title: World War II

text: Japan then began its plan to take over Papua New Guinea again, and the United States planned to attack the Solomon Islands. The fight at Guadalcanal began in September 1942 and involved many troops and ships from both sides. It ended with a Japanese defeat in early 1943.


title: World War II

text: On the Eastern Front, the Axis defeated Soviet attacks during summer and began its own main offensive to southern Russia along Don and Volga Rivers in June 1942 to try to take over oil fields in Caucasus, which were critical to the Axis for fuelling their war effort, and as well as a great steppe. Stalingrad (now Volgograd) was in the path of the Axis army, and the Soviets decided to defend the city. By November, the Germans had nearly taken Stalingrad, but the Soviets surrounded the Germans in the winter After heavy losses, the German army was forced to surrender the city in February 1943. Even though the front was pushed back farther than it was before the summer attacks, the German Army still had become dangerous to an area around Kursk. Hitler devoted almost two-thirds of his armies to The Battle of Stalingrad, which was the largest and deadliest battle at the time.


title: World War II

text: In August 1942, because of the Allied defense at El Alamein, the Axis army failed to take the town. A new Allied offensive drove the Axis west across Libya a few months later, just after the Anglo-American invasion of French North Africa forced it to join the Allies. That led to Axis defeat during the North African Campaign in May 1943.


title: World War II

text: In the Soviet Union, on July 4, 1943, Germany started an attack around Kursk. Many German soldiers were lost because of the Soviets' well-created defenses. Hitler cancelled the attack before it had any clear outcome. The Soviets then started their counterattack, which was one of the war's turning points. The Soviets, instead of the Germans, then became the attacking force on the Eastern Front.


title: World War II

text: On July 9, 1943, affected by the earlier Soviet victories, the Western Allies landed on Sicily, which resulted in the arrest of Mussolini in the same month. In September 1943, the Allies invaded mainland Italy, following the Italian armistice with the Allies. Germany then took control of Italy, disarmed its army, and built many defensive lines to slow the Allied invasion. German special forces rescued Mussolini and created the German-occupied puppet state of the Italian Social Republic.


title: World War II

text: In late 1943, Japan conquered some islands in India and began an invasion of the mainland of India. The British Indian Army and other forces expelled it in early 1944.


title: World War II

text: In early 1944, the Soviet army drove off the German army from Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg) and ended the longest and deadliest siege in history. After that, the Soviets began a large counterattack. By May, the Soviets had retaken Crimea. With the attacks in Italy from September 1943, the Allies succeeded in capturing Rome on June 4, 1944, and made the German forces fall back.


title: World War II

text: On D-Day, on June 6, 1944, the Allies began the invasion of Normandy, France. The codename for the invasion was "Operation Overlord". The successful invasion led to the defeat of the German forces in France. Paris was freed in August 1944, and the Allies continued eastward while the German front collapsed. Operation Market Garden was the combined aerial invasion of the Netherlands and was launched on September 17, 1944. The purpose was to seize a series of bridges that included a bridge in Arnhem, which spanned the Rhine River. The airborne invasion was called Market. The ground invasion, named Garden, reached the Rhine but could not take the bridge.


title: World War II

text: On June 22, the Soviet offensive on the Eastern Front codenamed "Operation Bagration", destroyed almost all of the German Army Group Centre. Soon, the Germans were forced to retreat and to defend Ukraine and Poland. The arriving Soviet troops caused uprisings against the German government in Eastern European countries, but they failed to succeed unless they were helped by the Soviets. Another Soviet offensive forced Romania and Bulgaria to join the Allies. Communist Serbian partisans under Josip Broz Tito retook Belgrade with some help from Bulgaria and the Soviet Union. By early 1945, the Soviets had attacked many German-occupied countries: Greece, Albania, Yugoslavia, and Hungary. The Soviets made Finland switch to the Allies.


title: World War II

text: On December 16, 1944, the Germans tried one last time to take the Western Front by attacking the Allies in Ardennes, Belgium, in a battle known as the Battle of the Bulge. It was the last major German war attack, and the Germans were unsuccessful in their attack.


title: World War II

text: By March 1945, the Soviets had moved quickly from Vistula River in Poland to East Prussia and Vienna, and the Western Allies had crossed the Rhine. In Italy, the Allies pushed forward while the Soviets attacked Berlin. The Western Allies eventually met up with the Soviets at the Elbe River on April 25, 1945.


title: World War II

text: Hitler committed suicide on April 30, 1945, two days after Mussolini had been killed. In his will, Hitler appointed his navy commander, Grand Admiral Karl Donitz, to be his successor. Donitz surrendered to the allies, and opposed Hitler for wanting Germany to continue fighting.


title: World War II

text: German forces in Italy surrendered on April 29, 1945. Germany surrendered to the Western Allies on May 7, 1945, known as V-E Day, and was forced to surrender to the Soviets on May 8, 1945. The final battle in Europe ended in Italy, on May 11, 1945.


title: World War II

text: In the Pacific, American forces arrived in the Philippines in June 1944. By April 1945, American and Philippine forces had cleared many of the Japanese forces, but fighting continued in some parts of the Philippines until the end of the war. British and Chinese forces had advanced in Northern Burma and captured Rangoon by May 3, 1945. American forces had taken Iwo Jima by March and Okinawa by June 1945. Many Japanese cities were destroyed by Allied bombings, and Japanese imports were cut off by American submarines.


title: World War II

text: The Allies wanted Japan to surrender without conditions, but Japan refused to do so. The United States dropped two atomic bombs over Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) and Nagasaki (August 9, 1945). On August 8, 1945, the Soviets entered the war against Japan and invaded Manchuria and quickly defeated the primary Imperial Japanese Army there. On August 15, 1945, Japan surrendered to the Allies. The surrender documents were formally signed on board the "USS Missouri" on September 2, 1945, which ended the war.


title: World War II

text: The Allies managed to occupy Austria and Germany. Germany was divided into two. The Soviets controlled the east, and the Western Allies controlled the west. The Allies began denazification, removing Nazi ideas from public life in Germany, and most high-ranking Nazis were captured and brought to a special court. Germany lost a quarter of its land in 1937, mostly to Poland and the Soviet Union. The Soviets also took some parts of Poland and Finland as well as the three Baltic countries. The United Nations was formed on October 24, 1945 to keep peace between countries in the world. However, the relationship between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union had worsened during the war and, soon after it, each power quickly built up their power over the controlled area. In Western Europe and West Germany, it was the United States, while in East Germany and Eastern Europe, it was the Soviet Union, which turned many countries into communist states. The Cold War led to the formation of the American-led NATO and the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact.


title: World War II

text: In Asia, Japan was put under American occupation. In 1948, Korea was divided into North Korea and South Korea, each claiming to be the legal representative of the Koreans, which led to the Korean War in 1950. The civil war in China continued from 1946 and resulted in the KMT retreating to Taiwan in 1949 after the communists had won the mainland. In the Middle East, the Arabs' disagreed with the United Nations plan to create Israel, which marked the beginning of conflicts between the Arabs and Israel.


title: World War II

text: After the war, decolonization took place in many European colonies. Bad economies and people wanting to rule themselves were the main reasons. In most cases, that happened peacefully, except in some countries, such as Indochina and Algeria. In many regions, European withdrawal caused divisions among the people who had different ethnic groups or religions.


title: World War II

text: Economic recovery was different in many parts of the world, but in general, it was quite positive. The United States became richer than any other country; by 1950, it had taken over the world's economy. It also decided on the Marshall Plan (1948–1951) to help European countries. The German, Italian, and French economies recovered. However, the British economy was badly harmed and continued to worsen for more than ten years. The Soviet economy grew very fast after the war was over. That also happened with the Japanese economy, which became one of the largest economies in the 1980s. China returned to the same production level as before the war by 1952.


title: World War II

text: There is no exact number of deaths because many were unrecorded. Many studies said that more than 60 million people died in the war, mostly civilians. The Soviet Union lost around 27 million people, almost half of the recorded number of deaths, which means that 25% of the Soviets were killed or wounded in the war. About 85% of the total deaths were on the Allies, and the other 15% were on the Axis. Mostly, people died because they were sick, hungry to death, bombed, or the wrong ethnicity.


title: World War II

text: The Nazis selected many groups of people to be killed in what is known as known as "The Holocaust". They killed Jews, Roma, Poles, Russians, homosexuals, and other groups. Around 11 million to 17 million civilians died. Around 7.5 million people were killed in China by the Japanese. The most well-known Japanese crime is the Nanking massacre, in which hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians were raped and murdered. There were reports that the Germans and Japanese tested biological weapons against civilians and against prisoners-of-war.


title: World War II

text: Although many Axis war crimes were brought to the first international court, no Allied war crimes were.


title: World War II

text: Other than the Holocaust, about 12 million people, mostly Eastern Europeans, were forced to work for the German economy. German concentration camps and Soviet gulags caused many deaths. Both sides treated prisoners of war badly. That was the case even for Soviet soldiers who survived and returned home.


title: World War II

text: Japanese prisoner-of-war camps, many of which were used as labor camps, also caused many deaths. The death rate of Western prisoners was 27.1%, seven times that of prisoners under Germans and Italians. More than 10 million Chinese civilians were made slaves and had to work in mines and war factories. Between 4 and 10 million people were forced to work in Java.


title: World War II

text: Between 1942 and 1945, US President Franklin Roosevelt signed an order that made Japanese Americans go to internment camps since he feared them helping an invasion. Some Germans and Italians were included as well.


title: World War II

text: The Allies agreed that the Soviet Union could use prisoners of war and civilians for forced labor. Hungarians were forced to work for the Soviet Union until 1955.


title: World War II

text: Before the war in Europe, the Allies had a larger population and economy than the Axis. If colonies were included, the GDP of the Allies would be twice that of the Axis. In Asia, however, China had a GDP only 38% higher than Japan if colonies were counted.


title: World War II

text: The Allied economy and population compared with the Axis lessened with the early Axis victories. However, that was no longer the case after the United States and the Soviet Union joined the Allies in 1941. The Allies had a higher production level than the Axis because of more natural resources. Also, Germany and Japan did not plan for a long war and even had no ability to do so. Both tried to improve their economies by using slave laborers.


