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Moritzburg Castle (Schloss Moritzburg) or Moritzburg Palace is a Baroque palace in Moritzburg, in the German state of Saxony, about 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) northwest of the Saxon capital, Dresden.
The castle has four round towers and lies on a symmetrical artificial island. It is named after Duke Moritz of Saxony, who had a hunting lodge built there between 1542 and 1546. The surrounding woodlands and lakes were a favourite hunting area of the electors and kings of Saxony.
In 1972 Moritzburg Castle was one of the locations of the Czechoslovak-German film Tři oříšky pro Popelku ("Three Nuts for Cinderella"), which became a popular fairy-tale movie in Central Europe.
The River Liffey (Irish: An Life) is a river in Ireland, which flows through the centre of Dublin. Its major tributaries include the River Dodder, the River Poddle and the River Camac. The river supplies much of Dublin's water and a range of recreational activities.
Ptolemy's Geography (2nd century AD) described a river, perhaps the Liffey, which he labelled Οβοκα (Oboka). Ultimately this led to the name of the River Avoca.
The Liffey was previously named An Ruirthech, meaning "fast (or strong) runner". The word Liphe (or Life) referred originally to the name of the plain through which the river ran, but eventually came to refer to the river itself. It was also known as the Anna Liffey, possibly from an anglicisation of Abhainn na Life, the Irish phrase that translates into English as "River Liffey". James Joyce embodies the river as "Anna Livia Plurabelle" in Finnegans Wake.
The Moonlight Pavilion, where the king invite his guests for dinner.
The Preah Thineang Chan Chhaya (Khmer: ព្រះទីន័ងច័ន្ទឆាយា) or "Moonlight Pavilion", is an open-air pavilion that serves as stage for Khmer classical dance in the past and present.
It is one of the most notable buildings of the palace as it easily seen from the outside as it was built alongside a section of the palace walls. The Chan Chhaya Pavilion has a balcony that was used as a platform for viewing parades marching along Sothearos Boulevard of Phnom Penh. The current Pavilion is the second incarnation of the Chanchhaya Pavilion, this one constructed in 1913–14 under King Sisowath to replace the earlier wooden pavilion built under King Norodom.
The current pavilion is of a similar design as the earlier version. The Chanchhaya Pavilion dominates the facade of the Palace on Sothearos Blvd. The Pavilion serves as a venue for the Royal Dancers, as a tribune for the King to address the crowds and as a place to hold state and Royal banquets. Most recently, the Pavilion was used for a banquet and a tribune for the new King at the 2004 coronation of King Norodom Sihamoni.
The house to the house is a water castle coming from the 13-th century in the Angerbach in Ratingen.
The water castle was established around 1276 as a family seat of the nobility gender „vom Haus“ and was a part of a row of defensive arrangements along the Anger, the so-called "Angerlinie".
The Wissen castle is a moated castle southeast from Weeze in the circle Cleve on the left shore of the Niers river. For 500 years it is the headquarters of the family of Loë and one of the best known nobility seats on the Lower Rhine.
In the 14th century when residential tower builds, the castle was changed in the course of his history several times in the taste of the respective time.
After the first rebuilding during the 16th century in the style of the Dutch Renaissance, the second reorganisation followed during the baroque. Between 1876 and 1886 the castle owner at that time allowed to change the whole arrangement then under the direction of Vincenz Statz neo-Gothic and extend.
The last architectural transformation took place in the late 1960th and the early 1970s when the strongly damaged and outdated buildings were redeveloped and were modernised inside.
Sligo Abbey (Irish: Mainistir Shligigh), a ruined abbey in Sligo, Ireland, (officially called the Dominican Friary of Sligo) was originally built in 1253 by the order of Maurice Fitzgerald, Baron of Offaly. It was destroyed in 1414 by a fire, ravaged during the Nine Years' War in 1595 and once more in 1641 during the Ulster Uprising.
The friars moved out in the 18th century, but Lord Palmerston restored the Abbey in the 1850s. Currently, it is open to the public.
It appears in two short stories by William Butler Yeats: The Crucifixion of the Outcast, set in the Middle Ages, and The Curse of the Fires and of the Shadows describing its destruction in 1641.
