once again.
My apologies for being so sporadic lately, life has a way of creeping up on you at times.
The front entrance to St Edmunds Church, a 13th century Church in Crickhowell, Powys.
It is dedicated to St Edmund the Martyr, otherwise known as King Edmund of East Anglia (855-869). Little is known of King Edmund but he is reputed to have been of East Anglia origin and an ideal King, but his sainthood is based on his capture and execution by invading Vikings , he refused to renounce Christianity, and was tortured and beheaded as a result. In the middle ages he became the patron saint of England.
The church itself is quite pretty although it fell into neglect in the 1700's, and the side aisles were taken down. A subsequent Victoria restoration left little of the ancient church although a few memorials survived. We are left with a predominantly Victoria building, with the only shingled steeple in Powys.
The photograph shows the front entrance with the restored side aisles, in an artistic fashion trying to create an oil painting style effect. I felt that this represents the church as it felt at the time of our visit to Crickhowell.
I have only done this a time or two, but I dedicate this image to Little m:) a flickr friend and real life friend as well. She is a true and generous person. She won't put my testimonial up on her profile, but I forgiver her anyway.
Concrete Blond~Darkening of the Light
Like a ghost (Like a ghost)
Is the curtain (Is the curtain)
In the white light of the morning
Dancing (Dancing)
In the morning (In the morning)
Are you there? Are you there?
And the shadows (And the shadows)
Like a sadness (Like a sadness)
Falling all across the garden
Dancing (Dancing)
In the garden (In the garden)
Are you there? Are you there?
Shine on friend
Goodnight
Why then the darkening of the light?
And the leaves (And the leaves)
At my feet (At my feet)
Whisper sounds so familiar
Whisper (Whisper)
So familiar (So familiar)
Are you there? Are you there?
Where the clouds (Where the clouds)
Pull apart (Pull apart)
Where the moon changes faces
In the quiet (In the quiet)
Secret places (Secret places)
Are you there? Are you there?
Shine on friend
Goodnight
Why then the darkening of the light?
this one is dedicated to our homey OTIK, keep on rockin' buddy!
painted today with my brother CORE.. lovin' this chrome-bizz!
soundtrack:
On July 7, 1919, a group of U.S. military members dedicated Zero Milestone – the point from which all road distances in the country would be measured – just south of the White House lawn in Washington, D.C. The next morning, they helped to define the future of the nation.
Instead of an exploratory rocket or deep-sea submarine, these explorers set out in 42 trucks, five passenger cars and an assortment of motorcycles, ambulances, tank trucks, mobile field kitchens, mobile repair shops and Signal Corps searchlight trucks. During the first three days of driving, they managed just over five miles per hour. This was most troubling because their goal was to explore the condition of American roads by driving across the U.S.
Participating in this exploratory party was U.S. Army Captain Dwight D. Eisenhower. Although he played a critical role in many portions of 20th-century U.S. history, his passion for roads may have carried the most significant impact on the domestic front. This trek, literally and figuratively, caught the nation and the young soldier at a crossroads.
Returning from World War I, Ike was entertaining the idea of leaving the military and accepting a civilian job. His decision to remain proved pivotal for the nation. By the end of the first half of the century, the roadscape – transformed with an interstate highway system while he was president – helped remake the nation and the lives of its occupants.
For Ike, though, roadways represented not only domestic development but also national security. By the early 1900s it become clear to many administrators that petroleum was a strategic resource to the nation’s present and future.
At the start of World War I, the world had an oil glut since there were few practical uses for it beyond kerosene for lighting. When the war was over, the developed world had little doubt that a nation’s future standing in the world was predicated on access to oil. “The Great War” introduced a 19th-century world to modern ideas and technologies, many of which required inexpensive crude.
Oil drilling in Beaumont, Texas in 1901. The U.S. supplied crude to its allies in World War I and relied on domestic production after its entry. AP Photo
Prime movers and national security
During and after World War I, there was a dramatic change in energy production, shifting heavily away from wood and hydropower and toward fossil fuels – coal and, ultimately, petroleum. And in comparison to coal, when utilized in vehicles and ships, petroleum brought flexibility as it could be transported with ease and used in different types of vehicles. That in itself represented a new type of weapon and a basic strategic advantage. Within a few decades of this energy transition, petroleum’s acquisition took on the spirit of an international arms race.
Even more significant, the international corporations that harvested oil throughout the world acquired a level of significance unknown to other industries, earning the encompassing name “Big Oil.” By the 1920s, Big Oil’s product – useless just decades prior – had become the lifeblood of national security to the U.S. and Great Britain. And from the start of this transition, the massive reserves held in the U.S. marked a strategic advantage with the potential to last generations.
As impressive as the U.S.’ domestic oil production was from 1900-1920, however, the real revolution occurred on the international scene, as British, Dutch and French European powers used corporations such as Shell, British Petroleum and others to begin developing oil wherever it occurred.
During this era of colonialism, each nation applied its age-old method of economic development by securing petroleum in less developed portions of the world, including Mexico, the Black Sea area and, ultimately, the Middle East. Redrawing global geography based on resource supply (such as gold, rubber and even human labor or slavery) of course, was not new; doing so specifically for sources of energy was a striking change.
Crude proves itself on the battlefield
“World War I was a war,” writes historian Daniel Yergin, “that was fought between men and machines. And these machines were powered by oil.”
When the war broke out, military strategy was organized around horses and other animals. With one horse on the field for every three men, such primitive modes dominated the fighting in this “transitional conflict.”
Throughout the war, the energy transition took place from horsepower to gas-powered trucks and tanks and, of course, to oil-burning ships and airplanes. Innovations put these new technologies into immediate action on the horrific battlefield of World War I.
It was the British, for instance, who set out to overcome the stalemate of trench warfare by devising an armored vehicle that was powered by the internal combustion engine. Under its code name “tank,” the vehicle was first used in 1916 at the Battle of the Somme. In addition, the British Expeditionary Force that went to France in 1914 was supported by a fleet of 827 motor cars and 15 motorcycles; by war’s end, the British army included 56,000 trucks, 23,000 motorcars and 34,000 motorcycles. These gas-powered vehicles offered superior flexibility on the battlefield.
Government airplane manufactured by Dayton-Wright Airplane Company in 1918. U.S. National Archives
In the air and sea, the strategic change was more obvious. By 1915, Britain had built 250 planes. In this era of the Red Baron and others, primitive airplanes often required that the pilot pack his own sidearm and use it for firing at his opponent. More often, though, the flying devices could be used for delivering explosives in episodes of tactical bombing. German pilots applied this new strategy to severe bombing of England with zeppelins and later with aircraft. Over the course of the war, the use of aircraft expanded remarkably: Britain, 55,000 planes; France, 68,0000 planes; Italy, 20,000; U.S., 15,000; and Germany, 48,000.
With these new uses, wartime petroleum supplies became a critical strategic military issue. Royal Dutch/Shell provided the war effort with much of its supply of crude. In addition, Britain expanded even more deeply in the Middle East. In particular, Britain had quickly come to depend on the Abadan refinery site in Persia, and when Turkey came into the war in 1915 as a partner with Germany, British soldiers defended it from Turkish invasion.
When the Allies expanded to include the U.S. in 1917, petroleum was a weapon on everyone’s mind. The Inter-Allied Petroleum Conference was created to pool, coordinate and control all oil supplies and tanker travel. The U.S. entry into the war made this organization necessary because it had been supplying such a large portion of the Allied effort thus far. Indeed, as the producer of nearly 70 percent of the world’s oil supply, the U.S.’ greatest weapon in the fighting of World War I may have been crude. President Woodrow Wilson appointed the nation’s first energy czar, whose responsibility was to work in close quarters with leaders of the American companies.
Infrastructure as a path to national power
When the young Eisenhower set out on his trek after the war, he deemed the party’s progress over the first two days “not too good” and as slow “as even the slowest troop train.” The roads they traveled across the U.S., Ike described as “average to nonexistent.” He continued:
“In some places, the heavy trucks broke through the surface of the road and we had to tow them out one by one, with the caterpillar tractor. Some days when we had counted on sixty or seventy or a hundred miles, we could do three or four.”
Eisenhower’s party completed its frontier trek and arrived in San Francisco, California on Sept. 6, 1919. Of course, the clearest implication that grew from Eisenhower’s trek was the need for roads. Unstated, however, was the symbolic suggestion that matters of transportation and of petroleum now demanded the involvement of the U.S. military, as it did in many industrialized nations.