title: World War II

text: As men went off to fight, women took over many of the jobs that they left behind. At factories, women were employed to make bombs, guns, aircraft, and other equipment. In Britain, thousands of women were sent to work on farms as part of the Land Army. Others formed the Women's Royal Naval Service to help with building and repairing ships. Even Princess Elizabeth, who later became Queen Elizabeth II, worked as a mechanic to aid the war effort. By 1945, some weapons were being made almost entirely by women.


title: World War II

text: In the beginning, women were rarely used in the labor forces in Germany and Japan. However, Allied bombings and the German change to a war economy made women take a greater part.


title: World War II

text: In Britain, women also worked in gathering intelligence at Bletchley Park and other places. The mass evacuation of children also had a major impact on the lives of mothers during the war years.


title: World War II

text: Germany had two different ideas of how it would occupy countries. In Western, Northern, and Central Europe, Germany set economic policies that would make it rich. During the war, the policies brought as much as 40% of total German income. In the east, the war against the Soviet Union meant Germany could not use the land to gain resources. The Nazis used their racial policy and murdered a lot of people they thought were non-human. The Resistance, the group of people secretly fighting Germany, could not harm Germany much until 1943.


title: World War II

text: Japan claimed to free colonized Asian countries from European colonial powers in Asia. Although it was welcomed at first in many territories, its cruel actions soon turned people against it. During the occupation, Japan used 4 million barrels of oil that had been left behind by the Allies. By 1943, Japan produced up to 50 million barrels of oil in the Dutch East Indies, was 76% of its 1940 rate.


title: World War II

text: The war brought new methods for future wars. The air forces improved greatly in fields such as air transport, strategic bombing to use bombs to destroy industry and morale, radar, and weapons for destroying aircraft. Jet aircraft were developed and were used worldwide in air forces.


title: World War II

text: At sea, the war focused on using aircraft carriers and submarines. Aircraft carriers soon replaced battleships, mainly for being cheaper. Submarines, a deadly weapon since World War I, also played an important part in the war. The British improved weapons for destroying submarines, such as sonar, while the Germans improved submarine tactics.


title: World War II

text: The style of war on the land had changed from World War I to be more moveable. Tanks, which had been used to support infantry, changed to being primary weapons. The tank was improved in speed, armour and firepower during the war. At the start of the war, most commanders thought that using better tanks was the best way to fight enemy tanks. However, early tanks could harm armour only a little. The German idea to avoid letting tanks fight each other meant tanks facing tanks rarely happened. That was a successful tactic in Poland and France. Ways to destroy tanks also improved. Vehicles became more used in the war, infantry remained the main part of the army, and most were equipped like in World War I.


title: World War II

text: Submachine guns became widely used, especially in cities and jungles. The assault rifle, a German development combining features of the rifle and submachine gun, became the main weapon for most armies after the war.


title: World War II

text: Other developments included better encryption for secret messages, such as the German Enigma. Another feature of military intelligence was the use of deception, especially by the Allies. Others include the first programmable computers, modern missiles and rockets, and the atomic bombs.


title: World War II

text: Most authorities now agree that of the 30 million Soviets who bore arms, there were 13.6 million military deaths.


title: World War II

text: Deaths among civilians during this war, many of which resulted from famine and internal purges, such as in China and the Soviet Union, were colossal but less well documented than those by the fighting forces. Although the figures are the best available from authoritative sources and present a broad picture of the scale of civilian losses, the precise numbers will never be known.


title: World War II

text: United States, British Empire, France, Soviet Union, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Denmark, Greece, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, South Africa, Yugoslavia


title: Odin

text: Odin (Old Norse: "Óðinn") is the god of wisdom, poetry, death, divination, and magic in Norse mythology. Son of Borr and the giantess (jötunn) Bestla, Odin is the chief of the Æsir and king of Asgard. He is married to the goddess Frigg, and is father to the gods Thor, Baldr, Höðr, Víðarr, and Váli.


title: Odin

text: Known as the All-Father, Odin is often accompanied by two ravens, Huginn and Muninn, along with the wolves Geri and Freki; the god rides into battle atop an eight-legged steed, Sleipnir, and wields the mighty spear Gungnir, which was fashioned for him by the dwarves known as the Sons of Ivaldi and is said to never miss its target.


title: Odin

text: A defining feature of Odin is his being one-eyed, a result of him having sacrificed an eye to drink from the Well of Urðr, which granted him an incomprehensible amount of knowledge of the universe. Odin himself often receives counsel from the severed head of the being Mímir, which recites secret knowledge to him. Half of the souls of those slain in battle will be guided by the Valkyries, battle maidens, to Valhalla, Odin's enormous and majestic hall: the other half go to Fólkvangr, Freyja's realm. Odin was known in Old English as Wōden, in Old Saxon as Wōdan, and in Old High German as Wuotan or Wōtan, all of which stem from the reconstructed Proto-Germanic *"wōđanaz".


title: Odin

text: The modern English weekday name Wednesday bears the god’s name. (from Old English "Wōdnesdæg", “Wōden’s day”).


title: Odin

text: Odin is the son of Borr and the jötunn Bestla. He is married to the goddess Frigg, by whom he is the father of the twin gods Baldr and Höðr. With the giantesses Gríðr and Rindr, Odin has two other sons named Víðarr and Váli. His eldest son is Thor, god of thunder, born to him by Jörð, the personification of the Earth.


title: Salam

text: Salam (, '), sometimes spelled salaam, is an Arabic word that literally means "peace", but is also used as a general greeting, above all in Arabian countries and by the Muslim countries around the world in general.


title: Salam

text: As-salamu ʿalaykum () is a greeting in Arabic that means "peace be upon you". The greeting is a standard salutation among Muslims, whether socially or within worship and other contexts.  The typical response to the greeting is "wa-ʿalaykumu as-salām" (وَعَلَيْكُمُ ٱلسَّلَامُ; "and upon you be peace"). The full version of the greeting is "as-salamu ʿalaykum wa-rahmatullahi wa-barakatuh" (, "peace be upon you, as well as the mercy of God and His blessings"), with the full response being "wa-ʿalaykum as-salam wa-rahmatullahi wa-barakatuh" (). It is also preferred to use the greeting when arriving and also while leaving. It was reported that Abu Hurairah said "When one of you joins a gathering, let him say 'Peace'. When he wants to get up and leave, let him say 'Peace'. The former is not more important than the latter" (Hasan hadith reported in Jāmiʿ at-Tirmidhi).


title: Harmonium

text: A harmonium, also called a "melodeon", "reed organ" or "pump organ", is a keyboard instrument that is a lot like an organ. It makes sound by blowing air through reeds, which are tuned to different pitches to make musical notes.


title: Harmonium

text: The hand-pumped harmonium was created by Dwarkanath Ghose so that the instrument could be played while the player was sitting down on the floor. It is used in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Afghanistan, Bangladesh and in other South Asian countries as an accompanying instrument in Hindustani classical music, Sufi Music, and other devotional music, Qawwali, , and a variety of genres including accompaniment to Classical Kathak Dance and other entertainments.


title: Harmonium

text: similar instruments. In Vienna, Anton Haeckl constructed the physharmonica, a keyboard instrument filled with free reeds. John Green invented the seraphine, which produced music when air was blown over metallic reeds. Such instruments are now museum pieces.


title: Harmonium

text: It was first invented by in 1840 in France, who patented his Harmonium in Paris on August 9, 1840. Harmonium with a Swarmandal (a small, harp-like instrument, similar to Zither and Autoharp) was produced by Bhishmadev Vedi. As the Swarmandal box was too big for the Harmonium, his disciple Manohar Chimote fixed the strings within the breadth of the instrument naming it as ‘Samvadini’. This instrument allows the strings to be played by the hand on the bellows, and keys by the other hand. Chimote provided a new natural ‘Gandhar’ tuning in this Harmonium. Although this tuning was limited to the 12 tones versus the 22 required in Hindustani classical music, it surely gave the European tuning of the Harmonium, an Indian flavour.


title: Harmonium

text: 22-Shruti-Harmonium was created by Vidyadhar Oke (Indian Patent No. 250197). To achieve this, he first clarified the essential difference between 'Nada' and 'Shruti' and pinpointed the positions to play the 22 Microtones (Shrutis) on any string instrument. He documented the specific difference between 22 Shrutis versus the 12-Tone Equal temperament Scale. His 22-Shruti-Harmonium provides special knobs below each of the keys to regulate the reeds, making 22 Shrutis available within 12 keys. As this is a modified hand-pumped harmonium, no special playing skill is necessary. The 22-Shruti-Harmonium enables the creation of any Raga with all the notes perfectly consonant with a Tanpura. Additionally, by positioning all the knobs in the central position, the 22-Shruti-Harmonium can produce the sound of an Accordion.


title: Politics

text: Politics is about making agreements between people so that they can live together in groups such as tribes, cities, or countries. In large groups, such as countries, some people may spend a lot of their time making such agreements. These people are called politicians. Politicians, and sometimes other people, may get together to form a government. The study of politics in universities is called political science, political studies, or public administration.


title: Politics

text: In everyday life, the term "politics" refers to the way that countries are governed, and to the ways that governments make rules and laws. Politics can also be seen in other groups, such as in companies, clubs, schools, and churches.


title: Politics

text: One of the ways the government leads the group is by making laws and rules which tell everybody what they can and can not do. The government makes these laws so that society will be safe and well-ordered. The law that says "you must not drive a car when you have been drinking alcohol" stops people from drunk driving, which could kill people. The law that says "you must wear a helmet on a motorcycle" makes sure that people protect themselves when riding their motorcycles.


title: Politics

text: The government can also control people and what happens in a country in other ways besides making laws.


title: Politics

text: Politics is often compared to ethics (ideas about right and wrong). Ethics is a more abstract study of right and wrong. Ethics is usually more concerned with principle than law or politics or diplomacy, so many people think ethics is not practical. But without some agreement on ethics, there is probably no way to even have a debate, laws or an election. There is always some agreement on ethics and personal conduct in a political system.


title: Politics

text: In most countries, people have formed political parties to put forward their ideas. There is usually some disagreement between people within a party, but they work together because they feel that they agree on enough things, and they will have more power if they join together. They agree to take the same position on many issues, and agree to support the same changes to law and the same leaders. An election is usually a competition between different parties. Some examples of parties are the Liberal party, the Labor party and the Greens.


