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3806 | Hit by pitch | of the Chicago White Sox being hit by a pitch]]
In baseball, hit by pitch (HBP) is an event in which a batter or his clothing or equipment (other than his bat) is struck directly by a pitch from the pitcher; the batter is called a hit batsman (HB). A hit batsman is awarded first base, provided that (in the plate umpire's judgment) he made an honest effort to avoid the pitch, although failure to do so is rarely called by an umpire. Being hit by a pitch is often caused by a batter standing too close to, or "crowding", home plate.
The rule dates from 1887; before that, a pitch that struck the batter was merely a ball.
Official rule
Per baseball official rule 5.05(b), a batter becomes a baserunner and is awarded first base when he or his equipment (except for his bat):
*is touched by a pitched ball outside the strike zone,
*and he attempts to avoid it (or has no opportunity to avoid it),
*and he did not swing at the pitch.
If all these conditions are met, the ball is dead, and other baserunners advance if they are forced to vacate their base by the batter taking first. Rule 5.09(a) further clarifies that a hit by pitch is also called when a pitch touches a batter's clothing.
In the case where a batter swings and the pitch hits him anyway, the ball is dead and a strike is called. If the batter does not attempt to avoid the pitch, he is not awarded first base, and the pitch is ruled either a strike if in the strike zone or a ball if out of the strike zone. Umpires rarely make this call. A famous instance of a non-hit by pitch was on May 31, 1968, when Don Drysdale hit Dick Dietz with a pitch that would have forced in a run and ended Drysdale's scoreless innings streak at 44. Umpire Harry Wendelstedt ruled that Dietz made no effort to avoid the pitch; Dietz proceeded to fly out, and Drysdale's scoreless streak continued to a then-record 58 innings. Another notable example was the first game of the 2022 World Series. In the bottom of the 10th inning, Philadelphia Phillies pitcher David Robertson was pitching to Houston Astros pitch hitter Aldemys Diaz. With 2 balls and no strikes, two out, and two runners in scoring position, Robertson threw a pitch inside that struck Diaz's left arm. Home plate umpire James Hoye ruled that Diaz did not attempt to avoid the pitch and called the pitch a ball. Diaz, who had begun to take first base before Hoye called time, disputed the call, and would go on to ground out to end the game.
A hit-by-pitch can also be called on a pitch that has first touched the ground before hitting the batter. Such a bouncing pitch is like any other, and if a batter is hit by such a pitch, he will be awarded first unless he made no attempt to avoid it (and he had an opportunity to avoid it).
A batter hit by a pitch is not credited with a hit or at bat, but is credited with a time on base and a plate appearance; therefore, being hit by a pitch does not increase or decrease a player's batting average but does increase his on-base percentage. A batter was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded is also credited with an RBI per MLB rule 10.04(a)(2). A pitch ruled a hit by pitch is recorded as a ball in the pitcher's pitch count, since by definition, the ball must be outside the strike zone and not have been swung at.
The rule awarding first base to a batter hit by a pitch was instituted in 1887.
Tactical use
is brushed back by an inside pitch during a 2010 game at Wrigley Field.]]
Inside pitching is a common and legal tactic in baseball, and many players make use of brushback pitches, or pitches aimed underneath the chin, commonly referred to as "chin music", to keep players away from the plate. "Headhunter" is a common term for pitchers who have a reputation for throwing these kinds of pitches. However, throwing at a batter intentionally is illegal, and can be very dangerous. When an umpire suspects that a pitcher has thrown at a batter intentionally, but is not certain, a warning is issued to the pitcher and the managers of both teams. From that point on, any pitch thrown at a batter can cause the pitcher and the manager of the offending team to be ejected immediately from the game. Serious offenses such as a ball thrown at the head (called a beanball) can result in the immediate ejection of the pitcher, and the manager if he ordered the beanball, even without a warning. If the umpire is certain that the pitcher intentionally hit the batter with the pitch, the pitcher is ejected from the game with no warning. This infamously happened on August 15, 2018, when José Ureña was ejected from a game against the Atlanta Braves after hitting Ronald Acuña Jr. on the elbow with the first pitch of the game, which led to the Braves' and Marlins' benches emptying.
Occasionally, if a player is acting rude or unsportsmanlike, or having an extraordinarily good day, the pitcher may intentionally hit the batter, disguising it as a pitch that accidentally slipped his control. Managers may also order a pitcher to throw such a pitch (sometimes called a "plunking"). These pitches are typically aimed at the lower back and slower than normal, designed to send a message more than anything else. The opposing team usually hits a batter in retaliation for this act. The plunkings generally end there because of umpire warnings, but in some cases things can get out of hand, and sometimes they lead to the batter charging the mound, bench-clearing brawls, and several ejections.Records
Korea Baseball Organization third baseman Choi Jeong holds the Korean Baseball Organization hit by pitch record with 348. It is also the world record. The all-time record for a player being hit by a pitch in MLB is held by Hughie Jennings, who was hit by 287 pitches between 1891 and 1903. The modern-era record is held by Craig Biggio of the Houston Astros, who had 285 as of the end of the 2007 season when he retired. Prior to Biggio, the modern-era record belonged to Don Baylor, who was hit 267 times.
The all-time single-season record also belongs to Jennings, who was hit 51 times during the 1896 season. Ron Hunt of the 1971 Montreal Expos was hit 50 times during that year, the modern-era record. The single-game record is three, held by numerous players.
The all-time record for pitchers is held by Gus Weyhing with 277 (1887–1901). The modern-era career pitching record for most hit batsmen is 205 by Hall-of-Famer Walter Johnson. The season record is 54 by Phil Knell in 1891, and the game record is six, held by Ed Knouff and John Grimes.
Brady Anderson was the first player to be hit by a pitch two times in the same inning in an American League game. On April 25, 2014, Brandon Moss became the second when he was hit twice in the top of the 9th inning by Houston Astros pitchers. Five players have been hit by a pitch twice in the same inning in the National League. On September 1, 2021, Austin Adams became the first pitcher hitting batters 20 or more times with 120 or less IPs in a season. Ed Doheny hit batters 22 times in 133.2 IP in 1900.
Three times has a perfect game been broken up by the 27th batter being hit by pitch. Hooks Wiltse, Max Scherzer, and Joe Musgrove hold this rare feat. All three finished with no-hitters after the hit by pitch. Scherzer's team was leading 6–0 and Musgrove's 3–0 when they pitched their no-hitters, but Wiltse's team was scoreless through 9; he pitched a 10-inning 1–0 no-hitter. The record for most hit batters in a no-hitter is three, held by Chris Heston of the San Francisco Giants for his 2015 effort against the New York Mets.
Postseason career records are held by Greg Maddux and Tim Wakefield—each of whom hit 9 batters—and Shane Victorino, who was hit by pitch 11 times.
Dangers
of the Memphis Redbirds is evaluated for injury after being hit by a pitch in a 2019 game.]]
One major-league player died as a result of being struck by a pitch: Ray Chapman of the Cleveland Indians was hit in the head by Carl Mays on August 16, 1920, and died the next morning.
Serious injuries may result from being hit by a pitch, even when wearing a batting helmet. On August 18, 1967, Boston Red Sox batter Tony Conigliaro was hit almost directly in the left eye by a fastball thrown by Jack Hamilton of the California Angels. His cheekbone was shattered; he nearly lost the sight of the eye, was unable to play for over a year, and never regained his earlier batting ability. At the time, batting helmets were not required to have an "ear flap"; it was not until 2002 that all major-league batters were required to wear helmets with side-protection. Ron Santo was the first player to wear a helmet with an improvised ear-flap; he had it made after he was struck by a pitch from Jack Fisher of the New York Mets on June 26, 1966, which briefly knocked Santo unconscious and left him with a fractured cheekbone.
Other notable injuries include:
* Mickey Cochrane of the Detroit Tigers was hit in the head by a pitch from Bump Hadley of the New York Yankees on May 25, 1937. Cochrane nearly died from his injuries and never played again; he was inducted to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1947.
* Kirby Puckett of the Minnesota Twins was struck in the cheek by a Dennis Martínez fastball on September 28, 1995, breaking his jaw and loosening two teeth. It was Puckett's last regular-season game; during spring training the following year he developed glaucoma, which ended his career; he was inducted to the Hall of Fame in 2001.
* Mike Piazza, then with the Mets, was hit in the head by a pitch from Julián Tavárez of the St. Louis Cardinals on September 10, 2005. Piazza's helmet shattered and he suffered a concussion; he went on to play in MLB through 2007 and was inducted to the Hall of Fame in 2016.
Other comparably minor injuries that are possible include broken fingers or hands, broken feet, broken ribs, injuries to the knee, or groin injuries.
Legal interpretation
Since inside pitching is a legitimate tactic in baseball, courts have recognized that being hit by a pitch is an inherent risk of the game, so that players cannot sue for any resulting injuries. On April 6, 2006, in a case arising from a game involving community college baseball teams, the Supreme Court of California ruled that baseball players in California assume the risk of being hit by baseballs even if the balls were intentionally thrown so as to cause injury. In the court's words: "For better or worse, being intentionally thrown at is a fundamental part and inherent risk of the sport of baseball. It is not the function of tort law to police such conduct."<ref name"Avila" />ReferencesExternal links
* [https://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/HBP_career.shtml List of all-time HBP leaders]
* [http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/the-hbp-explosion-that-almost-nobody-seems-to-have-noticed/ Article on changing HBP rates] in The Hardball Times
Category:Baseball rules
Category:Pitching (baseball)
Category:Baseball terminology
Category:Batting statistics
Category:Pitching statistics | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hit_by_pitch | 2025-04-05T18:26:34.907875 |
3807 | Hit (baseball) | 250px|upright|thumb|right|A batter starts his run to reach first base after successfully hitting the ball.
upright|thumb|right|Pete Rose is the all-time leader in Major League Baseball hits, recording 4,256.
upright|thumb|right|Ichiro Suzuki has recorded the most career hits across top tier professional leagues, 4,367, combining his 3,089 Major League hits with his previous 1,278 hits in Nippon Professional Baseball.
In baseball statistics, a hit (denoted by H), also called a base hit, is credited to a batter when the batter safely reaches or passes first base after hitting the ball into fair territory with neither the benefit of an error nor a fielder's choice.
Scoring a hit
To achieve a hit, the batter must reach first base before any fielder can either tag him with the ball, throw to another player protecting the base before the batter reaches it, or tag first base while carrying the ball. The hit is scored the moment the batter reaches first base safely; if he is put out while attempting to stretch his hit to a double or triple or home run on the same play, he still gets credit for a hit (according to the last base he reached safely on the play).
If a batter reaches first base because of offensive interference by a preceding runner (including if a preceding runner is hit by a batted ball), he is also credited with a hit.
Types of hits
A hit for one base is called a single, for two bases a double, and for three bases a triple. A home run is also scored as a hit. Doubles, triples, and home runs are also called extra base hits.
An "infield hit" is a hit where the ball does not leave the infield. Infield hits are uncommon by nature, and most often earned by speedy runners.
Pitching a no-hitter
A no-hitter is a game in which one of the teams prevented the other from getting a hit. Throwing a no-hitter is rare and considered an extraordinary accomplishment for a pitcher or pitching staff. In most cases in the professional game, no-hitters are accomplished by a single pitcher who throws a complete game. A pitcher who throws a no-hitter could still allow runners to reach base safely, by way of walks, errors, hit batsmen, or batter reaching base due to interference or obstruction. If the pitcher allows no runners to reach base in any manner whatsoever (hit, walk, hit batsman, error, etc.), the no-hitter is a perfect game.
1887 discrepancy
250px|thumb|right|Ty Cobb recorded a career 4,191 hits, holding the Major League record for 57 years.
In 1887, Major League Baseball counted bases on balls (walks) as hits. The result was skyrocketing batting averages, including some near .500; Tip O'Neill of the St. Louis Browns batted .485 that season, which would still be a major league record if recognized. The experiment was abandoned the following season.
There is controversy regarding how the records of 1887 should be interpreted. The number of legitimate walks and at-bats are known for all players that year, so computing averages using the same method as in other years is straightforward. In 1968, Major League Baseball formed a Special Baseball Records Committee to resolve this (and other) issues. The Committee ruled that walks in 1887 should not be counted as hits. In 2000, Major League Baseball reversed its decision, ruling that the statistics which were recognized in each year's official records should stand, even in cases where they were later proven incorrect. Most current sources list O'Neill's 1887 average as .435, as calculated by omitting his walks. He would retain his American Association batting championship. However, the variance between methods results in differing recognition for the 1887 National League batting champion. Cap Anson would be recognized, with his .421 average, if walks are included, but Sam Thompson would be the champion at .372 if they are not.
Major League Baseball rules
The official rulebook of Major League Baseball states in Rule 10.05:
(a) The official scorer shall credit a batter with a base hit when:
(1) the batter reaches first base (or any succeeding base) safely on a fair ball that settles on the ground, that touches a fence before being touched by a fielder or that clears a fence;
(2) the batter reaches first base safely on a fair ball hit with such force, or so slowly, that any fielder attempting to make a play with the ball has no opportunity to do so;
Rule 10.05(a)(2) Comment: The official scorer shall credit a hit if the fielder attempting to handle the ball cannot make a play, even if such fielder deflects the ball from or cuts off another fielder who could have put out a runner.
(3) the batter reaches first base safely on a fair ball that takes an unnatural bounce so that a fielder cannot handle it with ordinary effort, or that touches the pitcher's plate or any base (including home plate) before being touched by a fielder and bounces so that a fielder cannot handle the ball with ordinary effort;
(4) the batter reaches first base safely on a fair ball that has not been touched by a fielder and that is in fair territory when the ball reaches the outfield, unless in the scorer's judgment the ball could have been handled with ordinary effort;
(5) a fair ball that has not been touched by a fielder touches a runner or an umpire, unless a runner is called out for having been touched by an Infield Fly, in which case the official scorer shall not score a hit; or
(6) a fielder unsuccessfully attempts to put out a preceding runner and, in the official scorer's judgment, the batter-runner would not have been put out at first base by ordinary effort.
Rule 10.05(a) Comment: In applying Rule 10.05(a), the official scorer shall always give the batter the benefit of the doubt. A safe course for the official scorer to follow is to score a hit when exceptionally good fielding of a ball fails to result in a putout.
(b) The official scorer shall not credit a base hit when a:
(1) runner is forced out by a batted ball, or would have been forced out except for a fielding error;
(2) batter apparently hits safely and a runner who is forced to advance by reason of the batter becoming a runner fails to touch the first base to which such runner is advancing and is called out on appeal. The official scorer shall charge the batter with an at-bat but not a hit;
(3) pitcher, the catcher or any infielder handles a batted ball and puts out a preceding runner who is attempting to advance one base or to return to his original base, or would have put out such runner with ordinary effort except for a fielding error. The official scorer shall charge the batter with an at-bat but not a hit;
(4) fielder fails in an attempt to put out a preceding runner and, in the scorer's judgment, the batter-runner could have been put out at first base; or
Rule 10.05(b) Comment: Rule 10.05(b) shall not apply if the fielder merely looks toward or feints toward another base before attempting to make the putout at first base.
(5) runner is called out for interference with a fielder attempting to field a batted ball, unless in the scorer's judgment the batter-runner would have been safe had the interference not occurred.
See also
List of Major League Baseball hit records
List of Major League Baseball progressive career hits leaders
List of Nippon Professional Baseball career hits leaders
List of KBO Career Hits leaders
List of Major League Baseball career hits leaders
3,000 hit club
References
Category:Batting statistics
Category:Baseball rules | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hit_(baseball) | 2025-04-05T18:26:34.930714 |
3808 | On-base percentage | In baseball statistics, on-base percentage (OBP) measures how frequently a batter reaches base. An official Major League Baseball (MLB) statistic since 1984, it is sometimes referred to as on-base average (OBA), as it is rarely presented as a true percentage.
Generally defined as "how frequently a batter reaches base per plate appearance", OBP does not credit the batter for reaching base on fielding errors, fielder's choice, uncaught third strikes, fielder's obstruction, or catcher's interference, and deducts from plate appearances a batter intentionally giving himself up in a sacrifice bunt.
OBP is added to slugging average (SLG) to determine on-base plus slugging (OPS).
The OBP of all batters faced by one pitcher or team is referred to as "on-base against".
On-base percentage is calculable for professional teams dating back to the first year of National Association of Professional Base Ball Players competition in 1871, because the component values of its formula have been recorded in box scores ever since.HistoryThe statistic was invented in the late 1940s by Brooklyn Dodgers statistician Allan Roth with then-Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey. In 1954, Rickey, who was then the general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates, was featured in a Life Magazine graphic in which the formula for on-base percentage was shown as the first component of an all-encompassing "offense" equation. However, it was not named as on-base percentage, and there is little evidence that Roth's statistic was taken seriously at the time by the baseball community at large.
On-base percentage became an official MLB statistic in 1984. Its perceived importance jumped after the influential 2003 book Moneyball highlighted Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane's focus on the statistic. Many baseball observers, particularly those influenced by the field of sabermetrics, now consider on-base percentage superior to the statistic traditionally used to measure offensive skill, batting average, which accounts for hits but ignores other ways a batter can reach base.
Overview
Traditionally, players with the best on-base percentages bat as leadoff hitter, unless they are power hitters, who traditionally bat slightly lower in the batting order. The league average for on-base percentage in Major League Baseball has varied considerably over time; at its peak in the late 1990s, it was around .340, whereas it was typically .300 during the dead-ball era. On-base percentage can also vary quite considerably from player to player. The highest career OBP of a batter with more than 3,000 plate appearances is .482 by Ted Williams. The lowest is by Bill Bergen, who had an OBP of .194.
On-base percentage is calculated using this formula:
:<math>OBP = \frac{H+BB+HBP}{AB+BB+HBP+SF}</math>
where
*H = Hits
*BB = Bases on Balls (Walks)
*HBP = Hit By Pitch
*AB = At bat
*SF = Sacrifice fly
In certain unofficial calculations, the denominator is simplified and replaced by Plate Appearance (PA); however, the calculation PAs includes certain infrequent events that will slightly lower the calculated OBP (i.e. catcher's interference, and sacrifice bunts).
| width="450px" | Team(s)
| width="140px" | Year(s)
|-
|1
|Ted Williams
|.4817
|Boston Red Sox
|1939–1942, 1946–1960
|-
|2
|Babe Ruth
|.4740
|Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Boston Braves
|1914–1935
|-
|3
|John McGraw
|.4657
|Baltimore Orioles, St. Louis Cardinals, New York Giants
|1891–1906
|-
|4
|Billy Hamilton
|.4552
|Kansas City Cowboys, Philadelphia Phillies, Boston Beaneaters
|1888–1901
|-
|5
|Lou Gehrig
|.4474
|New York Yankees
|1923–1939
|-
|6
|Barry Bonds
|.4443
|Pittsburgh Pirates, San Francisco Giants
|1986–2007
|-
|7
|Bill Joyce
|.4349
|Brooklyn Ward's Wonders, Boston Reds, Brooklyn Grooms, Washington Senators, New York Giants
|1890–1898
|-
|8
|Rogers Hornsby
|.4337
|St. Louis Cardinals, New York Giants, Boston Braves, Chicago Cubs, St. Louis Browns
|1915–1937
|-
|9
|Ty Cobb
|.4330
|Detroit Tigers, Philadelphia Athletics
|1905–1928
|-
|10
|Jimmie Foxx
|.4283
|Philadelphia Athletics, Boston Red Sox, Chicago Cubs, Philadelphia Phillies
|1925–1942, 1944–1945
|-
|11
|Tris Speaker
|.4279
|Boston Red Sox, Cleveland Indians, Washington Senators, Philadelphia Athletics
|1907–1928
|-
|12
||Eddie Collins
|.4244
|Philadelphia Athletics, Chicago White Sox
|1906–1930
|}
Single-season leaders
{| class"wikitable" style"border-collapse: collapse;"
|- bgcolor"#E3E3E3" align"center"
| width="12px" | #
| width="135px" | Player
| width"60px" | OBP
| width="175px" | Team
| width="70px" | Year
|-
|1
|Barry Bonds
|.6094
|San Francisco Giants
|2004
|-
|2
|Barry Bonds
|.5817
|San Francisco Giants
|2002
|-
|3
|Ted Williams
|.5528
|Boston Red Sox
|1941
|-
|4
|John McGraw
|.5475
|Baltimore Orioles
|1899
|-
|5
|Babe Ruth
|.5445
|New York Yankees
|1923
|-
|6
|Babe Ruth
|.5319
|New York Yankees
|1920
|-
|7
|Barry Bonds
|.5291
|San Francisco Giants
|2003
|-
|8
|Ted Williams
|.5256
|Boston Red Sox
|1957
|-
|9
|Billy Hamilton
|.5209
|Philadelphia Phillies
|1894
|-
|10
|Babe Ruth
|.5156
|New York Yankees
|1926
|}
See also
*List of Major League Baseball career on-base percentage leaders
*Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game
Notes
References
Category:Batting statistics
Category:Baseball terminology
Category:Percentages | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-base_percentage | 2025-04-05T18:26:34.945481 |
3809 | Sacrifice fly | In baseball, a sacrifice fly (sometimes abbreviated to sac fly) is defined by Rule 9.08(d):
"Score a sacrifice fly when, before two are out, the batter hits a ball in flight handled by an outfielder or an infielder running in the outfield in fair or foul territory that
is caught, and a run scores after the catch, or
is dropped, and a runner scores, if in the scorer's judgment the runner could have scored after the catch had the fly ball been caught."
They are so named because the batter allows a teammate to score a run, while "sacrificing" their ability to do so. They are traditionally recorded in box scores with the designation "SF".
Rules
As addressed within Rule 9.02(a)(1) of the Official Baseball Rules
The sacrifice fly is credited even if another runner is put out, so long as the run scores. The sacrifice fly is credited on a dropped ball even if another runner is forced out by reason of the batter becoming a runner.
Records
The most sacrifice flies by a team in one game in Major League Baseball (MLB) is five; the record was established by the Seattle Mariners in 1988, tied by the Colorado Rockies in 2006, and tied again by the Mariners in 2008.
Five MLB teams have collected three sacrifice flies in an inning: the Chicago White Sox (fifth inning, July 1, 1962, against the Cleveland Indians); the New York Yankees twice (fourth inning, June 29, 2000, against the Detroit Tigers and third inning, August 19, 2000, against the Anaheim Angels); the New York Mets (second inning, June 24, 2005, against the Yankees); and the Houston Astros (seventh inning, June 26, 2005, against the Texas Rangers). In these cases one or more of the flies did not result in a putout due to an error.
Since the rule was reinstated in its present form in MLB in 1954, Gil Hodges of the Dodgers holds the record for most sacrifice flies in one season with 19, in 1954; Eddie Murray holds the MLB record for most sacrifice flies in a career with 128.
MLB season, the ten players with the most career sacrifice flies are:
Eddie Murray (128)
Cal Ripken Jr. (127)
Robin Yount (123) Albert Pujols (123) Hank Aaron (121) Frank Thomas (121) George Brett (120) Rubén Sierra (120) Rafael Palmeiro (119) Rusty Staub (119)
History
Batters have not been charged with a time at-bat for a sacrifice hit since 1893, but baseball has changed the sacrifice fly rule multiple times. The sacrifice fly as a statistical category was instituted in 1908, only to be discontinued in 1931. The rule was again adopted in 1939, only to be eliminated again in 1940, before being adopted for the last time in 1954. For some baseball fans, it is significant that the sacrifice-fly rule was eliminated in 1940 because, in 1941, Ted Williams was hitting .39955 on the last day of the season and needed one hit in a doubleheader against the Philadelphia A's to become the first hitter since Bill Terry in 1930 to hit .400. He got six hits, finishing with an official .406 average, the last player in over 80 years to bat .400 or more in the American or National League. In his book Baseball and Other Matters in 1941 author Robert Creamer, citing estimates, points out that if Williams' 14 at-bats on sacrifice flies that year were deducted from the 456 official at-bats he was charged with, his final average in 1941 would have been .419.
References
External links
MLB Official Rules from the Major League Baseball website
Baseball Rules Chronology, from Baseball Library
The Sacrifice Fly, from the SABR web site (Research Journals Archive)
Category:Baseball plays
Category:Batting (baseball) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacrifice_fly | 2025-04-05T18:26:34.962810 |
3810 | On-base plus slugging | On-base plus slugging (OPS) is a sabermetric baseball statistic calculated as the sum of a player's on-base percentage and slugging percentage. The ability of a player both to get on base and to hit for power, two important offensive skills, are represented. An OPS of .800 or higher in Major League Baseball puts the player in the upper echelon of hitters. Typically, the league leader in OPS will score near, and sometimes above, the 1.000 mark.
Equation
The basic equation is
OPS = OBP + SLG \,
where OBP is on-base percentage and SLG is slugging average. These averages are defined below as:
OBP = \frac{H+BB+HBP} {AB+BB+SF+HBP}
- the numerator "H + BB + HBP" effectively means "number of trips to first base at least"
- the denominator "AB + BB + SF + HBP" effectively means "total plate appearances", but does not include sacrifice bunts
This is because though a batter makes a trip to the plate he is not given an "AB" when he walks (BB or HBP) or when he hits the ball into play and is called out, but the action allows a run to score (SF). As a result, the 4 counts (AB + BB + SF +HBP) are needed to calculate a batter's total trips to the plate.
and
SLG = \frac{TB} {AB}
where:
H = hits
BB = bases on balls
HBP = times hit by pitch
AB = at bats
SF = sacrifice flies
TB = total bases
In one equation, OPS can be represented as:
OPS = \frac{AB*(H+BB+HBP)+TB*(AB+BB+SF+HBP)}{AB*(AB+BB+SF+HBP)}
History
On-base plus slugging was first popularized in 1984 by John Thorn and Pete Palmer's book, The Hidden Game of Baseball. The New York Times then began carrying the leaders in this statistic in its weekly "By the Numbers" box, a feature that continued for four years. Baseball journalist Peter Gammons used and evangelized the statistic, and other writers and broadcasters picked it up. The popularity of OPS gradually spread, and by 2004 it began appearing on Topps baseball cards.
OPS was formerly sometimes known as production. For instance, production was included in early versions of Thorn's Total Baseball encyclopedia, and in the Strat-O-Matic Computer Baseball game. This term has fallen out of use.
OPS gained popularity because of the availability of its components, OBP and SLG, and that team OPS correlates well with team runs scored.
An OPS scale
Bill James, in his essay titled "The 96 Families of Hitters" uses seven different categories for classification by OPS:
Category Classification OPS range A Great .9000 and higher B Very good .8334 to .8999 C Above average .7667 to .8333 D Average .7000 to .7666 E Below average .6334 to .6999 F Poor .5667 to .6333 G Very poor .5666 and lower
This effectively transforms OPS into a seven-point ordinal scale. Substituting quality labels such as excellent (A), very good (B), good (C), average (D), fair (E), poor (F) and very poor (G) for the A–G categories creates a subjective reference for OPS values.
Leaders
The top ten Major League Baseball players in lifetime OPS, with at least 3,000 plate appearances , were:
Babe Ruth, 1.1636
Ted Williams, 1.1155
Lou Gehrig, 1.0798
Oscar Charleston, 1.0632
Barry Bonds, 1.0512
Jimmie Foxx, 1.0376
Turkey Stearnes, 1.0340
Mule Suttles, 1.0276
Hank Greenberg, 1.0169
Rogers Hornsby, 1.0103
The top five were all left-handed batters. Jimmie Foxx has the highest career OPS for a right-handed batter.
The top ten single-season performances in MLB are:
Josh Gibson, 1.4744 ()
Josh Gibson, 1.4271 ()
Barry Bonds, 1.4217 ()
Charlie Smith, 1.4214 ()
Barry Bonds, 1.3807 ()
Babe Ruth, 1.3791 ()
Barry Bonds, 1.3785 ()
Babe Ruth, 1.3586 ()
Mule Suttles, 1.3489 ()
Mule Suttles, 1.3247 ()
Gibson holds the highest single-season OPS for a right-hander, while Barry Bonds holds the record for a left-hander. Since 1944, the highest single-season OPS for a right-hander is 1.2224 by Mark McGwire in , which was 28th all-time.
Adjusted OPS (OPS+)
OPS+, adjusted OPS, is a closely related statistic. OPS+ is OPS adjusted for the park and the league in which the player played. An OPS+ of 100 is defined to be the league average. An OPS+ of 150 or more is excellent and 125 very good, while an OPS+ of 75 or below is poor.
The basic equation for OPS+ is
OPS+ = 100 * (\frac{OBP} {*lgOBP} + \frac{SLG} {*lgSLG} - 1)
where *lgOBP is the park-adjusted OBP of the league and *lgSLG is the park-adjusted SLG of the league.
A common misconception is that OPS+ closely matches the ratio of a player's OPS to that of their league. In fact, due to the additive nature of the two components in OPS+, a player with an OBP and SLG both 50% better than the league average in those metrics will have an OPS+ of 200 (twice the league average OPS+) while still having an OPS that is only 50% better than the average OPS of the league. It would be a better (although not exact) approximation to say that a player with an OPS+ of 150 produces 50% more runs, in a given set of plate appearances than a player with an OPS+ of 100 (though see clarification above, under "History").
Leaders in OPS+
Through the end of the 2024 season, the career top twenty leaders in OPS+ (minimum 3,000 plate appearances) were:
Babe Ruth, 206
Ted Williams, 191
Oscar Charleston, 184
Barry Bonds, 182
Lou Gehrig, 179
Turkey Stearnes, 177
Rogers Hornsby, 175
Aaron Judge, 173
Mike Trout, 173
Mickey Mantle, 172
Mule Suttles, 172
Dan Brouthers, 171
Joe Jackson, 170
Ty Cobb, 168
Pete Browning, 163
Jimmie Foxx, 163
Mark McGwire, 163
Dave Orr, 162
Juan Soto, 160
Hank Greenberg, 159
Stan Musial, 159
The only purely right-handed batters to appear on this list are Hornsby, Judge, Trout, Suttles, Browning, Foxx, McGwire, Orr, and Greenberg. Mantle is the only switch-hitter in the group.
The top ten single-season performances were:
Josh Gibson, 281 ()
Josh Gibson, 273 ()
Barry Bonds, 268 ()
Barry Bonds, 263 ()
Barry Bonds, 259 ()
Fred Dunlap, 256 () *
Babe Ruth, 255 ()
Mule Suttles, 253 ()
Oscar Charleston, 251 ()
Josh Gibson, 251 ()
* Fred Dunlap's historic 1884 season came in the Union Association, which some baseball experts consider not to be a true major league. If Dunlap's seasons was to be eliminated from the list, Charleston's 1921 season would be on the list.
Criticism
Despite its simple calculation, OPS is a controversial measurement. OPS weighs on-base percentage and slugging percentage equally. However, on-base percentage correlates better with scoring runs. Statistics such as wOBA build on this distinction using linear weights. Additionally, the components of OPS are not typically equal (league-average slugging percentages are usually 75–100 points higher than league-average on-base percentages). As a point of reference, the OPS for all of Major League Baseball in 2024 was .711.
See also
Sabermetrics
Gross production average
Notes
References
Category:Batting statistics | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-base_plus_slugging | 2025-04-05T18:26:34.981240 |
3811 | Stolen base | thumb|The all-time stolen base leader, Rickey Henderson, steals third base in 1988.
In baseball, a stolen base occurs when a runner advances to a base unaided by other actions and the official scorer rules that the advance should be credited to the action of the runner. The umpires determine whether the runner is safe or out at the next base, but the official scorer rules on the question of credit or blame for the advance under Rule 10 (Rules of Scoring) of the MLB's Official Rules.
A stolen base most often occurs when a base runner advances to the next base while the pitcher is pitching the ball to home plate.
Successful base stealers must be fast and have good timing.
Background
Ned Cuthbert, playing for the Philadelphia Keystones in either 1863 or 1865, was the first player to steal a base in a baseball game, although the term stolen base was not used until 1870. For a time in the 19th century, stolen bases were credited when a baserunner reached an extra base on a base hit from another player. many of which would not have counted under modern rules. Modern steal rules were fully implemented in 1898.
thumb|Graph depicting the yearly number of home runs (blue line) and stolen bases (pink line) per MLB game. The two primary periods in which the stolen base was popular were before 1920 and again in the 1970s and 1980s.|500px
Base stealing was popular in the game's early decades, with speedsters such as Ty Cobb and Clyde Milan stealing nearly 100 bases in a season. But the tactic fell into relative disuse after Babe Ruth introduced the era of the home run – in 1955, for example, no one in baseball stole more than 25 bases, and Dom DiMaggio won the AL stolen base title in 1950 with just 15. However, in the late 1950s and early 1960s, base-stealing was brought back to prominence primarily by Luis Aparicio and Maury Wills, who broke Cobb's modern single-season record by stealing 104 bases in 1962. Wills’ record was broken in turn by Lou Brock in 1974 and Rickey Henderson in 1982. The stolen base remained a popular tactic through the 1980s, perhaps best exemplified by Vince Coleman and the St. Louis Cardinals, but began to decline again in the 1990s as the frequency of home runs reached record heights and the steal-friendly artificial turf ballparks began to disappear.
Base stealing is an important characteristic of the "small ball" managing style (or "manufacturing runs"). Such managers emphasize "doing the little things" (including risky running plays like base-stealing) to advance runners and score runs, often relying on pitching and defense to keep games close. The Los Angeles Dodgers of the 1960s, led by pitcher Sandy Koufax and speedy shortstop Maury Wills, were a successful example of this style. The antithesis of this is reliance on power hitting, exemplified by the Baltimore Orioles of the 1970s, which aspired to score most of its runs via home runs. Often the "small ball" model is associated with the National League, while power hitting is associated with the American League. However, some successful recent American League teams, including the 2002 Anaheim Angels, the 2001 Seattle Mariners, the 2005 Chicago White Sox, and the 2015 Kansas City Royals, have excelled at "small ball." The Royals in particular embodied this style within the last decade, leading the league in stolen bases but finishing last in home runs in 2013 and 2014, leading to a berth in two consecutive World Series, one of which they won. Successful teams often combine both styles, with speedy runners complementing power hitters—such as the 2005 White Sox, who hit 200 home runs, which was fifth most in the majors, and had 137 stolen bases, which was fourth.
Base-stealing technique
Baseball's Rule 8 (The Pitcher) specifies the pitching procedure in detail. For example, in the Set Position, the pitcher must "com[e] to a complete stop"; thereafter, "any natural motion associated with his delivery of the ball to the batter commits him to the pitch without alteration or interruption." A runner intending to "steal on the pitcher" breaks for the next base the moment the pitcher commits to pitch to home plate. The pitcher cannot abort the pitch and try to put the runner out; this is a balk under Rule 8.
If the runner breaks too soon (before the pitcher is obliged to complete a pitch), the pitcher may throw to a base rather than pitch, and the runner may be tagged out between the bases. Past this moment, any delay in the runner's break makes it more likely that the catcher, after receiving the pitch, will be able to throw the runner out at the destination base.
Before the pitch, the runner takes a lead, walking several steps away from the base as a head start toward the next base. Even a runner who does not intend to steal takes a secondary lead of a few more steps, once the pitcher has legally committed to complete the pitch.
The pitcher may throw to the runner's base. The runner must return to that base or risk being tagged out. As well as putting the runner out, an underlying goal is to dissuade the runner from too big a lead; that is, to hold the runner on the original base. (Historically, this gambit could be used without limit. An MLB rules change in 2023 limited the pitcher to two throws; the pitcher must then pitch to the batter.)
The more adept base stealers are proficient at reading the pickoff, meaning that they can detect certain tells (tell-tale signs) in a pitcher's pre-pitch movements or mannerisms that indicate the pickoff attempt is or is not imminent. For example, one experienced base stealer noted that careless pitchers dig the toes of their back foot into the ground when they are about to pitch in order to get a better push off, but when they intend to turn and throw a pickoff, they do not.
If a batted ball is caught on the fly, the runner must return to his original base. In this case, a runner trying to steal is more likely to be caught off his original base, resulting in a double play. This is a minor risk of a steal attempt. It is offset by the fact that a ground ball double play is less likely.
Plays involving baserunning
In the hit-and-run play, coaches coordinate the actions of runner and batter. The runner tries to steal and the batter swings at almost any pitch, if only to distract the catcher. If the batter makes contact, the runner has a greater chance of reaching the next base; if the batter gets a base hit, the runner will likely be able to take an extra base. If the batter fails to hit the ball, the hit-and-run becomes a pure steal attempt.
The less common cousin to the hit and run is the "run and hit" play. In the run and hit, the base runner attempts to advance when the pitcher commits the pitch to home plate, but the batter is instead directed to exercise his judgement as to whether or not to swing at the pitch. If the batter feels it is not advantageous to swing, AND he believes the base runner is very likely to succeed in the steal attempt, he does not swing. This play is typically utilized with elite base stealers and skilled batters only, wherein a highly experienced batsman is trusted to decide whether or not to "protect" the base runner. If the batter chooses not to swing, it becomes a pure steal attempt.