The emphasis on roads and, later, particularly on Ike’s interstate system was transformative for the U.S.; however, Eisenhower was overlooking the fundamental shift in which he participated. The imperative was clear: Whether through road-building initiatives or through international diplomacy, the use of petroleum by his nation and others was now a reliance that carried with it implications for national stability and security.
Eisenhower served in the Tank Corps until 1922. Eisenhower Presidential Library, ARC 876971
Seen through this lens of history, petroleum’s road to essentialness in human life begins neither in its ability to propel the Model T nor to give form to the burping plastic Tupperware bowl. The imperative to maintain petroleum supplies begins with its necessity for each nation’s defense. Although petroleum use eventually made consumers’ lives simpler in numerous ways, its use by the military fell into a different category entirely. If the supply was insufficient, the nation’s most basic protections would be compromised.
After World War I in 1919, Eisenhower and his team thought they were determining only the need for roadways – “The old convoy,” he explained, “had started me thinking about good, two lane highways.”
At the same time, though, they were declaring a political commitment by the U.S. And thanks to its immense domestic reserves, the U.S. was late coming to this realization. Yet after the “war to end all wars,” it was a commitment already being acted upon by other nations, notably Germany and Britain, each of whom lacked essential supplies of crude.
theconversation.com/how-world-war-i-ushered-in-the-centur...
THE SPLENDOR OF AUTUMN...
{{ Dedicated to Niña }}
May 5, 2001 - Oct 2, 2019
Nothing compares to the luscious hues of Autumn! The shade of amber is one such beautiful color and this shade had special meaning to me..as they were the beautiful shade of Nina's pretty eyes!
We started this collection together before she had passed away Oct 2nd. And as most of you know, the only reason I had begun knitting such pretty gnome hats all began with Nina!
She had broken her hip years ago and she never left my site or my side so make sure her hip set for weeks in her sling! In order to work off Momma's anxiety for her full
recovery...we started the Little Ditzies gnome hats! I am really happy to say that everyone of you who owns a hat from me.... Nina was forever at my side as I knitted away and she slept directly snuggled at my hip! This collection is dedicated to my dear sweet Nina and her beautiful soulful amber eyes which always captured my heart as I looked deep down into the well of them and felt her loving heart and soul! <3
Dedicated to the Gallipoli relief in 1915.
The Royal Gloucestershire Hussars was a volunteer yeomanry regiment which, in the 20th century, became part of the British Army Reserve. It traced its origins to the First or Cheltenham Troop of Gloucestershire Gentleman and Yeomanry raised in 1795, although a break in the lineage means that its formation is dated to the Marshfield and Dodington Troop raised in 1830. Six further troops – officered by nobility and gentry, and recruited largely from among landholders and tenant farmers – were subsequently raised in Gloucestershire, and in 1834 they came together to form the Gloucestershire Yeomanry Cavalry. In 1847, the regiment adopted a hussar uniform and the name Royal Gloucestershire Hussars. Originally intended to counter insurrection and a French invasion that never materialised, the yeomanry's first deployments were ceremonial and as mounted police during times of civil unrest. Three Gloucestershire troops were deployed to Bristol on two separate occasions in the 1830s in support of the civil authorities.
From the mid-19th century, the yeomanry's policing role diminished with the establishment of a civilian police force, and renewed fears of invasion turned its focus to national defence. The Royal Gloucestershire Hussars' first battle honour was won in South Africa during the Second Boer War, when a contingent of Gloucestershire yeomanry served as mounted infantry in the Imperial Yeomanry. Before the First World War, all volunteer forces, including the yeomanry, were brought into the Territorial Force. On the outbreak of the war the regiment raised a second-line unit, which remained in the UK and became a cyclist unit in 1916, and a third-line unit, which served as a reserve. The first-line unit saw action as infantry at Gallipoli and as cavalry in the Sinai and Palestine Campaign; in the latter it fought both mounted and dismounted from the Suez Canal to Aleppo in modern-day Syria. Following the war, the regiment was downsized and converted to the 21st (Royal Gloucestershire Hussars) Armoured Car Company.
For more history of the regiment, see here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Gloucestershire_Hussars
Shooting attendees of a London Fashion Week event earlier this year: "'Round the boutiques of London Town, / Eagerly pursuing all the latest fads and trends,"
Normally, in a French village, you have a church. One church. If you’re lucky, the church will be old, possibly Romanesque, and interesting. Therefore, it is extremely lucky that the small Alpine village of Notre-Dame-de-Mésage (barely over 1,000 inhabitants), not too far from the large city of Grenoble, should feature not one, but two churches, both of them Romanesque, and both full of very interesting aspects...!
We will begin the visit with the oldest one, the parochial church dedicated to the Virgin Mary —hence the name of the village itself. This little church, built perilously close to the chasm below on a very narrow flat ledge, dates back, for its oldest parts (the nave walls), to the 800s or 900s. At least, that is the opinion of Clovis Angelier in his notice published in the Bulletin monumental of 1962 (accessible online here: www.persee.fr/doc/bulmo_0007-473x_1952_num_110_2_3716). At the time, Angelier saw and was able to assess the apparel as being typical of that period in the area; unfortunately, it is not possible for us today to do the same, as those walls have been plastered over on every side. We will take his word for it.
The church is dominated by a stubby and adorably decorated bell tower built in tuff stone to be less heavy. In spite of that precaution, the bell tower must have caused significant damage to the structure of the church, as a pair of unsightly, thick pillars had to be built in the nave around 1200 to support the weight... which did not prevent the little bell tower from beginning to lean in a pronounced manner. Today, it resembles the Tower of Pisa and its curious appearance is known and well-liked in all the region: it has become an icon.
The church also features a beautiful semi-circular apse built around Year 1000, and is generally a good example of the premier art roman.
The western and southern sides of the bell tower.
1961 Brush Loughborough built A1A A1A class 31 built as D5695 renumbered to TOPS as 31265 in April 1974 then renumbered to 31430 in August 1983 when fitted with electric train heating and again renumbered to 31530 in may 1990 when dedicated to freight use seen in British rail blue livery named sister Dora at Tunbridge wells west on the spa valley railway
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The Friends' Benefactor Kneeler was dedicated on 3rd July 2011 and is now on the step in the nave that marks the medieval division between the people's part of the Abbey, to the west, and the Monk's part, to the east. This magnificent work, over 24 feet in length, was made by over 500 people, both local and from all parts of the world, each adding just a few stitches. It depicts the Coats of Arms of many of the medieval families who by their gifts created the Abbey that exists today. It also commemorates the charitable part played by the monks in the aftermath of the Battle of Tewkesbury in 1471. The kneeler is made up of eight cushions, the photo shows three of them.
Notre-Dame de Paris (French: [nɔtʁ(ə) dam də paʁi] ⓘ; meaning "Our Lady of Paris"), referred to simply as Notre-Dame,[a] is a medieval Catholic cathedral on the Île de la Cité (an island in the Seine River), in the 4th arrondissement of Paris, France. The cathedral, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, is considered one of the finest examples of French Gothic architecture. Several attributes set it apart from the earlier Romanesque style, particularly its pioneering use of the rib vault and flying buttress, its enormous and colourful rose windows, and the naturalism and abundance of its sculptural decoration.[5] Notre-Dame also stands out for its three pipe organs (one historic) and its immense church bells.[6]
Built during medieval France, construction of the cathedral began in 1163 under Bishop Maurice de Sully and was largely completed by 1260, though it was modified in succeeding centuries. In the 1790s, during the French Revolution, Notre-Dame suffered extensive desecration; much of its religious imagery was damaged or destroyed. In the 19th century, the coronation of Napoleon and the funerals of many of the French Republic's presidents took place at the cathedral. The 1831 publication of Victor Hugo's novel Notre-Dame de Paris (in English: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame) inspired interest which led to restoration between 1844 and 1864, supervised by Eugène Viollet-le-Duc. On 26 August 1944, the Liberation of Paris from German occupation was celebrated in Notre-Dame with the singing of the Magnificat. Beginning in 1963, the cathedral's façade was cleaned of soot and grime. Another cleaning and restoration project was carried out between 1991 and 2000.[7]
The cathedral is a widely recognized symbol of the city of Paris and the French nation. In 1805, it was awarded honorary status as a minor basilica. As the cathedral of the archdiocese of Paris, Notre-Dame contains the cathedra of the archbishop of Paris (currently Laurent Ulrich). In the early 21st century, approximately 12 million people visited Notre-Dame annually, making it the most visited monument in Paris.[8] The cathedral is renowned for its Lent sermons, a tradition founded in the 1830s by the Dominican Jean-Baptiste Henri Lacordaire. These sermons have increasingly been given by leading public figures or government-employed academics.