title: Politics

text: The Greek philosopher Aristotle wrote that humans are a political animal and that ethics and politics are closely linked.


title: Politics

text: Niccolò Machiavelli wrote, in his 1532 book, The Prince, that politics was firstly about having and keeping power. He said that without power, a leader could do nothing.


title: Politics

text: In 1651, Thomas Hobbes wrote "Leviathan", a book about politics. Hobbes wrote that people living in groups often give up some of their rights in exchange for some protections from a government. This is the basis of the social contract theory.


title: Politics

text: In the 1800s, John Stuart Mill developed the "liberal" idea of politics. Mill said that democracy is the most important political development of the 1800s. He said that there should be more protection for individual rights against the government.


title: Politics

text: Bernard Crick wrote a list of the political virtues, which were about best practices of politics itself.


title: Politics

text: There are also disagreements between different countries. Attempts to solve the problem with meetings are called diplomacy. This is politics between nations instead of politics within nations. If the problems are not resolved by diplomatic meetings they can lead to war or terrorism.


title: Palm tree

text: Palm tree is a common name of perennial lianas, shrubs, and trees. They are the only members of the family Arecaceae, which is the only family in the order Arecales. They grow in hot climates.


title: Palm tree

text: There are about 2600 species of palm trees, most of them living in tropical, subtropical, and warm temperate climates.


title: Palm tree

text: Palms are one of the best known and most widely planted tree families. They have held an important role for humans throughout much of history. Many common products and foods come from palms. They are often used in parks and gardens that are in areas that do not have heavy frosts.


title: Palm tree

text: In the past palms were symbols of victory, peace, and fertility. Today palms are a popular symbol for the tropics and for vacations.


title: Palm tree

text: Most palm trees grow in the tropical and subtropical regions of the world. They occur from about 44° northern latitude to about 44° southern latitude. The dwarf palm ("Chamaerops humilis") occurs in southern France, the Nikau ("Rhopalostylis sapida") is a species of palm growing in New Zealand. The hardiest palm in the world is known as the (Rhapidophyllum Hystrix) and is able to handle temperatures below -18 °C (0 °F).


title: Palm tree

text: Most palms are a straight, unbranched stem, but sometimes a branching stem, or even a creeping vine, such as the rattan. They have large evergreen leaves that are either 'fan-leaved' (palmate) or 'feather-leaved' (pinnate) and arranged in a spiral at the top of the trunk. The leaves have a tubular sheath at the base that usually splits open on one side when it is grown. The flowers grow on an inflorescence, a special branch just for carrying the great number of tiny flowers. The flowers are generally small and white, and are star-shaped. The sepals and petals usually number three each. The fruit is usually a single seed surrounded by flesh. The familiar coconut is the seed of a large fruit. Some kinds may contain two or more seeds in each fruit.


title: Palm tree

text: More than two-thirds of palms live in tropical forests, where some species grow tall enough to form part of the canopy and other shorter palms form part of the understory. Some kinds form pure stands in areas with poor drainage or regular flooding. Other palms live on tropical mountains above 1000 meters, Palms may also live in grasslands and scrublands, usually where there is water, and in desert oases. A few palms are adapted to extremely basic lime soils, while others are similarly adapted to very acidic soils.


title: Palm tree

text: The Coco de mer has the largest seeds of any plant, 30-50 centimeters in diameter and weighing 15-30 kilograms each. Raffia palms, with leaves up to 25 meters long and 3 meters wide, have the largest leaves of any plant. The "Corypha" palms have the largest inflorescence (flowering part) of any plant, up to 7.5 meters tall and containing millions of small flowers. The wax palm, Colombia's national tree, is the tallest palm in the world, reaching heights of 70 meters.


title: Palm tree

text: Palms first appear in the fossil record around 80 million years ago, during the late Cretaceous period. Some descendants from that period are still to be seen today, such as the nipa palm or mangrove palm.


title: Palm tree

text: Some palms are in danger of dying out because of human activity. The greatest dangers are from large cities, mining, and turning forests into farmland. The harvesting of the heart of a palm for food also poses a threat, because it comes from the inner core of the tree, and harvesting it kills the tree. The use of rattan palms in furniture has caused a big fall in the number of rattan palms, as they are collected from the wild instead of being farmed.


title: Palm tree

text: It is difficult to save palm seeds. They are killed by cooling them, which is the normal way of keeping rare seeds for the future. Also, planting rare species in parks can never truly recreate the wild areas they come from, and the plants may not do well in these parks.


title: Palm tree

text: The Palm Specialist Group of the World Conservation Union (IUCN) started in 1984, supported by the WWF. The group gathered a lot of information from different parts of the world. An action plan to save rare palms was made by this group in 1996.


title: Palm tree

text: Human use of palms is as old as, or even older than, civilization itself, starting with the growing of date palms by Mesopotamians and other Middle Eastern peoples 5000 years or more ago. The Date Palm had a great effect on the history of the Middle East. Historian W.H. Barreveld wrote:


title: Palm tree

text: The early importance of palms in the Middle East is shown in scripture. They are mentioned more than 30 times in the Bible, and more than 22 times in the Qur'an.


title: Palm tree

text: Apart from the well-known coconut and date, there are other kinds of food from palms. Palm oil, Sago, heart of palm and palm wine are all eaten or drunk in different parts of the world. Palm oil is used in everything, from cosmetics to food ingredients.


title: Palm tree

text: South Carolina is nicknamed the Palmetto State, after the sabal palmetto, logs from which were used to build the fort at Fort Moultrie. During the American Revolutionary War their spongy wood helped stop the British cannonballs.


title: Palm tree

text: Coir is a coarse, water-resistant fibre from the outer shell of coconuts. It is used in doormats, brushes, mattresses, and ropes. 'Dragon's blood' is a resin used in dyes, varnishes and incense, can come from the fruit of the rattan. The "Washingtonia robusta" trees line Ocean Avenue in Santa Monica, California.


title: Palm tree

text: Today, palms are popular in parks and gardens in countries outside the tropics. two of the most cold-tolerant species are the Chusan palm, from eastern Asia, and the needle palm from the United States.


title: Palm tree

text: The palm branch was a symbol of triumph and victory in Roman times. The Romans rewarded champions of the games and celebrated success in war with palm branches.


title: Palm tree

text: The motto of the University of Southern California is "Palmam qui meruit ferat", which means in Latin, "Let him bear the palm who has deserved it".


title: Palm tree

text: Palms appear on the flags and seals of several places where they are native, including those of Haiti, Guam, Florida, South Carolina, and Samoa.


title: Palm tree

text: Early Christians used the palm branch to symbolize the victory of the faithful over enemies of the soul, as in the Palm Sunday festival celebrating the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.


title: Palm tree

text: In Christian art, martyrs were usually shown holding palms representing the victory of spirit over flesh, and it was widely believed that a picture of a palm on a tomb meant that a martyr was buried there. Origen calls the palm "the symbol of victory in that war waged by the spirit against the flesh. In this sense it was especially applicable to martyrs, the victors par excellence over the spiritual foes of mankind; hence the frequent occurrence in the Acts of the martyrs of such expressions as "he received the palm of martyrdom".


title: Palm tree

text: In Judaism, the palm represents peace and plenty. The palm may also symbolize the Tree of Life in Kabbalah.


title: Palm tree

text: The Prophet Muhammad is said to have built his home out of palm, and the palm represents rest and hospitality in many cultures of the Middle East.


title: Palm tree

text: Palm stems represented long life to the Ancient Egyptians, and the god Huh was often shown holding a palm stem in one or both hands.


title: Palm tree

text: The sacred tree of the Assyrians was a palm that represents the god Ishtar connecting heaven, the crown of the tree, and earth, the base of the trunk. The Mesopotamian goddess Inanna, who had a part in the sacred marriage ritual, was thought of as the one who made the dates abundant.


title: Palm tree

text: At the birth of a child in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria, a coconut palm was planted to count the age of the child.


title: Primary color

text: Primary colors (or primary colours in Commonwealth English) are sets of colors that can be combined to make a useful range of colors. The primary colors are those which cannot be created by mixing other colors in a given color space.


title: Primary color

text: For subtractive combination of colors, as in mixing of pigments or dyes for printing, the CMYK set of primaries is often used. In this system the primary colors are cyan, magenta,and yellow. Other sets include the RYB system of red, yellow, blue, especially used by artists.


title: Primary color

text: For additive combination of colors, as in overlapping projected lights or in television and computer screens, the primary colors normally used are red, green, and blue.


title: Primary color

text: Primary colors are not a fundamental property of light but are related to the physiological response of the eye to light (the way the eye works). For humans, three primary colors are usually used, since human color vision is trichromatic.


title: Primary color

text: Fundamentally, light is a continuous spectrum of the wavelengths that can be detected by the human eye, an infinite-dimensional stimulus space. However, the human eye normally contains only three types of color receptors, called cone cells. Each color receptor respond to different ranges of the color spectrum. Humans and other species with three such types of color receptors are known as trichromats.


title: Primary color

text: Additive mixing of red and green light, produce shades of yellow or orange. Mixing green and blue produces shades of cyan, and mixing red and blue produces shades of purple and magenta. Mixing equal proportions of the additive primaries results in shades of grey; when all three colors are fully saturated, the result is white. The color space that is generated is called the RGB ("red, green, blue") color space.


title: Primary color

text: Media that use reflected light and colorants to produce colors are using the subtractive color method of color mixing. In the printing industry, to produce the varying colors, apply the subtractive primaries yellow, cyan, and magenta together in varying amounts. Subtractive color works best when the surface or paper, is white, or close to it.


title: Primary color

text: Mixing yellow and cyan produces shades of green; mixing yellow with magenta produces shades of red, and mixing magenta with cyan produces shades of blue. In theory, mixing equal amounts of all three pigments should produce shades of grey, resulting in black when all three are fully saturated, but in practice they tend to produce muddy brown colors. For this reason, a fourth "primary" pigment, black, is often used in addition to the cyan, magenta, and yellow colors.