In the delayed steal, the runner does not take advantage of the pitcher's duty to complete a pitch, but relies on surprise and takes advantage of any complacency by the fielders. The runner gives the impression he is not trying to steal, and does not break for the next base until the ball crosses the plate. It is rare for Major League defenses to be fooled, but the play is used effectively at the college level. The first delayed steal on record was performed by Miller Huggins in 1903. The delayed steal was famously practiced by Eddie Stanky of the Brooklyn Dodgers.
Second base is the base most often stolen, because once a runner is on second base he is considered to be in scoring position, meaning that he is expected to be able to run home and score on most routine singles hit into the outfield. Steals of home are not officially recorded statistics, and must be researched through individual game accounts. Thus Cobb's totals may be even greater than is recorded. In a variation on the steal of home, the batter is signaled to simultaneously execute a sacrifice bunt, which results in the squeeze play. The suicide squeeze is a squeeze in which the runner on third begins to steal home without seeing the outcome of the bunt; it is so named because if the batter fails to bunt, the runner will surely be out. In contrast, when the runner on third does not commit until seeing that the ball is bunted advantageously, it is called a safety squeeze.
In more recent years, most steals of home involve a delayed double steal, in which a runner on first attempts to steal second, while the runner on third breaks for home as soon as the catcher throws to second base. If it is important to prevent the run from scoring, the catcher may hold on to the ball (conceding the steal of second) or may throw to the pitcher; this may deceive the runner at third and the pitcher may throw back to the catcher for the out.
Statistics
thumb|Tim Locastro steals second base for the Oklahoma City Dodgers during a 2017 game
In baseball statistics, stolen bases are denoted by "SB". Attempts to steal that result in the baserunner being out are caught stealing ("CS"). The sum of these statistics is steal attempts. Successful steals as a percentage of total steal attempts is called the success rate.
The rule on stolen bases states that:
Advances that are credited to some other play are not steal attempts. For example, on a wild pitch or a passed ball, the official scorer must notice whether the runner broke for the next base before the pitch got away.
As usual, statistics in the case of a defensive error are based on error-free play. If a runner would have been out, but for the error, it is scored as "caught stealing, safe on the error." A catcher does not commit an error by throwing poorly to the destination base, but if any runner takes an extra base on the bad throw, it is "stolen base plus error."
There is no steal attempt on a dead ball, whether the runner is sent back to the original base (as on a foul ball) or is awarded the next base (as on a hit batsman). On a base award when the ball is live (such as a walk), the runner could make a steal attempt beyond the base awarded.
Cases where the defense intentionally allows the runner to advance without attempting to put him out are scored as defensive indifference, also called fielder's indifference, and do not count as stolen bases. This is usually only scored late in games when it is clear that the defense's priority is getting the batter out. The lack of a putout attempt does not by itself indicate defensive indifference; the official scorer must also factor in the game situation and the defensive players' actions.
Relative skill at stealing bases can be judged by evaluating either a player's total number of steals or the success rate. Noted statistician Bill James has argued that unless a player has a high success rate (67–70% or better), attempting to steal a base is detrimental to a team.
Comparing skill against players from other eras is problematic, because the definition has not been constant. Caught stealing was not recorded regularly until the middle of the 20th century. Ty Cobb, for example, was known as a great base-stealer, with 892 steals and a success rate of over 83%. However, the data on Cobb's caught stealing is missing from 12 seasons, strongly suggesting he was unsuccessful many more times than his stats indicate. Carlos Beltrán, with 286 steals, has the highest career success rate of all players with over 300 stolen base attempts, at 88.3%.
Evolution of rules and scoring
thumb|right|"Abbot Nailing the First Steal Attempded on Swayne Field" 1909
thumb|Lastings Milledge steals a base.
The first mention of the stolen base as a statistic was in the 1877 scoring rules adopted by the National League, which noted credit toward a player's total bases when a base is stolen. It was not until 1886 that the stolen base appeared as something to be tracked, but was only to "appear in the summary of the game".
In 1887, the stolen base was given its own individual statistical column in the box score, and was defined for purposes of scoring: "... every base made after first base has been reached by a base runner, except for those made by reason of or with the aid of a battery error (wild pitch or passed ball), or by batting, balks or by being forced off. In short, shall include all bases made by a clean steal, or through a wild throw or muff of the ball by a fielder who is directly trying to put the base runner out while attempting to steal." The next year, it was clarified that any attempt to steal must be credited to the runner, and that fielders committing errors during this play must also be charged with an error. This rule also clarified that advancement of another base(s) beyond the one being stolen is not credited as a stolen base on the same play, and that an error is charged to the fielder who permitted the extra advancement. There was clarification that a runner is credited with a steal if the attempt began before a battery error. Finally, batters were credited with a stolen base if they were tagged out after over running the base.
1904 saw an attempt to reduce the already wordy slew of rules governing stolen bases, with the stolen base now credited when "the advances a base unaided by a base hit, a put out, (or) a fielding or batter error."
1910 saw the first addressing of the double and triple steal attempts. Under the new rule, when any runner is thrown out, and the other(s) are successful, the successful runners will not be credited with a stolen base.
1931 saw a further narrowing of the criteria for awarding a stolen base. Power was given to the official scorer, in the event of a muff by the catcher in throwing, that in the judgment of the scorer the runner would have been out, to credit the catcher with an error, and not credit the runner with a stolen base. Further, any successful steal on a play resulting in a wild pitch, passed ball, or balk would no longer be credited as a steal, even if the runner had started to steal before the play. The stolen base was specifically to be credited "to a runner whenever he advances one base unaided by a base hit, a putout, a forceout, a fielder's choice, a passed ball, a wild pitch, or a balk."
There were noted exceptions, such as denying a stolen base to an otherwise successful steal as a part of a double or triple steal, if one other runner was thrown out in the process.
The criteria for "caught stealing" were fine-tuned in 1979, with a runner being charged with being caught if he is put out while trying to steal, overslides a base (otherwise successfully stolen), or is picked off a base and tries to advance to the next base. It is explicitly not caught stealing to be put out after a wild pitch or passed ball. In addition, the bases were enlarged from to , making stealing slightly easier.
In baseball's earlier decades, a runner on second base could "steal" first base, perhaps with the intention of drawing a throw that might allow a runner on third to score (a tactic famously employed by Germany Schaefer). However, such a tactic was not recorded as a stolen base. MLB rules now forbid running clockwise on the basepaths to "confuse the defense or make a travesty of the game". Further, after the pitcher assumes the pitching position, runners cannot return to any previous base.
In a game on August 16, 1987, Toronto Blue Jays center fielder Lloyd Moseby successfully stole second base on a throwing error by Chicago White Sox catcher Carlton Fisk that went well into center field. However, shortstop Ozzie Guillen faked as if the batter had hit a popfly, which would have required Moseby to return to first base to avoid getting doubled off. Moseby made it back to first base, but another throwing error sent the ball to the infield wall, giving Moseby another chance to steal second, which he did. This chaos led the announcer to say, "He doesn't know where the throw is; he's going back to first base! Is he going to steal first? He steals first! Now he's going to steal second again! I've never seen it before!" This bizarre play was officially scored as a baserunner advancing on a throwing error by the center fielder, ironically resulting in neither a stolen base awarded nor an error charged to the catcher.
In a game on April 19, 2013, Milwaukee Brewers shortstop Jean Segura stole second base in the bottom of the eighth inning. After the batter up, Ryan Braun, walked, Segura broke early for third base and the pitcher, Shawn Camp of the Chicago Cubs, threw ahead of him. As Segura was chased back to second base, Braun advanced to second as well and was tagged out. Segura, thinking he was out, began to return to the home dugout behind first base, but first base coach Garth Iorg directed him to stand at first. Segura had not intentionally run the bases backwards as a deception or mockery, but no fielder tried to tag him out. Later in the inning, he attempted to steal second for the second time, but was thrown out by catcher Welington Castillo.
The expression "You can't steal first base" is sometimes used in reference to a player who is fast but not very good at getting on base in the first place.
Former Pittsburgh Pirates and Seattle Mariners manager Lloyd McClendon is jokingly referred to as having "stolen first" in a June 26, 2001, game as the manager of the Pirates: after being ejected for disputing a call at first base, he yanked the base out of the ground and left the field with it, delaying the game. Of the incident, McClendon said "I told him he wasn't using it, so I thought I'd take it." When a groundskeeper came out to replace the bag, the crowd booed him.
The independent Atlantic League instituted a new rule for the second half of the 2019 season, allowing batters to become runners on any pitch not "caught in flight" by the catcher, as they can throughout baseball after most uncaught third strikes. On July 13, 2019, outfielder Tony Thomas of the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs became the first player to reach first base under this rule. The press described this as "stealing first base", though it is scored as described above.
See also
Lead off
Stolen base percentage
List of Major League Baseball career stolen bases leaders
List of Major League Baseball annual stolen base leaders
List of Major League Baseball stolen base records
List of KBO career stolen bases leaders
List of CPBL stolen bases champions
Stolen run (cricket)
References
External links
Baseball Almanac – List of MLB career leaders for stolen bases
Sports Illustrated – The 10 most significant steals of home in MLB history
Category:Baserunning statistics
Category:Baseball terminology | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_base | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.007916 |
3812 | Plate appearance | thumb|right|200px|Jimmy Rollins holds the single season record for most plate appearances, at 778
In baseball, a player is credited with a plate appearance (denoted by PA) each time he completes a turn batting. Under Rule 5.04(c) of the Official Baseball Rules, a player completes a turn batting when he is put out or becomes a runner. This happens when he strikes out or is declared out before reaching first base; or when he reaches first base safely or is awarded first base (by a base on balls, hit by pitch, catcher's interference, or obstruction); or when he hits a fair ball which causes a preceding runner to be put out for the third out before he himself is put out or reaches first base safely (see also left on base, fielder's choice, force play). A very similar baseball statistic, at bats, counts a subset of plate appearances that end under certain circumstances.
Use as batting record qualifier
At bats - rather than plate appearances - are used to calculate batting averages, slugging percentages. However, starting in 1957, at season's end a player must have accumulated a minimum number of plate appearances during a season to be ranked as a league-leader in certain statistical categories. For batting championships in MLB, this number is 3.1 plate appearances multiplied by the number of scheduled games in a season, rounded up or down to the nearest whole number. As of 2024, with a 162-game regular season, this means 502 plate appearances are required to qualify. A lesser criterion applies in the minor leagues, with 2.7 plate appearances per game required to qualify. There is, however, an exception:
Exception for batting titles
Rule 9.22(a) of the Official Baseball Rules make a single allowance to the minimum requirement of 502 plate appearances for the purposes of determining the batting, slugging or on-base percentage title. If a player:
leads the league in one of the statistics;
does not have the required 502 plate appearances; and
would still lead the league in that statistic if as many at bats (without hits or reaching base) were added to his records as necessary to meet the requirement,
he will win that title, but with his original statistic (before the extra at bats were added).
In the example above, Player B is 12 plate appearances short of the required 502, but were he be charged with 12 additional unproductive at bats, he would go 110-for-412 for a batting average of .267. If no one else has a batting average (similarly modified if appropriate) higher than .267, player B will be awarded the batting title (with his original batting average of .275) despite the lack of 502 plate appearances.
In a real-life example, in 2012, Melky Cabrera, then of the San Francisco Giants, finished the season with a league-high .346 batting average, but he had only 501 plate appearances, one short of the required 502. Per the rule, he would have won the batting title because after an extra at bat is added and his batting average recalculated, he still would have led the league in batting average. Cabrera's case, however, turned out differently. The reason Cabrera finished the season with only 501 plate appearances was because he was suspended in mid-August when he tested positive for illegal performance-enhancing drugs. Cabrera was still eligible for that extra at bat, but he requested that the extra at bat not be added to his total, and that he not be considered for the batting crown, because he admitted that his use of performance-enhancing drugs had given him an unfair advantage over other players. As a result, Cabrera's name is nowhere to be found on the list of 2012 National League batting leaders.
Scoring
A batter is not credited with a plate appearance if, while batting, a preceding runner is put out on the basepaths for the third out in a way other than by the batter putting the ball into play (i.e., picked off, caught stealing). In this case, the same batter continues his turn batting in the next inning with no balls or strikes against him.
A batter is not credited with a plate appearance if, while batting, the game ends as the winning run scores from third base on a balk, stolen base, wild pitch or passed ball.
A batter may or may not be credited with a plate appearance (and possibly at bat) in the rare instance when he is replaced by a pinch hitter after having already started his turn at bat. Under Rule 9.15(b), the pinch hitter would receive the plate appearance (and potential of an at-bat) unless the original batter is replaced when having 2 strikes against him and the pinch hitter subsequently completes the strikeout, in which case the plate appearance and at-bat are charged to the first batter.
Relation to at bat
Under Official Baseball Rule 9.02(a)(1), an at bat results from a completed plate appearance, unless the batter:
hits a sacrifice bunt or sacrifice fly; or
is awarded first base on four called balls; or
is hit by a pitched ball; or
is awarded first base because of interference or obstruction.
In common parlance, the term "at bat" is sometimes used to mean "plate appearance" (for example, "he fouled off the ball to keep the at bat alive"). The intent is usually clear from the context, although the term "official at bat" is sometimes used to explicitly refer to an at bat as distinguished from a plate appearance. However, terms such as turn at bat or time at bat are synonymous with plate appearance.
"Time at bat" in the rulebook
Official Baseball Rule 5.06(c) provides that "[a] batter has legally completed his time at bat when he is put out or becomes a runner" (emphasis added). The "time at bat" defined in this rule is more commonly referred to as a plate appearance, and the playing rules (Rules 1 through 8) uses the phrase "time at bat" in this sense (e.g. Rule 5.04(a)(3), which states that "[t]he first batter in each inning after the first inning shall be the player whose name follows that of the last player who legally completed his time at bat in the preceding inning" (emphasis added)). In contrast, the scoring rules uses the phrase "time at bat" to refer to the statistic at bat, defined in Rule 9.02(a)(1), but sometimes uses the phrase "official time at bat" or refers back to Rule 9.02(a)(1) when mentioning the statistic. The phrase "plate appearance" is used in Rules 9.22 and 9.23 dealing with batting titles and hitting streaks, and in Rule 5.10(g) Comment in relation to the Three-Batter Minimum: "[t]o qualify as one of three consecutive batters, the batter must complete his plate appearance, which ends only when the batter is put out or becomes a runner." (emphasis added) The term is not elsewhere defined in the rulebook.
In on-base percentage
Plate appearances are a primary component in calculating on-base percentage (OBP), an alternative measurement of a player's offensive performance, but are not the only one in determining its denominator.
By rule, certain plate appearances, such as times reached base via either catcher's interference or fielder's obstruction or sacrifice bunts, are excluded from it, leaving the denominator determined instead as the sum of at-bats, walks, hit-by-pitches, and sacrifice flies. And the numerator represented by a batter's times on base (composed of the sum of hits, base on balls, and times hit by pitch).
Other uses
Plate appearances are used by scorers for "proving" a box score. Under Rule 9.03(c), the following two items should be equal for each team, because each is equal to the team's total number of plate appearances:
The sum of the team's at bats, walks, hit by pitches, sacrifices (both bunts and flies), and times awarded first base on interference or obstruction.
The sum of the team's runs, runners left on base, and men put out.
Major League Baseball leaders
References
Category:Batting statistics | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_appearance | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.013961 |
3814 | Games played | Games played (GP) is a statistic used in team sports to indicate the total number of games in which a player has participated (in any capacity); the statistic is generally applied irrespective of whatever portion of the game is contested.
Association football
In association football, a game played is counted if a player is in the starting 11, or if a reserve player enters the game before full-time.
Baseball
In baseball, the statistic applies to players, who prior to a game, are included on a starting lineup card or are announced as an ex ante substitute, whether or not they play. For pitchers only, the statistic games pitched is used.
A notable example of the application of the above rule is pitcher Larry Yount, who suffered an injury while throwing warmup pitches after being summoned as a reliever in a Major League Baseball (MLB) game on September 15, 1971. He did not face a batter, but was credited with an appearance because he had been announced as a substitute. Yount never appeared in (or actually played in) any other MLB game.
Basketball
Robert Parish has the NBA record for most regular season games played, with 1,611. A. C. Green has the NBA record for most consecutive games played, with 1,192.
See also
Major League Baseball consecutive games played streaks
List of NHL players with 500 consecutive games played
References
Category:Baseball statistics | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Games_played | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.016813 |
3817 | Boogie Down Productions | }}
| associated_acts = Stop the Violence Movement, Heather B., Ms. Melodie
| website | past_members * KRS-One
*Ms. Melodie <small>(deceased) </small>
* Willie Dee (deceased)
* DJ Kenny Parker
* Mad Lion
* Moe
* D-Nice
* Scott La Rock <small>(deceased)</small>
}}
Boogie Down Productions (BDP) was an American hip hop group formed in the Bronx, New York City in 1986. It originally consisted of KRS-One, D-Nice, and DJ Scott La Rock. DJ Scott La Rock was murdered on August 27, 1987, five months after the release of BDP's debut album, Criminal Minded. The name of the group, Boogie Down, derives from a nickname for the South Bronx section of New York City. The group pioneered the fusion of dancehall reggae and hip hop music and their debut LP Criminal Minded contained frank descriptions of life in the South Bronx during the late 1980s, thus setting the stage for what would eventually become Hip Hop.
Members
BDP's membership changed throughout its existence, the only constant being KRS-One. The group was founded by KRS-One and DJ Scott La Rock, with producer Lee Smith, who was essential in the production of the songs on Criminal Minded, being added as a member shortly after.
Cultural influences and impact
"The Bridge Wars"
A conflict arose in the late 1980s concerning the origins of hip-hop, and BDP made conscious efforts in its early work to establish its interpretation of the issue. The origins of hip-hop to many, including BDP, are believed to be from the Bronx. A rival hip-hop collective, known as the Juice Crew's lyrics, were misunderstood to contain a claim in the song "The Bridge" that hip hop was directly a result of artists originating from Queensbridge. Boogie Down and KRS retorted angrily with songs such as "The Bridge is Over" and "South Bronx," which started one of the first notable hip hop wars as MC Shan, Marley Marl, Roxanne Shanté and Blaq Poet all released songs featuring verses personally attacking KRS and Scott La Rock. But the Bridge Wars were short-lived, and after Scott La Rock's death, KRS began to concentrate on socially conscious music.
While Criminal Minded contained vivid descriptions of South Bronx street life, BDP changed after Scott's death. and it was later resampled by artists such as Black Star and dead prez. As an album regarded by many as the start of the gangsta rap movement, Political and social activism From its start, BDP affected the development of hip-hop and gave a sincere voice to the reality of life in the South Bronx, a section of New York City clouded with poverty and crime. With Criminal Minded, the group combined the sounds of LaRock's harsh, spare, reggae-influenced beats and KRS-One's long-winded rhyme style on underground classics such as "9mm Goes Bang" and "South Bronx," the album's gritty portrait of life on the streets (as well as the firearms that adorned its cover) influenced the gangsta rap movement that began in earnest two years later.
BDP's influence in the creation and development of gangsta rap highlights the cultural significance and impact of the type of music BDP and other early hip-hop artists like it created. This subgenre of hip-hop is most closely associated with hard-core hip-hop and is widely misinterpreted as promoting violence and gang activity. This misinterpretation or stigma is closely related to Boogie Down Productions and the general purpose behind their underlying themes of violence. For instance, the cover art of Criminal Minded displays the two artists in the group brandishing drawn guns and displaying other firearms. KRS-One published four more albums under the title Boogie Down Productions, and each was increasingly innovative and expanded from the thuggish imagery of Criminal Minded, exploring themes like black-on-black crime and black radicalism, using a riff on the words of Malcolm X, "by any means necessary", which became the title of the second BDP album, and remains one of the most political hip-hop albums to date. All proceeds from this effort went to the National Urban League. Discography Studio albums
*Criminal Minded (1987)
*By All Means Necessary (1988)
*Ghetto Music: The Blueprint of Hip Hop (1989)
*Edutainment (1990)
*Sex and Violence (1992)
References
Bibliography
* "KRS-One." Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience, Second Edition. Ed. Kwame Anthony Appiah, Henry Louis Gates Jr. New York: Oxford UP, 2008. Oxford African American Studies Center.
External links
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20081118145531/http://www.myspace.com/theboogiedownproductions Myspace Official Music: Boogie Down Productions]
Category:African-American musical groups
Category:Hip-hop collectives
Category:Hip-hop groups from New York City
Category:Jive Records artists
Category:Musical groups established in 1985
Category:Musical groups disestablished in 1992
Category:Musical trios from New York (state)
Category:East Coast hip-hop groups
Category:Hardcore hip-hop groups
Category:1985 establishments in New York City
Category:Musical groups from the Bronx | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boogie_Down_Productions | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.023582 |
3821 | Binary-coded decimal | <!-- parked anchor for redirects -->
might use LEDs to express binary values. In this clock, each column of LEDs shows a binary-coded decimal numeral of the traditional sexagesimal time.]]
In computing and electronic systems, binary-coded decimal (BCD) is a class of binary encodings of decimal numbers where each digit is represented by a fixed number of bits, usually four or eight. Sometimes, special bit patterns are used for a sign or other indications (e.g. error or overflow).
In byte-oriented systems (i.e. most modern computers), the term unpacked BCD byte, with the lower four bits encoding the digit in BCD form. The upper four bits, called the "zone" bits, are usually set to a fixed value so that the byte holds a character value corresponding to the digit, or to values representing plus or minus. EBCDIC systems use a zone value of (), yielding -, the codes for "0" through "9", a zone value of () for positive, yielding -, the codes for "{" through "I" and a zone value of () for negative, yielding -, the codes for the characters "}" through "R". Similarly, ASCII systems use a zone value of 0011 (hex 3), giving character codes 30 to 39 (hex).
For signed zoned decimal values, the rightmost (least significant) zone nibble holds the sign digit, which is the same set of values that are used for signed packed decimal numbers (see above). Thus a zoned decimal value encoded as the hex bytes F1 F2 D3 represents the signed decimal value −123:
F1 F2 D3
1 2 −3
EBCDIC zoned decimal conversion table
<!-- Note that this table should also include codes A0-A9, B0-B9, and E0-E9 for completeness. -->
{| style"margin:auto; width:70%;" class"wikitable"
|-
! style="background:#e0e0e0;"|BCD digit
! style"background:#e0e0e0;" colspan"4"|Hexadecimal
! style"background:#e0e0e0;" colspan"4"|EBCDIC character
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
| style="width:20%; width:12%;"|0+
| style="width:10%; width:11%;"|C0
| style="width:10%; width:11%;"|A0
| style="width:10%; width:11%;"|E0
| style="width:10%; width:11%;"|F0
| style="width:10%; width:11%;"|{ (*)
| style="width:10%; width:11%; background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="width:10%; width:11%;"|\ (*)
| style="width:10%; width:11%;"|0
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||1+
||C1
||A1
||E1
||F1
||A
||~ (*)
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||1
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||2+
||C2
||A2
||E2
||F2
||B
||s
||S
||2
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||3+
||C3
||A3
||E3
||F3
||C
||t
||T
||3
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||4+
||C4
||A4
||E4
||F4
||D
||u
||U
||4
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||5+
||C5
||A5
||E5
||F5
||E
||v
||V
||5
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||6+
||C6
||A6
||E6
||F6
||F
||w
||W
||6
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||7+
||C7
||A7
||E7
||F7
||G
||x
||X
||7
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||8+
||C8
||A8
||E8
||F8
||H
||y
||Y
||8
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||9+
||C9
||A9
||E9
||F9
||I
||z
||Z
||9
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||0−
||D0
||B0
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||} (*)
||^ (*)
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||1−
||D1
||B1
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||J
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||2−
||D2
||B2
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||K
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||3−
||D3
||B3
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||L
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||4−
||D4
||B4
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||M
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||5−
||D5
||B5
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||N
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||6−
||D6
||B6
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||O
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||7−
||D7
||B7
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||P
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||8−
||D8
||B8
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||Q
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|- style="text-align:center; font-family: monospace; font-size: larger"
||9−
||D9
||B9
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
||R
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
| style="background:#f0f0f0;"|
|}
(*) Note: These characters vary depending on the local character code page setting.
Fixed-point zoned decimal
Some languages (such as COBOL and PL/I) directly support fixed-point zoned decimal values, assigning an implicit decimal point at some location between the decimal digits of a number.
For example, given a six-byte signed zoned decimal value with an implied decimal point to the right of the fourth digit, the hex bytes F1 F2 F7 F9 F5 C0 represent the value +1,279.50:
F1 F2 F7 F9 F5 C0
1 2 7 9. 5 +0
Operations with BCD
Addition
It is possible to perform addition by first adding in binary, and then converting to BCD afterwards. Conversion of the simple sum of two digits can be done by adding 6 (that is, 16 − 10) when the five-bit result of adding a pair of digits has a value greater than 9. The reason for adding 6 is that there are 16 possible 4-bit BCD values (since 2<sup>4</sup> = 16), but only 10 values are valid (0000 through 1001). For example:
1001 + 1000 = 10001
9 + 8 = 17
10001 is the binary, not decimal, representation of the desired result, but the most significant 1 (the "carry") cannot fit in a 4-bit binary number. In BCD as in decimal, there cannot exist a value greater than 9 (1001) per digit. To correct this, 6 (0110) is added to the total, and then the result is treated as two nibbles:
10001 + 0110 00010111> 0001 0111
17 + 6 = 23 1 7
The two nibbles of the result, 0001 and 0111, correspond to the digits "1" and "7". This yields "17" in BCD, which is the correct result.
This technique can be extended to adding multiple digits by adding in groups from right to left, propagating the second digit as a carry, always comparing the 5-bit result of each digit-pair sum to 9. Some CPUs provide a half-carry flag to facilitate BCD arithmetic adjustments following binary addition and subtraction operations. The Intel 8080, the Zilog Z80 and the CPUs of the x86 family provide the opcode DAA (Decimal Adjust Accumulator).
Subtraction
Subtraction is done by adding the ten's complement of the subtrahend to the minuend. To represent the sign of a number in BCD, the number 0000 is used to represent a positive number, and 1001 is used to represent a negative number. The remaining 14 combinations are invalid signs. To illustrate signed BCD subtraction, consider the following problem: 357 − 432.
In signed BCD, 357 is 0000 0011 0101 0111. The ten's complement of 432 can be obtained by taking the nine's complement of 432, and then adding one. So, 999 − 432 567, and 567 + 1 568. By preceding 568 in BCD by the negative sign code, the number −432 can be represented. So, −432 in signed BCD is 1001 0101 0110 1000.
Now that both numbers are represented in signed BCD, they can be added together:
0000 0011 0101 0111
0 3 5 7
+ 1001 0101 0110 1000
9 5 6 8
= 1001 1000 1011 1111
9 8 11 15
Since BCD is a form of decimal representation, several of the digit sums above are invalid. In the event that an invalid entry (any BCD digit greater than 1001) exists, 6 is added to generate a carry bit and cause the sum to become a valid entry. So, adding 6 to the invalid entries results in the following:
1001 1000 1011 1111
9 8 11 15
+ 0000 0000 0110 0110
0 0 6 6
= 1001 1001 0010 0101
9 9 2 5
Thus the result of the subtraction is 1001 1001 0010 0101 (−925). To confirm the result, note that the first digit is 9, which means negative. This seems to be correct since 357 − 432 should result in a negative number. The remaining nibbles are BCD, so 1001 0010 0101 is 925. The ten's complement of 925 is 1000 − 925 = 75, so the calculated answer is −75.
If there are a different number of nibbles being added together (such as 1053 − 2), the number with the fewer digits must first be prefixed with zeros before taking the ten's complement or subtracting. So, with 1053 − 2, 2 would have to first be represented as 0002 in BCD, and the ten's complement of 0002 would have to be calculated.
BCD in computers
IBM
IBM used the terms Binary-Coded Decimal Interchange Code (BCDIC, sometimes just called BCD), for 6-bit alphanumeric codes that represented numbers, upper-case letters and special characters. Some variation of BCDIC alphamerics is used in most early IBM computers, including the IBM 1620 (introduced in 1959), IBM 1400 series, and non-decimal architecture members of the IBM 700/7000 series.
The IBM 1400 series are character-addressable machines, each location being six bits labeled B, A, 8, 4, 2 and 1, plus an odd parity check bit (C) and a word mark bit (M). For encoding digits 1 through 9, B and A are zero and the digit value represented by standard 4-bit BCD in bits 8 through 1. For most other characters bits B and A are derived simply from the "12", "11", and "0" "zone punches" in the punched card character code, and bits 8 through 1 from the 1 through 9 punches. A "12 zone" punch set both B and A, an "11 zone" set B, and a "0 zone" (a 0 punch combined with any others) set A. Thus the letter A, which is (12,1) in the punched card format, is encoded (B,A,1). The currency symbol $, (11,8,3) in the punched card, was encoded in memory as (B,8,2,1). This allows the circuitry to convert between the punched card format and the internal storage format to be very simple with only a few special cases. One important special case is digit 0, represented by a lone 0 punch in the card, and (8,2) in core memory. the Motorola 68000 series, The Intel x86 architecture supports a unique 18-digit (ten-byte) BCD format that can be loaded into and stored from the floating point registers, from where computations can be performed.
Alternative encodings
If errors in representation and computation are more important than the speed of conversion to and from display, a scaled binary representation may be used, which stores a decimal number as a binary-encoded integer and a binary-encoded signed decimal exponent. For example, 0.2 can be represented as 2.
This representation allows rapid multiplication and division, but may require shifting by a power of 10 during addition and subtraction to align the decimal points. It is appropriate for applications with a fixed number of decimal places that do not then require this adjustment—particularly financial applications where 2 or 4 digits after the decimal point are usually enough. Indeed, this is almost a form of fixed point arithmetic since the position of the radix point is implied.
The Hertz and Chen–Ho encodings provide Boolean transformations for converting groups of three BCD-encoded digits to and from 10-bit values
}}
References
Further reading
*
* <!-- -->
* and (NB. At least some batches of the Krieger reprint edition were misprints with defective pages 115–146.)
* <!-- <ref name"Massalin_1987_Superoptimizer"> --> (Also: ACM SIGPLAN Notices, Vol. 22 #10, IEEE Computer Society Press #87CH2440-6, October 1987)
**
*
*
*
* Packed-Decimal Converter to and from Binary-Coded-Decimal Format Using in IEEE-754R |author-first1A. |author-last1Kaivani |author-first2A. Zaker |author-last2Alhosseini |author-first3S. |author-last3Gorgin |author-first4M. |author-last4Fazlali |conference9th International Conference on Information Technology (ICIT'06) |pages273–276 |publisherIEEE |dateDecember 2006}}
*
External links
*
*
* [http://www.unitjuggler.com/convert-numbersystems-from-decimal-to-bcd.html Convert BCD to decimal, binary and hexadecimal and vice versa]
* [https://github.com/c-rack/bcd4j BCD for Java]
Category:Computer arithmetic
Category:Numeral systems
Category:Non-standard positional numeral systems
Category:Binary arithmetic
Category:Articles with example C code | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary-coded_decimal | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.172558 |
3822 | BCD | BCD may refer to:
Computing
Binary-coded decimal, a representation of decimal digits in binary
BCD (character encoding), a 6-bit superset of binary-coded decimal derived from the binary encoding of the same name
Boot Configuration Data, the configuration data required to boot Microsoft Windows Vista and later
Bipolar-CMOS-DMOS, a type of BiCMOS semiconductor technology
Organisations
Banque de commerce et de développement, a defunct bank in Burundi
Basnahira Cricket Dundee, a Sri Lankan cricket team
BCD Tofu House, a Los Angeles-based Korean restaurant chain
BCD Travel, a provider of global corporate travel management
Belarusian Christian Democracy, a Christian-democratic political party in Belarus.
Berkshire Country Day School, an independent school in Lenox, Massachusetts, US
Bid Closing Date The closing date for a bid is a specific date (and usually a specific time) when the bid is closed to the public for bid submissions. At this point, only the submitted proposals will be considered eligible.
The British Columbia Dragoons, a Canadian Forces armoured regiment
Battlefield Coordination Detachment, is the senior United States Army liaison element of the Army Air Ground System.
Places
Bacolod–Silay International Airport (IATA code), Silay City, Philippines
Beirut Central District, Beirut, Lebanon
Other uses
Bad conduct discharge, a form of discharge from US military service, sometimes referred to colloquially as a "big chicken dinner".
Barrels per calendar day, a unit for measuring output of oil refineries
Blue compact dwarf galaxy, a small galaxy which contains large clusters of young, hot, massive stars
Board-certified diplomate, in the list of credentials in psychology
Buoyancy control device, in scuba diving
Bolt circle diameter, for example, of a crankset, of a bicycle disc brake, or in wheel sizing
"Behind closed doors", a marketing term for previewing a product to a select audience
See also
BCD in the sugar baby/sugar daddy (SBSD) community means Behind Closed Doors.
BCDS (disambiguation) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BCD | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.177318 |
3823 | Binary | Binary may refer to:
Science and technology
Mathematics
Binary number, a representation of numbers using only two values (0 and 1) for each digit
Binary function, a function that takes two arguments
Binary operation, a mathematical operation that takes two arguments
Binary relation, a relation involving two elements
Finger binary, a system for counting in binary numbers on the fingers of human hands
Computing
Binary code, the representation of text and data using only the digits 1 and 0
Bit, or binary digit, the basic unit of information in computers
Binary file, composed of something other than human-readable text
Executable, a type of binary file that contains machine code for the computer to execute
Binary tree, a computer tree data structure in which each node has at most two children
Binary-coded decimal, a method for encoding for decimal digits in binary sequences
Astronomy
Binary star, a star system with two stars in it
Binary planet, two planetary bodies of comparable mass orbiting each other
Binary asteroid, two asteroids orbiting each other
Biology
Binary fission, the splitting of a single-celled organism into two daughter cells
Chemistry
Binary phase, a chemical compound containing two different chemical elements
Arts and entertainment
Binary (Doctor Who audio)
Marvel Comics
Binary, the name of two superheroines in the Marvel Universe
Binary (Carol Danvers), a Marvel Comics character
Binary (Marvel Cinematic Universe), or Maria Rambeau, a Marvel Cinematic Universe character
Music
Binary form, a way of structuring a piece of music
Binary (Ani DiFranco album), 2017
Binary (Kay Tse album), 2008
"Binary" (song), a 2007 single by Assemblage 23
Novel
Binary (novel), a 1972 novel by Michael Crichton (writing as John Lange)
Binary, an evil organization in the novel InterWorld
Other uses
Binary opposition, polar opposites, often ignoring the middle ground
Gender binary, the classification of gender into two distinct and disconnected forms of masculine and feminine
See also
Binary logic (disambiguation)
Binomial (disambiguation)
Boolean (disambiguation)
Secondary (disambiguation)
Ternary (disambiguation)
Unary (disambiguation) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.181034 |
3826 | Bumin Qaghan | Bumin Qaghan (, also known as Illig Qaghan (Chinese: 伊利可汗, Pinyin: Yīlì Kèhán, Wade–Giles: i-li k'o-han) or Yamï Qaghan (, died 552 AD) was the founder of the Turkic Khaganate. He was the eldest son of Ashina Tuwu (吐務 / 吐务). He was the chieftain of the Turks under the sovereignty of Rouran Khaganate. He is also mentioned as Tumen (, , commander of ten thousand) of the Rouran Khaganate. Early life and reign According to History of Northern Dynasties and Zizhi Tongjian, in 545 Tumen's tribe started to rise and frequently invaded the western frontier of Wei. The chancellor of Western Wei, Yuwen Tai, sent An Nuopanto (安諾盤陀, Nanai-Banda, a Sogdian from Bukhara,) as an emissary to the Göktürk chieftain Tumen, in an attempt to establish a commercial relationship. In 546, Tumen paid tribute to the Western Wei state. Anagui's "blacksmith" (鍛奴 / 锻奴, Pinyin: duàn nú, Wade–Giles: tuan-nu) insult was recorded in Chinese chronicles. Some sources state that members of the Turks (referred as "Tujue" in Chinese sources) did serve as blacksmiths for the Rouran elite, Nevertheless, after this incident Bumin emerged as the leader of the revolt against Rouran.
In 551, Bumin requested a Western Wei princess in marriage. Yuwen Tai permitted it and sent Princess Changle(長樂公主) of Western Wei to Bumin. According to the Bilge Qaghan's memorial complex and the Kul Tigin's memorial complex, Bumin and Istemi ruled people by Turkic laws and they developed them. Death and family
Bumin died within several months after proclaiming himself Illig Qaghan. He was married to Princess Changle of Western Wei.