Over time, the cathedral has gradually been stripped of many decorations and artworks. However, the cathedral still contains Gothic, Baroque, and 19th-century sculptures, 17th- and early 18th-century altarpieces, and some of the most important relics in Christendom – including the Crown of Thorns, and a sliver and nail from the True Cross.
On 15 April 2019, while Notre-Dame was undergoing renovation and restoration, its roof caught fire and burned for 15 hours. The cathedral sustained serious damage. The flèche (the timber spirelet over the crossing) was destroyed, as was most of the lead-covered wooden roof above the stone vaulted ceiling.[9] This contaminated the site and nearby environment with lead.[10] Restoration proposals suggested modernizing the cathedral, but the French National Assembly rejected them, enacting a law in July 2019 that required the restoration preserve the cathedral's "historic, artistic and architectural interest".[11] The task of stabilizing the building against potential collapse was completed in November 2020.[12] The cathedral is expected to reopen on 8 December 2024; the date was confirmed by President Macron.
Key dates
4th century – Cathedral of Saint Étienne, dedicated to Saint Stephen, built just west of present cathedral.[14]
1163 – Bishop Maurice de Sully begins construction of new cathedral.[14]
1182 or 1185 – Choir completed, clerestory with two levels: upper level of upright windows with pointed arches, still without tracery, lower level of small rose windows.
c. 1200 – Construction of nave, with flying buttresses, completed.
c. 1210–1220 – Construction of towers begins.
c. 1210–1220 – Two new traverses join towers with nave. West rose window complete in 1220.
After 1220 – New flying buttresses added to choir walls, remodeling of the clerestories: pointed arched windows are enlarged downward, replacing the triforia, and get tracery.
1235–1245 – Chapels constructed between buttresses of nave and choir.
1250–1260 – North transept lengthened by Jean de Chelles to provide more light. North rose window constructed.[15]
1270 – South transept and rose window completed by Pierre de Montreuil.[16]
1699 – Beginning of major redecoration of interior in Louis XIV style by Hardouin Mansart and Robert de Cotte.[17]
1725–1727 – South rose window, poorly built, is reconstructed. Later entirely rebuilt in 1854.
1790 – In the French Revolution the Revolutionary Paris Commune removes all bronze, lead, and precious metals from the cathedral to be melted down.[16]
1793 – The cathedral is converted into a Temple of Reason and then Temple of the Supreme Being.
1801–1802 – With the Concordat of 1801, Napoleon restores the use of the cathedral (though not ownership) to the Catholic Church.
1804 – On 2 December, Napoleon crowns himself Emperor at Notre-Dame.
1805 – The cathedral is conceded the honor of minor basilica by Pope Pius VII, making it the first minor basilica outside of Italy.[18]
1844–1864 – Major restoration by Jean-Baptiste Lassus and Eugène Viollet-le-Duc with additions in the spirit of the original Gothic style.[19]
1871 – In final days of the Paris Commune, Communards attempt unsuccessfully to burn the cathedral.
1944 – On 26 August, General Charles de Gaulle celebrates the Liberation of Paris with a special Mass at Notre-Dame.
1949 – On 26 April, the Archbishop of Paris, Emmanuel Célestin Suhard, crowns the venerated image of Our Lady of Guadalupe in the name of Pope Pius XII.
1963 – Culture Minister André Malraux orders the cleaning of the cathedral façade of centuries of grime and soot.
2019 – On 15 April, a fire destroys a large part of the roof and the flèche.
2021 – Reconstruction begins two years after the fire that destroyed a large part of the roof and the flèche.
2024 - Expected reopening of the Cathedral to occur on 8 December.
It is believed that before the arrival of Christianity in France, a Gallo-Roman temple dedicated to Jupiter stood on the site of Notre-Dame. Evidence for this includes the Pillar of the Boatmen, discovered beneath the cathedral in 1710. In the 4th or 5th century, a large early Christian church, the Cathedral of Saint Étienne, was built on the site, close to the royal palace.[14] The entrance was situated about 40 metres (130 ft) west of the present west front of Notre-Dame, and the apse was located about where the west façade is today. It was roughly half the size of the later Notre-Dame, 70 metres (230 ft) long—and separated into nave and four aisles by marble columns, then decorated with mosaics.[7][20]
The last church before the cathedral of Notre-Dame was a Romanesque remodeling of Saint-Étienne that, although enlarged and remodeled, was found to be unfit for the growing population of Paris.[21][b] A baptistery, the Church of Saint-John-le-Rond, built about 452, was located on the north side of the west front of Notre-Dame until the work of Jacques-Germain Soufflot in the 18th century.[23]
In 1160, the Bishop of Paris, Maurice de Sully,[23] decided to build a new and much larger church. He summarily demolished the earlier cathedral and recycled its materials.[21] Sully decided that the new church should be built in the Gothic style, which had been inaugurated at the royal abbey of Saint Denis in the late 1130s.
The chronicler Jean de Saint-Victor [fr] recorded in the Memorial Historiarum that the construction of Notre-Dame began between 24 March and 25 April 1163 with the laying of the cornerstone in the presence of King Louis VII and Pope Alexander III.[24][25] Four phases of construction took place under bishops Maurice de Sully and Eudes de Sully (not related to Maurice), according to masters whose names have been lost. Analysis of vault stones that fell in the 2019 fire shows that they were quarried in Vexin, a county northwest of Paris, and presumably brought up the Seine by ferry.
The first phase began with the construction of the choir and its two ambulatories. According to Robert of Torigni, the choir was completed in 1177 and the high altar consecrated on 19 May 1182 by Cardinal Henri de Château-Marçay, the Papal legate in Paris, and Maurice de Sully.[28][failed verification] The second phase, from 1182 to 1190, concerned the construction of the four sections of the nave behind the choir and its aisles to the height of the clerestories. It began after the completion of the choir but ended before the final allotted section of the nave was finished. Beginning in 1190, the bases of the façade were put in place, and the first traverses were completed.[7] Heraclius of Caesarea called for the Third Crusade in 1185 from the still-incomplete cathedral.
Louis IX deposited the relics of the passion of Christ, which included the Crown of thorns, a nail from the Cross and a sliver of the Cross, which he had purchased at great expense from the Latin Emperor Baldwin II, in the cathedral during the construction of the Sainte-Chapelle. An under-shirt, believed to have belonged to Louis, was added to the collection of relics at some time after his death.
Transepts were added at the choir, where the altar was located, in order to bring more light into the centre of the church. The use of simpler four-part rather than six-part rib vaults meant that the roofs were stronger and could be higher. After Bishop Maurice de Sully's death in 1196, his successor, Eudes de Sully oversaw the completion of the transepts, and continued work on the nave, which was nearing completion at the time of his death in 1208. By this time, the western façade was already largely built, though it was not completed until around the mid-1240s. Between 1225 and 1250 the upper gallery of the nave was constructed, along with the two towers on the west façade.
Another significant change came in the mid-13th century, when the transepts were remodelled in the latest Rayonnant style; in the late 1240s Jean de Chelles added a gabled portal to the north transept topped by a spectacular rose window. Shortly afterward (from 1258) Pierre de Montreuil executed a similar scheme on the southern transept. Both these transept portals were richly embellished with sculpture; the south portal depicts scenes from the lives of Saint Stephen and of various local saints, while the north portal featured the infancy of Christ and the story of Theophilus in the tympanum, with a highly influential statue of the Virgin and Child in the trumeau.[30][29] Master builders Pierre de Chelles, Jean Ravy [fr], Jean le Bouteiller, and Raymond du Temple [fr] succeeded de Chelles and de Montreuil and then each other in the construction of the cathedral. Ravy completed de Chelles's rood screen and chevet chapels, then began the 15-metre (49 ft) flying buttresses of the choir. Jean le Bouteiller, Ravy's nephew, succeeded him in 1344 and was himself replaced on his death in 1363 by his deputy, Raymond du Temple.
Philip the Fair opened the first Estates General in the cathedral in 1302.