title: Primary color

text: The color space generated is the so-called CMYK color space. The abbreviation stands for "Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black" — K stands for "Kohle" (German for coal) and is used to represent black as 'B' could be confused with 'Blue'.


title: Primary color

text: In practice, mixtures of actual materials like paint tend to be less precise. Brighter, or more specific colors can be created using natural pigments instead of mixing, and natural properties of pigments can interfere with the mixing. For example, mixing magenta and green in acrylic creates a dark cyan - something which would not happen if the mixing process were perfectly subtractive.


title: Earthquake

text: An earthquake is a sudden movement or trembling of the Earth's tectonic plates that creates shaking of the Earth's surface. High magnitude earthquakes in residential areas often lead to building damage.


title: Earthquake

text: Earthquakes are caused by disturbances in the balance of the earth. The different tectonic plates slowly move past each other. When they get stuck, they build up tension. The earthquake happens when the tectonic plates are suddenly released, so they start to move very quickly. An earthquake's first point of rupture is called its hypocenter, or focus. The epicenter is the point at ground level directly above the hypocenter.


title: Earthquake

text: People who study about earthquakes are called seismologists. There can be many earthquakes over a short period of time in a small area. The sudden release of tension in the tectonic plates sends waves of energy that travel through the Earth. Seismology studies the cause, repeats, type, and size of earthquakes.


title: Earthquake

text: The effect of an earthquake can be measured by a seismometer. It detects the shakes caused and it puts these movements on a seismograph. The strength, or magnitude, of an earthquake, is measured using the Richter scale. The Richter Scale was invented by Charles Francis Richter in 1935. The scale is numbered 0-10. On the scale, 2 is scarcely noticeable, and magnitude 5 (or more) creates damage over a wide area. The largest earthquake ever measured was a 9.5. An earthquake of 10 has never been recorded.


title: Earthquake

text: Scientists cannot predict an earthquake before it happens. But we do know where earthquakes might happen in the future, like close to fault lines. An earthquake under the ocean can create a huge wave called a tsunami. This can create just as much destruction as the earthquake itself. Earthquakes can also create landslides.


title: Earthquake

text: Earthquake zones are concentrated in some parts of the world. The first is the Pacific belt, which circles the Pacific Ocean. This part is the biggest seismic belt: it has the most active earthquakes and the most volcanoes.


title: Earthquake

text: The second part is the Alpide belt. It includes the seismic activities from Sumatra, to the Himalayas, to south Europe and north Africa, to the Atlantic Ocean.


title: Earthquake

text: These belts are along the edges of tectonic plates. The tectonic plates push on each other and make great amounts of tension.


title: Earthquake

text: Earthquakes sometimes hit cities and kill hundreds or thousands of people. Most earthquakes happen along the Pacific Ring of Fire but the biggest ones mostly happen in other places. Tectonically active places are places where earthquakes or volcanic eruptions are quite repeated.


title: Earthquake

text: Earthquakes are caused by tectonic movements in the Earth's crust. The main cause is when tectonic plates ride one over the other, causing orogeny (mountain building), and severe earthquakes.


title: Earthquake

text: The boundaries between moving plates form the largest fault surfaces on Earth. When they stick, motion between the plates leads to increasing stress. This continues until the stress rises and breaks, suddenly allowing sliding over the locked portion of the fault. This releases the stored energy as shock waves. The San Andreas fault in San Francisco, and Rift valley fault in Africa are faults like this.


title: Earthquake

text: 1. Volcanic Earthquakes: Earthquakes which are caused by volcanic eruptions are quite devastating. However, these are confined to areas of active volcanoes.


title: Earthquake

text: 2. Collapse Earthquakes: In areas of intense mining activity, often the roofs of underground mines collapse and minor tremors take place. These are called collapse earthquakes.


title: Earthquake

text: There are three main types of geological fault that may cause an earthquake: normal, reverse (thrust) and strike-slip. Normal faults occur mainly in areas where the crust is being extended. Reverse faults occur in areas where the crust is being shortened. Strike-slip faults are steep structures where the two sides of the fault slip horizontally past each other.


title: Earthquake

text: Most earthquakes form part of a sequence, related to each other in terms of location and time. Most earthquake clusters consist of small tremors which cause little to no damage, but there is a theory that earthquakes can recur in a regular pattern.


title: Earthquake

text: An aftershock is an earthquake that happens after a previous earthquake, the mainshock. An aftershock is in the same place of the main shock but always of a smaller magnitude. Aftershocks are formed as the crust adjusts to the effects of the main shock.


title: Earthquake

text: Earthquake swarms are sequences of earthquakes striking in a specific area within a short period of time. They are different from earthquakes followed by a series of aftershocks by the fact that no single earthquake in the sequence is obviously the main shock, therefore none have notably higher magnitudes than the other. An example of an earthquake swarm is the 2004 activity at Yellowstone National Park.


title: Earthquake

text: Sometimes a series of earthquakes happen in a sort of earthquake storm, where the earthquakes strike a fault in clusters, each triggered by the shaking or stress redistribution of the previous earthquakes. Similar to aftershocks but on adjacent segments of fault, these storms happen over the course of years, and with some of the later earthquakes as damaging as the early ones. Such a pattern happened in the North Anatolian fault in Turkey in the 20th century.


title: Earthquake

text: A Tsunami or a chain of fast moving waves in the ocean caused by powerful earthquakes is a very serious challenge for people's safety and for earthquake engineering. Those waves can inundate coastal areas, destroy houses and even swipe away whole towns. This is a danger for the whole mankind.


title: Earthquake

text: Unfortunately, tsunamis cannot be prevented. However, there are warning systems which may warn the population before the big waves reach the land to let them enough time to rush to safety.


title: Earthquake

text: Earthquake-proof buildings are constructed to withstand the destructive force of an earthquake. This depends upon its type of construction, shape, mass distribution, and rigidity. Different combinations are used. Square, rectangular, and shell-shaped buildings can withstand earthquakes better than skyscrapers. To reduce stress, a building's ground floor can be supported by extremely rigid, empty columns, while the rest of the building is supported by flexible columns inside the empty columns. Another method is to use rollers or rubber pads to separate the base columns from the ground, allowing the columns to shake parallel to each other during an earthquake.


title: Earthquake

text: To help prevent a roof from collapsing, builders make the roof out of light-weight materials. Outdoor walls are made with stronger and more reinforced materials such as steel or reinforced concrete. During an earthquake, flexible windows may help hold the windows together so they don't break.


title: Green

text: Green is a colour between the yellow and blue colours in the rainbow. Green is a primary colour (a colour that can be mixed with another color) of light. The others are red and blue.


title: Green

text: Green and blue are next to each other on the spectrum, and there are languages which do not distinguish between them. Examples are old Chinese, Thai, old Japanese, and Vietnamese.


title: Green

text: Green light, like all light, is quanta—composed of photons. The wavelength of green light is about 550 nanometers (one-billionth of a meter).


title: Green

text: Most leaves of growing plants, such as trees and bushes, are green. This is because there is a chemical in leaves, called chlorophyll, which is coloured green.


title: Green

text: Green is a color, the perception of which is evoked by light having a spectrum dominated by range with a wavelength of roughly 570-520 nm.


title: Canada

text: Canada is a country in North America. It is to the north of the United States. Its land reaches from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west. The Arctic Ocean is to the north of Canada. Canada's land area is . It is the world's second largest country by total area, but only the fourth largest country by land area. It has the world's longest coastline (a border with water). Canada has ten provinces and three territories. Most parts of the country are cold or severely cold in the winter. Areas in the south of Canada are warm in the summer. Much of the land is covered in forest or tundra. Most of the people in Canada live in urban areas, near the southern border with the US. This border is the longest between any two countries in the world. The national capital is Ottawa, and the largest city is Toronto. Other large cities include Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Quebec City, Winnipeg and Hamilton.


title: Canada

text: The name "Canada" probably comes from the Huron-Iroquois word "kanata," meaning "village" or "settlement." In 1535, two Aboriginal youths told an explorer from France, named Jacques Cartier, about the route to kanata. They were actually referring to the village named Stadacona, which is near present-day City of Québec.


title: Canada

text: Aboriginal people lived in the places that are now Canada for a long time. In 1537, the French started a colony. The British Empire soon followed. The two empires fought several wars. In the late 18th century, only British North America remained with what is more or less Canada today. The country was formed from several colonies with the British North America Act on July 1, 1867. Over time, more provinces and territories became part of Canada. In 1931, Canada achieved nearly total independence with the Statute of Westminster 1931, and became completely independent when the Canada Act 1982 removed the last remaining ties of legal dependence with the Parliament of the United Kingdom.


title: Canada

text: Canada is a federal parliamentary democracy and a constitutional monarchy, with King Charles III as its head of state. The country is officially bilingual at the federal level, meaning that citizens have the right to communicate with the government in two languages, English or French. Immigration to Canada has made it one of the world's most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations. Its economy is the eleventh largest in the world, and relies mainly on natural resources and well-developed international trade networks. Canada's relationship with its neighbor and biggest trading partner, the U.S., has a big impact on its economy and culture.


title: Canada

text: Canada is a developed country and has the tenth highest nominal per capita income globally as well as the sixteenth highest ranking in the Human Development Index. It ranks among the highest in international measurements of government transparency, civil liberties, quality of life, economic freedom, and education. Canada is a Commonwealth realm member of the Commonwealth of Nations, a member of the Francophonie, and part of several major international and intergovernmental institutions or groupings including the United Nations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the G7, the G20, the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum.


title: Canada

text: By total land and water area, Canada is the second-largest country in the world. It is only smaller than Russia. By land area alone, Canada ranks fourth. It has the longest border with water (coastline) of any country in the world. It is next to the Pacific, Arctic, and Atlantic Oceans. It is the only country in the world to be next to three oceans at once. It has six time zones.


title: Canada

text: Canada is made up of ten provinces and three territories. The provinces are between the 45th and 60th parallels of latitude, and the territories are to the north of the 60th parallel of latitude. Most large cities in Canada are in the southern part of the country, including Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal. Very few people live in the northern part of Canada.