Issue:
* Ashina Keluo (阿史那科罗) - Issig Qaghan
* Ashina Qijin (阿史那俟斤) - Muqan Qaghan
* Taspar Qaghan
* Ashina Kutou (阿史那庫頭) - Ditou Qaghan (appointed by Muqan Qaghan to be lesser khagan of eastern wing of Turkic Empire)
* Mahan Tigin - Lesser khagan appointed by Taspar Qaghan
* Rudan Qaghan (褥但可汗)
** Böri Qaghan (步離可汗) - Lesser khagan of appointed by Taspar Qaghan in the western part and by his son Issik Qaghan in the eastern part. In less than one century, his khaganate expanded to comprise most of Central Asia. Notes References
Category:552 deaths
Category:Göktürk khagans
Category:6th-century monarchs in Asia
Category:Year of birth unknown
Category:Ashina house of the Turkic Empire
Category:Founding monarchs
Category:Leaders who took power by coup
Category:Rouran Khaganate | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumin_Qaghan | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.194318 |
3827 | Bilge Qaghan | |death_place= Otukan
|full name|fatherIlterish Khagan
|mother= El Bilga Khatun
|spouse= El Etmish Bilge Khatun
|issue=Yollıg Tigin<br/>Tengri Tigin<br/>Two unnamed sons
|reign= February 717 – 25 November 734
|coronation|othertitles
|succession = Qaghan of the Second Turkic Khaganate
|predecessor=Inel Qaghan
|regent=Tonyukuk
|successor=Yollıg Khagan
|house=House of Ashina
|religion = Tengrism
}}
Bilge Qaghan (; ; 683 – 25 November 734) was the fourth Qaghan of the Second Turkic Khaganate. His accomplishments were described in the Orkhon inscriptions.
Names
As was the custom, his personal name and the name after assuming the title Qaghan were different. His personal name was recorded in Chinese characters as (). His name after assuming the title was Bilgä Qaγan.Reign
.]]
In 716, Qapaghan Qaghan, the second Qaghan, was killed in his campaign against the Toquz Oghuz alliance and his severed head was sent to Chang'an. Although his son Inel Khagan succeeded him, Bilgä's brother Kul Tigin and Tonyukuk carried out a coup d'état against Inel Qaghan. They killed him and made him Bilgä Qaghan. Later reign In 720, Wang believed that the Pugu (僕固) and Xiedie tribes of the region were planning to defect to Eastern Tujue and attack with Eastern Tujue troops. He thus held a feast and invited the chieftains, and, at the feast, massacred them. He then attacked the Pugu and Xiedie tribes in the area, nearly wiping them out. He then proposed a plan to attack Qaghan along with the Baximi, Xi, and Khitan.
In 733, he defeated rebellious Khitan tribes. He did not die immediately and he had time to punish the family of Buyruk Chor with death.<ref name"Tang194" /> He died on 25 November 734, his burial ceremony took place on 22 June 735.
Family
He was married to El Etmish Bilge Khatun, Tonyukuk's daughter. He had several children:
* Ashina Yiran (阿史那伊然)
* Ashina Kutluk (阿史那骨咄)
* 2 unnamed sons who both became puppet Qaghans under Kutluk Yabgu Khagan
* A daughter who was married to Suluk
* Po Beg - submitted to Tang after 744.
Legacy
After his death from poisoning, several steles were erected in the capital area by the Orkhon River. These Orkhon inscriptions are the first known texts in the Old Turkic language.
In popular culture
* Bilge Qaghan is portrayed by Kang Jae-ik in the 2006-2007 KBS TV series Dae Jo-yeong.
See also
* Silver Deer of Bilge Khan
References
Sources
* Encyclopædia Britannica, Micropaedia, Vol. II, pp. 16–17
External links
*[https://gokturkanitlari.appspot.com/bilgekagan.html Bilge Kagan Inscriptions complete text]
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, designed by Oskar Schlemmer, was adopted in 1922.]]
by Herbert Bayer above the entrance to the workshop block of the Bauhaus Dessau, 2005]]
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the , was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts. The school became famous for its approach to design, which attempted to unify individual artistic vision with the principles of mass production and emphasis on function. The Bauhaus movement had a profound influence on subsequent developments in art, architecture, graphic design, interior design, industrial design, and typography. Staff at the Bauhaus included prominent artists such as Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, Gunta Stölzl, and László Moholy-Nagy at various points.
(1883–1969)]]
The school existed in three German cities—Weimar, from 1919 to 1925; Dessau, from 1925 to 1932; and Berlin, from 1932 to 1933—under three different architect-directors: Walter Gropius from 1919 to 1928; Hannes Meyer from 1928 to 1930; and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe from 1930 until 1933, when the school was closed by its own leadership under pressure from the Nazi regime, having been painted as a centre of communist intellectualism. Internationally, former key figures of Bauhaus were successful in the United States and became known as the avant-garde for the International Style. The White city of Tel Aviv to which numerous Jewish Bauhaus architects emigrated, has the highest concentration of the Bauhaus' international architecture in the world.
The changes of venue and leadership resulted in a constant shifting of focus, technique, instructors, and politics. For example, the pottery shop was discontinued when the school moved from Weimar to Dessau, even though it had been an important revenue source; when Mies van der Rohe took over the school in 1930, he transformed it into a private school and would not allow any supporters of Hannes Meyer to attend it.
Terms and Concepts
Several specific features are identified in the Bauhaus forms and shapes: simple geometric shapes like rectangles and spheres, without elaborate decorations. Buildings, furniture, and fonts often feature rounded corners, sometimes rounded walls, or curved chrome pipes. Some buildings are characterized by rectangular features, for example protruding balconies with flat, chunky railings facing the street, and long banks of windows. Some outlines can be defined as a tool for creating an ideal form, which is the basis of the architectural concept. Bauhaus and German modernism
After Germany's defeat in World War I and the establishment of the Weimar Republic, a renewed liberal spirit allowed an upsurge of radical experimentation in all the arts, which had been suppressed by the old regime. Many Germans of left-wing views were influenced by the cultural experimentation that followed the Russian Revolution, such as constructivism. Such influences can be overstated: Gropius did not share these radical views, and said that Bauhaus was entirely apolitical. Just as important was the influence of the 19th-century English designer William Morris (1834–1896), who had argued that art should meet the needs of society and that there should be no distinction between form and function. Thus, the Bauhaus style, also known as the International Style, was marked by the absence of ornamentation and by harmony between the function of an object or a building and its design.
However, the most important influence on Bauhaus was modernism, a cultural movement whose origins lay as early as the 1880s, and which had already made its presence felt in Germany before the World War, despite the prevailing conservatism. The design innovations commonly associated with Gropius and the Bauhaus—the radically simplified forms, the rationality and functionality, and the idea that mass production was reconcilable with the individual artistic spirit—were already partly developed in Germany before the Bauhaus was founded. The German national designers' organization Deutscher Werkbund was formed in 1907 by Hermann Muthesius to harness the new potentials of mass production, with a mind towards preserving Germany's economic competitiveness with England. In its first seven years, the Werkbund came to be regarded as the authoritative body on questions of design in Germany, and was copied in other countries. Many fundamental questions of craftsmanship versus mass production, the relationship of usefulness and beauty, the practical purpose of formal beauty in a commonplace object, and whether or not a single proper form could exist, were argued out among its 1,870 members (by 1914).
German architectural modernism was known as Neues Bauen. Beginning in June 1907, Peter Behrens' pioneering industrial design work for the German electrical company AEG successfully integrated art and mass production on a large scale. He designed consumer products, standardized parts, created clean-lined designs for the company's graphics, developed a consistent corporate identity, built the modernist landmark AEG Turbine Factory, and made full use of newly developed materials such as poured concrete and exposed steel. Behrens was a founding member of the Werkbund, and both Walter Gropius and Adolf Meyer worked for him in this period.
The Bauhaus was founded at a time when the German zeitgeist had turned from emotional Expressionism to the matter-of-fact New Objectivity. An entire group of working architects, including Erich Mendelsohn, Bruno Taut and Hans Poelzig, turned away from fanciful experimentation and towards rational, functional, sometimes standardized building. Beyond the Bauhaus, many other significant German-speaking architects in the 1920s responded to the same aesthetic issues and material possibilities as the school. They also responded to the promise "to promote the object of assuring to every German a healthful habitation" written into the new Weimar Constitution (Article 155). Ernst May, Bruno Taut and Martin Wagner, among others, built large housing blocks in Frankfurt and Berlin. The acceptance of modernist design into everyday life was the subject of publicity campaigns, well-attended public exhibitions like the Weissenhof Estate, films, and sometimes fierce public debate.
Bauhaus and Vkhutemas
The Vkhutemas, the Russian state art and technical school founded in 1920 in Moscow, has been compared to Bauhaus. Founded a year after the Bauhaus school, Vkhutemas has close parallels to the German Bauhaus in its intent, organization and scope. The two schools were the first to train artist-designers in a modern manner. Both schools were state-sponsored initiatives to merge traditional craft with modern technology, with a basic course in aesthetic principles, courses in color theory, industrial design, and architecture. but it was less publicised outside the Soviet Union and consequently, is less familiar in the West.
With the internationalism of modern architecture and design, there were many exchanges between the Vkhutemas and the Bauhaus. The second Bauhaus director Hannes Meyer attempted to organise an exchange between the two schools, while Hinnerk Scheper of the Bauhaus collaborated with various Vkhutein members on the use of colour in architecture. In addition, El Lissitzky's book Russia: an Architecture for World Revolution published in German in 1930 featured several illustrations of Vkhutemas/Vkhutein projects there.
History of the Bauhaus
Weimar
. Built between 1904 and 1911 and designed by Henry van de Velde to house the sculptors' studio at the Grand Ducal Saxon Art School, it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996.]]
The school was founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar on 1 April 1919, as a merger of the Grand-Ducal Saxon Academy of Fine Art and the Grand Ducal Saxon School of Arts and Crafts for a newly affiliated architecture department. Its roots lay in the arts and crafts school founded by the Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach in 1906, and directed by Belgian Art Nouveau architect Henry van de Velde. When van de Velde was forced to resign in 1915 because he was Belgian, he suggested Gropius, Hermann Obrist, and August Endell as possible successors. In 1919, after delays caused by World War I and a lengthy debate over who should head the institution and the socio-economic meanings of a reconciliation of the fine arts and the applied arts (an issue which remained a defining one throughout the school's existence), Gropius was made the director of a new institution integrating the two called the Bauhaus. In the pamphlet for an April 1919 exhibition entitled Exhibition of Unknown Architects, Gropius, still very much under the influence of William Morris and the British Arts and Crafts Movement, proclaimed his goal as being "to create a new guild of craftsmen, without the class distinctions which raise an arrogant barrier between craftsman and artist." Gropius's neologism Bauhaus references both building and the Bauhütte, a premodern guild of stonemasons. The early intention was for the Bauhaus to be a combined architecture school, crafts school, and academy of the arts. Swiss painter Johannes Itten, German-American painter Lyonel Feininger, and German sculptor Gerhard Marcks, along with Gropius, comprised the faculty of the Bauhaus in 1919. By the following year their ranks had grown to include German painter, sculptor, and designer Oskar Schlemmer who headed the theatre workshop, and Swiss painter Paul Klee, joined in 1922 by Russian painter Wassily Kandinsky. The first major joint project completed by the Bauhaus was the Sommerfeld House, which was built between 1920 and 1921. A tumultuous year at the Bauhaus, 1922 also saw the move of Dutch painter Theo van Doesburg to Weimar to promote De Stijl ("The Style"), and a visit to the Bauhaus by Russian Constructivist artist and architect El Lissitzky.
From 1919 to 1922 the school was shaped by the pedagogical and aesthetic ideas of Johannes Itten, who taught the Vorkurs or "preliminary course" that was the introduction to the ideas of the Bauhaus. Gropius argued that a new period of history had begun with the end of the war. He wanted to create a new architectural style to reflect this new era. His style in architecture and consumer goods was to be functional, cheap and consistent with mass production. To these ends, Gropius wanted to reunite art and craft to arrive at high-end functional products with artistic merit. The Bauhaus issued a magazine called Bauhaus and a series of books called "Bauhausbücher". Since the Weimar Republic lacked the number of raw materials available to the United States and Great Britain, it had to rely on the proficiency of a skilled labour force and an ability to export innovative and high-quality goods. Therefore, designers were needed and so was a new type of art education. The school's philosophy stated that the artist should be trained to work with the industry.
Weimar was in the German state of Thuringia, and the Bauhaus school received state support from the Social Democrat-controlled Thuringian state government. The school in Weimar experienced political pressure from conservative circles in Thuringian politics, increasingly so after 1923 as political tension rose. One condition placed on the Bauhaus in this new political environment was the exhibition of work undertaken at the school. This condition was met in 1923 with the Bauhaus' exhibition of the experimental Haus am Horn. The Ministry of Education placed the staff on six-month contracts and cut the school's funding in half. The Bauhaus issued a press release on 26 December 1924, setting the closure of the school for the end of March 1925. At this point it had already been looking for alternative sources of funding. After the Bauhaus moved to Dessau, a school of industrial design with teachers and staff less antagonistic to the conservative political regime remained in Weimar. This school was eventually known as the Technical University of Architecture and Civil Engineering, and in 1996 changed its name to Bauhaus-University Weimar.
Dessau
The Bauhaus moved to Dessau in 1925 and new facilities there were inaugurated in late 1926. Gropius's design for the Dessau facilities was a return to the futuristic Gropius of 1914 that had more in common with the International style lines of the Fagus Factory than the stripped down Neo-classical of the Werkbund pavilion or the Völkisch Sommerfeld House. During the Dessau years, there was a remarkable change in direction for the school. According to Elaine Hoffman, Gropius had approached the Dutch architect Mart Stam to run the newly founded architecture program, and when Stam declined the position, Gropius turned to Stam's friend and colleague in the ABC group, Hannes Meyer.
Meyer became director when Gropius resigned in February 1928, The Dessau city council attempted to convince Gropius to return as head of the school, but Gropius instead suggested Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Mies was appointed in 1930 and immediately interviewed each student, dismissing those that he deemed uncommitted. He halted the school's manufacture of goods so that the school could focus on teaching, and appointed no new faculty other than his close confidant Lilly Reich. By 1931, the Nazi Party was becoming more influential in German politics. When it gained control of the Dessau city council, it moved to close the school.
(1925–1926)]]
Berlin
In late 1932, Mies rented a derelict factory in Berlin (Birkbusch Street 49) to use as the new Bauhaus with his own money. The students and faculty rehabilitated the building, painting the interior white. The school operated for ten months without further interference from the Nazi Party. In 1933, the Gestapo closed down the Berlin school. Mies protested the decision, eventually speaking to the head of the Gestapo, who agreed to allow the school to re-open. However, shortly after receiving a letter permitting the opening of the Bauhaus, Mies and the other faculty agreed to voluntarily shut down the school. Mies decided to emigrate to the United States for the directorship of the School of Architecture at the Armour Institute (now Illinois Institute of Technology) in Chicago and to seek building commissions. The simple engineering-oriented functionalism of stripped-down modernism, however, did lead to some Bauhaus influences living on in Nazi Germany. When Hitler's chief engineer, Fritz Todt, began opening the new autobahns (highways) in 1935, many of the bridges and service stations were "bold examples of modernism", and among those submitting designs was Mies van der Rohe. Architectural output The paradox of the early Bauhaus was that, although its manifesto proclaimed that the aim of all creative activity was building, the school did not offer classes in architecture until 1927. During the years under Gropius (1919–1927), he and his partner Adolf Meyer observed no real distinction between the output of his architectural office and the school. The built output of Bauhaus architecture in these years is the output of Gropius: the Sommerfeld house in Berlin, the Otte house in Berlin, the Auerbach house in Jena, and the competition design for the Chicago Tribune Tower, which brought the school much attention. The definitive 1926 Bauhaus building in Dessau is also attributed to Gropius. Apart from contributions to the 1923 Haus am Horn, student architectural work amounted to un-built projects, interior finishes, and craft work like cabinets, chairs and pottery.
In the next two years under Meyer, the architectural focus shifted away from aesthetics and towards functionality. There were major commissions: one from the city of Dessau for five tightly designed "Laubenganghäuser" (apartment buildings with balcony access), which are still in use today, and another for the Bundesschule des Allgemeinen Deutschen Gewerkschaftsbundes (ADGB Trade Union School) in Bernau bei Berlin. Meyer's approach was to research users' needs and scientifically develop the design solution. He intended to place emphasis on Gropius' objective analysis of the properties determining an object's use value, known as Wesensforschung. Gropius believed that it was possible to design exemplary products of universal validity that should be standardized.
Mies van der Rohe repudiated Meyer's politics, his supporters, and his architectural approach. As opposed to Gropius's "study of essentials", and Meyer's research into user requirements, Mies advocated a "spatial implementation of intellectual decisions", which effectively meant an adoption of his own aesthetics. Neither Mies van der Rohe nor his Bauhaus students saw any projects built during the 1930s.
The Bauhaus movement was not focused on developing worker housing. Only two projects, the apartment building project in Dessau and the Törten row housing fall into the worker housing category. It was the Bauhaus contemporaries Bruno Taut, Hans Poelzig and particularly Ernst May, as the city architects of Berlin, Dresden and Frankfurt respectively, who are rightfully credited with the thousands of socially progressive housing units built in Weimar Germany. The housing Taut built in south-west Berlin during the 1920s, close to the U-Bahn stop Onkel Toms Hütte, is still occupied.
Impact
Studio 42 typewriter, designed by Bauhausler Xanti Schawinsky in 1936]]
The Bauhaus had a major impact on art and architecture trends in Western Europe, Canada, the United States and Israel in the decades following its demise, as many of the artists involved fled, or were exiled by the Nazi regime. In 1996, four of the major sites associated with Bauhaus in Germany were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List (with two more added in 2017).
In 1928, the Hungarian painter Alexander Bortnyik founded a school of design in Budapest called Műhely, which means "the studio". Located on the seventh floor of a house on Nagymezo Street, The literature sometimes refers to it—in an oversimplified manner—as "the Budapest Bauhaus". Bortnyik was a great admirer of László Moholy-Nagy and had met Walter Gropius in Weimar between 1923 and 1925. Moholy-Nagy himself taught at the Műhely. Victor Vasarely, a pioneer of op art, studied at this school before establishing in Paris in 1930.
]]
Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, and Moholy-Nagy re-assembled in Britain during the mid-1930s and lived and worked in the Isokon housing development in Lawn Road in London before the war caught up with them. Gropius and Breuer went on to teach at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and worked together before their professional split. Their collaboration produced, among other projects, the Aluminum City Terrace in New Kensington, Pennsylvania and the Alan I W Frank House in Pittsburgh. The Harvard School was enormously influential in America in the late 1920s and early 1930s, producing such students as Philip Johnson, I. M. Pei, Lawrence Halprin and Paul Rudolph, among many others.
In the late 1930s, Mies van der Rohe re-settled in Chicago, enjoyed the sponsorship of the influential Philip Johnson, and became one of the world's pre-eminent architects. Moholy-Nagy also went to Chicago and founded the New Bauhaus school under the sponsorship of industrialist and philanthropist Walter Paepcke. This school became the Institute of Design, part of the Illinois Institute of Technology. Printmaker and painter Werner Drewes was also largely responsible for bringing the Bauhaus aesthetic to America and taught at both Columbia University and Washington University in St. Louis. Herbert Bayer, sponsored by Paepcke, moved to Aspen, Colorado in support of Paepcke's Aspen projects at the Aspen Institute. In 1953, Max Bill, together with Inge Aicher-Scholl and Otl Aicher, founded the Ulm School of Design (German: Hochschule für Gestaltung – HfG Ulm) in Ulm, Germany, a design school in the tradition of the Bauhaus. The school is notable for its inclusion of semiotics as a field of study. The school closed in 1968, but the "Ulm Model" concept continues to influence international design education. Another series of projects at the school were the Bauhaus typefaces, mostly realized in the decades afterward.
The influence of the Bauhaus on design education was significant. One of the main objectives of the Bauhaus was to unify art, craft, and technology, and this approach was incorporated into the curriculum of the Bauhaus. The structure of the Bauhaus Vorkurs (preliminary course) reflected a pragmatic approach to integrating theory and application. In their first year, students learnt the basic elements and principles of design and colour theory, and experimented with a range of materials and processes. This approach to design education became a common feature of architectural and design school in many countries. For example, the Shillito Design School in Sydney stands as a unique link between Australia and the Bauhaus. The colour and design syllabus of the Shillito Design School was firmly underpinned by the theories and ideologies of the Bauhaus. Its first year foundational course mimicked the Vorkurs and focused on the elements and principles of design plus colour theory and application. The founder of the school, Phyllis Shillito, which opened in 1962 and closed in 1980, firmly believed that "A student who has mastered the basic principles of design, can design anything from a dress to a kitchen stove". In Britain, largely under the influence of painter and teacher William Johnstone, Basic Design, a Bauhaus-influenced art foundation course, was introduced at Camberwell School of Art and the Central School of Art and Design, whence it spread to all art schools in the country, becoming universal by the early 1960s.
One of the most important contributions of the Bauhaus is in the field of modern furniture design. The characteristic Cantilever chair and Wassily Chair designed by Marcel Breuer are two examples. (Breuer eventually lost a legal battle in Germany with Dutch architect/designer Mart Stam over patent rights to the cantilever chair design. Although Stam had worked on the design of the Bauhaus's 1923 exhibit in Weimar, and guest-lectured at the Bauhaus later in the 1920s, he was not formally associated with the school, and he and Breuer had worked independently on the cantilever concept, leading to the patent dispute.) The most profitable product of the Bauhaus was its wallpaper.
The physical plant at Dessau survived World War II and was operated as a design school with some architectural facilities by the German Democratic Republic. This included live stage productions in the Bauhaus theater under the name of Bauhausbühne ("Bauhaus Stage"). After German reunification, a reorganized school continued in the same building, with no essential continuity with the Bauhaus under Gropius in the early 1920s. In 1979 Bauhaus-Dessau College started to organize postgraduate programs with participants from all over the world. This effort has been supported by the Bauhaus-Dessau Foundation which was founded in 1974 as a public institution.
Later evaluation of the Bauhaus design credo was critical of its flawed recognition of the human element, an acknowledgment of "the dated, unattractive aspects of the Bauhaus as a projection of utopia marked by mechanistic views of human nature…Home hygiene without home atmosphere."
Subsequent examples which have continued the philosophy of the Bauhaus include Black Mountain College, Hochschule für Gestaltung in Ulm and Domaine de Boisbuchet.
]]
The White City
The White City (Hebrew: העיר הלבנה), refers to a collection of over 4,000 buildings built in the Bauhaus or International Style in Tel Aviv from the 1930s by German Jewish architects who emigrated to the British Mandate of Palestine after the rise of the Nazis. Tel Aviv has the largest number of buildings in the Bauhaus/International Style of any city in the world. Preservation, documentation, and exhibitions have brought attention to Tel Aviv's collection of 1930s architecture. In 2003, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) proclaimed Tel Aviv's White City a World Cultural Heritage site, as "an outstanding example of new town planning and architecture in the early 20th century." The citation recognized the unique adaptation of modern international architectural trends to the cultural, climatic, and local traditions of the city. Bauhaus Center Tel Aviv organizes regular architectural tours of the city, and the Bauhaus Foundation offers Bauhaus exhibits.
Centenary
As the centenary of the founding of Bauhaus, several events, festivals, and exhibitions were held around the world in 2019. The international opening festival at the Berlin Academy of the Arts from 16 to 24 January concentrated on "the presentation and production of pieces by contemporary artists, in which the aesthetic issues and experimental configurations of the Bauhaus artists continue to be inspiringly contagious". Original Bauhaus, The Centenary Exhibition at the Berlinische Galerie (6 September 2019 to 27 January 2020) presented 1,000 original artefacts from the Bauhaus-Archive's collection and recounted the history behind the objects. The Bauhaus Museum Dessau also opened in September 2019, operated by the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation and funded by the State of Saxony-Anhalt and the German Federal government. It is set to be the permanent home of the second largest Bauhaus collection at 49,000 objects, while paying homage to its strong influence in the city when Bauhaus arrived in 1925.
In 2024, the German far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfG) sought to attack celebrations of Bauhaus because of their view that Bauhaus did not follow tradition. Bauhaus was also crushed by the Nazi's before World War II, and according to political scientist Jan-Werner Mueller, AfG's condemnation seeks to use it in a culture war of far right-wing provocation.The New European Bauhaus
In September 2020, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen introduced the New European Bauhaus (NEB) initiative during her State of the Union address. The NEB is a creative and interdisciplinary movement that connects the European Green Deal to everyday life. It is a platform for experimentation aiming to unite citizens, experts, businesses and institutions in imagining and designing a sustainable, aesthetic and inclusive future.
Sport and physical activity were an essential part of the original Bauhaus approach. Hannes Meyer, the second director of Bauhaus Dessau, ensured that one day a week was solely devoted to sport and gymnastics. 1 In 1930, Meyer employed two physical education teachers. The Bauhaus school even applied for public funds to enhance its playing field. The inclusion of sport and physical activity in the Bauhaus curriculum had various purposes. First, as Meyer put it, sport combatted a “one-sided emphasis on brainwork.” In addition, Bauhaus instructors believed that students could better express themselves if they actively experienced the space, rhythms and movements of the body. The Bauhaus approach also considered physical activity an important contributor to wellbeing and community spirit. Sport and physical activity were essential to the interdisciplinary Bauhaus movement that developed revolutionary ideas and continues to shape our environments today. Bauhaus staff and students
People who were educated, or who taught or worked in other capacities, at the Bauhaus.
Gallery
<gallery widths"200" heights"200">
File:Bauhaus-Dessau Festsaal.jpg|A stage in the Festsaal, Dessau
File:Bauhaus-Dessau Festsaal Bühnenbeleuchtung.jpg|Ceiling with light fixtures for stage in the Festsaal, Dessau
File:Bauhaus-Dessau Wohnheim Balkone.jpg|Dormitory balconies in the residence, Dessau
File:Bauhaus-Dessau Fensterfront.JPG|Mechanically opened windows, Dessau
File:Mensa Bauhaus Dessau.PNG|The Mensa (cafeteria), Dessau
File:Monument to the March dead.jpg|Gropius' Expressionist Monument to the March Dead (1921–1922)
File:Bauhaus Chemnitz hb.JPG|A Bauhaus style building in Chemnitz
File:Christian-dell molitor-office-work-lamp-light.jpg|The Molitor Grapholux lamp, by Christian Dell (1922–1925)
File:Marianne-brandt.jpg|Tea infuser by Otto Rittweger, , and (1924)
File:Otto rittweger e wolfgang tümpel, sei infusori con ständer, 1924.JPG|Set of six tea infusers with stand (per previous)
File:Heinrich Neu Kinderstuhl 1930.jpg|Children's chair by (1930)
File:Dieckmann erich buffetuhr fuer bamberger otto lichtenfels 1931.png| Clock designed by (1931)
</gallery>
See also
* Art Deco architecture
* Bauhaus Archive
* Bauhaus Center Tel Aviv
* Bauhaus Dessau Foundation
* Bauhaus Museum, Tel Aviv
* Bauhaus Museum, Weimar
* Bauhaus Museum, Dessau
* Bauhaus Project (computing)
* Bauhaus World Heritage Site
* Constructivist architecture
* Expressionist architecture
* Form follows function
* Haus am Horn
* IIT Institute of Design
* International style (architecture)
* Lucia Moholy
* Max-Liebling House, Tel Aviv
* Modern architecture
* Neues Sehen (New Vision)
* New Objectivity (architecture)
* Swiss Style (design)
* Ulm School of Design
* Vkhutemas
* Women of the Bauhaus
Explanatory footnotes
* The closure, and the response of Mies van der Rohe, is fully documented in Elaine Hochman's Architects of Fortune.
* Google honored Bauhaus for its 100th anniversary on 12 April 2019 with a Google Doodle.
Citations
General and cited references
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* Olaf Thormann: Bauhaus Saxony. arnoldsche Art Publishers 2019, .
Further reading
*
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External links
* [https://artsandculture.google.com/project/bauhaus Bauhaus Everywhere] — Google Arts & Culture
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* [https://exchange.umma.umich.edu/resources/23635 Collection: Artists of the Bauhaus] from the University of Michigan Museum of Art
Category:1919 establishments in Germany
Category:1933 disestablishments in Germany
Category:Architecture in Germany
Category:Architecture schools
Category:Art movements
Category:Design schools in Germany
Category:Expressionist architecture
Category:German architectural styles
Category:Graphic design
Category:Industrial design
Category:Modernist architecture
Bauhaus, Dessau
Category:Visual arts education
Bauhaus
Category:Weimar culture
Category:World Heritage Sites in Germany | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.229587 |
3833 | Beowulf | <!--The film is already listed on the disambiguation page-->
| image = File:Beowulf Cotton MS Vitellius A XV f. 132r.jpg
| caption = First page of Beowulf in Cotton Vitellius A. xv.<br/>Beginning: (translation: How much we of Spear-Da/nes, in days gone by, of kings / the glory have heard...)
| author(s) = Unknown
| language = West Saxon dialect of Old English
| date = Disputed ()
| state of existence = Manuscript suffered damage from fire in 1731
| manuscript(s) = Cotton Vitellius A. xv ()
| first printed edition = Thorkelin (1815)
| verse form = Alliterative verse
| length =
| genre = Epic heroic writing
| subject = The battles of Beowulf, the Geatish hero, in youth and old age
| personages = Beowulf, Hygelac, Hrothgar, Wealhtheow, Hrothulf, Æschere, Unferth, Grendel, Grendel's mother, Wiglaf, Hildeburh. <br/> Full list of characters.
| wikisource = Beowulf
}}
Beowulf (; ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. The date of composition is a matter of contention among scholars; the only certain dating is for the manuscript, which was produced between 975 and 1025 AD. Scholars call the anonymous author the "Beowulf poet".
The story is set in pagan Scandinavia in the 5th and 6th centuries. Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, comes to the aid of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead hall Heorot has been under attack by the monster Grendel for twelve years. After Beowulf slays him, Grendel's mother takes revenge and is in turn defeated. Victorious, Beowulf goes home to Geatland and becomes king of the Geats. Fifty years later, Beowulf defeats a dragon, but is mortally wounded in the battle. After his death, his attendants cremate his body and erect a barrow on a headland in his memory.
Scholars have debated whether Beowulf was transmitted orally, affecting its interpretation: if it was composed early, in pagan times, then the paganism is central and the Christian elements were added later, whereas if it was composed later, in writing, by a Christian, then the pagan elements could be decorative archaising; some scholars also hold an intermediate position.
Beowulf is written mostly in the Late West Saxon dialect of Old English, but many other dialectal forms are present, suggesting that the poem may have had a long and complex transmission throughout the dialect areas of England.
There has long been research into similarities with other traditions and accounts, including the Icelandic Grettis saga, the Norse story of Hrolf Kraki and his bear-shapeshifting servant Bodvar Bjarki, the international folktale the Bear's Son Tale, and the Irish folktale of the Hand and the Child. Persistent attempts have been made to link Beowulf to tales from Homer's Odyssey or Virgil's Aeneid. More definite are biblical parallels, with clear allusions to the books of Genesis, Exodus, and Daniel.
The poem survives in a single copy in the manuscript known as the Nowell Codex. It has no title in the original manuscript, but has become known by the name of the story's protagonist. In 1731, the manuscript was damaged by a fire that swept through Ashburnham House in London, which was housing Sir Robert Cotton's collection of medieval manuscripts. It survived, but the margins were charred, and some readings were lost. The Nowell Codex is housed in the British Library.
The poem was first transcribed in 1786; some verses were first translated into modern English in 1805, and nine complete translations were made in the 19th century, including those by John Mitchell Kemble and William Morris.
After 1900, hundreds of translations, whether into prose, rhyming verse, or alliterative verse were made, some relatively faithful, some archaising, some attempting to domesticate the work. Among the best-known modern translations are those of Edwin Morgan, Burton Raffel, Michael J. Alexander, Roy Liuzza, and Seamus Heaney. The difficulty of translating Beowulf has been explored by scholars including J. R. R. Tolkien (in his essay "On Translating Beowulf), who worked on a verse and a prose translation of his own.
Historical background
and a possible site of the poem's composition in Rendlesham, Suffolk, settled by Angles. Others have associated this poem with the court of King Alfred the Great or with the court of King Cnut the Great.
The poem blends fictional, legendary, mythic and historical elements. Although Beowulf himself is not mentioned in any other Old English manuscript, many of the other figures named in Beowulf appear in Scandinavian sources. This concerns not only individuals (e.g., Healfdene, Hroðgar, Halga, Hroðulf, Eadgils and Ohthere), but also clans (e.g., Scyldings, Scylfings and Wulfings) and certain events (e.g., the battle between Eadgils and Onela). The raid by King Hygelac into Frisia is mentioned by Gregory of Tours in his History of the Franks and can be dated to around 521.
The majority view appears to be that figures such as King Hrothgar and the Scyldings in Beowulf are based on historical people from 6th-century Scandinavia. Like the Finnesburg Fragment and several shorter surviving poems, Beowulf has consequently been used as a source of information about Scandinavian figures such as Eadgils and Hygelac, and about continental Germanic figures such as Offa, king of the continental Angles. However, one scholar, Roy Liuzza, feels that the poem is "frustratingly ambivalent", neither myth nor folktale, but is set "against a complex background of legendary history ... on a roughly recognizable map of Scandinavia", and comments that the Geats of the poem may correspond with the Gautar (of modern Götaland).
's western mound, left, excavated in 1874, support Beowulf and the sagas.
In Denmark, recent (1986–88, 2004–05) archaeological excavations at Lejre, where Scandinavian tradition located the seat of the Scyldings, Heorot, have revealed that a hall was built in the mid-6th century, matching the period described in Beowulf, some centuries before the poem was composed. Three halls, each about long, were found during the excavation. and "láf" means "remnant, left-over"}} dares to join him. Beowulf finally slays the dragon, but is mortally wounded in the struggle. He is cremated and a burial mound by the sea is erected in his honour.
Beowulf is considered an epic poem in that the main character is a hero who travels great distances to prove his strength at impossible odds against supernatural demons and beasts. The poem begins in medias res or simply, "in the middle of things", a characteristic of the epics of antiquity. Although the poem begins with Beowulf's arrival, Grendel's attacks have been ongoing. An elaborate history of characters and their lineages is spoken of, as well as their interactions with each other, debts owed and repaid, and deeds of valour. The warriors form a brotherhood linked by loyalty to their lord. The poem begins and ends with funerals: at the beginning of the poem for Scyld Scefing and at the end for Beowulf.
The poem is tightly structured. E. Carrigan shows the symmetry of its design in a model of its major components, with for instance the account of the killing of Grendel matching that of the killing of the dragon, the glory of the Danes matching the accounts of the Danish and Geatish courts. Other analyses are possible as well; Gale Owen-Crocker, for instance, sees the poem as structured by the four funerals it describes. For J. R. R. Tolkien, the primary division in the poem was between young and old Beowulf.
First battle: Grendel
Beowulf begins with the story of Hrothgar, who constructed the great hall, Heorot, for himself and his warriors. In it, he, his wife Wealhtheow, and his warriors spend their time singing and celebrating. Grendel, a troll-like monster said to be descended from the biblical Cain, is pained by the sounds of joy. Grendel attacks the hall and devours many of Hrothgar's warriors while they sleep. Hrothgar and his people, helpless against Grendel, abandon Heorot.
Beowulf, a young warrior from Geatland, hears of Hrothgar's troubles and with his king's permission leaves his homeland to assist Hrothgar.
Beowulf and his men spend the night in Heorot. Beowulf refuses to use any weapon because he holds himself to be Grendel's equal. When Grendel enters the hall and kills one of Beowulf's men, Beowulf, who has been feigning sleep, leaps up to clench Grendel's hand. Grendel and Beowulf battle each other violently. Beowulf's retainers draw their swords and rush to his aid, but their blades cannot pierce Grendel's skin. Finally, Beowulf tears Grendel's arm from his body at the shoulder. Fatally hurt, Grendel flees to his home in the marshes, where he dies. Beowulf displays "the whole of Grendel's shoulder and arm, his awesome grasp" for all to see at Heorot. This display would fuel Grendel's mother's anger in revenge. Second battle: Grendel's mother
The next night, after celebrating Grendel's defeat, Hrothgar and his men sleep in Heorot. Grendel's mother, angry that her son has been killed, sets out to get revenge. "Beowulf was elsewhere. Earlier, after the award of treasure, The Geat had been given another lodging"; his assistance would be absent in this attack. Grendel's mother violently kills Æschere, who is Hrothgar's most loyal advisor, and escapes, later putting his head outside her lair.