An important innovation in the 13th century was the introduction of the flying buttress. Before the buttresses, all of the weight of the roof pressed outward and down to the walls, and the abutments supporting them. With the flying buttress, the weight was carried by the ribs of the vault entirely outside the structure to a series of counter-supports, which were topped with stone pinnacles which gave them greater weight. The buttresses meant that the walls could be higher and thinner, and could have larger windows. The date of the first buttresses is not known with precision beyond an installation date in the 13th century. Art historian Andrew Tallon, however, has argued, based on detailed laser scans of the entire structure, that the buttresses were part of the original design. According to Tallon, the scans indicate that "the upper part of the building has not moved one smidgen in 800 years,"[31] whereas if they were added later some movement from prior to their addition would be expected. Tallon thus concluded that flying buttresses were present from the outset.[31] The first buttresses were replaced by larger and stronger ones in the 14th century; these had a reach of fifteen metres (50') between the walls and counter-supports.[7]
John of Jandun recognized the cathedral as one of Paris's three most important buildings [prominent structures] in his 1323 Treatise on the Praises of Paris:
That most glorious church of the most glorious Virgin Mary, mother of God, deservedly shines out, like the sun among stars. And although some speakers, by their own free judgment, because [they are] able to see only a few things easily, may say that some other is more beautiful, I believe, however, respectfully, that, if they attend more diligently to the whole and the parts, they will quickly retract this opinion. Where indeed, I ask, would they find two towers of such magnificence and perfection, so high, so large, so strong, clothed round about with such multiple varieties of ornaments? Where, I ask, would they find such a multipartite arrangement of so many lateral vaults, above and below? Where, I ask, would they find such light-filled amenities as the many surrounding chapels? Furthermore, let them tell me in what church I may see such a large cross, of which one arm separates the choir from the nave. Finally, I would willingly learn where [there are] two such circles, situated opposite each other in a straight line, which on account of their appearance are given the name of the fourth vowel [O]; among which smaller orbs and circles, with wondrous artifice, so that some arranged circularly, others angularly, surround windows ruddy with precious colours and beautiful with the most subtle figures of the pictures. In fact, I believe that this church offers the carefully discerning such cause for admiration that its inspection can scarcely sate the soul.
— Jean de Jandun, Tractatus de laudibus Parisius
On 16 December 1431, the boy-king Henry VI of England was crowned king of France in Notre-Dame, aged ten, the traditional coronation church of Reims Cathedral being under French control.[33]
During the Renaissance, the Gothic style fell out of style, and the internal pillars and walls of Notre-Dame were covered with tapestries.[34]
In 1548, rioting Huguenots damaged some of the statues of Notre-Dame, considering them idolatrous.[35]
The fountain [fr] in Notre-Dame's parvis was added in 1625 to provide nearby Parisians with running water.[36]
Since 1449, the Parisian goldsmith guild had made regular donations to the cathedral chapter. In 1630, the guild began donating a large altarpiece every year on the first of May. These works came to be known as the grands mays.[37] The subject matter was restricted to episodes from the Acts of the Apostles. The prestigious commission was awarded to the most prominent painters and, after 1648, members of the Académie Royale.
Seventy-six paintings had been donated by 1708, when the custom was discontinued for financial reasons. Those works were confiscated in 1793 and the majority were subsequently dispersed among regional museums in France. Those that remained in the cathedral were removed or relocated within the building by the 19th-century restorers.
Today, thirteen of the grands mays hang in Notre-Dame although these paintings suffered water damage during the fire of 2019 and were removed for conservation.
An altarpiece depicting the Visitation, painted by Jean Jouvenet in 1707, was also located in the cathedral.
The canon Antoine de La Porte commissioned for Louis XIV six paintings depicting the life of the Virgin Mary for the choir. At this same time, Charles de La Fosse painted his Adoration of the Magi, now in the Louvre.[38] Louis Antoine de Noailles, archbishop of Paris, extensively modified the roof of Notre-Dame in 1726, renovating its framing and removing the gargoyles with lead gutters. Noailles also strengthened the buttresses, galleries, terraces, and vaults.[39] In 1756, the cathedral's canons decided that its interior was too dark. The medieval stained glass windows, except the rosettes, were removed and replaced with plain, white glass panes.[34] Lastly, Jacques-Germain Soufflot was tasked with the modification of the portals at the front of the cathedral to allow processions to enter more easily.
After the French Revolution in 1789, Notre-Dame and the rest of the church's property in France was seized and made public property.[40] The cathedral was rededicated in 1793 to the Cult of Reason, and then to the Cult of the Supreme Being in 1794.[41] During this time, many of the treasures of the cathedral were either destroyed or plundered. The twenty-eight statues of biblical kings located at the west façade, mistaken for statues of French kings, were beheaded.[7][42] Many of the heads were found during a 1977 excavation nearby, and are on display at the Musée de Cluny. For a time the Goddess of Liberty replaced the Virgin Mary on several altars.[43] The cathedral's great bells escaped being melted down. All of the other large statues on the façade, with the exception of the statue of the Virgin Mary on the portal of the cloister, were destroyed.[7] The cathedral came to be used as a warehouse for the storage of food and other non-religious purposes.[35]
With the Concordat of 1801, Napoleon Bonaparte restored Notre-Dame to the Catholic Church, though this was only finalized on 18 April 1802. Napoleon also named Paris's new bishop, Jean-Baptiste de Belloy, who restored the cathedral's interior. Charles Percier and Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine made quasi-Gothic modifications to Notre-Dame for the coronation of Napoleon as Emperor of the French within the cathedral. The building's exterior was whitewashed and the interior decorated in Neoclassical style, then in vogue.
In the decades after the Napoleonic Wars, Notre-Dame fell into such a state of disrepair that Paris officials considered its demolition. Victor Hugo, who admired the cathedral, wrote the novel Notre-Dame de Paris (published in English as The Hunchback of Notre-Dame) in 1831 to save Notre-Dame. The book was an enormous success, raising awareness of the cathedral's decaying state.[7] The same year as Hugo's novel was published, however, anti-Legitimists plundered Notre-Dame's sacristy.[45] In 1844 King Louis Philippe ordered that the church be restored.[7]
The architect who had hitherto been in charge of Notre-Dame's maintenance, Étienne-Hippolyte Godde, was dismissed. In his stead, Jean-Baptiste Lassus and Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, who had distinguished themselves with the restoration of the nearby Sainte-Chapelle, were appointed in 1844. The next year, Viollet-le-Duc submitted a budget of 3,888,500 francs, which was reduced to 2,650,000 francs, for the restoration of Notre-Dame and the construction of a new sacristy building. This budget was exhausted in 1850, and work stopped as Viollet-le-Duc made proposals for more money. In totality, the restoration cost over 12 million francs. Supervising a large team of sculptors, glass makers and other craftsmen, and working from drawings or engravings, Viollet-le-Duc remade or added decorations if he felt they were in the spirit of the original style. One of the latter items was a taller and more ornate flèche, to replace the original 13th-century flèche, which had been removed in 1786.[46] The decoration of the restoration included a bronze roof statue of Saint Thomas that resembles Viollet-le-Duc, as well as the sculpture of mythical creatures on the Galerie des Chimères.[35]
The construction of the sacristy was especially financially costly. To secure a firm foundation, it was necessary for Viollet-le-Duc's labourers to dig 9 metres (30 ft). Master glassworkers meticulously copied styles of the 13th century, as written about by art historians Antoine Lusson and Adolphe Napoléon Didron.[47]
During the Paris Commune of March through May 1871, the cathedral and other churches were closed, and some two hundred priests and the Archbishop of Paris were taken as hostages. In May, during the Semaine sanglante of "Bloody Week", as the army recaptured the city, the Communards targeted the cathedral, along with the Tuileries Palace and other landmarks, for destruction; the Communards piled the furniture together in order to burn the cathedral. The arson was halted when the Communard government realised that the fire would also destroy the neighbouring Hôtel-Dieu hospital, filled with hundreds of patients
During the liberation of Paris in August 1944, the cathedral suffered some minor damage from stray bullets. Some of the medieval glass was damaged, and was replaced by glass with modern abstract designs. On 26 August, a special Mass was held in the cathedral to celebrate the liberation of Paris from the Germans; it was attended by General Charles De Gaulle and General Philippe Leclerc.