title: Canada

text: Canada extends from the west coast to the Atlantic provinces. In the north, there are three territories: Yukon in the west, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut. Four of the five Great Lakes (Superior, Huron, Erie, and Ontario) are shared between Canada and the United States (Lake Michigan is in the USA). They make up 16% of the Earth's fresh water. The Saint Lawrence Seaway joins the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean, allowing vessels in the ocean to travel as far inland as Thunder Bay in Ontario, Canada.


title: Canada

text: Canada shares land and sea borders with the USA (the lower 48 states and Alaska), Greenland, and France (St. Pierre and Miquelon, a small group of islands off the southern coast off the island of Newfoundland).


title: Canada

text: The geography of Canada is very different in each region. Canada's geography features high alpine areas in the west, flat grasslands and prairies in the middle, and ancient shield rocks in the east. Canada has some of the very last untouched boreal forest in the world.


title: Canada

text: The Canadian Shield is a vast area of ancient Pre-Cambrian rocks lying in an arc around Hudson Bay, covering more than one third of Canada's land area. This is a unique land of lakes, bogs, swamps, trees, and rocks. It is a terrain that is very dangerous and difficult to traverse cross country because of the lakes, bogs, swamps, trees, and rocks. Canada has 60% of the world's lakes.


title: Canada

text: Indigenous peoples lived in what is now Canada for thousands of years before the first Europeans arrived. The indigenous groups that live in Canada are the First Nations, the Inuit, and the Métis. The Métis are people that come from both First Nations and European families. Together, these three groups are called "Indigenous," "Aboriginal," or "First Peoples." They used to be called "Indians" by the Europeans, but this is now considered rude.


title: Canada

text: Many people think the first people to live in Canada came from Siberia at least 14,000 years ago, using the Bering land bridge. The land bridge connected Asia and North America.


title: Canada

text: When European people first settled in Canada, the number of Indigenous people living in Canada was between 200,000 and two million.


title: Canada

text: The Vikings were the first Europeans to land in Canada, in what is now Newfoundland. The exploration was led by the Viking explorer Leif Erikson. They did not stay for a long time. In the early 16th century, Europeans started exploring Canada's eastern coast. The first of these explorers was John Cabot from England, in 1497, and later Jacques Cartier from France, in 1534. Alexander Mackenzie later reached the Pacific coast over land, where captains James Cook and George Vancouver went by sea. The Europeans also traded beaver furs to the First Nations.


title: Canada

text: Some parts of Canada were settled by France. Other parts of the country were settled by Great Britain. In 1605, Port-Royal was built in Acadia (today called Nova Scotia) by the French, led by Samuel de Champlain. In 1608, he settled in Quebec. The British took control of the French areas after a battle of the French and Indian War on the Plains of Abraham, near Quebec City, in 1759.


title: Canada

text: After the American Revolutionary War, many people in the newly created United States wanted to stay loyal to Britain. Thousands of people came north to Canada and settled in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec, and Ontario. They were called United Empire Loyalists. During the War of 1812, the United States tried to conquer Canada, but were defeated.


title: Canada

text: On July 1, 1867, Canada was united under a federal government. At first, Canada was only made up of the provinces Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia. Sir John A. Macdonald was the first prime minister. Manitoba, the Yukon territory, and the Northwest Territories became part of Canada in 1870. British Columbia joined in 1871, and Prince Edward Island in 1873.


title: Canada

text: There were two Red River Rebellions, in 1869-70 and 1885, both led by Louis Riel. He fought for more rights for the Métis people, a mix between French and First Nations. A railroad across the country, the Canadian Pacific Railway, finished in 1885, making it easier for Canadians to move to the west. Many Europeans came to the prairies, so Alberta and Saskatchewan became provinces in 1905.


title: Canada

text: Canadian soldiers fought in World War I for the British Empire. More Canadians died in this war than any other war. Canada became better known as a country after its success in capturing Vimy Ridge from the Germans in France in 1917. Women were given the right to vote by the end of the war, partly because of the help they gave making weapons while the men fought in Europe. In 1931, Canada became fully independent. The government of Canada made all the decisions about Canada.


title: Canada

text: Canadians also fought in World War II. The Dieppe Raid, in 1942, went very badly. Most soldiers were killed, wounded, or imprisoned. Canadians helped capture soldiers at Normandy in 1944. They also liberated the Netherlands from Germany.


title: Canada

text: In 1949, Newfoundland and Labrador became the 10th province of Canada. In 1956, Canadian Lester Pearson, who later became prime minister, helped end the Suez Crisis. Because of this, he won the Nobel Peace Prize. In 1965, Pearson helped change the design of Canada's flag. This design is known as the Maple Leaf today. Before that, the Red Ensign was Canada's flag. In 1982, Canada changed its constitution. The change introduced a new Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The main part of the Constitution is the 1867 British North America Act.


title: Canada

text: Some French Canadians today wish to form their own country, separate from the rest of Canada. The province of Quebec held a referendum (vote) in 1980, but only about 40% wanted to separate. Another referendum was held in 1995, with almost 50% voting in favour of leaving Canada. Since then, fewer people in Quebec have wanted to leave Canada, but it is still important to Quebec politics.


title: Canada

text: Today, about 25% of Canadians speak French as their first language. Many people in Canada speak both French and English. Although most French Canadians live in the province of Quebec, there are French-speaking communities and people all across Canada. For example, 40% of the people in the province of New Brunswick and 20% of those in Manitoba have a strong French background, as do some people in Ontario, mainly along its border with Quebec.


title: Canada

text: In 1999, Nunavut was created as Canada's third territory, out of the eastern Northwest Territories, in an agreement with the Inuit people.


title: Canada

text: Canada has a government called a constitutional monarchy. It has a monarch (meaning a king or queen is the head of that country), and is a democracy (meaning the people of that country rule it). The head of state is King Charles III, who is officially the King of Canada. He appoints a Governor General to represent him in the country, however, the choice of Governor General is made by the prime minister.


title: Canada

text: The King’s powers are mostly exercised by the Governor General, currently Mary Simon. The Governor General, like the Canadian sovereign (King/Queen of Canada), is not political and remains above politics, and because of that they do not usually use their powers without the advice of the Prime Minister or other ministers.


title: Canada

text: The head of government is the Prime Minister. The current prime minister is Justin Trudeau, who replaced Stephen Harper in October 2015. Each province and territory has a premier to lead its government. The day-to-day operations of the government are run by the cabinet. The cabinet is usually formed from the largest party in Parliament.


title: Canada

text: The Parliament of Canada passes the laws of the country. The governor general, acting on behalf of the monarch, has the right to veto a law (meaning the law cannot go into effect) but this right has not been used for some time. There are five main parties in the Canadian Parliament: the Conservative Party, the New Democratic Party, the Liberal Party, the "Bloc Québécois", and the Green Party. In addition to the five parties with MPs in Parliament, there are fourteen other smaller parties registered with Elections Canada and several MPs who sit as Independents.


title: Canada

text: Because Canada is very far north, and most people cannot survive the conditions, most Canadians live in the southern parts, where the weather is much milder. Nearly two-thirds of Canadians live less than from the U.S. border. In some cities, the temperature gets very cold in the winter, especially inland. Warm air systems, moving in from the Pacific Ocean, bring more rain than snow to the Pacific coast. The colder temperatures further inland result in snow. Parts of Canada can get quite hot in the summer, often over .


title: Canada

text: Canadians are known to play winter sports, such as ice hockey and skiing and snowboarding, as well as enjoy many summer sports and games.


title: Canada

text: Canada has lots of natural resources. Its large amounts of fish have been used for centuries for food and money. Hydroelectric power (electricity by water) is abundant because of Canada's many rivers. Forests in the west are used for wood. Besides these renewable resources, Canada has metal ores and oil deposits. Canada is the leading exporter of zinc, uranium, gold, nickel, aluminum, steel and lead.


title: Canada

text: Around 38 million people live in Canada. This is almost the same number as California. About 80% of the Canadian population live in the southern parts of Canada because the climate is warmer than the north of Canada.


title: Canada

text: Many immigrants, who come from almost every part of the world, live in Canada. One example is the former Governor General of Canada, Michaëlle Jean, who came to Canada as a young child with her family from Haiti in 1968. Today, up to 1/5th of the population is an immigrant of Canada.


title: Canada

text: The Canadian government provides universal health care. The provinces are responsible for health insurance. Five provinces prohibit all extra-billing, while Alberta, British Columbia and Newfoundland allow it in a small number of circumstances, and Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick do not restrict it at all.


title: Canada

text: In 2020, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported that there were not enough hospital beds in Ontario. Ontario is Canada's largest province, and is home to Canada's largest city, Toronto. The number of hospital beds available in Ontario is 1.4 per every 1,000 people. This is half the number of hospital beds per person as in the United States, and the same number that Mexico has.


title: Shivaji

text: Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj was the founder of the Maratha Empire. Shivaji Bhonsale was born in the Shivneri Fort in Maharashtra on 19 February 1630 to mother Jijabai and father Shahaji Bhosale. It is said that mother Jijabai prayed to Lord Shiva in Shivneri Fort for a brave son and kept her son name as Shivaji after the Hindu god Shiva.


title: Shivaji

text: Shivaji Maharaj is one of the revered historical figures of Maharashtra. He created an independent and sovereign state in the Maharashtra region. In course of time, his prominence in the political sphere of Maharashtra, as a cultural icon of Marathi pride.


title: Shivaji

text: Shivaji was born at the Shivneri fort near Junnar in Pune district on 19th February 1630. Shivaji’s mother, Jijabai was the daughter of Lakhuji Jadhavrao of Sindkhed. His father Shahaji Bhonsale was a prominent sardar in the Deccan. He worked under the local Deccan sultanates. At the time of Shivaji's birth, most of the territory in Maharashtra was under the possession of the Nizamshah of Ahmednagar and the Adilshah of Bijapur who were known as the Deccan sultanates. In the coastal belt of Konkan, there were two sea powers fighting for control, the Christian Portuguese and the Muslim Siddi. The British and the Dutch who were engaged in expanding their trade also had their factories on the coast. The Mughals, since the period of Emperor Akbar wanted to expand their power in the South. The Mughals launched a campaign to conquer the Nizamshahi Kingdom. The Adilshah of Bijapur allied with the Mughals in this campaign. Shahaji Bhonsale tried to rebel, but he could not withstand the combined might of the Mughals and the Adilshahi. The Nizamshahi kingdom came to an end in 1636. Thereafter Shahaji became a Sardar of the Adilshah of Bijapur and was posted in Karnataka. The region comprising Pune, Supe, Indapur, and Chakan Parganas located between the Bhima and Nira rivers which were vested in Shahaji as a jagir was continued by the Adilshah. Shahaji was also assigned a jagir of Bangalore. Mata Jijabai and Shivaji, stayed for a few years with Shahaji at Bangalore until Shivaji was twelve years old. Shahaji entrusted the administration of the Lakshmi jagir to Shivaji and Mata Jijabai. Shivaji grew up amidst the hills and valleys of the Pune region under the guidance of his mother Jijabai. His mother Jijabai taught Shivaji the stories of the Hindu epics and scriptures such as Mahabharata and also stories of old mighty Hindu kingdoms such as the Vijayanagara. Shivaji was also trained in guerrilla warfare.