Hrothgar, Beowulf, and their men track Grendel's mother to her lair under a lake. Unferth, a warrior who had earlier challenged him, presents Beowulf with his sword Hrunting. After stipulating a number of conditions to Hrothgar in case of his death (including the taking in of his kinsmen and the inheritance by Unferth of Beowulf's estate), Beowulf jumps into the lake and, while harassed by water monsters, gets to the bottom, where he finds a cavern. Grendel's mother pulls him in, and she and Beowulf engage in fierce combat.
At first, Grendel's mother prevails, and Hrunting proves incapable of hurting her; she throws Beowulf to the ground and, sitting astride him, tries to kill him with a short sword, but Beowulf is saved by his armour. Beowulf spots another sword, hanging on the wall and apparently made for giants, and cuts her head off with it. Travelling further into Grendel's mother's lair, Beowulf discovers Grendel's corpse and severs his head with the sword. Its blade melts because of the monster's "hot blood", leaving only the hilt. Beowulf swims back up to the edge of the lake where his men wait. Carrying the hilt of the sword and Grendel's head, he presents them to Hrothgar upon his return to Heorot. Hrothgar gives Beowulf many gifts, including the sword Nægling, his family's heirloom. The events prompt a long reflection by the king, sometimes referred to as "Hrothgar's sermon", in which he urges Beowulf to be wary of pride and to reward his thegns.
Final battle: The dragon
is the single warrior to return and witness Beowulf's death. Illustration by J. R. Skelton, 1908]]
Beowulf returns home and eventually becomes king of his own people. One day, fifty years after Beowulf's battle with Grendel's mother, a slave steals a golden cup from the lair of a dragon at Earnanæs. When the dragon sees that the cup has been stolen, it leaves its cave in a rage, burning everything in sight. Beowulf and his warriors come to fight the dragon, but Beowulf tells his men that he will fight the dragon alone and that they should wait on the barrow. Beowulf descends to do battle with the dragon, but finds himself outmatched. His men, upon seeing this and fearing for their lives, retreat into the woods. However, one of his men, Wiglaf, in great distress at Beowulf's plight, comes to his aid. The two slay the dragon, but Beowulf is mortally wounded. After Beowulf dies, Wiglaf remains by his side, grief-stricken. When the rest of the men finally return, Wiglaf bitterly admonishes them, blaming their cowardice for Beowulf's death. Beowulf is ritually burned on a great pyre in Geatland while his people wail and mourn him, fearing that without him, the Geats are defenceless against attacks from surrounding tribes. Afterwards, a barrow, visible from the sea, is built in his memory. Digressions The poem contains many apparent digressions from the main story. These were found troublesome by early Beowulf scholars such as Frederick Klaeber, who wrote that they "interrupt the story", More recent scholars from Adrien Bonjour onwards note that the digressions can all be explained as introductions or comparisons with elements of the main story; emphasises his heroic strength. many descriptions of the Geats, including the Swedish–Geatish wars, the "Lay of the Last Survivor" in the style of another Old English poem, "The Wanderer", and Beowulf's dealings with the Geats such as his verbal contest with Unferth and his swimming duel with Breca, and the tale of Sigemund and the dragon; history and legend, including the fight at Finnsburg and the tale of Freawaru and Ingeld; and biblical tales such as the creation myth and Cain as ancestor of all monsters. The digressions provide a powerful impression of historical depth, imitated by Tolkien in The Lord of the Rings, a work that embodies many other elements from the poem.
Authorship and date
The dating of Beowulf has attracted considerable scholarly attention; opinion differs as to whether it was first written in the 8th century, whether it was nearly contemporary with its 11th-century manuscript, and whether a proto-version (possibly a version of the "Bear's Son Tale") was orally transmitted before being transcribed in its present form. Albert Lord felt strongly that the manuscript represents the transcription of a performance, though likely taken at more than one sitting. J. R. R. Tolkien believed that the poem retains too genuine a memory of Anglo-Saxon paganism to have been composed more than a few generations after the completion of the Christianisation of England around AD 700, and Tolkien's conviction that the poem dates to the 8th century has been defended by scholars including Tom Shippey, Leonard Neidorf, Rafael J. Pascual, and Robert D. Fulk. An analysis of several Old English poems by a team including Neidorf suggests that Beowulf is the work of a single author, though other scholars disagree.
The claim to an early 11th-century date depends in part on scholars who argue that, rather than the transcription of a tale from the oral tradition by an earlier literate monk, Beowulf reflects an original interpretation of an earlier version of the story by the manuscript's two scribes. On the other hand, some scholars argue that linguistic, palaeographical (handwriting), metrical (poetic structure), and onomastic (naming) considerations align to support a date of composition in the first half of the 8th century;<!----> in particular, the poem's apparent observation of etymological vowel-length distinctions in unstressed syllables (described by Kaluza's law) has been thought to demonstrate a date of composition prior to the earlier ninth century. B.R. Hutcheson, for instance, does not believe Kaluza's law can be used to date the poem, while claiming that "the weight of all the evidence Fulk presents in his book tells strongly in favour of an eighth-century date."
From an analysis of creative genealogy and ethnicity, Craig R. Davis suggests a composition date in the AD 890s, when King Alfred of England had secured the submission of Guthrum, leader of a division of the Great Heathen Army of the Danes, and of Aethelred, ealdorman of Mercia. In this thesis, the trend of appropriating Gothic royal ancestry, established in Francia during Charlemagne's reign, influenced the Anglian kingdoms of Britain to attribute to themselves a Geatish descent. The composition of Beowulf was the fruit of the later adaptation of this trend in Alfred's policy of asserting authority over the Angelcynn, in which Scyldic descent was attributed to the West-Saxon royal pedigree. This date of composition largely agrees with Lapidge's positing of a West-Saxon exemplar .
The location of the poem's composition is intensely disputed. In 1914, F.W. Moorman, the first professor of English Language at University of Leeds, claimed that Beowulf was composed in Yorkshire, but E. Talbot Donaldson claims that it was probably composed during the first half of the eighth century, and that the writer was a native of what was then called West Mercia, located in the Western Midlands of England. However, the late tenth-century manuscript, "which alone preserves the poem", originated in the kingdom of the West Saxons — as it is more commonly known. Manuscript
Cotton Vitellius A.XV]]
Beowulf survived to modern times in a single manuscript, written in ink on parchment, later damaged by fire. The manuscript measures 245 × 185 mm. Provenance The poem is known only from a single manuscript, estimated to date from around 975–1025, in which it appears with other works. The manuscript therefore dates either to the reign of Æthelred the Unready, characterised by strife with the Danish king Sweyn Forkbeard, or to the beginning of the reign of Sweyn's son Cnut the Great from 1016. The Beowulf manuscript is known as the Nowell Codex, gaining its name from 16th-century scholar Laurence Nowell. The official designation is "British Library, Cotton Vitellius A.XV" because it was one of Sir Robert Bruce Cotton's holdings in the Cotton library in the middle of the 17th century. Many private antiquarians and book collectors, such as Sir Robert Cotton, used their own library classification systems. "Cotton Vitellius A.XV" translates as: the 15th book from the left on shelf A (the top shelf) of the bookcase with the bust of Roman Emperor Vitellius standing on top of it, in Cotton's collection. Kevin Kiernan argues that Nowell most likely acquired it through William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, in 1563, when Nowell entered Cecil's household as a tutor to his ward, Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford.
The earliest extant reference to the first foliation of the Nowell Codex was made sometime between 1628 and 1650 by Franciscus Junius (the younger). The ownership of the codex before Nowell remains a mystery.
The Reverend Thomas Smith (1638–1710) and Humfrey Wanley (1672–1726) both catalogued the Cotton library (in which the Nowell Codex was held). Smith's catalogue appeared in 1696, and Wanley's in 1705. The Beowulf manuscript itself is identified by name for the first time in an exchange of letters in 1700 between George Hickes, Wanley's assistant, and Wanley. In the letter to Wanley, Hickes responds to an apparent charge against Smith, made by Wanley, that Smith had failed to mention the Beowulf script when cataloguing Cotton MS. Vitellius A. XV. Hickes replies to Wanley "I can find nothing yet of Beowulph." Kiernan theorised that Smith failed to mention the Beowulf manuscript because of his reliance on previous catalogues or because either he had no idea how to describe it or because it was temporarily out of the codex.
The manuscript passed to Crown ownership in 1702, on the death of its then owner, Sir John Cotton, who had inherited it from his grandfather, Robert Cotton. It suffered damage in a fire at Ashburnham House in 1731, in which around a quarter of the manuscripts bequeathed by Cotton were destroyed. Since then, parts of the manuscript have crumbled along with many of the letters. Rebinding efforts, though saving the manuscript from much degeneration, have nonetheless covered up other letters of the poem, causing further loss. Kiernan, in preparing his electronic edition of the manuscript, used fibre-optic backlighting and ultraviolet lighting to reveal letters in the manuscript lost from binding, erasure, or ink blotting. Writing The Beowulf manuscript was transcribed from an original by two scribes, one of whom wrote the prose at the beginning of the manuscript and the first 1939 lines, before breaking off in mid-sentence. The first scribe made a point of carefully regularizing the spelling of the original document into the common West Saxon, removing any archaic or dialectical features. The second scribe, who wrote the remainder, with a difference in handwriting noticeable after line 1939, seems to have written more vigorously and with less interest. As a result, the second scribe's script retains more archaic dialectic features, which allow modern scholars to ascribe the poem a cultural context. While both scribes appear to have proofread their work, there are nevertheless many errors. The second scribe was ultimately the more conservative copyist as he did not modify the spelling of the text as he wrote, but copied what he saw in front of him. In the way that it is currently bound, the Beowulf manuscript is followed by the Old English poem Judith. Judith was written by the same scribe that completed Beowulf, as evidenced by similar writing style. Wormholes found in the last leaves of the Beowulf manuscript that are absent in the Judith manuscript suggest that at one point Beowulf ended the volume. The rubbed appearance of some leaves suggests that the manuscript stood on a shelf unbound, as was the case with other Old English manuscripts.
Performance
(left) to string accompaniment, but modern scholars have suggested its origin as a piece of written literature borrowed from oral traditions. Illustration by J. R. Skelton, ]]
The scholar Roy Liuzza notes that the practice of oral poetry is by its nature invisible to history as evidence is in writing. Comparison with other bodies of verse such as Homer's, coupled with ethnographic observation of early 20th century performers, has provided a vision of how an Anglo-Saxon singer-poet or scop may have practised. The resulting model is that performance was based on traditional stories and a repertoire of word formulae that fitted the traditional metre. The scop moved through the scenes, such as putting on armour or crossing the sea, each one improvised at each telling with differing combinations of the stock phrases, while the basic story and style remained the same. Liuzza notes that Beowulf itself describes the technique of a court poet in assembling materials, in lines 867–874 in his translation, "full of grand stories, mindful of songs ... found other words truly bound together; ... to recite with skill the adventure of Beowulf, adeptly tell a tall tale, and (wordum wrixlan) weave his words." The poem further mentions (lines 1065–1068) that "the harp was touched, tales often told, when Hrothgar's scop was set to recite among the mead tables his hall-entertainment". Debate over oral tradition The question of whether Beowulf was passed down through oral tradition prior to its present manuscript form has been the subject of much debate, and involves more than simply the issue of its composition. Rather, given the implications of the theory of oral-formulaic composition and oral tradition, the question concerns how the poem is to be understood, and what sorts of interpretations are legitimate. do exist across Germanic works. Some scholars conclude that Anglo-Saxon poetry is a mix of oral-formulaic and literate patterns. Larry Benson proposed that Germanic literature contains "kernels of tradition" which Beowulf expands upon. Ann Watts argued against the imperfect application of one theory to two different traditions: traditional, Homeric, oral-formulaic poetry and Anglo-Saxon poetry. Thomas Gardner agreed with Watts, arguing that the Beowulf text is too varied to be completely constructed from set formulae and themes. John Miles Foley wrote that comparative work must observe the particularities of a given tradition; in his view, there was a fluid continuum from traditionality to textuality.
Editions, translations, and adaptations
Editions
Many editions of the Old English text of Beowulf have been published; this section lists the most influential.
The Icelandic scholar Grímur Jónsson Thorkelin made the first transcriptions of the Beowulf-manuscript in 1786, working as part of a Danish government historical research commission. He had a copy made by a professional copyist who knew no Old English (and was therefore in some ways more likely to make transcription errors, but in other ways more likely to copy exactly what he saw), and then made a copy himself. Since that time, the manuscript has crumbled further, making these transcripts prized witnesses to the text. While the recovery of at least 2000 letters can be attributed to them, their accuracy has been called into question, and the extent to which the manuscript was actually more readable in Thorkelin's time is uncertain. Thorkelin used these transcriptions as the basis for the first complete edition of Beowulf, in Latin. it became the "central source used by graduate students for the study of the poem and by scholars and teachers as the basis of their translations." His third edition was published in 1936, with the last version in his lifetime being a revised reprint in 1950. Klaeber's text was re-presented with new introductory material, notes, and glosses, in a fourth edition in 2008.
Another widely used edition is Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie's, published in 1953 in the Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records series. The British Library, meanwhile, took a prominent role in supporting Kevin Kiernan's Electronic Beowulf; the first edition appeared in 1999, and the fourth in 2014. Beowulf has been translated into at least 38 other languages. This was followed in 1814 by John Josias Conybeare who published an edition "in English paraphrase and Latin verse translation." Seamus Heaney's 1999 translation of the poem (Beowulf: A New Verse Translation, called "Heaneywulf" by the Beowulf translator Howell Chickering and many others) was both praised and criticised. The US publication was commissioned by W. W. Norton & Company, and was included in the Norton Anthology of English Literature. Many retellings of Beowulf for children appeared in the 20th century.
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In 2000 (2nd edition 2013), Liuzza published his own version of Beowulf in a parallel text with the Old English, with his analysis of the poem's historical, oral, religious and linguistic contexts. R. D. Fulk, of Indiana University, published a facing-page edition and translation of the entire Nowell Codex manuscript in 2010. Hugh Magennis's 2011 Translating Beowulf: Modern Versions in English Verse discusses the challenges and history of translating the poem, as well as the question of how to approach its poetry, and discusses several post-1950 verse translations, paying special attention to those of Edwin Morgan, Burton Raffel, Michael J. Alexander, and Seamus Heaney. Translating Beowulf is one of the subjects of the 2012 publication Beowulf at Kalamazoo, containing a section with 10 essays on translation, and a section with 22 reviews of Heaney's translation, some of which compare Heaney's work with Liuzza's. Tolkien's long-awaited prose translation (edited by his son Christopher) was published in 2014 as Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary. The book includes Tolkien's own retelling of the story of Beowulf in his tale Sellic Spell, but not his incomplete and unpublished verse translation. The Mere Wife, by Maria Dahvana Headley, was published in 2018. It relocates the action to a wealthy community in 20th-century America and is told primarily from the point of view of Grendel's mother. In 2020, Headley published a translation in which the opening "Hwæt!" is rendered "Bro!"; this translation subsequently won the Hugo Award for Best Related Work.
Sources and analogues
Neither identified sources nor analogues for Beowulf can be definitively proven, but many conjectures have been made. These are important in helping historians understand the Beowulf manuscript, as possible source-texts or influences would suggest time-frames of composition, geographic boundaries within which it could be composed, or range (both spatial and temporal) of influence (i.e. when it was "popular" and where its "popularity" took it). The poem has been related to Scandinavian, Celtic, and international folkloric sources.Scandinavian parallels and sources19th-century studies proposed that Beowulf was translated from a lost original Scandinavian work; surviving Scandinavian works have continued to be studied as possible sources. In 1886 Gregor Sarrazin suggested that an Old Norse original version of Beowulf must have existed, but in 1914 Carl Wilhelm von Sydow claimed that Beowulf is fundamentally Christian and was written at a time when any Norse tale would have most likely been pagan. Another proposal was a parallel with the Grettis Saga, but in 1998, Magnús Fjalldal challenged that, stating that tangential similarities were being overemphasised as analogies. The story of Hrolf Kraki and his servant, the legendary bear-shapeshifter Bodvar Bjarki, has also been suggested as a possible parallel; he survives in Hrólfs saga kraka and Saxo's Gesta Danorum, while Hrolf Kraki, one of the Scyldings, appears as "Hrothulf" in Beowulf. New Scandinavian analogues to Beowulf continue to be proposed regularly, with Hrólfs saga Gautrekssonar being the most recently adduced text.
International folktale sources
(1910) wrote a thesis that the first part of Beowulf (the Grendel Story) incorporated preexisting folktale material, and that the folktale in question was of the Bear's Son Tale (Bärensohnmärchen) type, which has surviving examples all over the world. This tale type was later catalogued as international folktale type 301 in the ATU Index, now formally entitled "The Three Stolen Princesses" type in Hans Uther's catalogue, although the "Bear's Son" is still used in Beowulf criticism, if not so much in folkloristic circles. However, although this folkloristic approach was seen as a step in the right direction, "The Bear's Son" tale has later been regarded by many as not a close enough parallel to be a viable choice. Later, Peter A. Jorgensen, looking for a more concise frame of reference, coined a "two-troll tradition" that covers both Beowulf and Grettis saga: "a Norse 'ecotype' in which a hero enters a cave and kills two giants, usually of different sexes"; this has emerged as a more attractive folk tale parallel, according to a 1998 assessment by Andersson.
The epic's similarity to the Irish folktale "The Hand and the Child" was noted in 1899 by Albert S. Cook, and others even earlier. (1909) is credited by Andersson as the first person to present the Irish argument in academic form. He suggested the Irish Feast of Bricriu (not a folktale) as a source for Beowulf—a theory soon denied by Oscar Olson.}} In 1914, the Swedish folklorist Carl Wilhelm von Sydow made a strong argument for parallelism with "The Hand and the Child", because the folktale type demonstrated a "monstrous arm" motif that corresponded with Beowulf's wrenching off Grendel's arm. No such correspondence could be perceived in the Bear's Son Tale or in the Grettis saga.}}
James Carney and Martin Puhvel agree with this "Hand and the Child" contextualisation. Puhvel supported the "Hand and the Child" theory through such motifs as (in Andersson's words) "the more powerful giant mother, the mysterious light in the cave, the melting of the sword in blood, the phenomenon of battle rage, swimming prowess, combat with water monsters, underwater adventures, and the bear-hug style of wrestling."
In the Mabinogion, Teyrnon discovers the otherworldly boy child Pryderi, the principal character of the cycle, after cutting off the arm of a monstrous beast which is stealing foals from his stables. The medievalist R. Mark Scowcroft notes that the tearing off of the monster's arm without a weapon is found only in Beowulf and fifteen of the Irish variants of the tale; he identifies twelve parallels between the tale and Beowulf.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ Scowcroft's "Hand and Child" parallels in Beowulf
Frederick Klaeber, among others, argued for a connection between Beowulf and Virgil near the start of the 20th century, claiming that the very act of writing a secular epic in a Germanic world represents Virgilian influence. Virgil was seen as the pinnacle of Latin literature, and Latin was the dominant literary language of England at the time, therefore making Virgilian influence highly likely. Similarly, in 1971, Alistair Campbell stated that the apologue technique used in Beowulf is so rare in epic poetry aside from Virgil that the poet who composed Beowulf could not have written the poem in such a manner without first coming across Virgil's writings.Biblical influencesIt cannot be denied that Biblical parallels occur in the text, whether seen as a pagan work with "Christian colouring" added by scribes or as a "Christian historical novel, with selected bits of paganism deliberately laid on as 'local colour'", as Margaret E. Goldsmith did in "The Christian Theme of Beowulf". Beowulf channels the Book of Genesis, the Book of Exodus, and the Book of Daniel in its inclusion of references to the Genesis creation narrative, the story of Cain and Abel, Noah and the flood, the Devil, Hell, and the Last Judgment.
Form and metre<!--British English, do not attempt to change this, thanks-->
Old English poets typically used alliterative verse, a form of verse in which the first half of the line (the a-verse) is linked to the second half (the b-verse) through similarity in initial sound. That the line consists of two halves is clearly indicated by the caesura: (l. 4). This verse form maps stressed and unstressed syllables onto abstract entities known as metrical positions. There is no fixed number of beats per line: the first one cited has three () whereas the second has two ().
The poet had a choice of formulae to assist in fulfilling the alliteration scheme. These were memorised phrases that conveyed a general and commonly-occurring meaning that fitted neatly into a half-line of the chanted poem. Examples are line 8's ("waxed under welkin", i.e. "he grew up under the heavens"), line 11's ("pay tribute"), line 13's ("young in the yards", i.e. "young in the courts"), and line 14's ("as a comfort to his people").
Kennings are a significant technique in Beowulf. They are evocative poetic descriptions of everyday things, often created to fill the alliterative requirements of the metre. For example, a poet might call the sea the "swan's riding"; a king might be called a "ring-giver". The poem contains many kennings, and the device is typical of much of classic poetry in Old English, which is heavily formulaic.
Interpretation and criticism
The history of modern Beowulf criticism is often said to begin with Tolkien, author and Merton Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford, who in his 1936 lecture to the British Academy criticised his contemporaries' excessive interest in its historical implications. He noted in Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics that as a result the poem's literary value had been largely overlooked, and argued that the poem "is in fact so interesting as poetry, in places poetry so powerful, that this quite overshadows the historical content..." Tolkien argued that the poem is not an epic; that, while no conventional term exactly fits, the nearest would be elegy; and that its focus is the concluding dirge.<!--Tolkien wrote (on the 27th of 29 pages of the essay): Beowulf is not an "epic", not even a magnified "lay". No terms borrowed from Greek or other literatures exactly fit: there is no reason why they should. Though if we must have a term, we should choose rather "elegy". It is an heroic-elegiac poem; and in a sense all its first 3,136 lines are the prelude to a dirge: him tha gegiredan Geata leode ad ofer eorthan unwaclicne ["the Geatish people then built a pyre on that high ground, no mean thing"]: one of the most moving ever written.-->
Paganism and Christianity
In historical terms, the poem's characters were Germanic pagans, yet the poem was recorded by Christian Anglo-Saxons who had mostly converted from their native Anglo-Saxon paganism around the 7th century. Beowulf thus depicts a Germanic warrior society, in which the relationship between the lord of the region and those who served under him was of paramount importance.
In terms of the relationship between characters in Beowulf and God, one might recall the substantial amount of paganism that is present throughout the work. Literary critics such as Fred C. Robinson argue that the Beowulf poet tries to send a message to readers during the Anglo-Saxon time period regarding the state of Christianity in their own time. Robinson argues that the intensified religious aspects of the Anglo-Saxon period inherently shape the way in which the poet alludes to paganism as presented in Beowulf. The poet calls on Anglo-Saxon readers to recognize the imperfect aspects of their supposed Christian lifestyles. In other words, the poet is referencing their "Anglo-Saxon Heathenism". In terms of the characters of the epic itself, Robinson argues that readers are "impressed" by the courageous acts of Beowulf and the speeches of Hrothgar. But one is ultimately left to feel sorry for both men as they are fully detached from supposed "Christian truth". The relationship between the characters of Beowulf, and the overall message of the poet, regarding their relationship with God is debated among readers and literary critics alike.
Richard North argues that the Beowulf poet interpreted "Danish myths in Christian form" (as the poem would have served as a form of entertainment for a Christian audience), and states: "As yet we are no closer to finding out why the first audience of Beowulf liked to hear stories about people routinely classified as damned. This question is pressing, given... that Anglo-Saxons saw the Danes as 's' rather than as foreigners." Donaldson wrote that "the poet who put the materials into their present form was a Christian and ... poem reflects a Christian tradition".}}
Ursula Schaefer's view is that the poem was created, and is interpretable, within both pagan and Christian horizons. Schaefer's concept of "vocality" offers neither a compromise nor a synthesis of views that see the poem as on the one hand Germanic, pagan, and oral and on the other Latin-derived, Christian, and literate, but, as stated by Monika Otter: "a 'tertium quid', a modality that participates in both oral and literate culture yet also has a logic and aesthetic of its own." Politics and warfare Stanley B. Greenfield has suggested that references to the human body throughout Beowulf emphasise the relative position of thanes to their lord. He argues that the term "shoulder-companion" could refer to both a physical arm as well as a thane (Aeschere) who was very valuable to his lord (Hrothgar). With Aeschere's death, Hrothgar turns to Beowulf as his new "arm". Greenfield argues the foot is used for the opposite effect, only appearing four times in the poem. It is used in conjunction with Unferð (a man described by Beowulf as weak, traitorous, and cowardly). Greenfield notes that Unferð is described as "at the king's feet" (line 499). Unferð is a member of the foot troops, who, throughout the story, do nothing and "generally serve as backdrops for more heroic action."
Daniel Podgorski has argued that the work is best understood as an examination of inter-generational vengeance-based conflict, or feuding. In this context, the poem operates as an indictment of feuding conflicts as a function of its conspicuous, circuitous, and lengthy depiction of the Swedish–Geatish wars—coming into contrast with the poem's depiction of the protagonist Beowulf as being disassociated from the ongoing feuds in every way. See also
* List of Beowulf characters
* "On Translating Beowulf
* Sutton Hoo helmet § Beowulf
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
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* Jaillant, Lise. [https://www.academia.edu/3765663/A_Fine_Old_Tale_of_Adventure_Beowulf_Told_to_the_Children_of_the_English_Race_1898-1908 "A Fine Old Tale of Adventure: Beowulf Told to the Children of the English Race, 1898–1908." Children's Literature Association Quarterly 38.4 (2013): 399–419]
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* , and [https://archive.org/details/studienzurgerman01panz II. Sigfrid]
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Further reading
The secondary literature on Beowulf is immense. The following is a selection.
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The word "selection" here is the operative one. We are NOT able to list everything, so why should we list your paper? We should ONLY add anything here if it is asserted to be major and distinctive by OTHER scholars, not by its authors. In which case we may ask, if it's so important, why don't you add its key message to the article instead, and cite it in the main reference list?
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External links
* [http://web.archive.org/web/20190316130017/http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Cotton_MS_Vitellius_A_XV Full digital facsimile of the manuscript on the British Library's Digitised Manuscripts website]
* [http://ebeowulf.uky.edu/ebeo4.0/start.html Electronic Beowulf], edited by Kevin Kiernan, 4th online edition (University of Kentucky/The British Library, 2015)
* [http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/onlineex/englit/beowulf/ Beowulf manuscript in The British Library's Online Gallery, with short summary and podcast]
* [http://www.acmrs.org/academic-programs/online-resources/beowulf-list Annotated List of Beowulf Translations: The List – Arizonal Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies]
* [http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/ascp/a04_01.htm online text] (digitised from Elliott van Kirk Dobbie (ed.), Beowulf and Judith, Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, 4 (New York, 1953))
*
Category:9th-century books
Category:Denmark in fiction
Category:Poems adapted into films
Category:Sweden in fiction
Category:Germanic heroic legends
Category:Monsters in popular culture
Category:Influences on J. R. R. Tolkien | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.307020 |
3836 | Barb Wire (character) | Barb Wire}}
Barb Wire is a fictional character appearing in Comics Greatest World, an imprint of Dark Horse Comics. Created by Chris Warner and Team CGW, the character first appeared in ''Comics' Greatest World: Steel Harbor in 1993. The original Barb Wire series published nine issues between 1994 and 1995 and was followed by a four-issue miniseries in 1996. A reboot was published in 2015 and lasted eight issues. In 1996, the character was adapted into a film starring Pamela Anderson. Unlike the comics, the film takes place in a possible future rather than an alternate version of present-day Earth.
Creators
;Regular series
* 1: John Arcudi, writer/ Lee Moder, pencils/Ande Parks, inks
* 2–3: Arcudi, writer/ Dan Lawlis, pencils/Parks, inks
* 4–5: Arcudi, writer/Lawlis, pencils/Ian Akin, inks
* 6–7: Arcudi, writer/Mike Manley, pencils/Parks, inks
* 8: Arcudi, writer/ Andrew Robinson, pencils/ Jim Royal, inks
* 9: Anina Bennett & Paul Guinan, writers/ Robert Walker, pencils/Jim Royal, inks
;Ace of Spades'' miniseries
1–4: Chris Warner, script and pencils/Tim Bradstreet, inks
Fictional character biography
Barb Wire's stories take place on an alternate version of present-day Earth with superhumans and more advanced technology. In this Earth's history, an alien entity called the Vortex arrived in 1931 and began conducting secret experiments. In 1947, an atom bomb test detonated in a desert nearby the alien's experiments. The result was the creation of a trans-dimensional wormhole referred to as "the Vortex" or "the Maelstrom", which released energy that gave different people across Earth superpowers for years to come.
Decades later, Barbara Kopetski grows up in Steel Harbor when it is still a thriving steel industry city. Barbara and her brother Charlie live with their grandmother and parents, their mother being a police officer while their father is a former marine who became a steelworker. Officer Kopetski later dies, after which her husband becomes so ill he is confined to a bed for years, developing Alzheimer's disease as well before passing away. Following the death of her father, Barbara leaves Steel Harbour for a time as the city's economy starts to spiral and crime begins rising. Soon, much of the city is controlled by warring gangs rather than local government. Years later, Barbara returns to Steel Harbor, now an experienced bounty hunter operating under the name Barb Wire. Reuniting with Charlie, she decides to stay in her hometown, becoming the owner of the Hammerhead bar. To help bring in money, she continues moonlighting as a bounty hunter, working with the police directly or bail bondsman Thomas Crashell.
As time goes on, Steel Harbor becomes more dangerous, described as "a city under siege from drugs, crime, pollution and gang warfare". In 1993, a second American Civil War begins when Golden City announces its secession from the Union. The announcement leads to protests and riots in several cities. The Steel Harbor Riots leave some neighborhoods in literal ruin, with hundreds of buildings destroyed or abandoned in the area known as "Metal City". Many are forced to leave the city or take to the streets, and the gangs (all of whom have superhuman members) start moving to take more control. To help contain the chaos and keep her home from descending further, Barb Wire now acts at times as a vigilante, intervening when the police can't or won't. Fighting alongside the Wolf Gang, she defies criminal Mace Blitzkrieg's attempts to bring all gangs under his leadership and control the city.
Growing up with a police officer mother and marine father, as well as her life experiences traveling outside of the city, Barb Wire is an excellent hand-to-hand combatant, skilled in various firearms, and an expert driver and motorcycle rider. Her bar has been considered neutral meeting ground by the Steel Harbor gangs. Aiding her bounty hunter activities is her brother Charlie, acting as her mechanic and engineer, and others such as Avram Roman Jr., a cyborg sometimes known simply as "the Machine". Though she has loyal allies, including Charlie, Barb Wire is a harsh, guarded person who looks at the world with suspicion and cynicism, considering herself a loner at heart.
Other characters
Supporting characters
* Charlie Kopetski, Barb's brother, a blind mechanic, and engineering genius. He invents and maintains most of her weapons and superhuman restraining devices. He openly complains about how often he must fix the equipment she continuously breaks during her adventures.
Allies
* The Machine, real name: Avram Roman Jr. A man whose body is inhabited by a self-repairing machine colony, making him an advanced cyborg. Along with a reinforced skeleton, superhuman strength and enhanced durability, he is capable of rebuilding parts of his body. Over time, he becomes more machine-like in nature, no longer requiring food.
* Motörhead, real name: Frank Fletcher. A drifter with psychic powers who is bonded to an ancient, powerful artifact known as the Motor.
* Wolf Gang, a group that believe gangs shouldn't go too far in their activities and victimize the city, and prefer independence and a balance of power rather than uniting all gangs under one leader. The Wolf Gang is formidable and its members are known for discipline and loyalty. The gang includes five superhumans: Burner (fire abilities); Bomber (creates energy bombs); Breaker (superhuman strength); Cutter (energy blades); and their leader Wolf Ferrell, also known as Hunter (enhanced senses).
* Ghost, real name: Elisa Cameron. A popular Dark Horse Comics character with ghost-like abilities who has a brief crossover story with Barb Wire.
Enemies
* The Prime Movers, a collective of street gang leaders who agree to serve under the leadership of superhumanly strong criminal Mace Blitzkrieg. The gang leaders include Airborne, Blackbelt, Deadlight, Hurricane Max, Ignition, and Killerwatt.
* Death Card (appearing in the first Barb Wire regular series).
* Death Card II (appearing in the Ace of Spades mini-series) - an assassin.
* Ignition II - Maureen Skach. Girlfriend of Boyd Mack, the original Ignition, a gang leader with pyrokinetic powers. Believing Mack was having an affair with Barb Wire, Skach kills him, then assumes the Ignition name and leadership of his gang.
* The Mask
Film adaptation
portrayed Barb Wire in the film adaptation of the same name]]
A film adaptation was released in 1996 starring Pamela Anderson as Barb Wire. The story's premise was that Barb Wire lives in the near future rather than an alternate version of the present day, a world where superhumans and Dark Horse superheroes do not exist. In this version of the story, Steel Harbor is the last neutral "free city" during the Second American Civil War, and Barbara Kopetski is a resistance fighter who leaves behind the war after her heart is broken and she loses faith in the cause. Like the comic, she returns home to become a bounty hunter and owner of the Hammerhead.
References
External links
*[http://www.toonopedia.com/barbwire.htm Barb Wire] at Don Markstein's Toonopedia. [https://archive.today/20240528074819/https://www.webcitation.org/6xQvYgnZv?url=http://www.toonopedia.com/barbwire.htm Archived] from the original on February 22, 2018.
*[http://www.internationalhero.co.uk/b/barbwire.htm Barb Wire] International Hero
Category:1994 comics debuts
Category:Characters created by Chris Warner
Category:Comics' Greatest World
Category:Dark Horse Comics adapted into films
Category:Dark Horse Comics superheroes
Category:Dark Horse Comics female superheroes
Category:Dark Horse Comics titles
Category:Fictional bounty hunters
Category:Fictional female murderers | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barb_Wire_(character) | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.314038 |
3837 | Blazing Saddles | | story = Andrew Bergman
| producer = Michael Hertzberg
| starring =
| cinematography = Joseph Biroc
| editing =
| music = John Morris
| studio = Crossbow Productions
| distributor = Warner Bros.
| released =
| runtime 93 minutes
| country = United States
| language = English
| budget = $2.6 million
| gross $119.6 million
}}
Blazing Saddles is a 1974 American satirical postmodernist Western black comedy film directed by Mel Brooks, who co-wrote the screenplay with Andrew Bergman, Richard Pryor, Norman Steinberg and Alan Uger, based on a story treatment by Bergman. The film stars Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder. Brooks appears in two supporting roles: Governor William J. Le Petomane, and a Yiddish-speaking Native American chief; he also dubs lines for one of Lili Von Shtupp's backing troupe and a cranky moviegoer. The supporting cast includes Slim Pickens, Alex Karras and David Huddleston, as well as Brooks regulars Dom DeLuise, Madeline Kahn and Harvey Korman. Bandleader Count Basie has a cameo as himself, appearing with his orchestra.
The film is full of deliberate anachronisms, from the Count Basie Orchestra playing "April in Paris" in the Wild West, to Pickens' character mentioning the Wide World of Sports.
The film received generally positive reviews from critics and audiences, was nominated for three Academy Awards and is today regarded as a comedy classic. It is ranked number six on the American Film Institute's 100 Years...100 Laughs list, and was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry in 2006. Plot
On the American frontier of 1874, a new railroad under construction will have to be rerouted through the town of Rock Ridge to avoid quicksand. Realizing this will make Rock Ridge worth millions, territorial attorney general Hedley Lamarr plans to force Rock Ridge's residents out of the town and sends a gang of thugs, led by his flunky Taggart, to shoot the sheriff and trash the town.
Not wanting to go with Reverend Johnson's suggestion to leave, the other Johnsons lead the other townspeople in demanding that Governor William J. Le Petomane appoints a new sheriff to protect them. Lamarr persuades dim-witted Le Petomane to appoint Bart, a black railroad worker about to be executed for assaulting Taggart. A black sheriff, Lamarr reasons, will offend the townspeople, create chaos and leave Rock Ridge at his mercy.
After an initial hostile reception in which he takes himself "hostage" to escape, Bart relies on his quick wits and the assistance of Jim, an alcoholic gunslinger known as the "Waco Kid", to overcome the townspeople's hostility. Bart subdues Mongo, an immensely strong and dim-witted, yet philosophical henchman sent to kill him, then outwits German seductress-for-hire Lili Von Shtupp at her own game, with Lili falling in love with him.
Upon release, Mongo vaguely informs Bart of Lamarr's connection to the railroad, so Bart and Jim visit the railroad worksite and discover from Bart's best friend Charlie that the railway is planned to go through Rock Ridge. Taggart and his men arrive to kill Bart, but Jim outshoots them and forces their retreat. Furious that his schemes have backfired, Lamarr recruits an army of thugs, including common criminals, motorcycle gangsters, Ku Klux Klansmen, Nazi soldiers, and Methodists.