In 1963, on the initiative of culture minister André Malraux and to mark the 800th anniversary of the cathedral, the façade was cleaned of the centuries of soot and grime, restoring it to its original off-white colour.[49]
On 19 January 1969, vandals placed a North Vietnamese flag at the top the flèche, and sabotaged the stairway leading to it. The flag was cut from the flèche by Paris Fire Brigade Sergeant Raymond Belle in a daring helicopter mission, the first of its kind in France.[50][51][52]
The Requiem Mass of Charles de Gaulle was held in Notre-Dame on 12 November 1970.[53] The next year, on 26 June 1971, Philippe Petit walked across a tight-rope strung between Notre-Dame's two bell towers entertaining spectators.[54]
After the Magnificat of 30 May 1980, Pope John Paul II celebrated Mass on the parvis of the cathedral.[55]
The Requiem Mass of François Mitterrand was held at the cathedral, as with past French heads of state, on 11 January 1996.[56]
The stone masonry of the cathedral's exterior had deteriorated in the 19th and 20th century due to increased air pollution in Paris, which accelerated erosion of decorations and discoloured the stone. By the late 1980s, several gargoyles and turrets had also fallen or become too loose to safely remain in place.[57] A decade-long renovation programme began in 1991 and replaced much of the exterior, with care given to retain the authentic architectural elements of the cathedral, including rigorous inspection of new limestone blocks.[57][58] A discreet system of electrical wires, not visible from below, was also installed on the roof to deter pigeons.[59] The cathedral's pipe organ was upgraded with a computerized system to control the mechanical connections to the pipes.[60] The west face was cleaned and restored in time for millennium celebrations in December 1999.
The Requiem Mass of Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, former archbishop of Paris and Jewish convert to Catholicism, was held in Notre-Dame on 10 August 2007.[62]
The set of four 19th-century bells at the top of the northern towers at Notre-Dame were melted down and recast into new bronze bells in 2013, to celebrate the building's 850th anniversary. They were designed to recreate the sound of the cathedral's original bells from the 17th century.[63][64] Despite the 1990s renovation, the cathedral had continued to show signs of deterioration that prompted the national government to propose a new renovation program in the late 2010s.[65][66] The entire renovation was estimated to cost €100 million, which the archbishop of Paris planned to raise through funds from the national government and private donations.[67] A €6 million renovation of the cathedral's flèche began in late 2018 and continued into the following year, requiring the temporary removal of copper statues on the roof and other decorative elements days before the April 2019 fire.[68][69]
Notre-Dame began a year-long celebration of the 850th anniversary of the laying of the first building block for the cathedral on 12 December 2012.[70] During that anniversary year, on 21 May 2013, Dominique Venner, a historian and white nationalist, placed a letter on the church altar and shot himself, dying instantly. Around 1,500 visitors were evacuated from the cathedral.[71]
French police arrested two people on 8 September 2016 after a car containing seven gasoline canisters was found near Notre-Dame.[72]
On 10 February 2017, French police arrested four persons in Montpellier already known by authorities to have ties to radical Islamist organizations on charges of plotting to travel to Paris and attack the cathedral.[73] Later that year, on 6 June, visitors were shut inside Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris after a man with a hammer attacked a police officer outside.
Paris is the capital and most populous city of France. With an official estimated population of 2,102,650 residents as of 1 January 2023[2] in an area of more than 105 km2 (41 sq mi) Paris is the fourth-most populated city in the European Union and the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2022. Since the 17th century, Paris has been one of the world's major centres of finance, diplomacy, commerce, culture, fashion, and gastronomy. For its leading role in the arts and sciences, as well as its early and extensive system of street lighting, in the 19th century, it became known as the City of Light.
The City of Paris is the centre of the Île-de-France region, or Paris Region, with an official estimated population of 12,271,794 inhabitants on 1 January 2023, or about 19% of the population of France, The Paris Region had a GDP of €765 billion (US$1.064 trillion, PPP) in 2021, the highest in the European Union. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit Worldwide Cost of Living Survey, in 2022, Paris was the city with the ninth-highest cost of living in the world.
Paris is a major railway, highway, and air-transport hub served by two international airports: Charles de Gaulle Airport (the third-busiest airport in Europe) and Orly Airport. Opened in 1900, the city's subway system, the Paris Métro, serves 5.23 million passengers daily; it is the second-busiest metro system in Europe after the Moscow Metro. Gare du Nord is the 24th-busiest railway station in the world and the busiest outside Japan, with 262 million passengers in 2015. Paris has one of the most sustainable transportation systems and is one of the only two cities in the world that received the Sustainable Transport Award twice.
Paris is especially known for its museums and architectural landmarks: the Louvre received 8.9. million visitors in 2023, on track for keeping its position as the most-visited art museum in the world. The Musée d'Orsay, Musée Marmottan Monet and Musée de l'Orangerie are noted for their collections of French Impressionist art. The Pompidou Centre Musée National d'Art Moderne, Musée Rodin and Musée Picasso are noted for their collections of modern and contemporary art. The historical district along the Seine in the city centre has been classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1991.
Paris hosts several United Nations organizations including UNESCO, and other international organizations such as the OECD, the OECD Development Centre, the International Bureau of Weights and Measures, the International Energy Agency, the International Federation for Human Rights, along with European bodies such as the European Space Agency, the European Banking Authority and the European Securities and Markets Authority. The football club Paris Saint-Germain and the rugby union club Stade Français are based in Paris. The 80,000-seat Stade de France, built for the 1998 FIFA World Cup, is located just north of Paris in the neighbouring commune of Saint-Denis. Paris hosts the annual French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament on the red clay of Roland Garros. The city hosted the Olympic Games in 1900 and 1924, and will host the 2024 Summer Olympics. The 1938 and 1998 FIFA World Cups, the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup, the 2007 Rugby World Cup, as well as the 1960, 1984 and 2016 UEFA European Championships were also held in the city. Every July, the Tour de France bicycle race finishes on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées in Paris.
The Parisii, a sub-tribe of the Celtic Senones, inhabited the Paris area from around the middle of the 3rd century BC. One of the area's major north–south trade routes crossed the Seine on the île de la Cité, which gradually became an important trading centre. The Parisii traded with many river towns (some as far away as the Iberian Peninsula) and minted their own coins.
The Romans conquered the Paris Basin in 52 BC and began their settlement on Paris's Left Bank. The Roman town was originally called Lutetia (more fully, Lutetia Parisiorum, "Lutetia of the Parisii", modern French Lutèce). It became a prosperous city with a forum, baths, temples, theatres, and an amphitheatre.
By the end of the Western Roman Empire, the town was known as Parisius, a Latin name that would later become Paris in French. Christianity was introduced in the middle of the 3rd century AD by Saint Denis, the first Bishop of Paris: according to legend, when he refused to renounce his faith before the Roman occupiers, he was beheaded on the hill which became known as Mons Martyrum (Latin "Hill of Martyrs"), later "Montmartre", from where he walked headless to the north of the city; the place where he fell and was buried became an important religious shrine, the Basilica of Saint-Denis, and many French kings are buried there.
Clovis the Frank, the first king of the Merovingian dynasty, made the city his capital from 508. As the Frankish domination of Gaul began, there was a gradual immigration by the Franks to Paris and the Parisian Francien dialects were born. Fortification of the Île de la Cité failed to avert sacking by Vikings in 845, but Paris's strategic importance—with its bridges preventing ships from passing—was established by successful defence in the Siege of Paris (885–886), for which the then Count of Paris (comte de Paris), Odo of France, was elected king of West Francia. From the Capetian dynasty that began with the 987 election of Hugh Capet, Count of Paris and Duke of the Franks (duc des Francs), as king of a unified West Francia, Paris gradually became the largest and most prosperous city in France.
By the end of the 12th century, Paris had become the political, economic, religious, and cultural capital of France.[36] The Palais de la Cité, the royal residence, was located at the western end of the Île de la Cité. In 1163, during the reign of Louis VII, Maurice de Sully, bishop of Paris, undertook the construction of the Notre Dame Cathedral at its eastern extremity.
After the marshland between the river Seine and its slower 'dead arm' to its north was filled in from around the 10th century, Paris's cultural centre began to move to the Right Bank. In 1137, a new city marketplace (today's Les Halles) replaced the two smaller ones on the Île de la Cité and Place de Grève (Place de l'Hôtel de Ville). The latter location housed the headquarters of Paris's river trade corporation, an organisation that later became, unofficially (although formally in later years), Paris's first municipal government.