Amber or Amer Fort is located in Amer (a town with an area of 4 km2), 11 kilometres from Jaipur, Rajasthan state, India. It is one of the principal tourist attractions in the Jaipur area, located high on a hill.Amer Fort was built by Raja Man Singh I. Amer Fort is known for its artistic style of Hindu elements. With its large ramparts, series of gates and cobbled paths, the fort overlooks the Maota Lake, at its forefront.
The aesthetic ambiance of this formidable fort is seen within its walls on a four level layout plan (each with a courtyard) in a well turned out opulent palace complex built with red sandstone and marble consisting of the Diwan-e-Aam or the "Hall of Public Audience", the Diwan-e-Khas or the "Hall of Private Audience", the Sheesh Mahal (mirror palace) or Jai Mandir, and the Sukh Niwas where a cool climate is artificially created by winds that blow over the water cascade within the palace. Hence, the Amer Fort is also popularly known as the Amer Palace.
The palace was lived in by the Rajput Maharajas and their families. At the entrance to the palace near the fort’s Ganesh Gate, there is also a temple dedicated to Sila Devi, a goddess of the Chaitanya cult which was given to Raja Man Singh when he had defeated the Raja of Jessore, Bengal in 1604. (Jessore is now in Bangladesh).
This fort, along with Jaigarh Fort, located immediately above on the Cheel ka Teela (Hill of Eagles) of the same Aravalli range of hills, is considered as one complex, as the two are well connected by a subterranean passage. This passage was meant as an escape route in times of war for the royal family members and others in the Amer Fort to shift to the more redoubtable Jaigarh Fort.
Annual tourist visitation to the Amer Palace in Amer town was reported by the Superintendent of Department of Archaeology and Museums to the Amer Palace as 5000 visitors a day, and 1.4 million visitors were reported during 2007.
The Henrichenburg boat lift facilitates a change in elevation of the Dortmund-Ems-Kanal in Waltrop-Oberwiese. The boat lift is part of the Waltrop Lock Park (Schleusenpark), which includes the old Henrichenburg boat lift built in 1899, a disused shaft lock from 1912, the new boat lift built in 1962 and a modern ship lock from 1989.
The Henrichenburg boat lift is a popular destination for cyclists along the canals of the northern Ruhr Area.
The old boat lift was opened in 1899. It was an important structure on the Dortmund-Ems-Kanal without which it would not have been possible to navigate to Dortmund Port. The lift was the biggest and most spectacular structure on the old Dortmund-Ems-Kanal. It was inaugurated by Kaiser Wilhelm II on 11 August 1899.
This technically very interesting construction managed to lift approximately 1000 tonnes of ship and water filled trough using a relatively small amount of power. The trough was supported by 5 cylindrical floats each immersed in 40 metre deep water-filled wells. The lift from the floats was the same as the load of the water filled trough therefore, only a small electric motor sufficient to overcome friction and viscous resistance was needed to set the trough in motion in either direction. Four steel worm gears, 20 metres long and 280 mm in diameter were used to direct the trough in the appropriate course.
The old lift was closed shortly after the opening of the new lift. A year later in 1963 an attempt was made to restart the old lift. It was found that the trough had tilted and that it could no longer be moved into either the fully up or fully down positions. The lift remains in this condition today and is conserved as part of a museum.
Chiwa is a city of approximately 50,000 people located in Xorazm Region, Uzbekistan. According to archaeological data, the city was established in the beginning of the Christian era. It is the former capital of Khwarezmia and the Khanate of Chiwa. Itchan Kala in Khiva was the first site in Uzbekistan to be inscribed in the World Heritage List (1991).
Kalkar is a municipality in the district of Kleve, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located near the Rhine, approx. 10 km south-east of Cleves. The most famous building of Kalkar is its church St. Nicolai, which has one of the most significant sacral inventory from the late Middle Ages in Europe or the Brick Gothic town hall build in 1446.