East of Rock Ridge, Bart introduces the White townspeople to the black, Chinese, and Irish railroad workers who have all agreed to help them in exchange for acceptance by the community, and explains his plan to defeat Lamarr's army. They labor all night to build a perfect copy of the town as a diversion. When Bart realizes it will not be enough to fool the villains, the townsfolk construct copies of themselves.
Bart, Jim, and Mongo buy time by constructing the "Gov. William J. Le Petomane Thruway", forcing the raiding party to send for change to pay the toll. Once through the tollbooth, the raiders attack the fake town and its population of dummies, which have been booby trapped with dynamite. After Jim detonates the bombs with his sharpshooting, launching bad guys and horses skyward, the Rock Ridgers attack the villains with Lili singing with the Nazi soldiers.
The resulting brawl between townsfolk, railroad workers, and Lamarr's thugs literally breaks the fourth wall and bursts onto a neighboring movie set where director Buddy Bizarre is filming a Busby Berkeley-style top-hat-and-tails musical number. Then the brawl spreads into the studio commissary for a food fight and spills out of the Warner Bros. film lot onto the streets of Burbank.
Lamarr escapes the brawl and takes a taxi to hide at Mann's Chinese Theatre which is showing the premiere of Blazing Saddles. As he settles into his seat, he sees onscreen Bart arriving on horseback outside the theatre. Bart blocks Lamarr's escape and shoots him in the groin. Bart and Jim then enter the theater to watch the end of the film.
Back in the film, Bart announces to the townspeople that he is moving on because his work is done (and because he is bored). Riding out of town, he finds Jim, still eating his popcorn, and invites him along to "nowhere special". The two friends briefly ride into the desert before dismounting and boarding a limousine which drives off into the sunset.
Cast
Cast notes:
* Count Basie and his orchestra make a cameo appearance, playing "April in Paris" in the middle of the desert as Bart rides toward Rock Ridge to assume the post of sheriff.
* Brooks appears in three on-screen roles: Governor William J. Le Petomane, the Yiddish-speaking Native American chief (appearing in redface) in Bart's backstory, and an applicant for Hedley Lamarr's thug army (an aviator wearing sunglasses and a flight jacket). He also has two off-screen voice roles, as one of Lili's German chorus boys during "I'm Tired" and as a grouchy moviegoer.
* Carol Arthur (Harriett Johnson) was DeLuise's wife. Production Development The idea came from a story outline written by Andrew Bergman that he originally intended to develop and produce himself. "I wrote a first draft called Tex-X" (a play on Malcolm X's name), he said. "Alan Arkin was hired to direct and James Earl Jones was going to play the sheriff. That fell apart, as things often do." Brooks was taken with the story, which he described as "hip talk—1974 talk and expressions—happening in 1874 in the Old West", and purchased the film rights from Bergman. Though he had not worked with a writing team since Your Show of Shows, he hired a group of writers (including Bergman) to expand the outline, and posted a large sign: "Please do not write a polite script."
Brooks described the writing process as chaotic: Bergman remembers the room being just as chaotic, telling Creative Screenwriting, Brooks recalled. "I explained that I was a happily married man and that I needed someone who could straddle a chair with her legs like Marlene Dietrich in Destry Rides Again. So she lifted her skirt and said, 'No touching. When asked later about the many "nigger" references, Brooks said he received consistent support from Pryor and Little. He added: "If they did a remake of Blazing Saddles today [2012], they would leave out the N-word. And then, you've got no movie." Brooks said the use of the slur was to show how despised, hated, and loathed the black sheriff was. Brooks said he received many letters of complaint after the film's release. In an interview with Terry Gross, Laine said that he did not know at the time that Blazing Saddles was a comedy.
The choreographer for "I'm Tired" and "The French Mistake" was Alan Johnson. "I'm Tired" is a homage to and parody of Marlene Dietrich's performance of Cole Porter's song "I'm the Laziest Gal in Town" in Alfred Hitchcock's 1950 film Stage Fright, as well as "Falling in Love Again (Can't Help It)" from The Blue Angel.
The world premiere took place on February 7, 1974, at the Pickwick Drive-In Theater in Burbank; 250 invited guests—including Little and Wilder—watched the film on horseback.
Critical response
While Blazing Saddles is now considered a classic, critical reaction was mixed upon initial release. Vincent Canby wrote:
Roger Ebert gave the film four stars out of four, calling it a "crazed grab bag of a movie that does everything to keep us laughing except hit us over the head with a rubber chicken. Mostly, it succeeds. It's an audience picture; it doesn't have a lot of classy polish and its structure is a total mess. But of course! What does that matter while Alex Karras is knocking a horse cold with a right cross to the jaw?" Gene Siskel awarded three stars out of four and called it "bound to rank with the funniest of the year," adding, "Whenever the laughs begin to run dry, Brooks and his quartet of gag writers splash about in a pool of obscenities that score belly laughs if your ears aren't sensitive and if you're hip to western movie conventions being parodied."
Critics often perceived Blazing Saddles as inherently "un-cinematic", defying some expectations for Hollywood filmmaking in the era, often displaying production style associated with Broadway theater and US television variety shows. This was in part due to its "simplistic framing" and the casting of Harvey Korman, known for The Carol Burnett Show (CBS, 1967–1978), which was similarly "low on characterization and story, instead opting for a high volume of one-liners and visual gags." Typical to this perception, Variety wrote: "If comedies are measured solely by the number of yocks they generate from audiences, then Blazing Saddles must be counted a success ... Few viewers will have time between laughs to complain that pic is essentially a raunchy, protracted version of a television comedy skit."
Charles Champlin of the Los Angeles Times called the film "irreverent, outrageous, improbable, often as blithely tasteless as a stag night at the Friar's Club and almost continuously funny." Gary Arnold of The Washington Post was negative, writing: "Mel Brooks squanders a snappy title on a stockpile of stale jokes. To say that this slapdash Western spoof lacks freshness and spontaneity and originality is putting it mildly. Blazing Saddles is at once a messy and antiquated gag machine." Jan Dawson of The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "Perhaps it is pedantic to complain that the whole is not up to the sum of its parts when, for the curate's egg that it is, Blazing Saddles contains so many good parts and memorable performances." John Simon wrote a negative review of Blazing Saddles, saying: "All kinds of gags—chiefly anachronisms, irrelevancies, reverse ethnic jokes, and out and out vulgarities—are thrown together pell-mell, batted about insanely in all directions, and usually beaten into the ground."
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 88% based on 69 reviews, with an average rating of 8.10/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "Daring, provocative, and laugh-out-loud funny, Blazing Saddles is a gleefully vulgar spoof of Westerns that marks a high point in Mel Brooks' storied career." On Metacritic it has a score of 73 out of 100 based on 12 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
Ishmael Reed's 1969 novel Yellow Back Radio Broke-Down has been cited as an important precursor or influence for Blazing Saddles, a connection that Reed himself has made.
Box office
The film earned theatrical rentals of $26.7 million in its initial release in the United States and Canada. In its 1976 reissue, it earned a further $10.5 million and another $8 million in 1979. Its total rentals in the United States and Canada totalled $47.8 million from a gross of $119.5 million, becoming only the tenth film up to that time to pass the $100 million mark. Awards and accolades
While addressing his group of bad guys, Harvey Korman's character reminds them that although they are risking their lives, he is "risking an almost certain Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor!" Korman did not receive an Oscar bid, but the film did get three nominations at the 47th Academy Awards, including Best Supporting Actress for Madeline Kahn.
In 2006, Blazing Saddles was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. In 2014, NPR wrote that, four decades after the movie was made, it was "still as biting a satire" on racism as ever, although its treatment of gays and women was "not self-aware at all".
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Award
! Category
! Recipient
! Result
!
|-
| rowspan="3"| Academy Awards
| Best Supporting Actress
| Madeline Kahn
|
| align"center" rowspan"3"|
|-
| Best Film Editing
| John C. Howard and Danford B. Greene
|
|-
| Best Song
| "Blazing Saddles" <br /> Music by John Morris; <br /> Lyrics by Mel Brooks
|
|-
| rowspan="2"| British Academy Film Awards
| Best Screenplay
| Mel Brooks, Norman Steinberg, Andrew Bergman, <br /> Richard Pryor and Alan Uger
|
| align"center" rowspan"2"|
|-
| Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles
| Cleavon Little
|
|-
| National Film Preservation Board
| colspan="2"| National Film Registry
|
| align"center"|
|-
| Writers Guild of America Awards
| Best Comedy – Written Directly for the Screenplay
| Mel Brooks, Norman Steinberg, Andrew Bergman, <br /> Richard Pryor and Alan Uger
|
| align"center"|
|}
The film is recognized by the American Film Institute in these lists:
* 2000: AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs – No. 6 Adaptations TV series A television pilot titled Black Bart was produced for CBS based on Bergman's original story. It featured Louis Gossett Jr. as Bart and Steve Landesberg as his drunkard sidekick, a former Confederate officer named "Reb Jordan". Other cast members included Millie Slavin and Noble Willingham. Bergman is listed as the sole creator. CBS aired the pilot once on April 4, 1975. The pilot episode of Black Bart was later included as a bonus feature on the Blazing Saddles 30th Anniversary DVD and the Blu-ray disc. Possible stage production In September 2017, Brooks indicated his desire to do a stage version of Blazing Saddles in the future.
In popular culture
The Rock Ridge standard for CD and DVD media is named after the town in Blazing Saddles.
The 1988 animated television film The Good, the Bad, and Huckleberry Hound is a Western parody. Starring anthropomorphic cartoon dog Huckleberry Hound, the film is set in the California Gold Rush era and has similar spoofs and gags to Blazing Saddles, as well as depiction of Native American stereotypes. Here, much like Bart, Huck is unexpectedly appointed as a sheriff to defend townspeople.
In 2011, the fifteenth episode of Supernatural season 6 was entitled "The French Mistake", as a reference to the genre defining Fourth Wall breaking scene.
The 2022 animated film Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank, starring Michael Cera, Samuel L. Jackson, Michelle Yeoh and Ricky Gervais, was originally titled Blazing Samurai and its creators called it "equally inspired by and an homage to Blazing Saddles." Brooks served as an executive producer for the production, voiced one of the characters, and received screenplay credit. Home media The film was released on VHS several times and was first released on DVD in 1997, followed by a 30th Anniversary Special Edition DVD in 2004 and a Blu-ray version in 2006. A 40th anniversary Blu-ray set was released in 2014. References External links
*
* [https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/blazing_saddles.pdf Blazing Saddles essay] by Michael Schlesinger at National Film Registry.
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Category:1974 films
Category:1974 Western (genre) films
Category:1970s American films
Category:1974 black comedy films
Category:1970s English-language films
Category:1970s parody films
Category:1970s satirical films
Category:American self-reflexive films
Category:1970s Western (genre) comedy films
Category:African-American Western (genre) films
Category:American Western (genre) comedy films
Category:American black comedy films
Category:American parody films
Category:American satirical films
Category:Ethnic humour
Category:Films about racism in the United States
Category:Films directed by Mel Brooks
Category:Films scored by John Morris
Category:Films set in 1856
Category:Films set in 1874
Category:Films set in a movie theatre
Category:Films set in the American frontier
Category:Films shot in California
Category:Films with screenplays by Andrew Bergman
Category:Films with screenplays by Mel Brooks
Category:Films with screenplays by Richard Pryor
Category:Films with screenplays by Norman Steinberg
Category:Films with screenplays by Alan Uger
Category:Metafictional works
Category:United States National Film Registry films
Category:Warner Bros. films
Category:Postmodern films
Category:English-language Western (genre) comedy films
Category:English-language black comedy films | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blazing_Saddles | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.348382 |
3838 | Bruce Sterling | | birth_place = Brownsville, Texas, U.S.
| death_date | death_place
| occupation =
| spouse =
| period = 1970s–present
| genre = Science fiction
| subject = Cyberpunk
| movement = Cyberpunk/postcyberpunk
| signature = Bruce Sterling signature.jpg
| website =
| education = University of Texas at Austin (BA)
}}
Michael Bruce Sterling (born April 14, 1954) is an American science fiction author known for his novels and short fiction and editorship of the Mirrorshades anthology. In particular, he is linked to the cyberpunk subgenre.
Sterling's first science-fiction story, "Man-Made Self", was sold in 1976. He is the author of science-fiction novels, including Schismatrix (1985), Islands in the Net (1988), and Heavy Weather (1994). In 1992, he published his first non-fiction book, The Hacker Crackdown: Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier.
He has been interviewed for documentaries such as Freedom Downtime, TechnoCalyps and Traceroute.
Writing
Sterling is one of the founders of the cyberpunk movement in science fiction, along with William Gibson, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley, Lewis Shiner, and Pat Cadigan. In addition, he is one of the subgenre's chief ideological promulgators. This has earned him the nickname "Chairman Bruce". He was also one of the first organizers of the Turkey City Writer's Workshop, and is a frequent attendee at the Sycamore Hill Writer's Workshop. He won Hugo Awards for his novelettes "Bicycle Repairman" (1996) and "Taklamakan" (1998). His first novel, Involution Ocean (1977), features the world Nullaqua where all the atmosphere is contained in a single, miles-deep crater. The story concerns a ship sailing on the ocean of dust at the bottom and hunting creatures called dustwhales. It is partially a science-fictional pastiche of Moby-Dick by Herman Melville.
In the early 1980s, Sterling wrote a series of stories set in the Shaper/Mechanist universe: the Solar System is colonized, with two major warring factions. The Mechanists use a great deal of computer-based mechanical technologies; the Shapers do genetic engineering on a massive scale. The situation is complicated by the eventual contact with alien civilizations; humanity eventually splits into many subspecies, with the implication that some of these vanish from the galaxy, reminiscent of the singularity in the works of Vernor Vinge. The Shaper/Mechanist stories can be found in the collections Crystal Express and Schismatrix Plus, which contains the novel Schismatrix and all of the stories set in the Shaper/Mechanist universe. Alastair Reynolds identified Schismatrix and the other Shaper/Mechanist stories as one of the greatest influences on his own work.
]]
In the 1980s, Sterling edited the science fiction critical fanzine Cheap Truth under the alias of Vincent Omniaveritas. He wrote a column called Catscan for the now-defunct science fiction critical magazine SF Eye. He contributed a chapter to Sound Unbound: Sampling Digital Music and Culture (MIT Press, 2008) edited by Paul D. Miller, a.k.a. DJ Spooky. From April 2009 through May 2009, he was an editor at Cool Tools.
From October 2003 to May 2020 Sterling blogged at [http://blog.wired.com/sterling/ "Beyond the Beyond"], which was hosted by Wired until the COVID-19 pandemic led Condé Nast to cut back because of an advertising slump. He also contributed to other print and online platforms, including The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.Writing projects
He has been the instigator of three projects which can be found on the Web:
* The Dead Media Project: A collection of "research notes" on dead media technologies, from Incan quipus, through Victorian phenakistoscopes, to the departed video game and home computers of the 1980s. The Project's homepage, including Sterling's original Dead Media Manifesto can be found at deadmedia.org.
* The Viridian Design Movement: His attempt to create a "green" design movement focused on high-tech, stylish, and ecologically sound design. The Viridian Design home page, including Sterling's Viridian Manifesto and all of his Viridian Notes, is managed by Jon Lebkowsky. The Viridian Movement helped to spawn a popular "bright green" environmental weblog Worldchanging. WorldChanging contributors include many of the original members of the Viridian "curia".
* Embrace the Decay: A web-only art piece commissioned by the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in 2003. Incorporating contributions solicited through The Viridian Design 'movement', Embrace the Decay was the most visited piece/page at LA MOCA's Digital Gallery, and included contributions from Jared Tarbell of [http://www.levitated.net/ levitated.net] and co-author of several books on advanced Flash programming, and Monty Zukowski, creator of the winning 'decay algorithm' sponsored by Sterling.Neologisms
Sterling has coined various neologisms to describe things that he believes will be common in the future, especially items which already exist in limited numbers.
* In the December 2005 issue of Wired magazine, Sterling coined the term buckyjunk to refer to future, difficult-to-recycle consumer waste made of carbon nanotubes, a.k.a. buckytubes, based on buckyballs or buckminsterfullerene.
* In his 2005 book Shaping Things, he coined the term design fiction which refers to a type of speculative design which focuses on worldbuilding.
* In July 1989, in SF Eye #5, he was the first to use the word "slipstream" to refer to a type of speculative fiction between traditional science fiction and fantasy and mainstream literature.
* In August 2004, he suggested a type of technological device (he called it "spime") that, through pervasive RFID and GPS tracking, can track its history of use and interact with the world.
Bibliography
Sterling's novels include:
* Involution Ocean (1977)
* The Artificial Kid (1980)
* Schismatrix (1985)
* Islands in the Net (1988)
* The Difference Engine (1990; with William Gibson)
* Heavy Weather (1994)
* Holy Fire (1996)
* The Zenith Angle (2004)
* The Caryatids (2009)
* Love Is Strange (2012)
Personal life
'94]]
In the beginning of his childhood he lived in Galveston, Texas until his family moved to India. Sterling spent several years in India and has a fondness for Bollywood films. In 1976, he graduated from the University of Texas with a degree in journalism. In 1978, he was the Dungeon Master for a Dungeons & Dragons game whose players included Warren Spector, who cited Sterling's game as a major inspiration for the game design of Deus Ex.
In 2003, he was appointed professor at the European Graduate School where he is teaching summer intensive courses on media and design. for several years, and married her in 2005. In September 2007 he moved to Turin, Italy. Both Sterling and artist and musician Florian-Ayala Fauna are sponsors for V. Vale's RE/Search newsletter.
Awards
* 1989 John W. Campbell Memorial Award winner for the novel Islands in the Net
* 1997 Hugo Award winner for the novelette "Bicycle Repairman"
* 1999 Hugo Award winner for the novelette "Taklamakan"
* 1999 Hayakawa's S-F Magazine Reader's Award for Best Foreign Short Story winner for the novelette "Taklamakan"
* 2000 Arthur C. Clarke Award winner for the novel DistractionReferencesExternal links
* [https://www.wired.com/category/beyond_the_beyond Wired Blog : Beyond the beyond]
* [http://wolfliving.tumblr.com Wolf in Living Room] - blog about domestic ubiquitous computing
*
* - the Open Source connected apartment.
*
*
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Category:Writers from Austin, Texas | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Sterling | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.361272 |
3840 | Brain abscess | Brain abscess (or cerebral abscess) is an abscess within the brain tissue caused by inflammation and collection of infected material coming from local (ear infection, dental abscess, infection of paranasal sinuses, infection of the mastoid air cells of the temporal bone, epidural abscess) or remote (lung, heart, kidney etc.) infectious sources. The infection may also be introduced through a skull fracture following a head trauma or surgical procedures. Brain abscess is usually associated with congenital heart disease in young children. It may occur at any age but is most frequent in the third decade of life.
Signs and symptoms
Fever, headache, and neurological problems, while classic, only occur in 20% of people with brain abscess.
The famous triad of fever, headache and focal neurologic findings are highly suggestive of brain abscess. These symptoms are caused by a combination of increased intracranial pressure due to a space-occupying lesion (headache, vomiting, confusion, coma), infection (fever, fatigue etc.) and focal neurologic brain tissue damage (hemiparesis, aphasia etc.).
The most frequent presenting symptoms are headache, drowsiness, confusion, seizures, hemiparesis or speech difficulties together with fever with a rapidly progressive course. Headache is characteristically worse at night and in the morning, as the intracranial pressure naturally increases when in the supine position. This elevation similarly stimulates the medullary vomiting center and area postrema, leading to morning vomiting.
Other symptoms and findings depend largely on the specific location of the abscess in the brain. An abscess in the cerebellum, for instance, may cause additional complaints as a result of brain stem compression and hydrocephalus. Neurological examination may reveal a stiff neck in occasional cases (erroneously suggesting meningitis).PathophysiologyBacterialAnaerobic and microaerophilic cocci and gram-negative and gram-positive anaerobic bacilli are the predominant bacterial isolates. Many brain abscesses are polymicrobial. The predominant organisms include: Staphylococcus aureus, aerobic and anaerobic streptococci (especially Streptococcus intermedius), Bacteroides, Prevotella, and Fusobacterium species, Enterobacteriaceae, Pseudomonas species, and other anaerobes. Less common organisms include: Haemophillus influenzae, Streptococcus pneumoniae and Neisseria meningitidis.
Bacterial abscesses rarely (if ever) arise de novo within the brain although establishing a cause can be difficult in many cases. There is almost always a primary lesion elsewhere in the body that must be sought assiduously because failure to treat the primary lesion will result in relapse. In cases of trauma, for example in compound skull fractures where fragments of bone are pushed into the substance of the brain, the cause of the abscess is obvious. Similarly, bullets and other foreign bodies may become sources of infection if left in place. The location of the primary lesion may be suggested by the location of the abscess: infections of the middle ear result in lesions in the middle and posterior cranial fossae; congenital heart disease with right-to-left shunts often result in abscesses in the distribution of the middle cerebral artery; and infection of the frontal and ethmoid sinuses usually results in collection in the subdural sinuses.
Other organisms
Fungi and parasites may also cause the disease. Fungi and parasites are especially associated with immunocompromised patients. Other causes include: Nocardia asteroides, Mycobacterium, Fungi (e.g. Aspergillus, Candida, Cryptococcus, Mucorales, Coccidioides, Histoplasma capsulatum, Blastomyces dermatitidis, Bipolaris, Exophiala dermatitidis, Curvularia pallescens, Ochroconis gallopava, Ramichloridium mackenziei, Pseudallescheria boydii), Protozoa (e.g. Toxoplasma gondii, Entamoeba histolytica, Trypanosoma cruzi, Schistosoma, Paragonimus), and Helminths (e.g. Taenia solium). Organisms that are most frequently associated with brain abscess in patients with AIDS are poliovirus, Toxoplasma gondii, and Cryptococcus neoformans, though in infection with the latter organism, symptoms of meningitis generally predominate.
These organisms are associated with certain predisposing conditions:
* Sinus and dental infections—Aerobic and anaerobic streptococci, anaerobic gram-negative bacilli (e.g. Prevotella, Porphyromonas, Bacteroides), Fusobacterium, S. aureus, and Enterobacteriaceae
* Penetrating trauma—S. aureus, aerobic streptococci, Enterobacteriaceae, and Clostridium spp.
* Pulmonary infections—Aerobic and anaerobic streptococci, anaerobic gram-negative bacilli (e.g. Prevotella, Porphyromonas, Bacteroides), Fusobacterium, Actinomyces, and Nocardia
* Congenital heart disease—Aerobic and microaerophilic streptococci, and S. aureus
* HIV infection—T. gondii, Mycobacterium, Nocardia, Cryptococcus, and Listeria monocytogenes
* Transplantation—Aspergillus, Candida, Cryptococcus, Mucorales, Nocardia, and T. gondii
* Neutropenia—Aerobic gram-negative bacilli, Aspergillus, Candida, and Mucorales
Diagnosis
The diagnosis is established by a computed tomography (CT) (with contrast) examination. At the initial phase of the inflammation (which is referred to as cerebritis), the immature lesion does not have a capsule and it may be difficult to distinguish it from other space-occupying lesions or infarcts of the brain. Within 4–5 days the inflammation and the concomitant dead brain tissue are surrounded with a capsule, which gives the lesion the famous ring-enhancing lesion appearance on CT examination with contrast (since intravenously applied contrast material can not pass through the capsule, it is collected around the lesion and looks as a ring surrounding the relatively dark lesion). Lumbar puncture procedure, which is performed in many infectious disorders of the central nervous system is contraindicated in this condition (as it is in all space-occupying lesions of the brain) because removing a certain portion of the cerebrospinal fluid may alter the concrete intracranial pressure balances and causes the brain tissue to move across structures within the skull (brain herniation).
Ring enhancement may also be observed in cerebral hemorrhages (bleeding) and some brain tumors. However, in the presence of the rapidly progressive course with fever, focal neurologic findings (hemiparesis, aphasia etc.) and signs of increased intracranial pressure, the most likely diagnosis should be the brain abscess.TreatmentThe treatment includes lowering the increased intracranial pressure and starting intravenous antibiotics (and meanwhile identifying the causative organism mainly by blood culture studies).
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBO2 or HBOT) is indicated as a primary and adjunct treatment which provides four primary functions.
Firstly, HBOT reduces intracranial pressure. Secondly, high partial pressures of oxygen act as a bactericide and thus inhibits the anaerobic and functionally anaerobic flora common in brain abscess. Third, HBOT optimizes the immune function thus enhancing the host defense mechanisms and fourth, HBOT has been found to be of benefit when brain abscess is concomitant with cranial osteomyelitis.
Secondary functions of HBOT include increased stem cell production and up-regulation of VEGF which aid in the healing and recovery process.
Surgical drainage of the abscess remains part of the standard management of bacterial brain abscesses. The location and treatment of the primary lesion is also crucial, as is the removal of any foreign material (bone, dirt, bullets, and so forth).
There are few exceptions to this rule: Haemophilus influenzae meningitis is often associated with subdural effusions that are mistaken for subdural empyemas. These effusions resolve with antibiotics and require no surgical treatment. Tuberculosis can produce brain abscesses that look identical to conventional bacterial abscesses on CT imaging. Surgical drainage or aspiration is often necessary to identify Mycobacterium tuberculosis, but once the diagnosis is made no further surgical intervention is necessary.
CT guided stereotactic aspiration is also indicated in the treatment of brain abscess. The use of pre-operative imaging, intervention with post-operative clinical and biochemical monitoring used to manage brain abscesses today dates back to the Pennybacker system pioneered by Somerset, Kentucky-born neurosurgeon Joseph Buford Pennybacker, director of the neurosurgery department of the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford from 1952 to 1971.
Prognosis
While death occurs in about 10% of cases, people do well about 70% of the time.<ref nameBr2014/> This is a large improvement from the 1960s due to improved ability to image the head, more effective neurosurgery and more effective antibiotics.<ref nameBr2014/>
References
External links
*
* [http://rad.usuhs.mil/medpix/master.php3?modeslide_sorter&pt_id5842&imageid15286#top MR Diagnosis] MedPix Imaging Brain Abscess
| ICD10 = ,
| ICD9 =
| ICDO | OMIM
| MedlinePlus = 000783
| eMedicineSubj | eMedicineTopic
| MeshID = D001922
}}
Category:Brain disorders
Category:Disorders causing seizures
Category:Infectious diseases | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_abscess | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.372149 |
3845 | Brigitte Bardot | MV Brigitte Bardot}}
|birth_place = Paris, France
|occupation =
| party = National Rally
| otherparty = Union for the New Republic (1958–1967)
|works =
|years_active = 1952–1973 (entertainer)<br>1973–present (activist)
|spouse =
*
*
*
}}
|partner (1975–1979)<br> (1980–1985)
|children = 1
|relatives = Mijanou Bardot (sister)
|signature = Brigitte Bardot Signature.svg
}}
Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot ( ; ; born 28 September 1934), often referred to by her initials B.B., is a French former actress, singer, and model as well as an animal rights activist. Famous for portraying characters with hedonistic lifestyles, she is one of the best known symbols of the sexual revolution. Although she withdrew from the entertainment industry in 1973, she remains a major pop culture icon. She has acted in 47 films, performed in several musicals, and recorded more than 60 songs. She was awarded the Legion of Honour in 1985.
Born and raised in Paris, Bardot was an aspiring ballerina during her childhood. She started her acting career in 1952 and achieved international recognition in 1957 for her role in And God Created Woman (1956), catching the attention of many French intellectuals and earning her the nickname "sex kitten". She was the subject of philosopher Simone de Beauvoir's 1959 essay The Lolita Syndrome, which described her as a "locomotive of women's history" and built upon existentialist themes to declare her the most liberated woman of France. She won a 1961 David di Donatello Best Foreign Actress Award for her work in The Truth (1960). Bardot later starred in Jean-Luc Godard's film Le Mépris (1963). For her role in Louis Malle's film Viva Maria! (1965), she was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress. French President Charles de Gaulle called Bardot "the French export as important as Renault cars".
After retiring from acting in 1973, Bardot became an animal rights activist and created the Brigitte Bardot Foundation. She is known for her strong personality, outspokenness, and speeches on animal defense; she has been fined twice for public insults. She has also been a controversial political figure, as of November 2021 having been fined six times for inciting racial hatred when she criticised immigration and Islam in France and called residents of Réunion "savages". She is married to Bernard d'Ormale, a former adviser to Jean-Marie Le Pen, a far-right French politician. Bardot is a member of the Global 500 Roll of Honour of the United Nations Environment Programme and has received several awards and accolades from UNESCO and PETA. In 2011, Los Angeles Times Magazine ranked her second on the "50 Most Beautiful Women In Film".Early lifeBardot was born on 28 September 1934 in the 15th arrondissement of Paris to Louis Bardot (1896–1975) and Anne-Marie Mucel (1912–1978). Bardot's father, who originated from Ligny-en-Barrois, was an engineer and the proprietor of several industrial factories in Paris. Her mother was the daughter of an insurance company director. She grew up in a conservative Catholic family, as had her father. She suffered from amblyopia as a child, which resulted in decreased vision of her left eye. She has one younger sister, Mijanou Bardot.
Bardot's childhood was prosperous; she lived in her family's seven-bedroom apartment in the luxurious 16th arrondissement.
Hélène Gordon-Lazareff, the director of the magazines Elle and Le Jardin des Modes, hired Bardot in 1949 as a "junior" fashion model. On 8 March 1950, 15-year-old Bardot appeared on the cover of Elle, which brought her an acting offer for the film Les Lauriers sont coupés from director Marc Allégret. Her parents opposed her becoming an actress, but her grandfather was supportive, saying that "If this little girl is to become a whore, cinema will not be the cause."}} At the audition, Bardot met Roger Vadim, who later notified her that she did not get the role. They subsequently fell in love. Her parents fiercely opposed their relationship; her father announced to her one evening that she would continue her education in England and that he had bought her a train ticket for the following day. Bardot reacted by putting her head into an oven with open fire; her parents stopped her and ultimately accepted the relationship, on condition that she marry Vadim at the age of 18.
Career
Beginnings: 1952–1955
Bardot appeared on the cover of Elle again in 1952, which landed her an offer for a small part in the comedy film Crazy for Love the same year, directed by Jean Boyer and starring Bourvil. She was paid 200,000 francs (about 575 1952 US dollars) for the small role portraying a cousin of the main character. Bardot had her second film role in Manina, the Girl in the Bikini (1952), directed by Willy Rozier. She also had roles in the 1953 films The Long Teeth and ''His Father's Portrait.
Bardot had a small role in a Hollywood-financed film being shot in Paris in 1953, Act of Love, starring Kirk Douglas. She received media attention when she attended the Cannes Film Festival in April 1953.
Bardot had a small role in The Grand Maneuver (1955) for director René Clair, supporting Gérard Philipe and Michelle Morgan. The part was bigger in The Light Across the Street (1956) for director Georges Lacombe. She had another in the Hollywood film Helen of Troy, playing Helen's handmaiden.
For the Italian movie Mio figlio Nerone (1956) brunette Bardot was asked by the director to appear as a blonde. She dyed her hair rather than wear a wig; she was so pleased with the results that she decided to retain the color. Rise to stardom: 1956–1962
]]
, March 1959]]
Bardot then appeared in four movies that made her a star. First up was a musical, Naughty Girl (1956), where Bardot played a troublesome school girl. Directed by Michel Boisrond, it was co-written by Roger Vadim and was a great success, going on to become the 12th most popular film of the year in France. It was followed by a comedy, Plucking the Daisy (1956), also written by Vadim. This was succeeded by The Bride Is Much Too Beautiful (1956) with Louis Jourdan.
Finally, there was the melodrama And God Created Woman'' (1956). The movie was Vadim's debut as director, with Bardot starring opposite Jean-Louis Trintignant and Curt Jurgens. The film, about an immoral teenager in an otherwise respectable small-town setting, was an even larger success, not just in France but also around the world, listed among the ten most popular films in Great Britain in 1957. In the United States the film was the highest-grossing foreign film ever released, earning $4 million, which author Peter Lev describes as "an astonishing amount for a foreign film at that time." It turned Bardot into an international star. she was hailed as the "sex kitten". The film scandalized the United States and some theater managers were even arrested just for screening it.
Paul O'Neil of Life (June 1958) in describing Bardot's international popularity, writes:
<blockquote>In gaining her present eminence, Brigitte Bardot has had certain advantages beyond those she was born with. Like the European sports car, she has arrived on the American scene at a time when the American public is ready, even hungry, for something racier and more realistic than the familiar domestic product.<br></blockquote>
During her early career, professional photographer Sam Lévin's photos contributed to the image of Bardot's sensuality. British photographer Cornel Lucas made images of Bardot in the 1950s and 1960s that have become representative of her public persona.
Bardot followed And God Created Woman up with La Parisienne (1957), a comedy co-starring Charles Boyer for director Boisrond. She was reunited with Vadim in another melodrama The Night Heaven Fell (1958), and played a criminal who seduced Jean Gabin in In Case of Adversity (1958). The latter was the 13th most seen movie of the year in France. In 1958, Bardot became the highest-paid actress in the country of France.
The Female (1959) for director Julien Duvivier was popular, but Babette Goes to War (1959), a comedy set in World War II, was a huge hit, the fourth biggest movie of the year in France. Also widely seen was Come Dance with Me (1959) from Boisrond.
Bardot's next film was courtroom drama The Truth (1960), from Henri-Georges Clouzot. It was a highly publicised production, which resulted in Bardot having an affair and attempting suicide. The film was Bardot's biggest commercial success in France, the third biggest hit of the year, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. Bardot was awarded a David di Donatello Award for Best Foreign Actress for her role in the film.
She made a comedy with Vadim, Please, Not Now! (1961), and had a role in the all-star anthology, Famous Love Affairs (1962).
Bardot starred alongside Marcello Mastroianni in a film inspired by her life in A Very Private Affair (Vie privée, 1962), directed by Louis Malle. More popular than that was her role in Love on a Pillow (1962).
International films and singing career: 1962–1968
In the mid-1960s, Bardot made films that seemed to be more aimed at the international market. She starred in Jean-Luc Godard's film Le Mépris (1963), produced by Joseph E. Levine and starring Jack Palance. The following year she co-starred with Anthony Perkins in the comedy Une ravissante idiote (1964).
Dear Brigitte (1965), Bardot's first Hollywood film, was a comedy starring James Stewart as an academic whose son develops a crush on Bardot. Bardot's appearance was relatively brief in the film, and the movie was not a big success.
caught by paparazzi in Italy during the filming of Contempt in 1963]]
More successful was the Western buddy comedy Viva Maria! (1965) for director Louis Malle, appearing opposite Jeanne Moreau. It was a big hit in France and worldwide, although it did not break through in the United States as much as had been hoped.
After a cameo in Godard's Masculin Féminin (1966), she had her first outright flop for some years, Two Weeks in September (1968), a French–English co-production. She had a small role in the all-star Spirits of the Dead (1968), acting opposite Alain Delon, then tried a Hollywood film again: Shalako (1968), a Western starring Sean Connery, which was another box-office disappointment.
She participated in several musical shows and recorded many popular songs in the 1960s and 1970s, mostly in collaboration with Serge Gainsbourg, Bob Zagury and Sacha Distel, including "Harley Davidson"; "Je Me Donne À Qui Me Plaît"; "Bubble gum"; "Contact"; "Je Reviendrai Toujours Vers Toi"; "L'Appareil À Sous"; "La Madrague"; "On Déménage"; "Sidonie"; "Tu Veux, Ou Tu Veux Pas?"; "Le Soleil De Ma Vie" (a cover of Stevie Wonder's "You Are the Sunshine of My Life"); and "Je t'aime... moi non-plus". Bardot pleaded with Gainsbourg not to release this duet and he complied with her wish; the following year, he rerecorded a version with British-born model and actress Jane Birkin that became a massive hit all over Europe. The version with Bardot was issued in 1986 and became a download hit in 2006 when Universal Music made its back catalogue available to purchase online, with this version of the song ranking as the third most popular download. Final films: 1969–1973 From 1969 to 1972, Bardot was the official face of Marianne, who had previously up until then been anonymous, to represent the liberty of France.
Her next film, Les Femmes (1969), was a flop, although the screwball comedy The Bear and the Doll (1970) performed better. Her last few films were mostly comedies: Les Novices (1970), Boulevard du Rhum (1971) (with Lino Ventura). The Legend of Frenchie King (1971) was more popular, helped by Bardot co-starring with Claudia Cardinale.
She made one more movie working with Vadim, Don Juan, or If Don Juan Were a Woman (1973), playing the title role. Vadim said the film marked "Underneath what people call 'the Bardot myth' was something interesting, even though she was never considered the most professional actress in the world. For years, since she has been growing older, and the Bardot myth has become just a souvenir... I was curious in her as a woman and I had to get to the end of something with her, to get out of her and express many things I felt were in her. Brigitte always gave the impression of sexual freedom – she is a completely open and free person, without any aggression. So I gave her the part of a man – that amused me".