In the late 12th century, Philip Augustus extended the Louvre fortress to defend the city against river invasions from the west, gave the city its first walls between 1190 and 1215, rebuilt its bridges to either side of its central island, and paved its main thoroughfares. In 1190, he transformed Paris's former cathedral school into a student-teacher corporation that would become the University of Paris and would draw students from all of Europe.
With 200,000 inhabitants in 1328, Paris, then already the capital of France, was the most populous city of Europe. By comparison, London in 1300 had 80,000 inhabitants. By the early fourteenth century, so much filth had collected inside urban Europe that French and Italian cities were naming streets after human waste. In medieval Paris, several street names were inspired by merde, the French word for "shit".
During the Hundred Years' War, Paris was occupied by England-friendly Burgundian forces from 1418, before being occupied outright by the English when Henry V of England entered the French capital in 1420; in spite of a 1429 effort by Joan of Arc to liberate the city, it would remain under English occupation until 1436.
In the late 16th-century French Wars of Religion, Paris was a stronghold of the Catholic League, the organisers of 24 August 1572 St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in which thousands of French Protestants were killed. The conflicts ended when pretender to the throne Henry IV, after converting to Catholicism to gain entry to the capital, entered the city in 1594 to claim the crown of France. This king made several improvements to the capital during his reign: he completed the construction of Paris's first uncovered, sidewalk-lined bridge, the Pont Neuf, built a Louvre extension connecting it to the Tuileries Palace, and created the first Paris residential square, the Place Royale, now Place des Vosges. In spite of Henry IV's efforts to improve city circulation, the narrowness of Paris's streets was a contributing factor in his assassination near Les Halles marketplace in 1610.
During the 17th century, Cardinal Richelieu, chief minister of Louis XIII, was determined to make Paris the most beautiful city in Europe. He built five new bridges, a new chapel for the College of Sorbonne, and a palace for himself, the Palais-Cardinal. After Richelieu's death in 1642, it was renamed the Palais-Royal.
Due to the Parisian uprisings during the Fronde civil war, Louis XIV moved his court to a new palace, Versailles, in 1682. Although no longer the capital of France, arts and sciences in the city flourished with the Comédie-Française, the Academy of Painting, and the French Academy of Sciences. To demonstrate that the city was safe from attack, the king had the city walls demolished and replaced with tree-lined boulevards that would become the Grands Boulevards. Other marks of his reign were the Collège des Quatre-Nations, the Place Vendôme, the Place des Victoires, and Les Invalides.
18th and 19th centuries
Empire, and Haussmann's renovation of Paris
Paris grew in population from about 400,000 in 1640, to 650,000 in 1780. A new boulevard named the Champs-Élysées extended the city west to Étoile, while the working-class neighbourhood of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine on the eastern side of the city grew increasingly crowded with poor migrant workers from other regions of France.
Paris was the centre of an explosion of philosophic and scientific activity, known as the Age of Enlightenment. Diderot and d'Alembert published their Encyclopédie in 1751, and the Montgolfier Brothers launched the first manned flight in a hot air balloon on 21 November 1783. Paris was the financial capital of continental Europe, and the primary European centre of book publishing, fashion and the manufacture of fine furniture and luxury goods.
In the summer of 1789, Paris became the centre stage of the French Revolution. On 14 July, a mob seized the arsenal at the Invalides, acquiring thousands of guns, and stormed the Bastille, which was a principal symbol of royal authority. The first independent Paris Commune, or city council, met in the Hôtel de Ville and elected a Mayor, the astronomer Jean Sylvain Bailly, on 15 July.
Louis XVI and the royal family were brought to Paris and incarcerated in the Tuileries Palace. In 1793, as the revolution turned increasingly radical, the king, queen and mayor were beheaded by guillotine in the Reign of Terror, along with more than 16,000 others throughout France. The property of the aristocracy and the church was nationalised, and the city's churches were closed, sold or demolished. A succession of revolutionary factions ruled Paris until 9 November 1799 (coup d'état du 18 brumaire), when Napoleon Bonaparte seized power as First Consul.
The population of Paris had dropped by 100,000 during the Revolution, but after 1799 it surged with 160,000 new residents, reaching 660,000 by 1815. Napoleon replaced the elected government of Paris with a prefect that reported directly to him. He began erecting monuments to military glory, including the Arc de Triomphe, and improved the neglected infrastructure of the city with new fountains, the Canal de l'Ourcq, Père Lachaise Cemetery and the city's first metal bridge, the Pont des Arts.
The Eiffel Tower, under construction in November 1888, startled Parisians—and the world—with its modernity.
During the Restoration, the bridges and squares of Paris were returned to their pre-Revolution names; the July Revolution in 1830 (commemorated by the July Column on the Place de la Bastille) brought to power a constitutional monarch, Louis Philippe I. The first railway line to Paris opened in 1837, beginning a new period of massive migration from the provinces to the city. In 1848, Louis-Philippe was overthrown by a popular uprising in the streets of Paris. His successor, Napoleon III, alongside the newly appointed prefect of the Seine, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, launched a huge public works project to build wide new boulevards, a new opera house, a central market, new aqueducts, sewers and parks, including the Bois de Boulogne and Bois de Vincennes. In 1860, Napoleon III annexed the surrounding towns and created eight new arrondissements, expanding Paris to its current limits.
During the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), Paris was besieged by the Prussian Army. Following several months of blockade, hunger, and then bombardment by the Prussians, the city was forced to surrender on 28 January 1871. After seizing power in Paris on 28 March, a revolutionary government known as the Paris Commune held power for two months, before being harshly suppressed by the French army during the "Bloody Week" at the end of May 1871.
In the late 19th century, Paris hosted two major international expositions: the 1889 Universal Exposition, which featured the new Eiffel Tower, was held to mark the centennial of the French Revolution; and the 1900 Universal Exposition gave Paris the Pont Alexandre III, the Grand Palais, the Petit Palais and the first Paris Métro line. Paris became the laboratory of Naturalism (Émile Zola) and Symbolism (Charles Baudelaire and Paul Verlaine), and of Impressionism in art (Courbet, Manet, Monet, Renoir).
20th and 21st centuries
World War, Paris between the Wars (1919–1939), Paris in World War II, and History of Paris (1946–2000)
By 1901, the population of Paris had grown to about 2,715,000. At the beginning of the century, artists from around the world including Pablo Picasso, Modigliani, and Henri Matisse made Paris their home. It was the birthplace of Fauvism, Cubism and abstract art, and authors such as Marcel Proust were exploring new approaches to literature.
During the First World War, Paris sometimes found itself on the front line; 600 to 1,000 Paris taxis played a small but highly important symbolic role in transporting 6,000 soldiers to the front line at the First Battle of the Marne. The city was also bombed by Zeppelins and shelled by German long-range guns. In the years after the war, known as Les Années Folles, Paris continued to be a mecca for writers, musicians and artists from around the world, including Ernest Hemingway, Igor Stravinsky, James Joyce, Josephine Baker, Eva Kotchever, Henry Miller, Anaïs Nin, Sidney Bechet and Salvador Dalí.
In the years after the peace conference, the city was also home to growing numbers of students and activists from French colonies and other Asian and African countries, who later became leaders of their countries, such as Ho Chi Minh, Zhou Enlai and Léopold Sédar Senghor.
General Charles de Gaulle on the Champs-Élysées celebrating the liberation of Paris, 26 August 1944
On 14 June 1940, the German army marched into Paris, which had been declared an "open city". On 16–17 July 1942, following German orders, the French police and gendarmes arrested 12,884 Jews, including 4,115 children, and confined them during five days at the Vel d'Hiv (Vélodrome d'Hiver), from which they were transported by train to the extermination camp at Auschwitz. None of the children came back. On 25 August 1944, the city was liberated by the French 2nd Armoured Division and the 4th Infantry Division of the United States Army. General Charles de Gaulle led a huge and emotional crowd down the Champs Élysées towards Notre Dame de Paris, and made a rousing speech from the Hôtel de Ville.
In the 1950s and the 1960s, Paris became one front of the Algerian War for independence; in August 1961, the pro-independence FLN targeted and killed 11 Paris policemen, leading to the imposition of a curfew on Muslims of Algeria (who, at that time, were French citizens). On 17 October 1961, an unauthorised but peaceful protest demonstration of Algerians against the curfew led to violent confrontations between the police and demonstrators, in which at least 40 people were killed. The anti-independence Organisation armée secrète (OAS) carried out a series of bombings in Paris throughout 1961 and 1962.