title: Shivaji

text: Several small spurs run eastward from the sahyadri in the Pune region. The extremely rugged valleys enclosed by these are usually known as the Mavals or Khores each named after the stream running through it, or after the principal village. Collectively they are known as the Mavals. The inhabitants of this region who are called the Mavalas were extremely hardy people. Shivaji Maharaj started the work of founding the Swaraj in this region which is full of hills and valleys and is not easily accessible. He skillfully utilized the geographical features of the Maval region for the foundation of the Swaraj. He created a feeling of trust and affection in minds of the people. Many associates, companions, and Mavalas joined him in his work of founding Swaraj. The objective of Shivaji Maharaj in founding the Swaraj is clearly expressed in his official seal or Mudra which is in Sanskrit. Through this Mudra, Shivaji Maharaj assured his people that the ‘ever-increasing like the crescent moon, the kingdom of Shivaji, son of Shahaji, will always seek the welfare of the people.


title: Shivaji

text: In the medieval period, forts carried much significance. With a firm hold over a fort, one could defend as well as control the surrounding area and could rule the land. In case of an enemy’s invasion, it was possible to protect the people taking shelter in the fort. The forts situated within the jagir of Shivaji Maharaj were not under his control but were under the control of Adilshah. Therefore an attempt to capture the forts meant to challenge the Adilshahi power. Shivaji Maharaj decided to acquire the forts that were within his jagir. He captured the forts of Murumbdev (Rajgad), Torna, Kondhana, Purandar and laid the foundation of the Swaraj. Shivaji Maharaj was steadily but cautiously aiming at extending and consolidating his power. Those sardars who appreciated his aim were brought to his side, but some sardars in the Adilshahi opposed him. It was necessary to bring them under control to found the Swaraj.


title: Shivaji

text: The region of Javali in the Satara district was important from the strategic point of view. Many routes to the Konkan were through Javali. For the expansion of the Swaraj in the Konkan, it was essential to control that region. The region of Javali was ruled by Chandrarao More, a powerful Sardar in the Adilshahi. Shivaji Maharaj attacked Javali and captured it in A.D. 1656. Then he also captured Rairi. This strong fort, later under the name of Raigad, was to become the capital of Shivaji Maharaj. Shivaji Maharaj built the Pratapgad fort in the Javali valley to protect the newly conquered territory and to control the Paar pass. The victory at Javali led to the expansion of the Swaraj in Konkan. Shivaji Maharaj then crossed the Ghats and descended into Konkan. He captured Kalyan and Bhivandi on the Konkan coast which were under the control of Adilshahi. Shivaji Maharaj also captured forts like Mahuli, Lohagad, Tunga, Tikona, Visapur, Songad, Karnala, Tala and Ghosala, in the Konkan. Shivaji Maharaj was able to command the coast line because of his acquisition of this territory in the Konkan. He came in contact with the Portuguese, the British and the Siddi powers on the western coast. The Siddi controlled the fort of Janjira and the areas around, including Danda-Rajpuri. Wherever in future these powers created obstacles in the work of expanding the Swaraj, Shivaji Maharaj tried to curb their activities.


title: Shivaji

text: When Shivaji Maharaj became master of a long coastal strip, he deemed it necessary to undertake the construction of a Navy. Shivaji Maharaj realized that the one who had a navy, controlled the sea. To protect his own territory from the Siddi's depredations, to protect the merchant ships and ports in order to secure and enhance revenue incomes derived from maritime trade and customs duty, he concentrated on building the Navy. There were four hundred ships of various kinds in the Navy. They included battleships like Gurab, Galbat and Pal.


title: Shivaji

text: Shivaji Maharaj had openly challenged the Adilshahi by capturing forts in his jagir and the territory in north Konkan. At that time the Badi Sahiba was looking after the administration of Adilshahi. She sent Afzal Khan, a powerful and experienced Adilshahi General to curb Shivaji Maharaj. Afzal Khan set out from Bijapur sometime in May 1659. To isolate Shivaji Maharaj, Ali Adilshah issued Farmans to the Deshmukhs in the Mavals, ordering them to join Afzal Khan. Besides this, Afzal Khan made efforts to seek the support of the Deshmukh's. A meeting between Shivaji Maharaj and Afzal Khan took place on 10th November 1659 at the foot of Pratapgad. At the meeting, Afzal Khan attempted treachery when he went to greet Shivaji Maharaj by stabbing Shivaji in the back with his dagger however Shivaji Maharaj had come prepared and he was wearing body armour so the dagger failed to pierce his skin. In retaliation, Shivaji Maharaj ripped at Afzal Khan's stomach with his weapon which is known as tiger-claws ("wagh-nakh") and killed Afzal Khan. The Marathas destroyed Afzal Khan’s army in the dense forests of Javali. Shivaji Maharaj secured a large booty from Afzal Khan's camp which enabled him to consolidate and strengthen his position.


title: Shivaji

text: Shivaji Maharaj intended to capture as much of Adilshahi province and forts as possible. Thereafter, he was captured from the Adilshah forts of Panhala, Vasantgad, and Khelna. He renamed Khelna as Vishalgad. In A.D. 1660, to check the rapid progress of Shivaji Maharaj, the Adilshah sent Siddi Jauhar, the Sardar of Karnul region, with a large army against Shivaji Maharaj. The Adilshah gave Siddi the title of ‘Salabatkhan’. In these circumstances, Shivaji Maharaj took shelter in the Panhala fort. Siddi’s soldiers led siege to the fort for about five months. Shivaji Maharaj found himself trapped inside the fort. Netaji Palkar made attempts to raise the siege by 4 attacking Siddi’s army from outside. But Siddi showed no signs of relenting. Shivaji Maharaj opened overtures with him. This led to slackness in the siege around Panhalgad. Taking advantage of the situation Shivaji Maharaj escaped through siege around the Panhala fort and proceeded to Vishalgad. Siddi Jauhar’s army pursued Shivaji Maharaj. Shivaji Maharaj stationed Baji Prabhu Deshpande at the foot of Vishalgad and entrusted the responsibility of stopping the Siddi’s army. Baji Prabhu Deshpande checked Siddi’s army at the Ghod pass near Gajapur. He fought with the greatest valor. Baji Prabhu died a hero’s death in this battle. While going to Vishalgad, Shivaji Maharaj also crushed the opposition of the Adilshahi sardars- Dalvi of Palawan and Surve of Shringarpur. Maharaj reached Vishalgad safely. While Shivaji Maharaj was trapped at Panhala, the Mughal army invaded the Swaraj. Shivaji Maharaj realized that it would not be prudent to fight two enemies at the same time. Therefore Shivaji Maharaj entered into a treaty with the Adilshah. As per the treaty, he returned the fort of Panhala to the Adilshah.


title: Shivaji

text: For the expansion of the Swaraj, conflict with the Mughals was inevitable. Emperor Aurangzeb appointed Shaista khan, to the viceroyalty of the Deccan, ordering him to invade and annex Shivaji Maharaj’s dominions. Shaista khan left Ahmednagar in February 1660 and arrived in Pune on 10th May 1660. He decided to capture the fort of Chakan to obtain supplies. Though the killedar of the fort of Chakan- Firangoji Narsala offered strong resistance to Shaista khan’s army, the Mughals captured the fort of Chakan. Shaista khan captured Swaraj's territories -Pune, Supe. He set up his camp at Lal Mahal in Pune. The Mughal army began to ravage the regions around Pune. Shaista khan adopted the strategy to occupy as much of Shivaji Maharaj’s dominions as possible. Forces were dispatched to invade the Konkan region below the Ghats. Kalyan and Bhiwandi were captured by the Mughal army. Shaista Khan appointed Kartalabkhan on an expedition to the North Konkan. Shivaji Maharaj humbled the Khan in Umbarkhind. Shivaji Maharaj left Netaji Palkar to defend the North Konkan and he marched southwards and captured Dabhol, Chiplun, Sangameshwar, Rajapur, Palavani, and Shringarpur. Two years had passed but Shaista khan still would not think of leaving Pune. Naturally, this harmed the population. Intending to drive Shaista khan out of Pune, Shivaji Maharaj devised a bold plan. On 5th April 1663, Shivaji Maharaj raided Lal Mahal. In this raid, Shaista khan lost his fingers. He left Pune and shifted his camp to Aurangabad. The successful attack on Shaista khan resulted in an immense increase in Shivaji Maharaj's prestige and fame. It also had an impact on the people and their faith in the capabilities of Maharaj was strengthened even further.


title: Shivaji

text: In three years, Shaista Khan had ravaged the territories of the Swaraj. It was necessary to make up for this loss. Surat was the most prosperous port of the Mughal Empire on the west coast. Europeans i.e. the British, the Dutch and the French had their factories there. Shivaji Maharaj devised a plan of attack on Surat. The Subhedar of Surat could not put up any resistance to the Marathas. Shivaji Maharaj obtained enormous wealth from Surat. Surat's campaign was a stunning blow to emperor Aurangzeb’s prestige.


title: Shivaji

text: Soon after his return from Surat, Shivaji Maharaj embarked upon a vigorous naval program. Shivaji Maharaj had realized the importance of sea forts. Sea forts would protect the navy and keep in check the Siddi of Janjira and the Portuguese. He built Suvarnadurg. In 1664 he commenced the construction of Sindhudurg at Malvan. About the same time, he strengthened a fort named Vijaydurg. He also built a fort named Padmadurg on a small island in front of Rajpuri to counter the Siddi power.