"If Don Juan is not my last movie it will be my next to last", said Bardot during filming. She kept her word and made only one more film, The Edifying and Joyous Story of Colinot (1973).
In 1973, Bardot announced she was retiring from acting as "a way to get out elegantly".
Animal rights activism
Bardot met Paul Watson in 1977, the same year he founded the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, during an operation to condemn the "massacre" of seal pups and seal hunting on the Canadian ice floe. In support of animal protection, Bardot went to the ice floe after being invited by Watson. Bardot posed lying down next to the seal pups; the photos were seen worldwide. Bardot and Watson remained friends.
After appearing in more than 40 motion pictures and recording several music albums, Bardot used her fame to promote animal rights. In 1986, she established the Brigitte Bardot Foundation for the Welfare and Protection of Animals. She became a vegetarian and raised three million francs (about 430,000 1986 US dollars
In 1989, while looking after her neighbour, Jean-Pierre Manivet's donkey, the mare displayed excessive interest in Bardot's older donkey and she subsequently had the neighbour's donkey castrated due to concerns the mating would prove fatal for her mare. The neighbour then sued Bardot, and Bardot later won, with the court ordering Manivet to pay 20,000 francs for creating a "false scandal".
Bardot urged French television viewers to boycott horse meat and was soon the target of death threats in January 1994. Not backing off from the threats, she sent a letter to the French Minister of Agriculture, Jean Puech, calling on him to ban the sale of horse meat.
Bardot wrote a 1999 letter to Chinese President Jiang Zemin, published in French magazine VSD, in which she accused the Chinese of "torturing bears and killing the world's last tigers and rhinos to make aphrodisiacs".
She donated more than US$140,000 over two years in 2001 for a mass sterilization and adoption program for Bucharest's stray dogs, estimated to number 300,000.
In August 2010, Bardot addressed a letter to Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, appealing for the sovereign to halt the killing of dolphins in the Faroe Islands. In the letter, Bardot describes the activity as a "macabre spectacle" that "is a shame for Denmark and the Faroe Islands ... This is not a hunt but a mass slaughter ... an outmoded tradition that has no acceptable justification in today's world".
On 22 April 2011, French culture minister Frédéric Mitterrand officially included bullfighting in the country's cultural heritage. Bardot wrote him a highly critical letter of protest. On 25 May 2011, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society renamed its fast interceptor vessel, MV Gojira, as MV Brigitte Bardot in appreciation of her support.
From 2013, the Brigitte Bardot Foundation, in collaboration with Kagyupa International Monlam Trust of India, operated an annual veterinary care camp. Bardot committed to the cause of animal welfare in Bodhgaya over several years.
On 23 July 2015, Bardot condemned Australian politician Greg Hunt's plan to eradicate 2 million cats to save endangered species such as the Warru and night parrot.
At the age of 90, Bardot appealed to free Watson, who had been detained in Greenland since 21 July 2024, when Japan requested his extradition. Through a request expressed in mid-October 2024 by her lawyers and Sea Shepherd France, Bardot asked French President Emmanuel Macron to grant Watson political asylum. Bardot asked Macron to show "a little bit of courage". During that month, she initiated a demonstration in support of Watson in front of the Hôtel de Ville, Paris.
Personal life
Marriages and relationships
Bardot has been married four times, with her current marriage lasting far longer than the previous three combined. By her own count, she has had a total of 17 romantic relationships. Bardot would characteristically leave for another relationship when "the present was getting lukewarm"; she said, "I have always looked for passion. That's why I was often unfaithful. And when the passion was coming to an end, I was packing my suitcase".
On 20 December 1952, aged 18, Bardot married director Roger Vadim. They separated in 1956 after she became involved with And God Created Woman co-star Jean-Louis Trintignant, divorcing the next year. Trintignant at the time was married to actress Stéphane Audran. Bardot and Vadim had no children together, but remained in touch for the rest of his life and even collaborated on later projects. Bardot and Trintignant lived together for about two years, spanning the period before and after Bardot's divorce from Vadim, but they never married. Their relationship was complicated by Trintignant's frequent absence due to military service and Bardot's affair with musician Gilbert Bécaud.
in 1963]]
After her separation from Vadim, Bardot acquired a historic property dating from the 16th century, called Le Castelet, in Cannes. The fourteen-bedroom villa, surrounded by lush gardens, olive trees, and vineyards, consisted of several buildings.
In 1958, she bought a second property called La Madrague, located in Saint-Cyr-sur-Mer. She recovered within weeks, began a relationship with actor Jacques Charrier, and became pregnant well before they married on 18 June 1959. Bardot's only child, son Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, was born on 11 January 1960. After she and Charrier divorced in 1962, Nicolas was raised in the Charrier family and had little contact with his biological mother until his adulthood.
From 1963 to 1965, she lived with musician Bob Zagury.
Bardot's third marriage was to German millionaire playboy Gunter Sachs, lasting from 14 July 1966 to 7 October 1969, though they had separated the previous year. While filming Shalako, she rejected Sean Connery's advances; she said, "It didn't last long because I wasn't a James Bond girl! I have never succumbed to his charm!" In 1968, she began dating Patrick Gilles, who co-starred with her in The Bear and the Doll (1970); but she ended their relationship in spring 1971.
In 1974, Bardot appeared in a nude photo shoot in Playboy magazine, which celebrated her 40th birthday. In 1975, she entered a relationship with artist Miroslav Brozek and posed for some of his sculptures. Brozek was also an occasional actor; his stage name is . The couple lived together for four years, separating in December 1979.
From 1980 to 1985, Bardot had a live-in relationship with French TV producer .}} She refused to undergo chemotherapy treatment and decided only to do radiation therapy. She recovered in 1986.
Bardot's fourth and current husband is Bernard d'Ormale; they have been married since 16 August 1992. In 2018, in an interview accorded to Le Journal du Dimanche, she denied rumors of relationships with Johnny Hallyday, Jimi Hendrix, and Mick Jagger.
In her 2003 book, Un cri dans le silence (A Scream in the Silence''), she contrasted her close gay friends with homosexuals who "jiggle their bottoms, put their little fingers in the air and with their little castrato voices moan about what those ghastly heteros put them through," and said some contemporary homosexuals behave like "fairground freaks." In her own defence, Bardot wrote in a letter to a French gay magazine: "Apart from my husband—who maybe will cross over one day as well—I am entirely surrounded by homos. For years, they have been my support, my friends, my adopted children, my confidants."
In her book, she criticised racial mixing, immigration, the role of women in politics and Islam. The book also contained a section attacking what she called the mixing of genes, and praised previous generations which, she said, had given their lives to push out invaders. On 10 June 2004, Bardot was convicted for a fourth time by a French court for inciting racial hatred and fined €5,000. Bardot denied the racial hatred charge and apologized in court, saying: "I never knowingly wanted to hurt anybody. It is not in my character." In 2008, Bardot was convicted of inciting racial/religious hatred in regard to a letter she wrote, a copy of which she sent to Nicolas Sarkozy when he was Interior Minister of France. The letter stated her objections to Muslims in France ritually slaughtering sheep by slitting their throats without anesthetizing them first. She also said, in reference to Muslims, that she was "fed up with being under the thumb of this population which is destroying us, destroying our country and imposing its habits." The trial concluded on 3 June 2008, with a conviction and fine of €15,000. The prosecutor stated she was weary of charging Bardot with offences related to racial hatred.
On 13 August 2010, Bardot criticised American filmmaker Kyle Newman for his plan to produce a biographical film about her. She told him, "Wait until I'm dead before you make a movie about my life!" otherwise "sparks will fly."
In 2014, Bardot wrote an open letter demanding the ban in France of Jewish ritual slaughter shechita. In response, the European Jewish Congress released a statement saying "Bardot has once again shown her clear insensitivity for minority groups with the substance and style of her letter...She may well be concerned for the welfare of animals but her longstanding support for the far-right and for discrimination against minorities in France shows a constant disdain for human rights instead."
In 2015, Bardot threatened to sue a Saint-Tropez boutique for selling items featuring her face. In 2018, she expressed support for the Yellow vests protests.
On 19 March 2019, Bardot issued an open letter to Réunion prefect in which she accused inhabitants of the Indian Ocean island of animal cruelty and referred to them as "autochthones who have kept the genes of savages". In her letter relating to animal abuse and sent through her foundation, she mentioned the "beheadings of goats and billy goats" during festivals, and associated these practices with "reminiscences of cannibalism from past centuries". The public prosecutor filed a lawsuit the following day.
In June 2021, 86-year-old Bardot was fined €5,000 by the Arras court for public insults against hunters and their national president . She had published a post at the end of 2019 on her foundation's website, calling hunters "sub-men" and "drunkards" and carriers of "genes of cruel barbarism inherited from our primitive ancestors", and insulting Schraen. At the time of the hearing, she had not removed the comments from the website. Following her letter sent to the prefect of Réunion in 2019, she was convicted on 4 November 2021 by a French court for public insults and fined €20,000, the largest of her fines to date.
Bardot's husband Bernard d'Ormale is a former adviser to Jean-Marie Le Pen, former leader of the far-right party National Front (which became National Rally), the main far-right party in France. Bardot expressed support for Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Front (National Rally), calling her "the Joan of Arc of the 21st century". She endorsed Le Pen in the 2012 and 2017 French presidential elections.
Bardot has been convicted of inciting racial hatred multiple times, having received six separate fines for the offense as of November 2021.<br> – Mamie Van Doren, 2000|width25%|alignright|stylepadding:8px;}}
The Guardian named Bardot "one of the most iconic faces, models, and actors of the 1950s and 1960s". She has been called a "style icon" and a "muse for Dior, Balmain, and Pierre Cardin".
In fashion, the Bardot neckline (a wide-open neck that exposes both shoulders) is named after her. Bardot popularized this style, which is especially used for knitted sweaters or jumpers, although it is also used for other tops and dresses. Bardot popularized the bikini in her early films such as Manina (1952) (released in France as Manina, la fille sans voiles). The following year she was also photographed in a bikini on every beach in southern France during the Cannes Film Festival. She gained additional attention when she filmed ...And God Created Woman (1956) with Jean-Louis Trintignant (released in France as Et Dieu Créa La Femme). In it Bardot portrays an immoral teenager cavorting in a bikini who seduces men in a respectable small-town setting. The film was an international success. The bikini was in the 1950s relatively well accepted in France but was still considered risqué in the United States. As late as 1959, Anne Cole, one of the United States' largest swimsuit designers, said, "It's nothing more than a G-string. It's at the razor's edge of decency."
She also brought into fashion the () hairstyle (similar to the beehive hair style) and gingham clothes after wearing a checkered pink dress, designed by Jacques Esterel, at her wedding to Charrier. French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir described Bardot as "a locomotive of women's history". This pose has been emulated numerous times by models and celebrities such as Lindsay Lohan, Elle Macpherson, Gisele Bündchen, and Rihanna. In the late 1960s, Bardot's silhouette was used as a model for designing and modelling the statue's bust of Marianne, a symbol of the French Republic. The town hosts a Bardot statue by Christina Motta.
Bardot was idolized by the young John Lennon and Paul McCartney. They made plans to shoot a film featuring The Beatles and Bardot, similar to ''A Hard Day's Night, but the plans were never fulfilled. According to the liner notes of his first (self-titled) album, musician Bob Dylan dedicated the first song he ever wrote to Bardot. He also mentioned her by name in "I Shall Be Free", which appeared on his second album, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan''. The first-ever official exhibition spotlighting Bardot's influence and legacy opened in Boulogne-Billancourt on 29 September 2009 – a day after her 75th birthday.
Bardot was the subject of eight Andy Warhol paintings in 1974.
The Australian pop group Bardot was named after her.
, Brazil]]
Kylie Minogue adopted the Bardot "sex kitten look" on the cover of her album Body Language, released in 2003.
Women who emulated and were inspired by Bardot include Claudia Schiffer, Emmanuelle Béart, Elke Sommer, Kate Moss, Faith Hill, Isabelle Adjani, Diane Kruger, Lara Stone, Minogue, Amy Winehouse, Georgia May Jagger, Zahia Dehar, Scarlett Johansson, Louise Bourgoin, and Paris Hilton. Bardot said: "None have my personality." Laetitia Casta embodied Bardot in the 2010 French drama film Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life by Joann Sfar.
In 2011, Los Angeles Times Magazines list of "50 Most Beautiful Women in Film" ranked her number two.
A portrait of Bardot by Warhol, commissioned by Sachs in 1974, was sold at Sotheby's in London on 22 and 23 May 2012. The painting, estimated at million, was part of Sachs' art collection put on sale a year after his death.
She inspired Nicole Kidman, who had "Bardot-esque" hair in the 2013 British brand Jimmy Choo campaign.
In 2015, Bardot was ranked number six in "The Top Ten Most Beautiful Women of All Time", according to a survey carried out by Amway's beauty company in the UK involving 2,000 women.
In 2020, Vogue named Bardot number one of "The most beautiful French actresses of all time". In a retrospective retracing women throughout the history of cinema, she was listed among "the most accomplished, talented and beautiful actresses of all time" by Glamour.
The French drama television series Bardot was broadcast on France 2 in 2023. It stars Julia de Nunez and is about Bardot's career from her first casting at age 15 and until the filming of La Vérité ten years later. In 2023, she was mentioned in Olivia Rodrigo's song "Lacy" from her album Guts, and Chappell Roan's "Red Wine Supernova" from her album The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess.FilmographyDiscographyStudio albums{| class"wikitable sortable" border="2"
! scope="col" | Year
! scope="col" | Original title
! scope="col" | Translation
! scope="col" | Songwriters(s)
! scope="col" | Label
! scope="col" | Main tracks
|-
| 1956
|Et dieu... créa la femme<br><small>(music from Roger Vadim's motion picture)</small>
|"And God Created Woman"
| Paul Misraki
| Versailles
|
|-
|1963
|Brigitte Bardot Sings
|
| Serge Gainsbourg<br>Claude Bolling<br>Jean-Max Rivière<br>Fernand Bonifay<br>Spencer Williams<br>Gérard Bourgeois
|rowspan=2|Philips
|"L'appareil à sous"<br>"Invitango"<br>"Les amis de la musique"<br>"La Madrague"<br>"El Cuchipe"
|-
|1964
|B.B.
|
| André Popp<br>Jean-Michel Rivat<br>Jean-Max Rivière<br>Fernand Bonifay<br>Gérard Bourgeois
|"Moi je joue"<br>"Une histoire de plage"<br>"Maria Ninguém"<br>"Je danse donc je suis"<br>"Ciel de lit"
|-
|rowspan=2|1968
|Bonnie and Clyde<br><small>(with Serge Gainsbourg)</small>
|
| Serge Gainsbourg<br>Alain Goraguer<br>Spencer Williams<br>Jean-Max Rivière
| Fontana
|"Bonnie and Clyde"<br>"Bubble Gum"<br>"Comic Strip"
|-
|Show
|
| Serge Gainsbourg<br>Francis Lai<br>Jean-Max Rivière
| AZ
|"Harley Davidson"<br>"Ay Que Viva La Sangria"<br>"Contact"
|-
|}
Other notable singles
{| class"wikitable sortable" border"2"
! scope="col" | Year
! scope="col" | Original Title
! scope="col" | Translation
! scope="col" | Songwriters(s)
! scope="col" | Label
|-
| 1962
|"Sidonie"<br><small>(music from Louis Malle's the motion picture Vie Privée)</small>
|
| Fiorenzo Capri<br>Charles Cros<br>Jean-Max Rivière
| Barclay
|-
|1965
|"Viva Maria!"<br><small>(music from Louis Malle's eponymous motion picture)<br>(with Jeanne Moreau)</small>
|
| Jean-Claude Carrière<br>Georges Delerue
|Philips
|-
|1966
|"Le soleil"
|"The Sun"
| Jean-Max Rivière<br>Gérard Bourgeois
| AZ
|-
|1969
|"La fille de paille"
|"The Straw Girl"
| Franck Gérald<br>Gérard Lenorman
| Philips
|-
|rowspan=2|1970
|"Tu veux ou tu veux pas"<br><small>"(Nem Vem Que Nao Tem)"</small>
|"Do You Want or Not"
| Pierre Cour<br>Carlos Imperial
|rowspan=4|Barclay
|-
|"Nue au soleil"
|"Naked Under the Sun"
| Jean Fredenucci<br>Jean Schmidtt
|-
|rowspan=2|1972
|"Tu es venu mon amour" / "Vous Ma Lady"<br><small>(with Laurent Vergez)</small>
|"You Came My Love" / "You My Lady"
| Hugues Aufray<br>Eddy Marnay<br>Eddie Barclay
|-
|"Boulevard du rhum"<br><small>(with Guy Marchand)<br>(music from Robert Enrico's motion picture)</small>
|"Boulevard of Rhum"
| François De Roubaix<br>Jean-Paul-Egide Martini
|-
|1973
|"Soleil de ma vie"<br><small>(with Sacha Distel)</small>
|"Sun of My Life"
| Stevie Wonder<br>Jean Broussolle
| Pathé
|-
|1982
|"Toutes les bêtes sont à aimer"
|"All Animals Must Be Loved"
| Jean-Max Rivière
| Polydor
|-
|1986
|"Je t'aime... moi non plus"<br><small>(with Serge Gainsbourg)<br>(released and shelved in 1968)</small>
|"I Love You... Me Neither"
| Serge Gainsbourg
| Philips
|-
|}
Books
Bardot has also written five books:
* Noonoah: Le petit phoque blanc (Grasset, 1978)
* Initiales B.B. (autobiography, Grasset & Fasquelle, 1996)
* Le Carré de Pluton (Grasset & Fasquelle, 1999)
* Un Cri Dans Le Silence (Editions Du Rocher, 2003)
* Pourquoi? (Editions Du Rocher, 2006)
Accolades
Awards and nominations
*12th Victoires du cinéma français (French cinema victories) (1957): Best Actress, win, as Juliette Hardy in And God Created Woman.
*11th Bambi Awards (1958): Best Actress, nomination, as Juliette Hardy in And God Created Woman.
*14th Victoires du cinéma français (1959): Best Actress, win, as Yvette Maudet in In Case of Adversity.
*Brussels European Awards (1960): Best Actress, win, as Dominique Marceau in The Truth.
*5th David di Donatello Awards (1961): Best Foreign Actress, win, as Dominique Marceau in The Truth.
*20th BAFTA Awards (1967): BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress, nomination, as Marie Fitzgerald O'Malley in Viva Maria!.Honours*1980: Medal of the City of Trieste.
*1985: Legion of Honour. Medal of the City of Lille. Creation in Hollywood of the Brigitte Bardot International Award as part of the Genesis Awards.
*1994: Medal of the City of Paris.
*1995: Medal of the City of Saint-Tropez.
*1996: Medal of the City of La Baule.
*2001: PETA Humanitarian Award.
*2017: A statue of and high was erected in her honour in central Saint-Tropez.
*2019: GAIA Lifetime Achievement Award from the Belgian association for the defence of animal rights.
*2021: Her effigy in Saint-Tropez was dressed in 1400 gold leaves of 23.75 carats each.See also
* Brigitte Bardot
* List of animal rights advocates
Notes
References
Other sources
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
* Brigitte Tast, Hans-Jürgen Tast (Hrsg.) Brigitte Bardot. Filme 1953–1961. Anfänge des Mythos B.B. (Hildesheim 1982) .
*
External links
*
*
*
*
*
Category:1934 births
Category:20th-century French actresses
Category:21st-century French women singers
Category:Actresses from Paris
Category:Anti-immigration politics in Europe
Category:Christian critics of Islam
Category:David di Donatello winners
Category:Female critics of feminism
Category:French critics of Islam
Category:French activists
Category:French animal rights activists
Category:French female models
Category:French film actresses
Category:French Roman Catholics
Category:French women activists
Category:French women singers
Category:Legion of Honour refusals
Category:Living people
Category:MGM Records artists
Category:People convicted of racial hatred offences
Category:People from Armação dos Búzios
Category:Sex positivism | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brigitte_Bardot | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.428860 |
3846 | Banjo | }}
The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and in modern forms is usually made of plastic, where early membranes were made of animal skin.
Early forms of the instrument were fashioned by African Americans and had African antecedents. In the 19th century, interest in the instrument was spread across the United States and United Kingdom by traveling shows of the 19th-century minstrel show fad, followed by mass production and mail-order sales, including instructional books. The inexpensive or home-made banjo remained part of rural folk culture, but 5-string and 4-string banjos also became popular for home parlor music entertainment, college music clubs, and early 20th century jazz bands. By the early 20th century, the banjo was most frequently associated with folk, bluegrass and country music, but was also used in some rock, pop and even hip-hop music. Among rock bands, the Eagles, Led Zeppelin, and the Grateful Dead have used the five-string banjo in some of their songs. Some famous pickers of the banjo are Ralph Stanley and Earl Scruggs.
Historically, the banjo occupied a central place in Black American traditional music and rural folk culture before entering the mainstream via the minstrel shows of the 19th century. Along with the fiddle, the banjo is a mainstay of American styles of music, such as bluegrass and old-time music. It is also very frequently used in Dixieland jazz, as well as in Caribbean genres like biguine, calypso, mento and troubadour.
History
Early origins
, , the earliest known American painting to picture a banjo-like instrument, which shows a four-string instrument with its 4th (thumb) string shorter than the others; thought to depict a plantation in Beaufort County, South Carolina]]
se Creole culture.]]
The modern banjo derives from instruments that have been recorded to be in use in North America and the Caribbean since the 17th century by enslaved people taken from West and Central Africa, such as the kora. Their African-style instruments were crafted from split gourds with animal skins stretched across them. Strings, from gut or vegetable fibers, were attached to a wooden neck. Written references to the banjo in North America and the Caribbean appear in the 17th and 18th centuries. which is a loan word to the Portuguese language resulting in the term banza, Its earliest recorded use was in 1678
The OED claims that the term banjo comes from a dialectal pronunciation of Portuguese bandore or from an early anglicisation of Spanish bandurria. Contrary evidence shows that the terms bandore and bandurria were used when Europeans encountered the instrument or its kin varieties in use by people of African descent, who used names for the instrument such as banza,
<blockquote>As for the guitars, which the negroes call banzas, this is what they consist of: they cut lengthwise, through the middle, a fresh calabash [the fruit of a tree called the callebassier]. This fruit is sometimes eight inches or more in diameter. The stretch across it the skin of a goat, which they attach on the edges with little nails; they put two or three little holes on this surface, and then a kind of plank or piece of wood that is rudely flattened makes the neck of the instrument; they stretch three strings made of pitre [a kind of string taken from the agave plant, commonly known as pitre] across it; and so the instrument is built. On this instrument they play airs composed of three or four notes, which they repeat constantly. It was played during any occasion, from boredom to joyous parties and calendas to funeral ceremonies. It was the custom to also combine this sound with the more noisy bamboula, a type of drum made from a stick of bamboo covered on both sides with a skin that was played with fingers and knuckles while sitting astride. These instruments differ from early African-American banjos in that the necks do not possess a Western-style fingerboard and tuning pegs; instead they have stick necks, with strings attached to the neck with loops for tuning. played by the Jola tribe of Senegambia, and the ubaw-akwala of the Igbo. Similar instruments include the xalam of Senegal and the ngoni of the Wassoulou region that includes parts of Mali, Guinea, and Ivory Coast, as well as a larger variation of the ngoni, known as the gimbri, developed in Morocco by sub-Saharan Africans (Gnawa or Haratin).
Banjo-like instruments seem to have been independently invented in several different places, in addition to the many African instruments mentioned above, since instruments similar to the banjo are known from a diverse array of distant countries. For example, the Chinese sanxian, the Japanese shamisen, the Persian tar, and the Moroccan sintir. banjer and banjar.
The instrument became increasingly available commercially from around the second quarter of the 19th century due to minstrel show performances. Sweeney has been credited with adding a string to the four-string African-American banjo, and popularizing the five-string banjo. in the 1830s Sweeney became the first white performer to play the banjo on stage. Sweeney participated in this transition by encouraging drum maker William Boucher of Baltimore to make banjos commercially for him to sell. However, modern scholar Gene Bluestein pointed out in 1964 that Sweeney may not have originated either the 5th string or sound box.
The instrument grew in popularity during the 1840s after Sweeney began his traveling minstrel show. By the end of the 1840s the instrument had expanded from Caribbean possession to take root in places across America and across the Atlantic in England. It was estimated in 1866 that there were probably 10,000 banjos in New York City, up from only a handful in 1844. People were exposed to banjos not only at minstrel shows, but also medicine shows, Wild-West shows, variety shows, and traveling vaudeville shows. The banjo's popularity also was given a boost by the Civil War, as servicemen on both sides in the Army or Navy were exposed to the banjo played in minstrel shows and by other servicemen. A popular movement of aspiring banjoists began as early as 1861. The enthusiasm for the instrument was labeled a "banjo craze" or "banjo mania." There were more teachers teaching banjo basics in the 1850s than there had been in the 1840s. The first book of notated music was The Complete Preceptor by Elias Howe, published under the pseudonym Gumbo Chaff, consisting mainly of Christy's Minstrels tunes. Frank B. Converse also published his entire collection of compositions in The Complete Banjoist'' in 1868, which included "polkas, waltzes, marches, and clog hornpipes."
In the 1840s, opportunities for work were found not only in minstrel companies and circuses, but also in floating theaters and variety theaters, which served as precursors to the variety show and vaudeville. It is still used by banjoists today. The term also differentiates that style of playing from the fingerpicking bluegrass banjo styles, such as the Scruggs style and Keith style. Alternatively known as "finger style", the new way of playing the banjo displaced the stroke method, until by 1870 it was the dominant style. Although mentioned by Briggs, it wasn't taught. The first banjo method to teach the technique was ''Frank B. Converse's New and Complete Method for the Banjo with or without a Master'', published in 1865.
To play in guitar style, players use the thumb and two or three fingers on their right hand to pick the notes. Samuel Swaim Stewart summarized the style in 1888, saying,
The banjo, although popular, carried low-class associations from its role in blackface minstrel shows, medicine shows, tent shows, and variety shows or vaudeville. There was a push in the 19th century to bring the instrument into "respectability." Huntley may have been the first white performer to successfully make the transition from performing in blackface to being himself on stage, noted by the Boston Herald in November 1884.
As the "raucous" imitations of plantation life decreased in minstrelsy, the banjo became more acceptable as an instrument of fashionable society, even to be accepted into women's parlors. Part of that change was a switch from the stroke style to the guitar playing style.
Some of those entertainers, such as Alfred A. Farland, specialized in classical music. However, musicians who wanted to entertain their audiences, and make a living, mixed it in with the popular music that audiences wanted. Farland's pupil Frederick J. Bacon was one of these. A former medicine show entertainer, Bacon performed classical music along with popular songs such as ''Massa's in de cold, cold ground, a Medley of Scotch Airs, a Medley of Southern Airs, and Thomas Glynn’s West Lawn Polka''.
Banjo innovation which began in the minstrel age continued, with increased use of metal parts, exotic wood, raised metal frets and a tone-ring that improved the sound. Instruments were designed in a variety of sizes and pitch ranges, to play different parts in banjo orchestras.
The instruments became ornately decorated in the 1920s to be visually dynamic to a theater audience.Modern era
performing on solo banjo at the IBMA Bluegrass Live! festival in Raleigh, North Carolina on October 2, 2021]]
In the years after World War II, the banjo experienced a resurgence, played by music stars such as Earl Scruggs (bluegrass), Bela Fleck (jazz, rock, world music), Gerry O'Connor (Celtic and Irish music), Perry Bechtel (jazz, big band), Pete Seeger (folk), and Otis Taylor (African-American roots, blues, jazz).
Pete Seeger "was a major force behind a new national interest in folk music." Scruggs played the banjo "with heretofore unheard of speed and dexterity," using a picking technique for the 5-string banjo that he perfected from 2-finger and 3-finger picking techniques in rural North Carolina. It is a relative newcomer to the genre.
The banjo has also been used more recently in the hardcore punk scene, most notably by Show Me the Body on their debut album, Body War.
Technique
, on the banjo, without and with drone notes These techniques are both idiomatic to the banjo in all styles, and their sound is characteristic of bluegrass.
Historically, the banjo was played in the claw-hammer style by the Africans who brought their version of the banjo with them. Several other styles of play were developed from this. Clawhammer consists of downward striking of one or more of the four main strings with the index, middle or both fingers while the drone or fifth string is played with a 'lifting' (as opposed to downward pluck) motion of the thumb. The notes typically sounded by the thumb in this fashion are, usually, on the off beat. Melodies can be quite intricate adding techniques such as double thumbing and drop thumb. In old time Appalachian Mountain music, a style called two-finger up-pick is also used, and a three-finger version that Earl Scruggs developed into the "Scruggs" style picking was nationally aired in 1945 on the Grand Ole Opry. In this style the instrument is played by plucking individual notes. Modern fingerstyle is usually played using fingerpicks, though early players and some modern players play either with nails or with a technique known as on the flesh. In this style the strings are played directly with the fingers, rather than any pick or intermediary.
While five-string banjos are traditionally played with either fingerpicks or the fingers themselves, tenor banjos and plectrum banjos are played with a pick, either to strum full chords, or most commonly in Irish traditional music, play single-note melodies.
Modern forms
The modern banjo comes in a variety of forms, including four- and five-string versions. A six-string version, tuned and played similarly to a guitar, has gained popularity. In almost all of its forms, banjo playing is characterized by a fast arpeggiated plucking, though many different playing styles exist.
The body, or "pot", of a modern banjo typically consists of a circular rim (generally made of wood, though metal was also common on older banjos) and a tensioned head, similar to a drum head. Traditionally, the head was made from animal skin, but today is often made of various synthetic materials. Most modern banjos also have a metal "tone ring" assembly that helps further clarify and project the sound, but many older banjos do not include a tone ring.
The banjo is usually tuned with friction tuning pegs or planetary gear tuners, rather than the worm gear machine head used on guitars. Frets have become standard since the late 19th century, though fretless banjos are still manufactured and played by those wishing to execute glissando, play quarter tones, or otherwise achieve the sound and feeling of early playing styles.
Modern banjos are typically strung with metal strings. Usually, the fourth string is wound with either steel or bronze-phosphor alloy. Some players may string their banjos with nylon or gut strings to achieve a more mellow, old-time tone.
Some banjos have a separate resonator plate on the back of the pot to project the sound forward and give the instrument more volume. This type of banjo is usually used in bluegrass music, though resonator banjos are played by players of all styles, and are also used in old-time, sometimes as a substitute for electric amplification when playing in large venues.
Open-back banjos generally have a mellower tone and weigh less than resonator banjos. They usually have a different setup than a resonator banjo, often with a higher string action. Five-string banjo <!-- This section is linked from redirect "Five-string banjo" -->
The modern five-string banjo is a variation on Sweeney's original design. The fifth string is usually the same gauge as the first, but starts from the fifth fret, three-quarters the length of the other strings. This lets the string be tuned to a higher open pitch than possible for the full-length strings. Because of the short fifth string, the five-string banjo uses a reentrant tuning – the string pitches do not proceed lowest to highest across the fingerboard. Instead, the fourth string is lowest, then third, second, first, and the fifth string is highest.
The short fifth string presents special problems for a capo. For small changes (going up or down one or two semitones, for example), simply retuning the fifth string is possible. Otherwise, various devices called "fifth-string capos" effectively shorten the vibrating part of the string. Many banjo players use model-railroad spikes or titanium spikes (usually installed at the seventh fret and sometimes at others), under which they hook the string to press it down on the fret.
Five-string banjo players use many tunings. (Tunings are given in left-to-right order, as viewed from the front of the instrument with the neck pointing up for a right-handed instrument. Left handed instruments reverse the order of the strings.) Probably the most common, particularly in bluegrass, is the Open-G tuning G4 D3 G3 B3 D4. In earlier times, the tuning G4 C3 G3 B3 D4 was commonly used instead, and this is still the preferred tuning for some types of folk music and for classic banjo. Other tunings found in old-time music include double C (G4 C3 G3 C4 D4), "sawmill" (G4 D3 G3 C4 D4) also called "mountain modal" and open D (F#4 D3 F#3 A3 D4). These tunings are often taken up a tone, either by tuning up or using a capo. For example, "double-D" tuning (A4 D3 A3 D4 E4) – commonly reached by tuning up from double C – is often played to accompany fiddle tunes in the key of D, and Open-A (A4 E3 A3 C#4 E4) is usually used for playing tunes in the key of A. Dozens of other banjo tunings are used, mostly in old-time music. These tunings are used to make playing specific tunes easier, usually fiddle tunes or groups of fiddle tunes.
The size of the five-string banjo is largely standardized, with a scale length of , but smaller and larger sizes exist, including the long-neck or "Seeger neck" variation designed by Pete Seeger. Petite variations on the five-string banjo have been available since the 1890s. S.S. Stewart introduced the banjeaurine, tuned one fourth above a standard five-string. Piccolo banjos are smaller, and tuned one octave above a standard banjo. Between these sizes and standard lies the A-scale banjo, which is two frets shorter and usually tuned one full step above standard tunings. Many makers have produced banjos of other scale lengths, and with various innovations.
American old-time music typically uses the five-string, open-back banjo. It is played in a number of different styles, the most common being clawhammer or frailing, characterized by the use of a downward rather than upward stroke when striking the strings with a fingernail. Frailing techniques use the thumb to catch the fifth string for a drone after most strums or after each stroke ("double thumbing"), or to pick out additional melody notes in what is known as drop-thumb. Pete Seeger popularized a folk style by combining clawhammer with up picking, usually without the use of fingerpicks. Another common style of old-time banjo playing is fingerpicking banjo or classic banjo. This style is based upon parlor-style guitar.
Bluegrass music, which uses the five-string resonator banjo almost exclusively, is played in several common styles. These include Scruggs style, named after Earl Scruggs; melodic, or Keith style, named for Bill Keith; and three-finger style with single-string work, also called Reno style after Don Reno. In these styles, the emphasis is on arpeggiated figures played in a continuous eighth-note rhythm, known as rolls. All of these styles are typically played with fingerpicks.
The first five-string, electric, solid-body banjo was developed by Charles Wilburn (Buck) Trent, Harold "Shot" Jackson, and David Jackson in 1960.
The five-string banjo has been used in classical music since before the turn of the 20th century. Contemporary and modern works have been written or arranged for the instrument by Don Vappie, Jerry Garcia, Buck Trent, Béla Fleck, Tony Trischka, Ralph Stanley, George Gibson, Steve Martin, Clifton Hicks, George Crumb, Tim Lake, Modest Mouse, Jo Kondo, Paul Elwood, Hans Werner Henze (notably in his Sixth Symphony), Daniel Mason, Beck, the Water Tower Bucket Boys, Todd Taylor, J.P. Pickens, Peggy Honeywell, Norfolk & Western, Putnam Smith, Iron & Wine, The Avett Brothers, The Well Pennies, Punch Brothers, Julian Koster, Sufjan Stevens, and Sarah Jarosz.
George Gershwin includes a banjo in his opera Porgy and Bess
Frederick Delius wrote for a banjo in his opera Koanga.
Ernst Krenek includes two banjos in his Kleine Symphonie (Little Symphony).
Kurt Weill has a banjo in his opera The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny.
Viktor Ullmann included a tenor banjo part in his Piano Concerto (op. 25).
Virgil Thomson includes a banjo in his orchestral music to accompany the film The Plow That Broke the Plains (1936).
Four-string banjos
The four-string plectrum banjo is a standard banjo without the short drone string. It usually has 22 frets on the neck and a scale length of 26 to 28 inches, and was originally tuned C3 G3 B3 D4. It can also be tuned like the top four strings of a guitar, which is known as "Chicago tuning". As the name suggests, it is usually played with a guitar-style pick (that is, a single one held between thumb and forefinger), unlike the five-string banjo, which is either played with a thumbpick and two fingerpicks, or with bare fingers. The plectrum banjo evolved out of the five-string banjo, to cater to styles of music involving strummed chords. The plectrum is also featured in many early jazz recordings and arrangements.
Four-string banjos can be used for chordal accompaniment (as in early jazz), for single-string melody playing (as in Irish traditional music), in "chord melody" style (a succession of chords in which the highest notes carry the melody), in tremolo style (both on chords and single strings), and a mixed technique called duo style that combines single-string tremolo and rhythm chords.
Four-string banjos are used from time to time in musical theater. Examples include: Hello, Dolly!, Mame, Chicago, Cabaret, Oklahoma!, Half a Sixpence, Annie, Barnum, The Threepenny Opera, ''Monty Python's Spamalot, and countless others. Joe Raposo had used it variably in the imaginative seven-piece orchestration for the long-running TV show Sesame Street'', and has sometimes had it overdubbed with itself or an electric guitar. The banjo is still (albeit rarely) in use in the show's arrangement currently.