In May 1968, protesting students occupied the Sorbonne and put up barricades in the Latin Quarter. Thousands of Parisian blue-collar workers joined the students, and the movement grew into a two-week general strike. Supporters of the government won the June elections by a large majority. The May 1968 events in France resulted in the break-up of the University of Paris into 13 independent campuses. In 1975, the National Assembly changed the status of Paris to that of other French cities and, on 25 March 1977, Jacques Chirac became the first elected mayor of Paris since 1793. The Tour Maine-Montparnasse, the tallest building in the city at 57 storeys and 210 m (689 ft) high, was built between 1969 and 1973. It was highly controversial, and it remains the only building in the centre of the city over 32 storeys high. The population of Paris dropped from 2,850,000 in 1954 to 2,152,000 in 1990, as middle-class families moved to the suburbs. A suburban railway network, the RER (Réseau Express Régional), was built to complement the Métro; the Périphérique expressway encircling the city, was completed in 1973.
Most of the postwar presidents of the Fifth Republic wanted to leave their own monuments in Paris; President Georges Pompidou started the Centre Georges Pompidou (1977), Valéry Giscard d'Estaing began the Musée d'Orsay (1986); President François Mitterrand had the Opéra Bastille built (1985–1989), the new site of the Bibliothèque nationale de France (1996), the Arche de la Défense (1985–1989) in La Défense, as well as the Louvre Pyramid with its underground courtyard (1983–1989); Jacques Chirac (2006), the Musée du quai Branly.
In the early 21st century, the population of Paris began to increase slowly again, as more young people moved into the city. It reached 2.25 million in 2011. In March 2001, Bertrand Delanoë became the first socialist mayor. He was re-elected in March 2008. In 2007, in an effort to reduce car traffic, he introduced the Vélib', a system which rents bicycles. Bertrand Delanoë also transformed a section of the highway along the Left Bank of the Seine into an urban promenade and park, the Promenade des Berges de la Seine, which he inaugurated in June 2013.
In 2007, President Nicolas Sarkozy launched the Grand Paris project, to integrate Paris more closely with the towns in the region around it. After many modifications, the new area, named the Metropolis of Grand Paris, with a population of 6.7 million, was created on 1 January 2016. In 2011, the City of Paris and the national government approved the plans for the Grand Paris Express, totalling 205 km (127 mi) of automated metro lines to connect Paris, the innermost three departments around Paris, airports and high-speed rail (TGV) stations, at an estimated cost of €35 billion.The system is scheduled to be completed by 2030.
In January 2015, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed attacks across the Paris region. 1.5 million people marched in Paris in a show of solidarity against terrorism and in support of freedom of speech. In November of the same year, terrorist attacks, claimed by ISIL, killed 130 people and injured more than 350.
On 22 April 2016, the Paris Agreement was signed by 196 nations of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in an aim to limit the effects of climate change below 2 °C.
A mortuary temple dedicated to the longest ruling female of Ancient Egypt, Queen Hatshepsut. The temple is decorated with statues, sphinxes, and reliefs, which have been meticulously restored over time
Taken @Luxor, Egypt
Stuart Nicol Transport truck dedicated to Colin McRae .
First time I have seen this magnificent truck, I was delighted to see it and had a chat with the driver, a fellow Colin McRae fan who suggested to his employers Stuart Nicol Transport Ltd that a truck in livery honouring Colin McRae was something they should consider, this magnificent truck is the result .
Colin McRae MBE
Personal information
Nationality Scottish
Born5 August 1968nLanark, Scotland
Died15 September 2007 (aged 39)
Lanark, Scotland
World Rally Championship record
Active years1987–2003, 2005–2006
Co-driverUnited Kingdom Derek Ringer
United Kingdom Nicky Grist
TeamsSubaru, Citroën, Ford, Škoda
Rallies146
Championships1 (1995)
Rally wins25
Podiums42
Stage wins477
Total points626
First rally1987 Swedish Rally
First win1993 Rally New Zealand
Last win2002 Safari Rally
Last rally2006 Rally of Turkey
Colin Steele McRae, MBE (5 August 1968 – 15 September 2007) was a British rally driver from Scotland, born in Lanark. The son of five-time British Rally Champion Jimmy McRae and brother of rally driver Alister McRae, Colin McRae was the 1991 and 1992 British Rally Champion and, in 1995 became the first British person and the youngest to win the World Rally Championship Drivers' title, a record he still holds.
McRae's outstanding performance with the Subaru World Rally Team enabled the team to win the World Rally Championship Constructors' title three times in succession in 1995, 1996 and 1997. After a four-year spell with the Ford Motor Co. team, which saw McRae win nine events, he moved to Citroën World Rally Team in 2003 where, despite not winning an event, he helped them win the first of their three consecutive manufacturers' titles. He was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to motorsport in 1996.
McRae died in 2007 when he crashed his helicopter near his home. The accident also killed his son and two family friends. In November 2008 he was posthumously inducted into the Scottish Sports Hall of Fame.
Stuart Nicol Transport is based in Shotts, Lanarkshire and is owned and managed by Stuart Nicol who has built the business from the ground up.
Through no shortage of hard work, dedication and word of mouth recommendations, Stuart Nicol Transport has grown organically and have developed a very impressive six acre development comprising an office suite containing the all-important traffic department, a 12,000 square feet warehouse and transit shed and workshop with a full length pit and a roller brake tester: purpose built premises that provide both a solid foundation and a springboard for the company’s future successes.
Grampian Transport Museum Alford Aberdeenshire
This year we have support from Ford through local dealer Lawrence of Kemnay. That will ensure an excellent Ford presence with activities and displays (and some very special show offers on Ford merchandise!).
2018 is a major anniversary for the Blue Oval – it is 50 years since the launch of the legendary Escort! AllFord wants to celebrate this with at least 50 Escorts at the show, to be arranged in a ‘50’ formation in the centre of the arena. With this in mind please speak to everybody you know with an Escort (or several!) and ask them to bring them all.
2018 is also the 25th anniversary of the Mondeo so if you know anyone with a special Mondeo please encourage them to enter and bring it along on 19th August.
AllFord at Alford is ‘A celebration of Ford throughout the ages’ and we would like to see cars from every era of production so if you know of any old, interesting or special Ford or Ford powered cars, please forward this email to their owners and let us achieve our aim of making the 2018 event very special indeed.
This years ALLFord has a record number of entrants - a huge thanks to all those who are bringing their Fords on Sunday.
The Grade I Listed Norwich Cathedral which is dedicated to the Holy and Undivided Trinity, it is the cathedral church for the Church of England Diocese of Norwich and is one of the Norwich 12 heritage sites. The cathedral close is one of the largest in England and one of the largest in Europe and has more people living within it than any other close. The cathedral spire, measuring at 315 ft or 96 m, is the second tallest in England despite being partly rebuilt after being struck by lightning in 1169, just 23 months after its completion. In Norwich Norfolk.
In 672 the Archbishop of Canterbury, Theodore of Tarsus divided East Anglia into two dioceses, one covering Norfolk, with its see at Elmham, the other, covering Suffolk with its see at Dunwich. During much of the 9th century, because of the Danish incursions, there was no bishop at Elmham; in addition the see of Dunwich was extinguished and East Anglia became a single diocese once more. Following the Norman Conquest many sees were moved to more secure urban centres, that of Elmham being transferred to Thetford in 1072, and finally to Norwich in 1094.
The structure of the cathedral is primarily in the Norman style, having been constructed at the behest of Bishop Herbert de Losinga who had bought the bishopric for £1,900 before its transfer from Thetford. Building started in 1096 and the cathedral was completed in 1145. It was built from flint and mortar and faced with cream coloured Caen limestone. It still retains the greater part of its original stone structure. An Anglo-Saxon settlement and two churches were demolished to make room for the buildings and a canal cut to allow access for the boats bringing the stone and building materials which were taken up the Wensum and unloaded at Pulls Ferry, Norwich.
The ground plan remains almost entirely as it was in Norman times, except for that of the easternmost chapel. The cathedral has an unusually long nave of fourteen bays. The transepts are without aisles and the east end terminates in an apse with an ambulatory.
The crossing tower was the last piece of the Norman cathedral to be completed, in around 1140. It is boldly decorated with circles, lozenges and interlaced arcading. The present spire was added in the late fifteenth century.