Kalkar was founded by Dirk VI of Cleves in 1230 and received city rights in 1242. It was one of the seven "capitals" of Cleves (called Kleve), until the line of the Duchy of Cleves died out in 1609, whereupon the city went over to the Margraviate of Brandenburg. Marie of Burgundy, Duchess of Cleves retired to Monreberg castle in Kalkar, where she founded a Dominican convent in 1455. Under her influence the city bloomed and artists were attracted to the favorable climate for cultural investment. She died at Monreberg castle in 1463.
The Palace, a complex of several connected and adjacent buildings and courtyards, was built by several generations on a wide artificial terrace during four century period. The Palace was used by the Mayan aristocracy for bureaucratic functions, entertainment, and ritualistic ceremonies. The Palace is located in the center of the ancient city.
Within the Palace there are numerous sculptures and bas-relief carvings that have been conserved. The Palace most unique and recognizable feature is the four-story tower known as The Observation Tower. The Observation Tower like many other buildings at the site exhibit a mansard-like roof. The A-shaped Corbel arch is an architectural motif observed throughout the complex. The Corbel arches require a large amount of masonry mass and are limited to a small dimensional ratio of width to height providing the characteristic high ceilings and narrow passageways. The Palace was equipped with numerous large baths and saunas which were supplied with fresh water by an intricate water system. An aqueduct, constructed of great stone blocks with a three-meter-high vault, deviates the Otulum River to flow underneath the main plaza. The Palace is the largest building complex in Palenque measuring 97 meters by 73 meters at its base.
Temple I (also known as the Temple of Ah Cacao or Temple of the Great Jaguar) is a funerary pyramid dedicated to Jasaw Chan K'awil, who was entombed in the structure in AD 734, the pyramid was completed around 740–750. The temple rises 47 m high. The massive roofcomb that topped the temple was originally decorated with a giant sculpture of the enthroned king, although little of this decoration survives.
The tomb of the king was discovered by Aubrey Trik of the University of Pennsylvania in 1962. Among items recovered from the Late Classic tomb were a large collection of inscribed human and animal bone tubes and strips with sophisticated scenes depicting deities and people, finely carved and rubbed with vermilion, as well as jade and shell ornaments and ceramic vessels filled with offerings of food and drink.
The shrine at the summit of the pyramid has three chambers, each behind the next, with the doorways spanned by wooden lintels fashioned from multiple beams. The outermost lintel is plain but the two inner lintels were carved, some of the beams were removed in the 19th century and their location is unknown, while others were taken to museums in Europe.
Tokyo (Eastern Capital) is on the island of Honshu. Tokyo is the center of the Japanese government.
Tokyo is the center of business, trade, and industry of Japan and also of Asia. The city is the center of the largest metropolitan area in the world. It faces Tokyo Bay.
It became the capital city of Japan in the middle of 19th century, when its name changed from "Edo" to "Tokyo". Before then, Kyoto was the capital of Japan. The Emperor of Japan, Tenno, lived in Kyoto. Edo was the place where the Tokugawa Shoguns lived. The city grew up under the control of the shoguns. Before then it was a small town on the sea. Edo means "the mouth of a river" in Japanese.
Tokyo
Tokyo was destroyed by fires started by the Great Kantō earthquake in 1923. It was also badly damaged by bombs during World War II. After Japan lost the war, the city was rebuilt.
The Speicherstadt (lit. city of warehouses, meaning warehouse district) in Hamburg, Germany is the largest warehouse district in the world where the buildings stand on timber-pile foundations, oak logs, in this particular case. It is located in the port of Hamburg—within the HafenCity quarter—and was built from 1883 to 1927.
The district was built as a free zone to transfer goods without paying customs. As of 2009 the district and the surrounding area is under redevelopment.
Since 1815, the independent and sovereign city of Hamburg was a member of the German Confederation—the association of Central European states created by the Congress of Vienna—but not member of the German Customs Union. With the establishment of the German Empire in 1871, Hamburg could not be a customs free zone and part of the German Empire. Due to treaties of 1888 Hamburg was part of the German customs zone and a free port was established.
In 1883 the demolition of the Kehrwieder area began and more than 20,000 people needed to be relocated. From 1885 to 1888 the first part was built and managed by the Freihafen-Lagerhaus-Gesellschaft (the predecessor of the Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG). Since 1991 it is listed a heritage site in Hamburg, and since 2008, part of the HafenCity quarter. In an attempt to revitalize the inner city area, the Hamburg government initiated the development of the HafenCity area, for example with the construction of the Elbe Philharmonic Hall.