Tenor banjo
The shorter-necked, tenor banjo, with 17 ("short scale") or 19 frets, is also typically played with a plectrum. It became a popular instrument after about 1910. Early models used for melodic picking typically had 17 frets on the neck and a scale length of 19 to 21 inches. By the mid-1920s, when the instrument was used primarily for strummed chordal accompaniment, 19-fret necks with a scale length of 21 to 23 inches became standard. The usual tuning is the all-fifths tuning C3 G3 D4 A4, in which exactly seven semitones (a perfect fifth) occur between the open notes of consecutive strings; this is identical to the tuning of a viola. Other players (particularly in Irish traditional music) tune the banjo G2 D3 A3 E4 like an octave mandolin, which lets the banjoist duplicate fiddle and mandolin fingering. The popularization of this tuning is usually attributed to the late Barney McKenna, banjoist with The Dubliners.
The tenor banjo was a common rhythm instrument in early 20th-century dance bands. Its volume and timbre suited early jazz (and jazz-influenced popular music styles) and could both compete with other instruments (such as brass instruments and saxophones) and be heard clearly on acoustic recordings. George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, in Ferde Grofe's original jazz-orchestra arrangement, includes tenor banjo, with widely spaced chords not easily playable on plectrum banjo in its conventional tunings. With development of the archtop and electric guitar, the tenor banjo largely disappeared from jazz and popular music, though keeping its place in traditional "Dixieland" jazz.
Some 1920s Irish banjo players picked out the melodies of jigs, reels, and hornpipes on tenor banjos, decorating the tunes with snappy triplet ornaments. The most important Irish banjo player of this era was Mike Flanagan of the New York-based Flanagan Brothers, one of the most popular Irish-American groups of the day. Other pre-WWII Irish banjo players included Neil Nolan, who recorded with Dan Sullivan's Shamrock Band in Boston, and Jimmy McDade, who recorded with the Four Provinces Orchestra in Philadelphia. Meanwhile, in Ireland, the rise of ceili bands provided a new market for a loud instrument like the tenor banjo. Use of the tenor banjo in Irish music has increased greatly since the folk revival of the 1960s. A zither banjo usually has a closed back and sides with the drum body and skin tensioning system suspended inside the wooden rim, the neck and string tailpiece mounted on the outside of the rim, and the drone string led through a tube in the neck so that the tuning peg can be mounted on the head. They were often made by builders who used guitar tuners that came in banks of three, so five-stringed instruments had a redundant tuner; these banjos could be somewhat easily converted over to a six-string banjo.
American Alfred Davis Cammeyer (1862–1949), a young violinist turned concert banjo player, devised the six-string zither banjo around 1880. British opera diva Adelina Patti advised Cammeyer that the zither banjo might be popular with English audiences as it had been invented there, and Cammeyer went to London in 1888. With his virtuoso playing, he helped show that banjos could make more sophisticated music than normally played by blackface minstrels. He was soon performing for London society, where he met Sir Arthur Sullivan, who recommended that Cammeyer progress from arranging the music of others for banjo to composing his own music.
Modern six-string bluegrass banjos have been made. These add a bass string between the lowest string and the drone string on a five-string banjo, and are usually tuned G4 G2 D3 G3 B3 D4. Sonny Osborne played one of these instruments for several years. It was modified by luthier Rual Yarbrough from a Vega five-string model. A picture of Sonny with this banjo appears in Pete Wernick's Bluegrass Banjo method book.
Six-string banjos known as banjo guitars basically consist of a six-string guitar neck attached to a bluegrass or plectrum banjo body, which allows players who have learned the guitar to play a banjo sound without having to relearn fingerings. This was the instrument of the early jazz great Johnny St. Cyr, jazzmen Django Reinhardt, Danny Barker, Papa Charlie Jackson and Clancy Hayes, as well as the blues and gospel singer Reverend Gary Davis. Today, musicians as diverse as Keith Urban, Rod Stewart, Taj Mahal, Joe Satriani, David Hidalgo, Larry Lalonde and Doc Watson play the six-string guitar banjo. They have become increasingly popular since the mid-1990s.
Other banjos
Low banjos
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in vogue in plucked-string instrument ensembles – guitar orchestras, mandolin orchestras, banjo orchestras – was when the instrumentation was made to parallel that of the string section in symphony orchestras. Thus, "violin, viola, 'cello, bass" became "mandolin, mandola, mandocello, mandobass", or in the case of banjos, "banjolin, banjola, banjo cello, bass banjo". Because the range of pluck-stringed instrument generally is not as great as that of comparably sized bowed-string instruments, other instruments were often added to these plucked orchestras to extend the range of the ensemble upwards and downwards.
The banjo cello was normally tuned C2-G2-D3-A3, one octave below the tenor banjo like the cello and mandocello. A five-string cello banjo, set up like a bluegrass banjo (with the short fifth string), but tuned one octave lower, has been produced by the Goldtone company.
Bass banjos have been produced in both upright bass formats and with standard, horizontally carried banjo bodies. Contrabass banjos with either three or four strings have also been made; some of these had headstocks similar to those of bass violins. Tuning varies on these large instruments, with four-string models sometimes being tuned in 4ths like a bass violin (E1-A1-D2-G2) and sometimes in 5ths, like a four-string cello banjo, one octave lower (C1-G1-D2-A2).
Long neck banjos
Also called Seeger banjos for having been invented by Pete Seeger, these banjos feature three extra frets, giving the instrument a longer neck and greater playing versatility. With three extra frets, these banjos can be played one-and-a-half steps lower than a regular banjo, which some players find advantageous for singing or playing along. They are almost always open-backed. Notably, the drone strings on Seeger banjos are not pushed three frets back, so the tuning peg for the 5th string is in line with the 8th fret instead of the 5th fret.
Banjo hybrids and variants
A number of hybrid instruments exist, crossing the banjo with other stringed instruments. Most of these use the body of a banjo, often with a resonator, and the neck of the other instrument. Examples include the banjo mandolin (first patented in 1882) and the banjo ukulele, most famously played by the English comedian George Formby. These were especially popular in the early decades of the 20th century, and were probably a result of a desire either to allow players of other instruments to jump on the banjo bandwagon at the height of its popularity, or to get the natural amplification benefits of the banjo resonator in an age before electric amplification.
Conversely, the tenor and plectrum guitars use the respective banjo necks on guitar bodies. They arose in the early 20th century as a way for banjo players to double on guitar without having to relearn the instrument entirely.
Instruments that have a five-string banjo neck on a wooden body (for example, a guitar, bouzouki, or dobro body) have also been made, such as the banjola. A 20th-century Turkish instrument similar to the banjo is called the cümbüş, which combines a banjo-like resonator with a neck derived from an oud. At the end of the 20th century, a development of the five-string banjo was the BanSitar. This features a bone bridge, giving the instrument a sitar-like resonance.
The Brazilian samba banjo is basically a cavaquinho neck on a banjo body, thereby producing a louder sound than the cavaquinho. It is tuned the same as the top 4 strings of a 5-string banjo up an octave (or any cavaquinho tuning).
Noted banjoists
* Joel Sweeney (1810–1860), also known as Joe Sweeney, was a musician and early blackface minstrel performer. He is known for popularizing the playing of the banjo and has often been credited with advancing the physical development of the modern five-string banjo.
* Vess Ossman (1868–1923) was a leading five-string banjoist who started playing banjo at age 12. He was a popular recording artist, and in fact one of the first recording artists ever, when audio recording first became commercially available. He formed various recording groups, his most popular being the Ossman-Dudley trio.
* Clifford Essex (1869–1946), a British banjoist, who was also a musical instrument manufacturer
* Uncle Dave Macon (1870–1952) was a banjo player and comedian from Tennessee known for his "plug hat, gold teeth, chin whiskers, gates ajar collar and that million dollar Tennessee smile".
* Fred Van Eps (1878–1960) was a noted five-string player and banjo maker who learned to play from listening to cylinder recordings of Vess Ossman. He recorded for Edison's company, producing some of the earliest disk recordings, and also the earliest ragtime recordings in any medium other than player piano.
* Frank Lawes (1894–1970), of the United Kingdom, developed a unique fingerstyle technique on the four-string plectrum instrument, and was a prolific composer of four-string banjo music, much of which is still performed and recorded today.
* Pasquale Troise (1895-1957), Italian emigrant to the UK in the 1920s. Formed Troise and his Banjoliers in 1933, which recorded with Decca and performed regularly on the BBC's long-running series Music While You Work.
* Harry Reser (1896–1965), plectrum and tenor banjo, was regarded by some as the best tenor banjoist of the 1920s. He wrote a large number of works for tenor banjo, as well as instructional material including numerous banjo method books, over a dozen other instrumental method books (for guitar, ukulele, mandolin etc.), and was well known in the banjo community. Reser's accomplished single string and "chord melody" technique set a "high mark" that many subsequent tenor players still endeavor to attain.
* Eddie Peabody (1902–1970) was a great proponent of the plectrum banjo who performed for nearly five decades (1920–1968) and left a considerable legacy of recordings. An early reviewer dubbed him "King of the Banjo", and his was a household name for decades. He went on to develop new instruments, produce records, and appear in movies.
* Ola Belle Reed (1916–2002) was an American folk singer, songwriter and banjo player.
* Pete Seeger (1919–2014), a singer-songwriter who performed solo as well as with folk group the Weavers, included five-string banjo among his instruments. His 1948 method book How to Play the Five-String Banjo has been credited by thousands of banjoists, including prominent professionals, with sparking their interest in the instrument. He is also credited with inventing the long-neck banjo (also known as the "Seeger Banjo"), which adds three lower frets to the five-string banjo's neck, and tunes the four main strings down by a minor third, to facilitate playing in singing keys more comfortable for some folk guitarists.
* Earl Scruggs (1924–2012), whose career ranged from the end of World War II into the 21st century, is widely regarded as the father of the bluegrass style of banjo playing. The three-finger style of playing he developed while playing with Bill Monroe's band is known by his name: Scruggs Style.
* Ralph Stanley (1927–2016) had a long career, both with his brother as the Stanley Brothers and with his band the Clinch Mountain Boys. He was awarded an honorary doctorate of music by Lincoln Memorial University, is a member of the Bluegrass Hall of Fame and the Grand Ole Opry. He won a Grammy Award for Best Male Country Vocal Performance in the movie O Brother, Where Art Thou?.
* Roy Clark (1933–2018)
* John Hartford (1937–2001)
* Sonny Osborne (1937-2021)
* Ben Eldridge (1938-2024)
* Barney McKenna (1939–2012) was an Irish musician and a founding member of The Dubliners. He played the tenor banjo, violin, mandolin, and melodeon. He was most renowned as a banjo player. Barney used GDAE tuning on a 19-fret tenor banjo, an octave below fiddle/mandolin and, according to musician Mick Moloney, was single-handedly responsible for making the GDAE-tuned tenor banjo the standard banjo in Irish music. Due to his skill level on the banjo, fans all around the world and other members of The Dubliners nicknamed him "Banjo Barney".
* Bill Keith (1939–2015)
* Pete Wernick (b. 1946)
* Tony Trischka (b. 1949)
* Béla Fleck (b. 1958) is widely acknowledged as one of the world's most innovative and technically proficient banjo players. His work spans many styles and genres, including jazz, bluegrass, classical, R&B, avant garde, and "world music", and he has produced a substantial discography and videography. He works extensively in both acoustic and electric media. Fleck has been nominated for Grammy Awards in more categories than any other artist, and has received 13 .
* Noam Pikelny (b. 1981) is an American banjoist who plays eclectic styles including traditional bluegrass, classical, rock, and jazz music. He has won the Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass in 2010. He has been nominated for eight Grammy Nominations and has been awarded one with his band, the Punch Brothers, in 2018.
* Other important four-string performers were Mike Pingitore, who played tenor for the Paul Whiteman Orchestra through 1948, and Roy Smeck, early radio and recording pioneer, author of many instructional books, and whose influential performances on many fretted instruments earned him the nickname "Wizard of the Strings", during his active years (1922–1950). Prominent tenor players of more recent vintage include Narvin Kimball (d. 2006) (left-handed banjoist of Preservation Hall Jazz Band fame).
* Noted four-string players currently active include ragtime and dixieland stylists Charlie Tagawa (1935–2017) and Bill Lowrey (b. 1963). Jazz guitarist Howard Alden (b. 1958) began his career on tenor banjo and still plays it at traditional jazz events. Cynthia Sayer (b. 1962) is regarded as one of the top jazz plectrum banjoists. Rock and country performer Winston Marshall (b. 1988) plays banjo (among other instruments) for the British folk rock group Mumford and Sons, a band that won the 2013 Grammy Award for "Best Album of the Year".
See also
* Akonting
* Banjo (samba)
* Banjo ukulele
* Benju
* Bulbul tarang
* Cuatro (instrument)
* Double-neck guitjo
* Sanshin
* Stringed instrument tunings
References
Further reading
Banjo history
* Castelnero, Gordon and Russell, David L. Earl Scruggs: Banjo Icon. Rowman & Littlefield, 2017
* Conway, Cecelia (1995). African Banjo Echoes in Appalachia: A Study of Folk Traditions, University of Tennessee Press. Paper: ; cloth: . A study of the influence of African Americans on banjo playing throughout U.S. history.
* De Smaele G. (1983). "Banjo a cinq cordes". Brussels: Musée Instrumental (MIM), Brussels. D 1983-2170-1
* De Smaele G. (2015). "Banjo Attitudes." Paris: L'Harmattan, 2015.
* De Smaele G. (2019). "A Five-String Banjo Sourcebook." Paris: L'Harmattan, 2019.
* Dubois, Laurent (2016). ''The Banjo: America's African Instrument. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016.
* Epstein, Dena (1977). Sinful Tunes and Spirituals: Black Folk Music to the Civil War. University of Illinois Press, 2003. Winner of the Simkins Prize of the Southern Historical Association, 1979. Winner of the Chicago Folklore Prize. The anniversary edition of a classic study of black slave music in America.
* Gaddy, Kristina (2022). Well of Souls: Uncovering the Banjo's Hidden History''. W. W. Norton & Company, 2022. . The author uncovers the banjo's key role in Black spirituality, ritual, and rebellion.
* Gibson, George R. (2018). "Black Banjo, Fiddle and Dance in Kentucky and the Amalgamation of African American and Anglo-American Folk Music." Banjo Roots and Branches(Winans, 2018). University of Illinois Press, 2018. Gibson's historiographic chapter uncovers much new information about black banjo and fiddle players, and dance, in Kentucky, and their influence on white musicians, from the 1780s.
* Gura, Philip F. and James F. Bollman (1999). ''America's Instrument: The Banjo in the Nineteenth Century''. The University of North Carolina Press. . The definitive history of the banjo, focusing on the instrument's development in the 1800s.
* Katonah Museum of Art (2003). The Birth of the Banjo. Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York. .
* Linn, Karen (1994). That Half-Barbaric Twang: The Banjo in American Popular Culture. University of Illinois Press. . Scholarly cultural history of the banjo, focusing on how its image has evolved over the years.
* Tsumura, Akira (1984). Banjos: The Tsumura Collection. Kodansha International Ltd. . An illustrated history of the banjo featuring the world's premier collection.
* Webb, Robert Lloyd (1996). Ring the Banjar!. 2nd edition. Centerstream Publishing. . A short history of the banjo, with pictures from an exhibition at the MIT Museum.
* Winans, Robert (2018). Banjo Roots and Branches. University of Illinois Press, 2018. The story of the banjo's journey from Africa to the western hemisphere blends music, history, and a union of cultures. In Banjo Roots and Branches, Robert B. Winans presents cutting-edge scholarship that covers the instrument's West African origins and its adaptations and circulation in the Caribbean and United States.
External links
*
* [https://www.theirishplace.com/traditional-irish-music/the-irish-banjo/ The Banjo in Irish Traditional Music]
* [http://www.vintagebanjomaker.com 200 banjo makers pre 2nd WW]
* [http://www.editions-harmattan.fr/index.asp?navigcatalogue&objlivre&no=48796 BANJO ATTITUDES - Le banjo à cinq cordes : son histoire générale, sa documentation, Gérard De Smaele - livre, ebook, epub]
* [http://elib.hamilton.edu/banjo-tutors 19th Century Banjo Instruction Manuals]
* [https://archive.org/details/to_hear_your_banjo_play To Hear Your Banjo Play], 1947 Alan Lomax film (16 minutes)
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20160110220432/http://mirekpatek.com/ Fingerstyle Tenor Banjo]
* [https://banjonews.com/ Banjo Newsletter]
* [http://www.banjohangout.org/ Banjo Hangout]
* Dr Joan Dickerson, Sparky Rucker, and George Gibson with host Michael Johnathon explore the African-American History of the Banjo through conversation and music on show 350 of the WoodSongs Old-Time Radio Hour. [https://web.archive.org/web/20080320095521/http://www.woodsongs.com/showlist.asp Both audio and video are provided].
* [http://www.ideasroadshow.com/issues/the-physics-of-banjos-part-i "The Physics of Banjos – A Conversation with David Politzer"] , Ideas Roadshow, 2016
* Banjo Physics 411 https://www.its.caltech.edu/~politzer/
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Category:Australian musical instruments | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banjo | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.481235 |
3850 | Baseball | Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play beginning when a player on the fielding team, called the pitcher, throws a ball that a player on the batting team, called the batter, tries to hit with a bat. The objective of the offensive team (batting team) is to hit the ball into the field of play, away from the other team's players, allowing its players to run the bases, having them advance counter-clockwise around four bases to score what are called "runs". The objective of the defensive team (referred to as the fielding team) is to prevent batters from becoming runners, and to prevent runners advancing around the bases. A run is scored when a runner legally advances around the bases in order and touches home plate (the place where the player started as a batter).
The initial objective of the batting team is to have a player reach first base safely; this occurs either when the batter hits the ball and reaches first base before an opponent retrieves the ball and touches the base, or when the pitcher persists in throwing the ball out of the batter's reach. Players on the batting team who reach first base without being called "out" can attempt to advance to subsequent bases as a runner, either immediately or during teammates' turns batting. The fielding team tries to prevent runs by using the ball to get batters or runners "out", which forces them out of the field of play. The pitcher can get the batter out by throwing three pitches which result in strikes, while fielders can get the batter out by catching a batted ball before it touches the ground, and can get a runner out by tagging them with the ball while the runner is not touching a base.
The opposing teams switch back and forth between batting and fielding; the batting team's turn to bat is over once the fielding team records three outs. One turn batting for each team constitutes an inning. A game is usually composed of nine innings, and the team with the greater number of runs at the end of the game wins. Most games end after the ninth inning, but if scores are tied at that point, extra innings are usually played. Baseball has no game clock, though some competitions feature pace-of-play regulations such as the pitch clock to shorten game time.
Baseball evolved from older bat-and-ball games already being played in England by the mid-18th century. This game was brought by immigrants to North America, where the modern version developed. Baseball's American origins, as well as its reputation as a source of escapism during troubled points in American history such as the American Civil War and the Great Depression, have led the sport to receive the moniker of "America's Pastime"; since the late 19th century, it has been unofficially recognized as the national sport of the United States, though in modern times is considered less popular than other sports, such as American football. In addition to North America, baseball spread throughout the rest of the Americas and the Asia–Pacific in the 19th and 20th centuries, and is now considered the most popular sport in parts of Central and South America, the Caribbean, and East Asia, particularly in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan.
In Major League Baseball (MLB), the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, teams are divided into the National League (NL) and American League (AL), each with three divisions: East, West, and Central. The MLB champion is determined by playoffs that culminate in the World Series. The top level of play is similarly split in Japan between the Central and Pacific Leagues and in Cuba between the West League and East League. The World Baseball Classic, organized by the World Baseball Softball Confederation, is the major international competition of the sport and attracts the top national teams from around the world. Baseball was played at the Olympic Games from 1992 to 2008, and was reinstated on a one-off basis in 2020.
Rules and gameplay
Overview
Diamond may refer to the square area defined by the four bases or to the entire playing field. The dimensions given are for professional and professional-style games. Children often play on smaller fields.]]
match between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, March 20, 2013]]
A baseball game is played between two teams, each composed of nine players, that take turns playing offense (batting and baserunning) and defense (pitching and fielding). A pair of turns, one at bat and one in the field, by each team constitutes an inning. A game consists of nine innings (seven innings at the high school level and in doubleheaders in college, Minor League Baseball and, since the 2020 season, Major League Baseball; and six innings at the Little League level). One team—customarily the visiting team—bats in the top, or first half, of every inning. The other team—customarily the home team—bats in the bottom, or second half, of every inning.
The goal of the game is to score more points (runs) than the other team. The players on the team at bat attempt to score runs by touching all four bases, in order, set at the corners of the square-shaped baseball diamond. A player bats at home plate and must attempt to safely reach a base before proceeding, counterclockwise, from first base, to second base, third base, and back home to score a run. The team in the field attempts to prevent runs from scoring by recording outs, which remove opposing players from offensive action until their next turn at bat comes up again. When three outs are recorded, the teams switch roles for the next half-inning. If the score of the game is tied after nine innings, extra innings are played to resolve the contest. Many amateur games, particularly unorganized ones, involve different numbers of players and innings.
The game is played on a field whose primary boundaries, the foul lines, extend forward from home plate at 45-degree angles. The 90-degree area within the foul lines is referred to as fair territory; the 270-degree area outside them is foul territory. The part of the field enclosed by the bases and several yards beyond them is the infield; the area farther beyond the infield is the outfield. In the middle of the infield is a raised pitcher's mound, with a rectangular rubber plate (the rubber) at its center. The outer boundary of the outfield is typically demarcated by a raised fence, which may be of any material and height. The fair territory between home plate and the outfield boundary is baseball's field of play, though significant events can take place in foul territory, as well.
There are three basic tools of baseball: the ball, the bat, and the glove or mitt:
* The baseball is about the size of an adult's fist, around in circumference. It has a rubber or cork center, wound in yarn and covered in white cowhide, with red stitching.
* The bat is a hitting tool, traditionally made of a single, solid piece of wood. Other materials are now commonly used for nonprofessional games. It is a hard round stick, about in diameter at the hitting end, tapering to a narrower handle and culminating in a knob. Bats used by adults are typically around long, and not longer than .
* The glove or mitt is a fielding tool, made of padded leather with webbing between the fingers. As an aid in catching and holding onto the ball, it takes various shapes to meet the specific needs of different fielding positions.
Protective helmets are also standard equipment for all batters.
Fielding positions
At the beginning of each half-inning, the nine players of the fielding team arrange themselves around the field. One of them, the pitcher, stands on the pitcher's mound. The pitcher begins the pitching delivery with one foot on the rubber, pushing off it to gain velocity when throwing toward home plate. Another fielding team player, the catcher, squats on the far side of home plate, facing the pitcher. The rest of the fielding team faces home plate, typically arranged as four infielders—who set up along or within a few yards outside the imaginary lines (basepaths) between first, second, and third base—and three outfielders. In the standard arrangement, there is a first baseman positioned several steps to the left of first base, a second baseman to the right of second base, a shortstop to the left of second base, and a third baseman to the right of third base. The basic outfield positions are left fielder, center fielder, and right fielder. With the exception of the catcher, all fielders are required to be in fair territory when the pitch is delivered. A neutral umpire sets up behind the catcher. Other umpires will be distributed around the field as well. Offense
, the batter, awaiting a pitch, with the catcher and umpire]]
Play starts with a member of the batting team, the batter, standing in either of the two batter's boxes next to home plate, holding a bat. The batter waits for the pitcher to throw a pitch (the ball) toward home plate, and attempts to hit the ball with the bat. Defense
determines the result of most pitches, and varies in vertical length for each batter.]]
A pitch that is not hit into the field of play is called either a strike or a ball. A batter against whom three strikes are recorded strikes out. A batter against whom four balls are recorded is awarded a base on balls or walk, a free advance to first base. (A batter may also freely advance to first base if the batter's body or uniform is struck by a pitch outside the strike zone, provided the batter does not swing and attempts to avoid being hit.) Crucial to determining balls and strikes is the umpire's judgment as to whether a pitch has passed through the strike zone, a conceptual area above home plate extending from the midpoint between the batter's shoulders and belt down to the hollow of the knee. Any pitch which does not pass through the strike zone is called a ball, unless the batter either swings and misses at the pitch, or hits the pitch into foul territory; an exception generally occurs if the ball is hit into foul territory when the batter already has two strikes, in which case neither a ball nor a strike is called.
tries to tag out a runner who is sliding head first, attempting to reach second base.]]
While the team at bat is trying to score runs, the team in the field is attempting to record outs. In addition to the strikeout and flyout, common ways a member of the batting team may be put out include the ground out, force out, and tag out. These occur either when a runner is forced to advance to a base, and a fielder with possession of the ball reaches that base before the runner does, or the runner is touched by the ball, held in a fielder's hand, while not on a base. (The batter-runner is always forced to advance to first base, and any other runners must advance to the next base if a teammate is forced to advance to their base.) It is possible to record two outs in the course of the same play. This is called a double play. Three outs in one play, a triple play, is possible, though rare. Players put out or retired must leave the field, returning to their team's dugout or bench. A runner may be stranded on base when a third out is recorded against another player on the team. Stranded runners do not benefit the team in its next turn at bat as every half-inning begins with the bases empty.
Batting order and substitution
.]]
An individual player's turn batting or plate appearance is complete when the player reaches base, hits a home run, makes an out, or hits a ball that results in the team's third out, even if it is recorded against a teammate. On rare occasions, a batter may be at the plate when, without the batter's hitting the ball, a third out is recorded against a teammate—for instance, a runner getting caught stealing (tagged out attempting to steal a base). A batter with this sort of incomplete plate appearance starts off the team's next turn batting; any balls or strikes recorded against the batter the previous inning are erased.
A runner may circle the bases only once per plate appearance and thus can score at most a single run per batting turn. Once a player has completed a plate appearance, that player may not bat again until the eight other members of the player's team have all taken their turn at bat in the batting order. The batting order is set before the game begins, and may not be altered except for substitutions. Once a player has been removed for a substitute, that player may not reenter the game. Children's games often have more lenient rules, such as Little League rules, which allow players to be substituted back into the same game.
If the designated hitter (DH) rule is in effect, each team has a tenth player whose sole responsibility is to bat (and run). The DH takes the place of another player—almost invariably the pitcher—in the batting order, but does not field. Thus, even with the DH, each team still has a batting order of nine players and a fielding arrangement of nine players. Personnel Players
The number of players on a baseball roster, or squad, varies by league and by the level of organized play. A Major League Baseball (MLB) team has a roster of 26 players with specific roles. A typical roster features the following players:
* Eight position players: the catcher, four infielders, and three outfielders—all of whom play on a regular basis
* Five starting pitchers who constitute the team's pitching rotation or starting rotation
* Seven relief pitchers, including one closer, who constitute the team's bullpen (named for the off-field area where pitchers warm up)
* One backup, or substitute, catcher
* Five backup infielders and backup outfielders, or players who can play multiple positions, known as utility players.
Most baseball leagues worldwide have the DH rule, including MLB, Japan's Pacific League, and Caribbean professional leagues, along with major American amateur organizations. The Central League in Japan does not have the rule and high-level minor league clubs connected to National League teams are not required to field a DH. In leagues that apply the designated hitter rule, a typical team has nine offensive regulars (including the DH), five starting pitchers, seven or eight relievers, a backup catcher, and two or three other reserve players.
Managers and coaches
The manager, or head coach, oversees the team's major strategic decisions, such as establishing the starting rotation, setting the lineup, or batting order, before each game, and making substitutions during games—in particular, bringing in relief pitchers. Managers are typically assisted by two or more coaches; they may have specialized responsibilities, such as working with players on hitting, fielding, pitching, or strength and conditioning. At most levels of organized play, two coaches are stationed on the field when the team is at bat: the first base coach and third base coach, who occupy designated coaches' boxes, just outside the foul lines. These coaches assist in the direction of baserunners, when the ball is in play, and relay tactical signals from the manager to batters and runners, during pauses in play. In contrast to many other team sports, baseball managers and coaches generally wear their team's uniforms; coaches must be in uniform to be allowed on the field to confer with players during a game. Umpires Any baseball game involves one or more umpires, who make rulings on the outcome of each play. At a minimum, one umpire will stand behind the catcher, to have a good view of the strike zone, and call balls and strikes. Additional umpires may be stationed near the other bases, thus making it easier to judge plays such as attempted force outs and tag outs. In MLB, four umpires are used for each game, one near each base. In the playoffs, six umpires are used: one at each base and two in the outfield along the foul lines.
Strategy
Many of the pre-game and in-game strategic decisions in baseball revolve around a fundamental fact: in general, right-handed batters tend to be more successful against left-handed pitchers and, to an even greater degree, left-handed batters tend to be more successful against right-handed pitchers. A manager with several left-handed batters in the regular lineup, who knows the team will be facing a left-handed starting pitcher, may respond by starting one or more of the right-handed backups on the team's roster. During the late innings of a game, as relief pitchers and pinch hitters are brought in, the opposing managers will often go back and forth trying to create favorable matchups with their substitutions. The manager of the fielding team trying to arrange same-handed pitcher-batter matchups and the manager of the batting team trying to arrange opposite-handed matchups. With a team that has the lead in the late innings, a manager may remove a starting position player—especially one whose turn at bat is not likely to come up again—for a more skillful fielder (known as a defensive substitution).
Tactics
Pitching and fielding
receives a pickoff throw, as the runner dives back to first base.]]
The tactical decision that precedes almost every play in a baseball game involves pitch selection. By gripping and then releasing the baseball in a certain manner, and by throwing it at a certain speed, pitchers can cause the baseball to break to either side, or downward, as it approaches the batter, thus creating differing pitches that can be selected. Among the resulting wide variety of pitches that may be thrown, the four basic types are the fastball, the changeup (or off-speed pitch), and two breaking balls—the curveball and the slider. Pitchers have different repertoires of pitches they are skillful at throwing. Conventionally, before each pitch, the catcher signals the pitcher what type of pitch to throw, as well as its general vertical or horizontal location. If there is disagreement on the selection, the pitcher may shake off the sign and the catcher will call for a different pitch.
With a runner on base and taking a lead, the pitcher may attempt a pickoff, a quick throw to a fielder covering the base to keep the runner's lead in check or, optimally, effect a tag out. Pickoff attempts, however, are subject to rules that severely restrict the pitcher's movements before and during the pickoff attempt. Violation of any one of these rules could result in the umpire calling a balk against the pitcher, which permits any runners on base to advance one base with impunity. If an attempted stolen base is anticipated, the catcher may call for a pitchout, a ball thrown deliberately off the plate, allowing the catcher to catch it while standing and throw quickly to a base. Facing a batter with a strong tendency to hit to one side of the field, the fielding team may employ a shift, with most or all of the fielders moving to the left or right of their usual positions. With a runner on third base, the infielders may play in, moving closer to home plate to improve the odds of throwing out the runner on a ground ball, though a sharply hit grounder is more likely to carry through a drawn-in infield.
Batting and baserunning
player Mookie Betts hits a pitch by swinging his bat.]]
Several basic offensive tactics come into play with a runner on first base, including the fundamental choice of whether to attempt a steal of second base. The hit and run is sometimes employed, with a skillful contact hitter, the runner takes off with the pitch, drawing the shortstop or second baseman over to second base, creating a gap in the infield for the batter to poke the ball through. The sacrifice bunt, calls for the batter to focus on making soft contact with the ball, so that it rolls a short distance into the infield, allowing the runner to advance into scoring position as the batter is thrown out at first. A batter, particularly one who is a fast runner, may also attempt to bunt for a hit. A sacrifice bunt employed with a runner on third base, aimed at bringing that runner home, is known as a squeeze play. With a runner on third and fewer than two outs, a batter may instead concentrate on hitting a fly ball that, even if it is caught, will be deep enough to allow the runner to tag up and score—a successful batter, in this case, gets credit for a sacrifice fly. History
The evolution of baseball from older bat-and-ball games is difficult to trace with precision. Consensus once held that today's baseball is a North American development from the older game rounders, popular among children in Great Britain and Ireland. American baseball historian David Block suggests that the game originated in England; recently uncovered historical evidence supports this position. According to Block and John Thorn, official MLB historian, this earlier version of baseball may have involved hitting the ball with a hand, making it akin to today's punchball. Block argues that rounders and early baseball were actually regional variants of each other, and that the game's most direct antecedents are the English games of stoolball and "tut-ball". The earliest known reference to baseball is in a 1744 British publication, A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, by John Newbery. Block discovered that the first recorded game of "Bass-Ball" took place in 1749 in Surrey, and featured the Prince of Wales as a player. This early form of the game was apparently brought to Canada by English immigrants.
, baseball (bottom) had overtaken its fellow bat-and-ball sport cricket (top) in popularity within the United States. Growing American influence abroad meant the same occurred in Japan and the Dominican Republic by the early 20th century.]]
By the early 1830s, there were reports of a variety of uncodified bat-and-ball games recognizable as early forms of baseball being played around North America. The first officially recorded baseball game in North America was played in Beachville, Ontario, Canada, on June 4, 1838. In 1845, Alexander Cartwright, a member of New York City's Knickerbocker Club, led the codification of the so-called Knickerbocker Rules, which in turn were based on rules developed in 1837 by William R. Wheaton of the Gotham Club. While there are reports that the New York Knickerbockers played games in 1845, the contest long recognized as the first officially recorded baseball game in U.S. history took place on June 19, 1846, in Hoboken, New Jersey: the "New York Nine" defeated the Knickerbockers, 23–1, in four innings. With the Knickerbocker code as the basis, the rules of modern baseball continued to evolve over the next half-century. The game then went on to spread throughout the Pacific Rim and the Americas, with Americans backing the sport as a way to spread American values. In the United States Establishment of professional leagues In the mid-1850s, a baseball craze hit the New York metropolitan area, and by 1856, local journals were referring to baseball as the "national pastime" or "national game". A year later, the sport's first governing body, the National Association of Base Ball Players, was formed. In 1867, it barred participation by African Americans. The more formally structured National League was founded in 1876. Professional Negro leagues formed, but quickly folded. In 1887, softball, under the name of indoor baseball or indoor-outdoor, was invented as a winter version of the parent game. The National League's first successful counterpart, the American League, which evolved from the minor Western League, was established in 1893, and virtually all of the modern baseball rules were in place by then.
The National Agreement of 1903 formalized relations both between the two major leagues and between them and the National Association of Professional Base Ball Leagues, representing most of the country's minor professional leagues. The World Series, pitting the two major league champions against each other, was inaugurated that fall. The Black Sox Scandal of the 1919 World Series led to the formation of the office of the Commissioner of Baseball. The first commissioner, Kenesaw Mountain Landis, was elected in 1920. That year also saw the founding of the Negro National League; the first significant Negro league, it would operate until 1931. For part of the 1920s, it was joined by the Eastern Colored League.
Rise of Ruth and racial integration
Compared with the present, professional baseball in the early 20th century was lower-scoring, and pitchers were more dominant. This so-called "dead-ball era" ended in the early 1920s with several changes in rule and circumstance that were advantageous to hitters. Strict new regulations governed the ball's size, shape and composition, along with a new rule officially banning the spitball and other pitches that depended on the ball being treated or roughed-up with foreign substances, resulted in a ball that traveled farther when hit. The rise of the legendary player Babe Ruth, the first great power hitter of the new era, helped permanently alter the nature of the game. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, St. Louis Cardinals general manager Branch Rickey invested in several minor league clubs and developed the first modern farm system. A new Negro National League was organized in 1933; four years later, it was joined by the Negro American League. The first elections to the National Baseball Hall of Fame took place in 1936. In 1939, Little League Baseball was founded in Pennsylvania.
barnstorming team, November 1945 (photo by Maurice Terrell)|Jackie Robinson in 1945, with the era's Kansas City Royals, a barnstorming squad associated with the Negro American League's Kansas City Monarchs]]
Many minor league teams disbanded when World War II led to a player shortage. Chicago Cubs owner Philip K. Wrigley led the formation of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League to help keep the game in the public eye. The first crack in the unwritten agreement barring blacks from white-controlled professional ball occurred in 1945: Jackie Robinson was signed by the National League's Brooklyn Dodgers and began playing for their minor league team in Montreal. In 1947, Robinson broke the major leagues' color barrier when he debuted with the Dodgers. Latin-American players, largely overlooked before, also started entering the majors in greater numbers. In 1951, two Chicago White Sox, Venezuelan-born Chico Carrasquel and black Cuban-born Minnie Miñoso, became the first Hispanic All-Stars. Integration proceeded slowly: by 1953, only six of the 16 major league teams had a black player on the roster. Significant work stoppages occurred in 1981 and 1994, the latter forcing the cancellation of the World Series for the first time in 90 years. Attendance had been growing steadily since the mid-1970s and in 1994, before the stoppage, the majors were setting their all-time record for per-game attendance. After play resumed in 1995, non-division-winning wild card teams became a permanent fixture of the post-season. Regular-season interleague play was introduced in 1997 and the second-highest attendance mark for a full season was set. In 2000, the National and American Leagues were dissolved as legal entities. While their identities were maintained for scheduling purposes (and the designated hitter distinction), the regulations and other functions—such as player discipline and umpire supervision—they had administered separately were consolidated under the rubric of MLB.