title: Shivaji

text: Intending to crush the growing power of Shivaji Maharaj, Aurangzeb sent Jaisingh of Ambar, an experienced and powerful Mughal Sardar. He left Delhi on 30th September 1664 and reached Pune on 3rd March 1665. Jaisingh's strategy was to isolate Shivaji Maharaj from his neighboring powers so that he would get neither help nor support from them, to prevent him from breaking out into the Mughal territory, to devastate his homeland, and capture his forts. As per this strategy he was trying to provoke the Adilshahi against Shivaji Maharaj. Jaisingh was simultaneously instigating local rulers in the Karnataka against the Adilshah so that the latter would be unable to help Shivaji Maharaj. To the Portuguese of Goa and Vasai, the Dutch of Vengurla, the British of Surat, and the Siddis of Janjira, Jaisingh suggested that they should start a naval campaign against Shivaji Maharaj. He also drew up a plan of capturing the forts in possession of Maharaj. Jaisingh and Dilerkhan led siege to the fort of Purandar. Mughal forces were sent to various parts of Swaraj to devastate the territories of the Swaraj. Maharaj endeavored to resist the Mughals. When the Mughals put the fort of Purandar under siege, Murarbaji Deshpande fought with the greatest of courage. He died a hero’s death. Realizing that in this conflict with the Mughals, Shivaji Maharaj and his subjects had to face great losses, Maharaj began talks for a treaty with Jaisingh. A treaty between Jaisingh and Maharaj was signed in June 1665 which is known as the ‘Treaty of Purandar’. Under the terms of the treaty, Maharaj ceded twenty-three forts and adjacent areas yielding a revenue of four lakh hons to the Mughals. He also assured the Mughals of help against the Adilshahi.


title: Shivaji

text: Jaisingh’s campaign against the Adilshahi proved unsuccessful. Jaisingh and Aurangzeb felt that if the Adilshah, the Qutubshah, and Shivaji Maharaj joined forces against the Mughals, it would be a great setback to the Mughal policies in the Deccan. Both of them felt that Shivaji Maharaj ought to be kept away at least for some time from the Deccan politics. Jaisingh proposed to Shivaji Maharaj that he should visit Agra and meet the Emperor. After making thorough arrangements to ensure effective administration of his dominions during his absence, Shivaji Maharaj proceeded to Agra with his son Sambhaji and a few of his trusted people. Shivaji Maharaj set out for Agra on 5th March 1666 and reached on 11th May 1666. Aurangzeb did not treat Shivaji Maharaj with due honor at his court. Livid with rage, Maharaj walked out of the court instantly. Aurangzeb then put him under house arrest. Shivaji Maharaj devised a plan of escaping from his house arrest. He adroitly escaped from Agra and safely reached Rajgad on 20th November 1666. While returning from Agra, he left Sambhaji at Mathura. Later, Sambhaji was brought safely to Rajgad.


title: Shivaji

text: For about four years after his return from Agra, Shivaji Maharaj concentrated his attention on putting the affairs of Swaraj in order. He re-organized the army and carried repairs to forts. In 1670, Shivaji Maharaj followed an offensive policy against the Mughals. His first aim was to clear his homeland of the Mughals. He also aimed at recapturing the forts and territories ceded to the Mughals according to the treaty of Purandar. The strategy followed by Shivaji Maharaj was to capture the forts by sending a well-equipped army on one hand and on the other hand to keep the Mughals unstable by invading the Mughal territories of the Deccan. Maharaj thus attacked Ahmednagar and Junnar. Sinhgad was the first fort to be recaptured. Mavala infantry under the command of Tanaji Malusare entered the fort secretly. The fort was defended by Udai Bhan. Tanaji Malusare fought with the greatest valor. He died a hero’s death. The fort was captured on 4th February 1670. Shivaji Maharaj also recaptured several other forts such as Purandar, Lohgad, Mahuli, Karnala, Rohida one after another. Then Shivaji Maharaj attacked Surat for the second time. On the way back he fought a battle with the Mughals at Vani- Dindori in Nashik district. He defeated Daud Khan in the battle. The Marathas under the leadership of Moropant Pingle captured Trimbakgad. The Maratha army then invaded Baglan, a hilly district that was guarded by nine hill forts, the strongest among these were of Salher and Mulher, the others being smaller hill forts. The Maratha army not only captured smaller hill forts of Baglan but also captured Mulher fort and Salher which lay on the border of Khandesh and Gujarat. The capture of Salher was an event of great strategic importance. Then Salher became a base of operations against the rich provinces of Gujarat and Khandesh. The Mughals tried to recapture Salher but failed. In 1672, Shivaji Maharaj’s army conquered the principality of Jawhar and then Ramnagar.


title: Shivaji

text: Shivaji Maharaj decided to expand his dominions at the expense of the Adilshahi Sultanate. He captured the Panhala fort which was in the possession of Adilshah on 8th March 1673. Then he captured the fort of Parali near Satara, fort of Satara, and forts like Chandan-vandan, Pandavgad Nandagiri, Kelanja, and Tathavda.


title: Shivaji

text: The founding of the Maratha Swaraj involved a` relentless struggle for over thirty years. Maharaj realized that now the Swaraj needed to win general recognition as a sovereign, independent state. For legal recognition to the Swaraj, a formal coronation was necessary. On 6th June 1674, Shivaji Maharaj was coroneted at Raigad by Gagabhatt, a learned pandit of Benaras. Maharaj ascended the throne of the Swaraj. He now became the Chhatrapati of the Swaraj. As a symbol of sovereignty, Shivaji Maharaj instituted a new era commencing from the date of his coronation. It is known as Rajyabhisheka shaka. Shivaji Maharaj thus became the founder of a new era. On the occasion of the coronation, special coins were minted- a gold coin called hon and a copper coin called Shivraj with the legend Shri Raja Shivachhatrapati inscribed on them. Thereafter, all royal correspondence carried the words, 'Kshatriyakulaawatansa Shri Raja Shivachhatrapati'.


title: Shivaji

text: A dictionary called Rajya-vyavahara-kosha, showing Sanskrit alternatives for Persian words was prepared. Sabhasad, a contemporary chronicler, while pointing out the significance of the coronation, writes ‘It was no mean achievement for a Maratha king to become such a great Chhatrapati’. The coronation of Shivaji Maharaj was a revolutionary event in the history of medieval India. Shivaji Maharaj had his second coronation performed under the guidance of Nischalpuri Gosavi.


title: Shivaji

text: After the coronation, Shivaji Maharaj marched to the conquest of Phonda near Goa and captured it in April 1675. Then the Marathas captured Ankola and Shiveshwar which was followed by the annexation of Kolhapur. After that Shivaji Maharaj accomplished 'Dakshin Digvijay'. Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj planned to carry his army to the east coast in the South and conquer the province of Adilshahi Karnataka. He undertook the Karnataka expedition in 1677. Karnataka was long famous for its riches. At the same time, it was ill-defended by the Adilshah. Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj went to Golkonda to meet the Qutubshah. He entered into a treaty of friendship with him. In April 1677 he set out for the Adilshahi Karnataka. He captured Jinjee and proceeded to Vellore. The city withstood a long siege. The eastern portion of the south was mostly held by nobles of the Adilshahi kingdom. Vyankoji, Shivaji Maharaj’s stepbrother had carved out a principality for himself at Thanjavur. At Tirumalvadi, on the northern bank of the Coleroon, Vyankoji met Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. Shivaji Maharaj tried to get Vyankoji to participate in the activities of the Swaraj. He did not get any response from Vyankoji. Later, Maharaj conquered Bangalore, Hoskote in Karnataka, certain other forts such as those at Vellore, and also some parts of the Adilshahi kingdom. Permanent annexation in the south increased Maharaj’s strength and most importantly he was successful in executing his plan of defense which would help him to resist the armies of Aurangzeb in the future. For the administration of the newly conquered province, Shivaji Maharaj made excellent arrangements. He appointed Raghunath Narayan Hanamante, the chief officer to look after these newly conquered territories. After accomplishing the mission of the south, Shivaji Maharaj returned to Swaraj.


title: Shivaji

text: Shivaji Maharaj decided to fortify the island of Khanderi, commanded a key position as it was located near Mumbai. The British then decided to lay a regular siege to the island. In this naval conflict, the English had to withdraw their fleet. This brought to an end the naval conflict between Shivaji Maharaj and the British.


title: Shivaji

text: Within few months Shivaji Maharaj fell ill. After a short illness, he passed away at the Raigad fort on 3rd April 1680.


title: Shivaji

text: The Swaraj established by Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj comprised of large areas of Nashik, Pune, Satara, Sangli, Kolhapur, Sindhudurg, Ratnagiri, Raigad, and Thane districts of Maharashtra. It also included parts of the Belgaum, Karwar, and Dharwad districts of Karnataka and Jinjee, Vellore, and their neighboring areas in the state of Tamil Nadu. He set up an efficient and sound system for the administration of this Swaraj. The administration was divided into eight departments. A minister was appointed as the head of every department. His council of eight ministers was known as the Ashta-Pradhan Mandal. Shivaji Maharaj followed a policy of encouraging agriculture. He paid attention to the welfare of the peasantry. He was also equally concerned about the growth of trade and the protection of industries. Thus he turned the Swaraj into a surajya a state which sought the welfare of all. He was a great military commander, an outstanding general, and a statesman. He had a clear concept of military organization.


title: Shivaji

text: His military organization consisted of infantry, cavalry, and navy. Strict discipline, rapid movements, excellent intelligence service, and continuous attention to defense marked his military organization. He used to take utmost care to protect his subjects especially at the time of enemy invasions. Shivaji Maharaj was also keen to see to it that the soldiers did not in any way cause any harm to the subjects. He followed a tolerant religious policy. The greatest achievement of Shivaji Maharaj was to inculcate the spirit of independence in his people. By his great deeds and achievements, Shivaji Maharaj created an altogether new order of things. Shivaji Maharaj’s personality and message are as relevant today as they were in the past.