Monschau (French: Montjoie, Walloon: Mondjoye) is a small resort town in the Eifel region of western Germany, located in the district Aachen, North Rhine-Westphalia.
On the heights above the city is Monschau castle, which dates back to the 13th century — the first mention of Monschau was made in 1198. Beginning in 1433, the castle was used as a seat of the dukes of Jülich. In 1543, Emperor Charles V besieged it as part of the Geldern Feud, captured it and plundered the town. However, the castle stayed with Jülich until 1609, when it became part of Palatinate-Neuburg.
In 1795, the French captured the area and, under the name Montjoie, made it the capital of a canton of the Roer département. After the area became part of the Kingdom of Prussia in 1815, Monschau became the district capital of the Kreis Montjoie.
During World War I, some people argued that Monschau (or "Montjoie" as it was then still called) should be annexed to Belgium since they believed it historically to be a Walloon area that had been Germanized by the Prussians.
In 1918, William II, German Emperor, changed the name to Monschau. In 1972, the town was enlarged with the previous independent municipalities of Höfen, Imgenbroich, Kalterherberg, Konzen, Mützenich and Rohren. Mützenich, to the west of the town center, is an exclave of German territory surrounded by Belgium. It is separated from Germany by a railroad line that was assigned to Belgium by the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.
Little Italy located just south of historic downtown Troy on 4th Street from Ida to Division Streets.
Jaisalmer, nicknamed "The Golden city", is a town in the Indian state of Rajasthan. It is located 575 kilometres west of the state capital Jaipur. It was once known as Jaisalmer state.
Jaisalmer is named after its founder Maharawal Jaisal Singh, a Rajput king in 1156 AD. "Jaisalmer" means "the Hill Fort of Jaisal". Jaisalmer is sometimes called the "Golden City of India" because the yellow sand and the yellow sandstone used in every architecture of the city gives a yellowish-golden tinge to the city and its surrounding area.
The town stands on a ridge of yellowish sandstone, crowned by a fort, which contains the palace and several ornate Jain temples. Many of the houses and temples are finely sculptured. It lies in the heart of the Thar Desert (great Indian desert) and has a population of about 78,000. It is the administrative headquarters of Jaisalmer District.
Angkor Thom"Great City", located in present-day Cambodia, was the last and most enduring capital city of the Khmer empire. It was established in the late twelfth century by King Jayavarman VII.:378–382:170
It covers an area of 9 km², within which are located several monuments from earlier eras as well as those established by Jayavarman and his successors. At the centre of the city isJayavarman's state temple, the Bayon, with the other major sites clustered around the Victory Square immediately to the north.
Map of Central Angkor Thom
Angkor Thom was established as the capital of Jayavarman VII's empire, and was the centre of his massive building programme. One inscription found in the city refers to Jayavarman as the groom and the city as his bride.:121
Angkor Thom seems not to be the first Khmer capital on the site, however. Yasodharapura, dating from three centuries earlier, was centred slightly further northwest, and Angkor Thom overlapped parts of it. The most notable earlier temples within the city are the former state temple of Baphuon, and Phimeanakas, which was incorporated into the Royal Palace. The Khmers did not draw any clear distinctions between Angkor Thom and Yashodharapura: even in the fourteenth century an inscription used the earlier name.:138 The name of Angkor Thom—great city—was in use from the 16th century.
The last temple known to have been constructed in Angkor Thom was Mangalartha, which was dedicated in 1295. Thereafter the existing structures continued to be modified from time to time, but any new creations were in perishable materials and have not survived.
The Ayutthaya Kingdom, led by King Borommarachathirat II, sacked Angkor Thom, forcing the Khmers under Ponhea Yat to relocate their capital southeast.:29
Angkor Thom was abandoned some time prior to 1609, when an early western visitor wrote of an uninhabited city, "as fantastic as the Atlantis of Plato".:140 It is believed to have sustained a population of 80,000–150,000 people.