The cathedral was damaged after riots in 1272, which resulted in the city paying heavy fines levied by Henry III, Rebuilding was completed in 1278 and the cathedral was reconsecrated in the presence of Edward I on Advent Sunday of that year.
A large two-storey cloister, the only such in England, with over 1,000 ceiling bosses was begun in 1297 and finally finished in 1430 after the Black Death had plagued the city.
The Norman spire was blown down in 1362. Its fall caused considerable damage to the east end, as a result of which the clerestory of the choir was rebuilt in the Perpendicular style. In the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, the cathedrals flat timber ceilings were replaced with stone vaults: the nave was vaulted under Bishop Lyhart (1446–72), the choir under Bishop Goldwell (1472–99) and the transepts after 1520.
In 1463 the spire was struck by lightning, causing a fire to rage through the nave which was so intense it turned some of the creamy Caen limestone a pink colour. In 1480 the bishop, James Goldwell, ordered the building of a new spire which is still in place today. It is of brick faced with stone, supported on brick squinches built into the Norman tower. At 315 feet (96 metres) high, the spire is the second tallest in England. Only that of Salisbury Cathedral is taller at 404 feet (123 metres).
The cathedral was partially in ruins when John Cosin was at the grammar school in the early 17th century and the former bishop was an absentee figure. In 1643 during the reign of Charles I, an angry Puritan mob invaded the cathedral and destroyed all Roman Catholic symbols. The building, abandoned the following year, lay in ruins for two decades. The mob also fired their muskets. At least one musket ball remains lodged in the stonework. Only at the Restoration in 1660 would the cathedral be restored under Charles II.
Nit de Sant Joan, 23/06.
The photo is not really taken that night. It is any bonfire, but it serves to illustrate history. Dedicated specially to miriamsbd, the person thanks to which I am here, in Flickr, and one of her photos was one of my first favorites.
Realmente la foto no está tomada esa noche. Es una hoguera cualquiera, pero sirve para ilustrar la historia. Dedicada especialmente a miriamsbd, la persona gracias a la cual estoy aquí, en Flickr, y una de sus fotos fue una de mis primeras favoritas.
ENGLISH
The evening of June 23, St. John's Eve, is the eve of celebration before the Feast Day of St. John the Baptist. The Gospel of Luke (Luke 1:36, 56-57) states that John was born about six months before Jesus, therefore the feast of John the Baptist falls on June 24, six months before Christmas. This feast day is one of the very few saint's days to mark the anniversary of the birth, rather than the death, of its namesake.
The Feast of St. John coincides with the summer solstice in the northern hemisphere, which technically can occur anywhere between June 20 - 26th. The Christian holy day is fixed at June 24, but, in the old way, festivities are celebrated the night before, on St. John's Eve.
St. John's Eve (or Bonfire Night) is celebrated in many parts of rural Ireland with the lighting of bonfires. This ancient custom has its roots in pre-Christian Irish society when the Celts honoured the Goddess Áine, the Celtic equivalent of Venus and Aphrodite. She was the Goddess Queen of Munster and Christianised rituals in her honour (as Naomh Áine) took place until the nineteenth century on Knockainy, (Cnoc Áine - the Hill of Áine) in County Limerick.
Similar festivities take place in Spain. Bonfires are lit and effigees burned on the evening of June 23. People jump over the bonfires to prove their courage. Traditionally, three jumps cleanses one from sin and disease. One of the centers of the festival is in Ciutadella; but many different cities and towns have their own unique traditions associated with the festival. In recent years, public celebrations have begun cordoning off the fires for safety reasons.
Historically, this date has been venerated in the practice of Voodoo. The famous Voodoo priestess Marie Laveau was said to have held ceremonies involving Voodoo ritual on the Bayou St. John in New Orleans, commemorating St. John's Eve. Modern day practitioners of Voodoo have kept the tradition alive.
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CASTELLANO
La Verbena de San Juan, también llamada popularmente como la Noche del Fuego o la Noche de las Brujas, es una celebración que se realiza durante la noche más corta del año, eso es la que hay entre el 23 y 24 de junio.
No se tiene claro el origen de esta celebración. Hay quien le ve un origen pagano anterior al cristianismo. Una especie de reminiscencia de las fiestas del solsticio de verano. En cambio, hay quien le ve un origen burlón y alegre en el hecho que es la noche más distante a la de Navidad y por tanto debería ser la más maldita y estimada por el diablo.
La noche de San Juan siempre se ha relacionado con tradiciones ambientadas en torno al fuego. Tanto es así que a menudo se la llama la Noche del Fuego. Es creencia común que las llamas alejan y espantan los seres imaginarios que sólo campan durante esta noche o que si bien también vagan durante el resto del año, en este día lo hacen más intensamente y en mayor número.
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CATALÀ
La Revetlla de Sant Joan, també anomenada popularment com la Nit del Foc o la Nit de les Bruixes, és una celebració que es realitza durant la nit més curta de l'any, això és la que hi ha entre el 23 i 24 de juny.
No es té clar l'origen d'aquesta celebració. Hi ha qui li veu un origen pagà anterior en el cristianisme. Una mena de remiscència de les festes per al solstici d'estiu. En canvi, n'hi ha que li veuen un origen burleta i alegre en el fet que és la nit més distant a la de Nadal i per tant hauria de ser la més maleïda i estimada pel diable.
La nit de Sant Joan sempre s'ha relacionat amb tradicions ambientades entorn del foc. Tant és així que sovint se l'anomena la Nit del Foc. És creença comuna que les flames allunyen i espanten els éssers imaginaris que només campen durant aquesta nit o que si també vaguen durant la resta de l'any, en aquest dia ho fan més intensament i en més nombre.
Dedicated to Hamim Chowdhury wishing him a speedy recovery from his painful "tennis elbow".
(Ref: DSCN7045PSA1)
Dedicated to Guinevere as her name reminds me of the imagery I lived through, with knights and chivalry*, as a child!
Dedicated in 1849, the Roman Catholic Church is named after "The Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary". The parish boundaries include the areas of Rathcoole and Brittas and works in conjunction with the neighbouring parish of St. Finian's, Newcastle.
Dedicated to my American family and Flickr friends!
"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow" - Melody Beattie © All Rights Reserved
No Usage Allowed in Any Form Without the Written Consent of Judy Meikle
dedicated to my mum
and wishing everyone a happy mother’s day x
(PLEASE NO AWARDS OR PICTURES OR FLASHY BADGES)
The world class boanical collections in Waimea Valley owe there existence to Mir. Keith Woolliams, a dedicated botanical horticulturist who was trained at the Royal Botanic Garden at Kew, on the outskirts of London.
Keith led a rich life traveling around the globe studying botanical collections in England, Japan, Papua New Guinea and Bermuda. He brought to Hawaii his expertise and knowledge of uncommon horticultural treasures, and he acquired seeds, plants, and cuttings from remote places and botanical gardens all over the world. In pre-internet days dozens of letters and packages were dispatched and received daily.
His theme of "Conservation Through Cultivation" resulted in a balance of rare and useful native and Polynesian-introduced plants among exotic horticultural specimens.
What was once an ungroomed valley, filled with koa haole and ravaged by feral cattle was transformed into what you see today by Keith and the many dedicated people he inspired. They oversaw the design, landscaping and construction of the pathways, stone walls and stairs that frame the gardens. Keith's high standards for record keeping and signage persist to this day. He left us in 1998 with a library full of his propagation knowledge, cultivation practices and plant lore which survives to ensure that the precious life forms brought to this valley will thrive here long into the future.
Keith was an inspiring advocate for Hawatian plant conservation and he influenced many young people across the state. He connected Waimea with state, federal and international agencies such as the Center for Plant Conservation, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, and the Botanical Gardens Conservation International - partnerships that Waimea Valley continues to uphold today.
Keith was instrumental in bringing in critically endangered plants from Japan's Ogasawara Islands, hibiscus relatives from all over the world, and with international colleagues he tried to assemble wild-source collections of every species of Erythrina in the world. In the periodical, "Notes from Waimea Arboretum and Botanical Garden" published twice a year until 1992 he stated "Waimea is a labeled and documented collection of plants for educational and scientific purposes, a living gene pool for future generations".
It is with great honor and gratitude that we remember Mr. Keith Woolliams and his dedication to Waimea Valley.