title: Dog

text: Dogs ("Canis lupus familiaris") are domesticated mammals, not natural wild animals. They were originally bred from wolves. They have been bred by humans for a long time and were the first animals ever to be domesticated. Remains dating to 30,000 years ago have been described as "Paleolithic dogs". Their status as dogs or wolves is unclear. Considerable morphological diversity existed among wolves in the Late Pleistocene. The dingo is also a dog, but many dingos have become wild animals again and live independently of humans in the range where they occur (parts of Australia).


title: Dog

text: Today, some dogs are used as pets, and others are used to help humans do their work. They are popular pets because they are usually playful, friendly, loyal, and listen to humans. Thirty million dogs in the United States are registered as pets. Dogs eat both meat and vegetables, often mixed together and sold in stores as dog food. Dogs often have jobs, including police dogs, army dogs, assistance dogs, fire dogs, messenger dogs, hunting dogs, herding dogs, or rescue dogs.


title: Dog

text: They are sometimes called "canines" from the Latin word for dog - "canis". Sometimes people also use "dog" to describe other canids, such as wolves. A baby dog is called a pup or puppy. A dog is called a puppy until it is about one year old.


title: Dog

text: Dogs are sometimes referred to as "man's best friend" because they are kept as domestic pets, are usually loyal, and like being around humans. Dogs like to be petted, but only when they can first see the petter's hand before petting; one should never pet a dog from behind.


title: Dog

text: Dogs have four legs and make a "bark," "woof," or "arf" sound. Dogs often chase cats, and most dogs will fetch a ball or stick.


title: Dog

text: Dogs can smell and hear better than humans but cannot see well in color because they are color blind. Due to the anatomy of the eye, dogs can see better in dim light than humans. They also have a wider field of vision.


title: Dog

text: Like wolves, wild dogs travel in groups called packs. Packs of dogs are ordered by rank, and dogs with low rank will submit to other dogs with a higher rank. The highest ranked dog is called the alpha male. A dog in a group helps and cares for others. Domesticated dogs often view their owner as the alpha male.


title: Dog

text: Different dog breeds have different lifespans. In general, smaller dogs live longer than bigger ones. The size and the breed of the dog change how long the dog lives, on average. Breeds such as the Dachshund usually live for fifteen years, Chihuahuas can reach age twenty. On the other hand, the Great Dane has an average lifespan of six to eight years; some Great Danes have lived for ten years.


title: Dog

text: All dogs are descended from wolves, by domestication and artificial selection. This is known because DNA genome analysis has been done to discover this. They have been bred by humans. The earliest known fossil of a domestic dog is from 31,700 years ago in Belgium. Dogs have lived with people for at least 30,000 years. In 2013, a study was published that showed that the skull and teeth of a canid, dated to 33,000 years ago, had characteristics closer to a dog than to a wolf, and the authors concluded that "this specimen may represent a dog in the very early stages of domestication, i.e., an "incipient" dog." The researchers suggest that it was a line that did not lead to modern dogs. Genetically, this material is closer to that of a modern dog than that of a wolf. Other signs of domestication are that sometimes, dogs were buried together with humans. Evidence of this is a tomb in Bonn, where a man of about 50 years of age, a woman of about 25 years of age, the remains of a dog, plus other artifacts were found. Radiocarbon dating showed that the human bones were between 13.300 and 14.000 years old.


title: Dog

text: Dogs are often called "man's best friend" because they fit in with human life. Man refers to humankind and not just guys (Old English). Dogs can serve people in many ways. For example, there are guard dogs, hunting dogs, herding dogs, guide dogs for blind people, and police dogs. There are also dogs that are trained to smell for diseases in the human body or to find bombs or illegal drugs. These dogs sometimes help police in airports or other areas. Sniffer dogs (usually beagles) are sometimes trained for this job. Dogs have even been sent by Russians into outer space, a few years before any human being. The first dog sent up was named Laika, but she died within a few hours.


title: Dog

text: There are at least 800 breeds (kinds) of dogs. Dogs whose parents were the same breed will also be that breed: these dogs are called purebred or pure pedigree dogs. Dogs with parents from different breeds no longer belong to one breed: they are called "mutts", "mixed-breed dogs", "hybrids", or "mongrels". Some of the most popular breeds are sheepdogs, collies, poodles and retrievers. It is becoming popular to breed together two different breeds of dogs and call the new dog's breed a name that is a mixture of the parents' breeds' two names. A puppy with a poodle and a pomeranian as parents might be called a Pomapoo. Instead of being called mutts, these kinds of dogs are known as designer dog breeds. These dogs are normally used for prize shows and designer shows.


The Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution was an addition to the United States Constitution that put a limit on how many times a person could be elected to be President. A person is limited to being elected twice, or once if they have already served more than two years as President. Congress passed the amendment on March 1947. It was ratified on February 27, 1951.


title: Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution

text: The President of the United States is elected to have that position for a period, or "term", that lasts for four years. The Constitution had no limit on how many times a person could be elected as president. The nation’s first president, George Washington chose not to try to be elected for a third term. This suggested that two terms were enough for any president. Washington’s two-term limit became the unwritten rule for all Presidents until 1940.


text: In 1940, President Franklin D. Roosevelt won a third term. He also won a fourth term in 1944. Roosevelt was president through the Great Depression of the 1930s and almost all of World War II. He held approval ratings in the mid-50% to the low 60% ranges over his many years in office. Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage in April 1945, just months after the start of his fourth term. Soon after, Republicans in Congress began the work of creating Amendment XXII. Roosevelt was the first and only President to serve more than two terms.


text: The amendment was passed by Congress in 1947, and was ratified by the states on 27 February 1951. The Twenty-Second Amendment says a person can only be elected to be president two times for a total of eight years. It does make it possible for a person to serve up to ten years as president. This can happen if a person (most likely the Vice-President) takes over for a president who can no longer serve their term. If this person serves two years or less of the preceding President’s term, they may serve for two more four-year terms. If they served more than two years of the last President's term, the new President can serve only one full four-year term. Under the language of the amendment, the President at the time of its ratification (Harry S. Truman) was exempt from the two-term limitation. Truman served nearly all of Roosevelt's unexpired fourth term and then was elected President once, serving his own four year term.


text: Since 1985, there have been many attempts to either change or remove this amendment. This began when Ronald Reagan was serving his second term as President. Since then, changes have been tried from both Democrats and Republicans. No changes have been made.


text: There is some debate about how this amendment works with the 12th Amendment. The 12th Amendment limits who can become Vice-President to only people who meet the requirements of being President. The central question in this debate is whether the 22nd Amendment is imposing requirements on eligibility for "holding" the office of President or if it is merely imposing requirements on "being elected to" the office of President.


text: One side of the debate argues that the 22nd Amendment explicitly uses the language "No person shall be elected" and is therefore issuing guidance on elections. The existence of other means of assuming the office (as enumerated in the 20th Amendment, Section 3 and the 25th Amendment) lends support to this argument.


text: The other side of the debate argues that the 12th Amendment, in describing how elections are to be carried out, is enumerating additional requirement for holding the office of President. In support of this side of the argument is the fact that the requirements for holding the office of President are not restricted to Article 2 (where the main requirements like age and citizenship are listed). For example, impeachment is described in Article 1, Section 3 and upon impeachment, conviction, and removal from office a person becomes ineligible to hold the office in the future. Similarly, the 14th Amendment establishes a requirement that a President must not have fought against the United States or given aid and comfort to its enemies. These amendments suggest a pattern of enumerating additional requirements for the presidency and proponents of this side of the debate would argue that the 22nd Amendment was intended to add yet another requirement.


text: Since no president who has served two terms has ever tried to be vice-president, this situation has not yet been decided by the courts.


text: Harry S Truman became President because of the death of Roosevelt. He served most of Roosevelt's last term as President. This would have limited him to being elected only one time, but he was not affected since the amendment did not affect the person who was the current President when the amendment was originally proposed by Congress. Since this provision could only have applied to Truman, it was an obvious effort not to limit him. Truman did win the election in 1948 but ended his try to be President in 1952 before the election began.


text: Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected President in 1952 and won a second term in 1956. He therefore became the first President not allowed to run again because of the amendment.


text: Lyndon B. Johnson is the only president so far who could have served more than 8 years under this amendment. He became President in 1963 after John F. Kennedy was assassinated. He served the last 14 months of Kennedy's term. Because this was less than two years, he was allowed to be elected for two additional terms. He won the first term in 1964, but chose not to run for a second full term before the elections in 1968.


text: Richard M. Nixon became the second person not allowed to run again for President when he won the elections in 1968 and 1972, but he was forced to resign due to the Watergate scandal 19 months into his second term. Gerald Ford became President in 1974 after Nixon left office. Ford served the last 29 months of Nixon's term. This meant he could only be elected as president once, but he lost the election to Jimmy Carter in 1976 and did not try to become President again.


text: Ronald Reagan became the third President to be not allowed to run again after he won the elections in 1980 and 1984.


text: Out of the U.S. Presidents that are still alive as of , Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama cannot be elected again because of this amendment. All of them were elected twice. Jimmy Carter, Donald Trump and Joe Biden can be elected president again as they have been elected only once.


text: "Section 1". No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of President more than once. But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.


text: "Section 2". This Article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress.


title: History of Christianity

text: The history of the Christian religion and the Christian church began with Jesus and his apostles,twelve disciples (students) of Jesus Christ for a mission. Christianity is the religion that is based on the birth, life, death, resurrection and teaching of Jesus Christ.


title: History of Christianity

text: Christianity began in the 1st century CE after Jesus died and was resurrected. Starting as a small group of Jewish people in Judea, it spread quickly throughout the Roman Empire. Despite early persecution of Christians, it later became the state religion. In the Middle Ages it spread into Northern Europe and Russia. During the Age of Exploration, Christianity expanded throughout the world; it is currently the largest religion of the world.


title: History of Christianity

text: The religion had schisms and theological disputes that had as result four main branches: the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox churches, Oriental Orthodoxy and Protestant churches.


title: History of Christianity

text: Most of the first Christians were ethnically Jewish or Jewish proselytes. An early difficulty came from non-Jewish converts. There was the question if they had to "become Jewish" before becoming Christian. The decision of St. Peter, was that they did not, and the matter was further addressed with the Council of Jerusalem.