It doesn't happen so often any more that Den Helder is covered with snow. On the 19th of december it did and I was able to shoot these nice shot in dunes covered by snow, worked out as HDR with Photomatix.
Dunseverick Castle is situated in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, near the small village of Dunseverick and the Giant's Causeway. Dunseverick Castle and earthworks are Scheduled Historic Monuments.
Dunseverick Castle and the peninsula on which it stands were given to the National Trust in 1962 by local farmer Jack McCurdy. The Causeway Cliff Path also runs past on its way to Dunseverick Harbour to the east and to the Giant's Causeway to the west.
Saint Patrick is recorded as having visited Dunseverick castle in the 5th century AD, where he baptized Olcán, a local man who later became a Bishop of Ireland.[2] The original stone fort that occupied the position was attacked by Viking raiders in 870 AD.
In the later part of the 6th century AD, this was the seat of Fergus Mor MacEirc (Fergus the Great). Fergus was King of Dalriada and great-uncle of the High King of Ireland, Muirceartaigh (Murtagh) MacEirc. It is the 500 AD departure point from Ireland of the Lia Fail or coronation stone. Murtagh loaned it to Fergus for the latter's coronation in western Scotland part of which Fergus had settled as his sea-kingdom expanded.
The O'Cahan family held it from circa 1000 AD to circa 1320 AD, then regained it in the mid 16th century. Last one to have the castle was Giolla Dubh Ó Catháin, who left it in 1657 to settle in the Craig/Lisbellanagroagh area. Post 1660 they use the anglicised name McCain/O'Kane.
The castle was captured and destroyed by General Robert Munro in 1642 and his Cromwellian troops in the 1650s, and today only the ruins of the gatelodge remain. A small residential tower survived until 1978 when it eventually surrendered to the sea below.
It was a 'key' ancient site in Ireland. One of the five great royal highways, or slighe of ancient Ireland, Slige Midluachra, had its terminal point at Dunseverick castle, running from here to Emain Macha and further to Tara and the fording point on the Liffey at what is now Dublin.
Po-i-Kalan or Poi Kalan (Uzbek: Poi Kalon, Persian: پای کلان Pā-i Kalān, which means "The Foot of the Great"), is an Islamic religious complex located around the Kalan minaret in Bukhara, Uzbekistan.
The complex is located in the historic part of the city. Since 713, several ensembles of main mosques were built in this area, to the south of the Ark citadel. One of these complexes, burned down by Genghis Khan during the siege of Bukhara, was built in 1121 by the Karakhanid ruler Arslan-khan. The Kalan minaret is the only one of the structures of Arslan-han complex that was kept safe during that siege.
The moated Castle Strünkede finds in Herner district Baukau, midst of an extensive palace gardens to the federalstreet 51st. Its name dates in the Middle High German word for
"strunk" of cleared trees back on.
By the end of the 18th Century family, the castle was the seat of the Barons of Strünkede.
Since 1938, the museum's cultural and civic history collections of the "Emschertal" at home there, and for several years, the rooms are also used for civil weddings and ceremonys.
Antigua Guatemala (commonly referred to as just Antigua or la Antigua) is a city in the central highlands of Guatemala famous for its well-preserved Spanish Baroque influenced architecture as well as a number of spectacular ruins of colonial churches. It has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The castle Oberhausen is a classicistic castle arrangement in the Oberhausener part of town Oberhausen. The property gave in 1846 nearby built and in 1847 open railway station and with it of the later city of Oberhausen the name.
After heavy damages during the Second World War the mansion was anew established in the end of the 1950s after old original plans.
Today it accommodates gallery an internationally famous art Museum Ludwig; the castle park with his leisure offers is a popular destination of the Oberhausener population.
Under the name „Schloss Oberhausen und Kaisergarten“ the buildings and the park since beginning of 2011 are a station of the subject route Oberhausen: Industry makes town of the route of the industrial culture.
The Registan was the heart of the ancient city of Samarkand of the Timurid dynasty, now in Uzbekistan. The name Rēgistan means "Sandy place" or "desert" in Persian.
The Registan was a public square, where people gathered to hear royal proclamations, heralded by blasts on enormous copper pipes called dzharchis - and a place of public executions. It is framed by three madrasahs (Islamic schools) of distinctive Islamic architecture.
The three madrasahs of the Registan are: the Ulugh Beg Madrasah (1417–1420), the Tilya-Kori Madrasah (1646–1660) and the Sher-Dor Madrasah (1619–1636). Madrasah is an Arabic term meaning school.
Wikipedia picture of the day on November 23, 2016: Wasserschloss at night, Speicherstadt, Hamburg, Germany ift.tt/2gIhEdp
The Dechen Cave (Dechenhöhle) at Iserlohn in Germany is one of the most beautiful and most visited show caves in Germany, seen here the waterfall. It is located in the northern part of the Sauerland at Iserlohn. 360 metres of the 870-metre long cave have been laid out for visitors, beginning at the spot where, in 1868, the cave was discovered by two railway workers. The workers dropped a hammer into a rock crevice which turned out to be the entrance to a dripstone cave when they were searching for the lost tool.
The cave is named after Oberberghauptmann Heinrich von Dechen (1800–1889), in recognition of his contribution to researching the geology of the Rhineland and Westphalia.
Minh Mạng (25 May 1791 – 20 January 1841; born Nguyễn Phúc Đảm, also known as Nguyễn Phúc Kiểu) was the second emperor of the Nguyễn dynasty of Vietnam, reigning from 14 February 1820 until his death, on 20 January 1841. He was the fourth son of Emperor Gia Long, whose eldest son, Crown Prince Cảnh, had died in 1801. He was well known for his opposition to French involvement in Vietnam and his rigid Confucian orthodoxy.
The castle was built in 1271 by Bishop Gerhard von der Mark. It was then the headquarters Droste of Vischering, one of the most important families of the Westphalian state nobility Erbdrosten the Prince-Bishop of Munster. She served until 1521 as a purely defensive structure. In the same year and burned down the castle was built on the foundations of the old.
By installing numerous window and a bay window from the time of the Renaissance, the building lost its function as a castle, not their appearance, for they maintained for the sake of representation drawbridges, gates and moats. The refurbishing of the castle was carried out in many cases, Baumberger sandstone, its pale yellow color contrasts harmoniously with the red of the tile and the dark colors of the sandstone slab from the adjacent Haard.
Ta Prohm (pronunciation: prasat taprohm) is the modern name of the temple at Angkor, Siem Reap Province, Cambodia, built in the Bayon style largely in the late 12th and early 13th centuries and originally called Rajavihara (in Khmer: រាជវិហារ). Located approximately one kilometre east of Angkor Thom and on the southern edge of the East Baray, it was founded by the Khmer King Jayavarman VII:125]:388 as a Mahayana Buddhist monastery and university.
Unlike most Angkorian temples, Ta Prohm is in much the same condition in which it was found: the photogenic and atmospheric combination of trees growing out of the ruins and the jungle surroundings have made it one of Angkor's most popular temples with visitors. UNESCO inscribed Ta Prohm on the World Heritage List in 1992. Today, it is one of the most visited complexes in Cambodia’s Angkor region. The conservation and restoration of Ta Prohm is a partnership project of the Archaeological Survey of India and the APSARA (Authority for the Protection and Management of Angkor and the Region of Siem Reap).
The Royal Palace (Khmer: ព្រះបរមរាជាវាំងនៃព្រះរាជាណាចក្រកម្ពុជា, Preah Barum Reachea Veang Nei Preah Reacheanachak Kampuchea), in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, is a complex of buildings which serves as the royal residence of the king of Cambodia. Its full name in the Khmer language is Preah Barum Reachea Veang Chaktomuk Serei Mongkol (Khmer: ព្រះបរមរាជវាំងចតុមុខសិរីមង្គល).
The Kings of Cambodia have occupied it since it was built in 1860s, with a period of absence when the country came into turmoil during and after the reign of the Khmer Rouge.
The palace was constructed after King Norodom relocated the royal capital from Oudong to Phnom Penh in the mid-19th century. It was built atop an old citadel called Banteay Kev. It faces towards the East and is situated at the Western bank of the cross division of the Tonle Sap River and the Mekong River called Chaktomuk (an allusion to Brahma).