In 2001, Barry Bonds established the current record of 73 home runs in a single season. There had long been suspicions that the dramatic increase in power hitting was fueled in large part by the abuse of illegal steroids (as well as by the dilution of pitching talent due to expansion), but the issue only began attracting significant media attention in 2002 and there was no penalty for the use of performance-enhancing drugs before 2004. In 2007, Bonds became MLB's all-time home run leader, surpassing Hank Aaron, as total major league and minor league attendance both reached all-time highs.
Around the world
Despite having been called "America's national pastime", baseball is well-established in several other countries. As early as 1877, a professional league, the International Association, featured teams from both Canada and the United States. While baseball is widely played in Canada and many minor league teams have been based in the country, the American major leagues did not include a Canadian club until 1969, when the Montreal Expos joined the National League as an expansion team. In 1977, the expansion Toronto Blue Jays joined the American League.
managing the Japan national team in the 2006 World Baseball Classic. Playing for the Central League's Yomiuri Giants (1959–80), Oh set the professional world record for home runs.]]
In 1847, American soldiers played what may have been the first baseball game in Mexico at Parque Los Berros in Xalapa, Veracruz. The first formal baseball league outside of the United States and Canada was founded in 1878 in Cuba, which maintains a rich baseball tradition. The Dominican Republic held its first islandwide championship tournament in 1912. Professional baseball tournaments and leagues began to form in other countries between the world wars, including the Netherlands (formed in 1922), Australia (1934), Japan (1936), Mexico (1937), and Puerto Rico (1938). The Japanese major leagues have long been considered the highest quality professional circuits outside of the United States.
, a Finnish variation of baseball, was invented by Lauri "Tahko" Pihkala in the 1920s, and after that, it has changed with the times and grown in popularity. Picture of Pesäpallo match in 1958 in Jyväskylä, Finland.]]
After World War II, professional leagues were founded in many Latin American countries, most prominently Venezuela (1946) and the Dominican Republic (1955). Since the early 1970s, the annual Caribbean Series has matched the championship clubs from the four leading Latin American winter leagues: the Dominican Professional Baseball League, Mexican Pacific League, Puerto Rican Professional Baseball League, and Venezuelan Professional Baseball League. In Asia, South Korea (1982), Taiwan (1990) and China (2003) all have professional leagues.
The English football club, Aston Villa, were the first British baseball champions winning the 1890 National League of Baseball of Great Britain. The 2020 National Champions were the London Mets. Other European countries have seen professional leagues; the most successful, other than the Dutch league, is the Italian league, founded in 1948. In 2004, Australia won a surprise silver medal at the Olympic Games. The Confédération Européene de Baseball (European Baseball Confederation), founded in 1953, organizes a number of competitions between clubs from different countries. Other competitions between national teams, such as the Baseball World Cup and the Olympic baseball tournament, were administered by the International Baseball Federation (IBAF) from its formation in 1938 until its 2013 merger with the International Softball Federation to create the current joint governing body for both sports, the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC). Women's baseball is played on an organized amateur basis in numerous countries.
After being admitted to the Olympics as a medal sport beginning with the 1992 Games, baseball was dropped from the 2012 Summer Olympic Games at the 2005 International Olympic Committee meeting. It remained part of the 2008 Games. While the sport's lack of a following in much of the world was a factor, more important was MLB's reluctance to allow its players to participate during the major league season. MLB initiated the World Baseball Classic, scheduled to precede its season, partly as a replacement, high-profile international tournament. The inaugural Classic, held in March 2006, was the first tournament involving national teams to feature a significant number of MLB participants. The Baseball World Cup was discontinued after its 2011 edition in favor of an expanded World Baseball Classic. Distinctive elements Baseball has certain attributes that set it apart from the other popular team sports in the countries where it has a following. All of these sports use a clock, play is less individual, and the variation between playing fields is not as substantial or important. The comparison between cricket and baseball demonstrates that many of baseball's distinctive elements are shared in various ways with its cousin sports. No clock to kill In clock-limited sports, games often end with a team that holds the lead killing the clock rather than competing aggressively against the opposing team. In contrast, baseball has no clock, thus a team cannot win without getting the last batter out and rallies are not constrained by time. At almost any turn in any baseball game, the most advantageous strategy is some form of aggressive strategy. Whereas, in the case of multi-day Test and first-class cricket, the possibility of a draw (which occurs because of the restrictions on time, which like in baseball, originally did not exist) often encourages a team that is batting last and well behind, to bat defensively and run out the clock, giving up any faint chance at a win, to avoid an overall loss.
While nine innings has been the standard since the beginning of professional baseball, the duration of the average major league game has increased steadily through the years. At the turn of the 20th century, games typically took an hour and a half to play. In the 1920s, they averaged just less than two hours, which eventually ballooned to 2:38 in 1960. By 1997, the average American League game lasted 2:57 (National League games were about 10 minutes shorter—pitchers at the plate making for quicker outs than designated hitters). In 2004, Major League Baseball declared that its goal was an average game of 2:45. The lengthening of games is attributed to longer breaks between half-innings for television commercials, increased offense, more pitching changes, and a slower pace of play, with pitchers taking more time between each delivery, and batters stepping out of the box more frequently.
In 2016, the average nine-inning playoff game in Major League baseball was 3 hours and 35 minutes. This was up 10 minutes from 2015 and 21 minutes from 2014. In response to the lengthening of the game, MLB decided from the 2023 season onward to institute a pitch clock rule to penalize batters and pitchers who take too much time between pitches; this had the effect of shortening 2023 regular season games by 24 minutes on average. Individual focus
in 1920, the year he joined the New York Yankees]]
Although baseball is a team sport, individual players are often placed under scrutiny and pressure. While rewarding, it has sometimes been described as "ruthless" due to the pressure on the individual player. In 1915, a baseball instructional manual pointed out that every single pitch, of which there are often more than two hundred in a game, involves an individual, one-on-one contest: "the pitcher and the batter in a battle of wits". Pitcher, batter, and fielder all act essentially independent of each other. While coaching staffs can signal pitcher or batter to pursue certain tactics, the execution of the play itself is a series of solitary acts. If the batter hits a line drive, the outfielder is solely responsible for deciding to try to catch it or play it on the bounce and for succeeding or failing. The statistical precision of baseball is both facilitated by this isolation and reinforces it.
Cricket is more similar to baseball than many other team sports in this regard: while the individual focus in cricket is mitigated by the importance of the batting partnership and the practicalities of tandem running, it is enhanced by the fact that a batsman may occupy the wicket for an hour or much more. There is no statistical equivalent in cricket for the fielding error and thus less emphasis on personal responsibility in this area of play.
Uniqueness of parks
, home of the Boston Red Sox. The Green Monster is visible beyond the playing field on the left.]]
Unlike those of most sports, baseball playing fields can vary significantly in size and shape. While the dimensions of the infield are specifically regulated, the only constraint on outfield size and shape for professional teams, following the rules of MLB and Minor League Baseball, is that fields built or remodeled since June 1, 1958, must have a minimum distance of from home plate to the fences in left and right field and to center. Major league teams often skirt even this rule. For example, at Daikin Park, which became the home of the Houston Astros in 2000, the Crawford Boxes in left field are only from home plate. There are no rules at all that address the height of fences or other structures at the edge of the outfield. The most famously idiosyncratic outfield boundary is the left-field wall at Boston's Fenway Park, in use since 1912: the Green Monster is from home plate down the line and tall.
Similarly, there are no regulations at all concerning the dimensions of foul territory. Thus a foul fly ball may be entirely out of play in a park with little space between the foul lines and the stands, but a foulout in a park with more expansive foul ground. A fence in foul territory that is close to the outfield line will tend to direct balls that strike it back toward the fielders, while one that is farther away may actually prompt more collisions, as outfielders run full speed to field balls deep in the corner. These variations can make the difference between a double and a triple or inside-the-park home run. The surface of the field is also unregulated. While the adjacent image shows a traditional field surfacing arrangement (and the one used by virtually all MLB teams with naturally surfaced fields), teams are free to decide what areas will be grassed or bare. Some fields—including several in MLB—use artificial turf. Surface variations can have a significant effect on how ground balls behave and are fielded as well as on baserunning. Similarly, the presence of a roof (seven major league teams play in stadiums with permanent or retractable roofs) can greatly affect how fly balls are played. While football and soccer players deal with similar variations of field surface and stadium covering, the size and shape of their fields are much more standardized. The area out-of-bounds on a football or soccer field does not affect play the way foul territory in baseball does, so variations in that regard are largely insignificant.
batter (Andruw Jones) and a Boston Red Sox catcher at Fenway Park]]
These physical variations create a distinctive set of playing conditions at each ballpark. Other local factors, such as altitude and climate, can also significantly affect play. A given stadium may acquire a reputation as a pitcher's park or a hitter's park, if one or the other discipline notably benefits from its unique mix of elements. The most exceptional park in this regard is Coors Field, home of the Colorado Rockies. Its high altitude— above sea level—is partly responsible for giving it the strongest hitter's park effect in the major leagues due to the low air pressure. Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs, is known for its fickle disposition: a pitcher's park when the strong winds off Lake Michigan are blowing in, it becomes more of a hitter's park when they are blowing out. The absence of a standardized field affects not only how particular games play out, but the nature of team rosters and players' statistical records. For example, hitting a fly ball into right field might result in an easy catch on the warning track at one park, and a home run at another. A team that plays in a park with a relatively short right field, such as the New York Yankees, will tend to stock its roster with left-handed pull hitters, who can best exploit it. On the individual level, a player who spends most of his career with a team that plays in a hitter's park will gain an advantage in batting statistics over time—even more so if his talents are especially suited to the park.
Statistics
Organized baseball lends itself to statistics to a greater degree than many other sports. Each play is discrete and has a relatively small number of possible outcomes. In the late 19th century, a former cricket player, English-born Henry Chadwick of Brooklyn, was responsible for the "development of the box score, tabular standings, the annual baseball guide, the batting average, and most of the common statistics and tables used to describe baseball." The statistical record is so central to the game's "historical essence" that Chadwick came to be known as Father Baseball.
The Official Baseball Rules administered by MLB require the official scorer to categorize each baseball play unambiguously. The rules provide detailed criteria to promote consistency. The score report is the official basis for both the box score of the game and the relevant statistical records. General managers, managers, and baseball scouts use statistics to evaluate players and make strategic decisions.
—the major leagues' all-time leader in runs and stolen bases—stealing third base in a 1988 game]]
Certain traditional statistics are familiar to most baseball fans. The basic batting statistics include:
* At bats: plate appearances, excluding walks and hit by pitches—where the batter's ability is not fully tested—and sacrifices and sacrifice flies—where the batter intentionally makes an out in order to advance one or more baserunners
* Hits: times a base is reached safely, because of a batted, fair ball without a fielding error or fielder's choice
* Runs: times circling the bases and reaching home safely
* Runs batted in (RBIs): number of runners who scored due to a batter's action (including the batter, in the case of a home run), except when batter grounded into double play or reached on an error
* Home runs: hits on which the batter successfully touched all four bases, without the contribution of a fielding error
* Batting average: hits divided by at bats—the traditional measure of batting ability
The basic baserunning statistics include:
* Stolen bases: times advancing to the next base entirely due to the runner's own efforts, generally while the pitcher is preparing to deliver or delivering the ball
* Caught stealing: times tagged out while attempting to steal a base
—the holder of many major league career marks, including wins and innings pitched, as well as losses—in 1908. MLB's annual awards for the best pitcher in each league are named for Young.]]
The basic pitching statistics include:
* Wins: credited to pitcher on winning team who last pitched before the team took a lead that it never relinquished (a starting pitcher must pitch at least five innings to qualify for a win)
* Losses: charged to pitcher on losing team who was pitching when the opposing team took a lead that it never relinquished
* Saves: games where the pitcher enters a game led by the pitcher's team, finishes the game without surrendering the lead, is not the winning pitcher, and either (a) the lead was three runs or less when the pitcher entered the game; (b) the potential tying run was on base, at bat, or on deck; or (c) the pitcher pitched three or more innings
* Innings pitched: outs recorded while pitching divided by three (partial innings are conventionally recorded as, e.g., "5.2" or "7.1", the last digit actually representing thirds, not tenths, of an inning)
* Strikeouts: times pitching three strikes to a batter
* Winning percentage: wins divided by decisions (wins plus losses)
* Earned run average (ERA): runs allowed, excluding those resulting from fielding errors, per nine innings pitched
The basic fielding statistics include:
* Putouts: times the fielder catches a fly ball, tags or forces out a runner, or otherwise directly effects an out
* Assists: times a putout by another fielder was recorded following the fielder touching the ball
* Errors: times the fielder fails to make a play that should have been made with common effort, and the batting team benefits as a result
* Total chances: putouts plus assists plus errors
* Fielding average: successful chances (putouts plus assists) divided by total chances
Among the many other statistics that are kept are those collectively known as situational statistics. For example, statistics can indicate which specific pitchers a certain batter performs best against. If a given situation statistically favors a certain batter, the manager of the fielding team may be more likely to change pitchers or have the pitcher intentionally walk the batter in order to face one who is less likely to succeed.
Sabermetrics
Sabermetrics is the field of baseball statistical study and the development of new statistics and analytical tools. Such new statistics are also called sabermetrics. The term was coined around 1980 by one of the field's leading proponents, Bill James, and derives from the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).
The growing popularity of sabermetrics since the early 1980s has brought more attention to two batting statistics that sabermetricians argue are much better gauges of a batter's skill than batting average:
* On-base percentage (OBP) measures a batter's ability to get on base. It is calculated by taking the sum of the batter's successes in getting on base (hits plus walks plus hit by pitches) and dividing that by the batter's total plate appearances (at bats plus walks plus hit by pitches plus sacrifice flies), except for sacrifice bunts.
* Slugging percentage (SLG) measures a batter's ability to hit for power. It is calculated by taking the batter's total bases (one per each single, two per double, three per triple, and four per home run) and dividing that by the batter's at bats.
Some of the new statistics devised by sabermetricians have gained wide use:
* On-base plus slugging (OPS) measures a batter's overall ability. It is calculated by adding the batter's on-base percentage and slugging percentage.
* Walks plus hits per inning pitched (WHIP) measures a pitcher's ability at preventing hitters from reaching base. It is calculated by adding the number of walks and hits a pitcher surrendered, then dividing by the number of innings pitched.
*Wins Above Replacement (WAR) measures number of additional wins his team has achieved above the number of expected team wins if that player were substituted with a replacement-level player. Popularity and cultural impact
in 1921]]
Writing in 1919, philosopher Morris Raphael Cohen described baseball as the national religion of the US. In the words of sports columnist Jayson Stark, baseball has long been "a unique paragon of American culture"—a status he sees as devastated by the steroid abuse scandal. Baseball has an important place in other national cultures as well: Scholar Peter Bjarkman describes "how deeply the sport is ingrained in the history and culture of a nation such as Cuba, [and] how thoroughly it was radically reshaped and nativized in Japan." Western Hemisphere American influence in the Western Hemisphere has meant that baseball grew significantly in the region. In the United States
The major league game in the United States was originally targeted toward a middle-class, white-collar audience: relative to other spectator pastimes, the National League's set ticket price of 50 cents in 1876 was high, while the location of playing fields outside the inner city and the workweek daytime scheduling of games were also obstacles to a blue-collar audience. A century later, the situation was very different. With the rise in popularity of other team sports with much higher average ticket prices—football, basketball, and hockey—professional baseball had become among the most popular blue-collar-oriented American spectator sports.
celebrating the 2017 title in Turku, Finland]]
Overall, baseball has a large following in the United States; a 2006 poll found that nearly half of Americans are fans. This led to baseball being granted the title of "America's favorite pastime" by many American baseball fans. The game was historically seen as contributing to the melting pot society of the nation, encouraging immigrants to integrate. In the late 1900s and early 2000s, baseball's position compared to football in the United States moved in contradictory directions. In 2008, MLB set a revenue record of $6.5 billion, matching the NFL's revenue for the first time in decades. A new MLB revenue record of more than $10 billion was set in 2017. On the other hand, the percentage of American sports fans polled who named baseball as their favorite sport was 9%, compared to pro football at 37%. In 1985, the respective figures were pro football 24%, baseball 23%. Because there are so many more major league games played, there is no comparison in overall attendance. In 2008, total attendance at major league games was the second-highest in history: 78.6 million, 0.7% off the record set the previous year. Eight years later, it dropped under 73 million. Attendance at games held under the Minor League Baseball umbrella set a record in 2008, with 43.3 million. While MLB games have not drawn the same national TV viewership as football games, MLB games are dominant in teams' local markets and regularly lead all programs in primetime in their markets during the summer. Latin America
Baseball is very popular in Venezuela; in 2011, 95% of people surveyed claimed it to be the national sport. The sport's overall popularity in Latin America has assisted in integrating Latin American migrants to the United States.
In Brazil, baseball fan popularity has grown in last few years, thanks to MLB broadcasts in Brazilian ESPN and the historic silver medal in 2023 Pan-American games. although, it still lags behind Basketball and American Football in the list of most played sports in Brazil.
Caribbean
Since the early 1980s, the Dominican Republic, in particular the city of San Pedro de Macorís, has been the major leagues' primary source of foreign talent. In 2017, 83 of the 868 players on MLB Opening Day rosters (and disabled lists) were from the country. Among other Caribbean countries and territories, a combined 97 MLB players were born in Venezuela, Cuba, and Puerto Rico. Hall-of-Famer Roberto Clemente remains one of the greatest national heroes in Puerto Rico's history. While baseball has long been the island's primary athletic pastime, its once well-attended professional winter league has declined in popularity since 1990, when young Puerto Rican players began to be included in the major leagues' annual first-year player draft. In Cuba, where baseball is by every reckoning the national sport, the national team overshadows the city and provincial teams that play in the top-level domestic leagues.
Asia
In East Asia, baseball is among the most popular sports in Japan, Taiwan and South Korea. In Japan, where baseball is inarguably the leading spectator team sport, combined revenue for the twelve teams in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB), the body that oversees both the Central and Pacific Leagues, was estimated at $1 billion in 2007. Total NPB attendance for the year was approximately 20 million. While in the preceding two decades, MLB attendance grew by 50 percent and revenue nearly tripled, the comparable NPB figures were stagnant. There are concerns that MLB's growing interest in acquiring star Japanese players will hurt the game in their home country. Revenue figures are not released for the country's amateur system. Similarly, according to one official pronouncement, the sport's governing authority "has never taken into account attendance ... because its greatest interest has always been the development of athletes". In Taiwan, baseball is one of the most widely spectated sports, in tv and person.
Baseball has grown significantly in China in recent years, with MLB estimating in 2019 that there are 21 million active fans in the country. Among children , Little League Baseball oversees leagues with close to 2.4 million participants in over 80 countries. The number of players has fallen since the 1990s, when 3 million children took part in Little League Baseball annually. Babe Ruth League teams have over 1 million participants. According to the president of the International Baseball Federation, between 300,000 and 500,000 women and girls play baseball around the world, including Little League and the introductory game of Tee Ball.
A varsity baseball team is an established part of physical education departments at most high schools and colleges in the United States. In 2015, nearly half a million high schoolers and over 34,000 collegians played on their schools' baseball teams. By early in the 20th century, intercollegiate baseball was Japan's leading sport. Today, high school baseball in particular is immensely popular there. The final rounds of the two annual tournaments—the National High School Baseball Invitational Tournament in the spring, and the even more important National High School Baseball Championship in the summer—are broadcast around the country. The tournaments are known, respectively, as Spring Koshien and Summer Koshien after the 55,000-capacity stadium where they are played. In Cuba, baseball is a mandatory part of the state system of physical education, which begins at age six. Talented children as young as seven are sent to special district schools for more intensive training—the first step on a ladder whose acme is the national baseball team.]]
Baseball has had a broad impact on popular culture, both in the United States and elsewhere. Dozens of English-language idioms have been derived from baseball; in particular, the game is the source of a number of widely used sexual euphemisms. The first networked radio broadcasts in North America were of the 1922 World Series: famed sportswriter Grantland Rice announced play-by-play from New York City's Polo Grounds on WJZ–Newark, New Jersey, which was connected by wire to WGY–Schenectady, New York, and WBZ–Springfield, Massachusetts. The baseball cap has become a ubiquitous fashion item not only in the United States and Japan, but also in countries where the sport itself is not particularly popular, such as the United Kingdom.
Baseball has inspired many works of art and entertainment. One of the first major examples, Ernest Thayer's poem "Casey at the Bat", appeared in 1888. A wry description of the failure of a star player in what would now be called a "clutch situation", the poem became the source of vaudeville and other staged performances, audio recordings, film adaptations, and an opera, as well as a host of sequels and parodies in various media. There have been many baseball movies, including the Academy Award–winning The Pride of the Yankees (1942) and the Oscar nominees The Natural (1984) and Field of Dreams (1989). The American Film Institute's selection of the ten best sports movies includes The Pride of the Yankees at number 3 and Bull Durham (1988) at number 5. Baseball has provided thematic material for hits on both stage—the Adler–Ross musical Damn Yankees—and record—George J. Gaskin's "Slide, Kelly, Slide", Simon and Garfunkel's "Mrs. Robinson", and John Fogerty's "Centerfield". The baseball-inspired comedic sketch "Who's on First?", popularized by Abbott and Costello in 1938, quickly became famous. Six decades later, Time named it the best comedy routine of the 20th century.
Literary works connected to the game include the short fiction of Ring Lardner and novels such as Bernard Malamud's The Natural (the source for the movie), Robert Coover's The Universal Baseball Association, Inc., J. Henry Waugh, Prop., John Grisham's Calico Joe and W. P. Kinsella's Shoeless Joe (the source for Field of Dreams). Baseball's literary canon also includes the beat reportage of Damon Runyon; the columns of Grantland Rice, Red Smith, Dick Young, and Peter Gammons; and the essays of Roger Angell. Among the celebrated nonfiction books in the field are Lawrence S. Ritter's The Glory of Their Times, Roger Kahn's The Boys of Summer, and Michael Lewis's Moneyball. The 1970 publication of major league pitcher Jim Bouton's tell-all chronicle Ball Four is considered a turning point in the reporting of professional sports.
Baseball has also inspired the creation of new cultural forms. Baseball cards were introduced in the late 19th century as trade cards. A typical example featured an image of a baseball player on one side and advertising for a business on the other. In the early 1900s they were produced widely as promotional items by tobacco and confectionery companies. The 1930s saw the popularization of the modern style of baseball card, with a player photograph accompanied on the rear by statistics and biographical data. Baseball cards—many of which are now prized collectibles—are the source of the much broader trading card industry, involving similar products for different sports and non-sports-related fields.
Modern fantasy sports began in 1980 with the invention of Rotisserie League Baseball by New York writer Daniel Okrent and several friends. Participants in a Rotisserie league draft notional teams from the list of active MLB players and play out an entire imaginary season with game outcomes based on the players' latest real-world statistics. Rotisserie-style play quickly became a phenomenon. Now known more generically as fantasy baseball, it has inspired similar games based on an array of different sports. The field boomed with increasing Internet access and new fantasy sports-related websites. By 2008, 29.9 million people in the United States and Canada were playing fantasy sports, spending $800 million on the hobby. The burgeoning popularity of fantasy baseball is also credited with the increasing attention paid to sabermetrics—first among fans, only later among baseball professionals.
Derivative games
is a common street variant of baseball which often features impromptu adaptations. (Note the painted strike zone on the wall behind the batter.)]]
Informal variations of baseball have popped up over time, with games like corkball reflecting local traditions and allowing the game to be played in diverse environments. Two variations of baseball, softball and Baseball5, are internationally governed alongside baseball by the World Baseball Softball Confederation. British baseball
American professional baseball teams toured Britain in 1874 and 1889, and had a great effect on similar sports in Britain. In Wales and Merseyside, a strong community game had already developed with skills and plays more in keeping with the American game and the Welsh began to informally adopt the name "baseball" (Pêl Fas), to reflect the American style. By the 1890s, calls were made to follow the success of other working class sports (like Rugby in Wales and Soccer in Merseyside) and adopt a distinct set of rules and bureaucracy. During the 1892 season rules for the game of "baseball" were agreed and the game was officially codified.
Finnish baseball
Finnish baseball, also known as pesäpallo, is a combination of traditional ball-batting team games and North American baseball, invented by Lauri "Tahko" Pihkala in the 1920s. The basic idea of pesäpallo is similar to that of baseball: the offense tries to score by hitting the ball successfully and running through the bases, while the defense tries to put the batter and runners out. One of the most important differences between pesäpallo and baseball is that the ball is pitched vertically, which makes hitting the ball, as well as controlling the power and direction of the hit, much easier. This gives the offensive game more variety, speed, and tactical aspects compared to baseball.<ref name"INTRO2"/> See also
* Baseball awards
* Baseball clothing and equipment
* List of baseball films
* List of organized baseball leagues
* Women in baseball
Related sports
* Brännboll (Scandinavian bat-and-ball game)
* Comparison of baseball and softball
* Comparison of baseball and cricket
* Lapta (game) (Russian bat-and-ball game)
* Oină (Romanian bat-and-ball game)
* Snow baseball (with similar rules played in India during winters)
* Stickball
* Stoop ball
* Vitilla
* Wiffle ball
Citations
General and cited sources
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Further reading
* Dickson, Paul. The Dickson Baseball Dictionary, 3rd ed. (W. W. Norton, 2009). .
* Fitts, Robert K. Remembering Japanese Baseball: An Oral History of the Game (Southern Illinois University Press, 2005). .
* Gillette, Gary, and Pete Palmer (eds.). The ESPN Baseball Encyclopedia, 5th ed. (Sterling, 2008). .
* Peterson, Robert. Only the Ball Was White: A History of Legendary Black Players and All-Black Professional Teams (Oxford University Press, 1992 [1970]). .
* Reaves, Joseph A. Taking in a Game: A History of Baseball in Asia (Bison, 2004). .
* Ward, Geoffrey C., and Ken Burns. Baseball: An Illustrated History (Alfred A. Knopf, 1996). .
External links
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* [http://www.wbsc.org/ World Baseball Softball Confederation]
* [https://www.britannica.com/sports/baseball "Baseball"]. Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
* [http://www.baseballprospectus.com/ Baseball Prospectus]
* [http://www.sabr.org/ Society for American Baseball Research]
* [http://www.mister-baseball.com/ Mister Baseball] European baseball news
* [http://baseballheritagemuseum.org/ Baseball Heritage Museum] at League Park in Cleveland, Ohio
* "[https://books.google.com/books?id=p4o9AQAAIAAJ Perils of Base Ball Playing]", historical perspective on statistics of baseball injuries, Scientific American, July 13, 1878, p. 21
* [https://learninglab.si.edu/collections/subject-baseball-nmahphc/N5DAuhDVcVe9hDmJ Baseball collection] at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History
}}
Category:Baseball terminology
Category:1846 introductions
Category:Culture of the United States
Category:Articles containing video clips
Category:Ball and bat games
Category:Sports originating in England
Category:Sports originating in the United States
Category:Summer Olympic sports
Category:Team sports
Category:Turf sports | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baseball | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.545353 |
3851 | Baseball positions | right|frameless
In the sport of baseball, each of the nine players on a team is assigned a particular fielding position when it is their turn to play defense. Each position conventionally has an associated number, for use in scorekeeping by the official scorer: 1 (pitcher), 2 (catcher), 3 (first baseman), 4 (second baseman), 5 (third baseman), 6 (shortstop), 7 (left fielder), 8 (center fielder), and 9 (right fielder). Collectively, these positions are usually grouped into three groups: the outfield (left field, center field, and right field), the infield (first base, second base, third base, and shortstop), and the battery (pitcher and catcher). Traditionally, players within each group will often be more able to exchange positions easily (that is, a second baseman can usually play shortstop well, and a center fielder can also be expected to play right field); however, the pitcher and catcher are highly specialized positions and rarely will play at other positions.
Fielding
Fielders must be able to catch the ball well, as catching batted balls before they bounce is one way they can put the batter out, as well as create opportunities to prevent the advance of, and put out other runners. Additionally, they must be able to throw the ball well, with many plays in the game depending on one fielder collecting the hit ball and then throwing it to another fielder who, while holding the ball in their hand/glove, touches either a runner or the base the runner is forced to run to in order to record an out. Fielders often have to run, dive, and slide a great deal in the act of reaching, stopping, and retrieving a hit ball, and then setting themselves up to transfer the ball, all with the end goal of getting the ball as quickly as possible to another fielder. They also run the risk of colliding with incoming runners during a tag attempt at a base.
Fielders may have different responsibilities depending on the game situation. For example, when an outfielder is attempting to throw the ball from near the fence to one of the bases, an infielder may need to "cut off" the throw and then act as a relay thrower to help the ball cover its remaining distance to the target destination.
As a group, the outfielders are responsible for preventing home runs by reaching over the fence (and potentially doing a wall climb) for fly balls that are catchable. The infielders are the ones who generally handle plays that involve tagging a base or runner, and also need quick reflexes in order to catch a batted ball before it leaves the infield. The pitcher and catcher have special responsibilities to prevent base stealing, as they are the ones who handle the ball whenever it has not been hit. The catcher will also sometimes attempt to block the plate in order to prevent a run being scored.
Other roles
Designated hitter
Pinch hitter
Pinch runner
Utility infielder
Utility players
Starting pitcher
Relief pitcher
Left-handed specialist
Long reliever
Middle reliever
Setup pitcher (setup man)
Closer
Other team personnel
Manager
Coaches
Athletic trainer
Equipment manager
General manager
Batboy
Ball boy/girl
Team physician
See also
Infield shift
Ace (baseball)
Starting lineup
Injury list
Mascot
Official scorer
Umpire
Baseball awards
Baseball clothing and equipment
Glossary of baseball terms
Baseball scorekeeping
Baseball statistics
Fielding (cricket)
References | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baseball_positions | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.559196 |
3856 | History of baseball in the United States | The history of baseball in the United States dates to the 19th century, when boys and amateur enthusiasts played a baseball-like game by their own informal rules using homemade equipment. The popularity of the sport grew and amateur men's ball clubs were formed in the 1830–1850s. Semi-professional baseball clubs followed in the 1860s, and the first professional leagues arrived in the post-American Civil War 1870s.
Early history
The earliest known mention of baseball in the United States is either a 1786 diary entry by a Princeton University student who describes playing "baste ball," or a 1791 Pittsfield, Massachusetts, ordinance that barred the playing of baseball within of the town meeting house and its glass windows. Another early reference reports that base ball was regularly played on Saturdays in 1823 on the outskirts of New York City in an area that today is Greenwich Village. The Olympic Base Ball Club of Philadelphia was organized in 1833.
In 1903, the British-born sportswriter Henry Chadwick published an article speculating that baseball was derived from an English game called rounders, which Chadwick had played as a boy in England. Baseball executive Albert Spalding disagreed, asserting that the game was fundamentally American and had hatched on American soil. To settle the matter, the two men appointed a commission, headed by Abraham Mills, the fourth president of the National League of Professional Baseball Clubs. The commission, which also included six other sports executives, labored for three years, finally declaring that Abner Doubleday had invented the national pastime. Doubleday "...never knew that he had invented baseball. But 15 years after his death, he was anointed as the father of the game," writes baseball historian John Thorn. The myth about Doubleday inventing the game of baseball actually came from a Colorado mining engineer who claimed to have been present at the moment of creation. The miner's tale was never corroborated, nonetheless the myth was born and persists to this day. Which does not mean that the Doubleday myth does not continue to be disputed; in fact, it is likely that the parentage of the modern game of baseball will be in some dispute until long after such future time when the game is no longer played.
The first team to play baseball under modern rules is believed to be the New York Knickerbockers. The club was founded on September 23, 1845, as a breakaway from the earlier Gotham Club. The new club's by-laws committee, William R. Wheaton and William H. Tucker, formulated the Knickerbocker Rules, which, in large part, dealt with organizational matters but which also laid out some new rules of play. One of these prohibited soaking or plugging the runner; under older rules, a fielder could put a runner out by hitting the runner with the thrown ball, as in the common schoolyard game of kickball. The Knickerbocker Rules required fielders to tag or force the runner. The new rules also introduced base paths, foul lines and foul balls; in "town ball" every batted ball was fair, as in cricket, and the lack of runner's lanes led to wild chases around the infield. In the long run, these changes resulted in the focus of baseball being more about the duel between batting and pitching rather than baserunning and fielding.
Initially, Wheaton and Tucker's innovations did not serve the Knickerbockers well. In the first known competitive game between two clubs under the new rules, played at Elysian Fields in Hoboken, New Jersey, on June 19, 1846, the "New York nine" (almost certainly the Gotham Club) humbled the Knickerbockers by a score of 23 to 1. Nevertheless, the Knickerbocker Rules were rapidly adopted by teams in the New York area and their version of baseball became known as the "New York Game" (as opposed to the less rule-bound "Massachusetts Game," played by clubs in New England, and "Philadelphia Town-ball").
In spite of its rapid growth in popularity, baseball had yet to overtake the British import, cricket. As late as 1855, the New York press was still devoting more space to coverage of cricket than to baseball.
At a 1857 convention of sixteen New York area clubs, including the Knickerbockers, the National Association of Base Ball Players (NABBP) was formed. It was the first official organization to govern the sport and the first to establish a championship. The convention also formalized three key features of the game: 90 feet distance between the bases, 9-man teams, and 9-inning games (under the Knickerbocker Rules, games were played to 21 runs). During the Civil War, soldiers from different parts of the United States played baseball together, leading to a more unified national version of the sport. Membership in the NABBP grew to almost 100 clubs by 1865 and to over 400 by 1867, including clubs from as far away as California. Beginning in 1869, the league permitted professional play, addressing a growing practice that had not been previously permitted under its rules. The first and most prominent professional club of the NABBP era was the Cincinnati Red Stockings in Ohio, which went undefeated in 1869 and half of 1870. After the Cincy club broke up at the end of that season, four key members including player/manager Harry Wright moved to Boston under owner and businessman Ivers Whitney Adams and became the "Boston Red Stockings" and the Boston Base Ball Club.
]]
In 1858, at the Fashion Race Course in the Corona neighborhood of Queens (now part of New York City), the first games of baseball to charge admission were played. The All Stars of Brooklyn, including players from the Atlantic, Excelsior, Putnam and Eckford clubs, took on the All Stars of New York (Manhattan), including players from the Knickerbocker, Gotham, Eagle and Empire clubs. These are commonly believed to the first all-star baseball games.
Growth
Before the Civil War, baseball competed for public interest with cricket and regional variants of baseball, notably town ball played in Philadelphia and the Massachusetts Game played in New England. In the 1860s, aided by the Civil War, "New York" style baseball expanded into a national game. Baseball began to overtake cricket in popularity, impelled by its much shorter duration relative to the contemporary form of cricket. Several other factors reduced North Americans' cultural loyalty to cricket, as Puritan anti-recreational attitudes and centuries of separation had eroded ties to English sporting culture. William Humber argues there was also less of a social taboo around baseball in the New World than in England, where it was strongly perceived as a children's game, and that Americans preferred a sport where the teams alternated offense and defense more frequently.
As its first governing body, the National Association of Base Ball Players was formed. The NABBP soon expanded into a truly national organization, although most of the strongest clubs remained those based in the country's northeastern part. In its 12-year history as an amateur league, the Atlantic Club of Brooklyn won seven championships, establishing themselves as the first true dynasty in the sport. However, Mutual of New York was widely considered one of the best teams of the era. By the end of 1865, almost 100 clubs were members of the NABBP. By 1867, it ballooned to over 400 members, including some clubs from as far away as California. One of these western clubs, Chicago (dubbed the "White Stockings" by the press for their uniform hosiery), won the championship in 1870. Because of this growth, regional and state organizations began to assume a more prominent role in the governance of the amateur sport at the expense of the NABBP. At the same time, the professionals soon sought a new governing body.
]]
Professionalism
The NABBP of America was initially established upon principles of amateurism. However, even early in the Association's history, some star players such as James Creighton of Excelsior received compensation covertly or indirectly. In 1866, the NABBP investigated Athletic of Philadelphia for paying three players including Lip Pike, but ultimately took no action against either the club or the players. In many cases players, quite openly, received a cut of the gate receipts. Clubs playing challenge series were even accused of agreeing beforehand to split the earlier games to guarantee a decisive (and thus more certain to draw a crowd) "rubber match". To address this growing practice, and to restore integrity to the game, at its December 1868 meeting the NABBP established a professional category for the 1869 season. Clubs desiring to pay players were now free to declare themselves professional.
The Cincinnati Red Stockings were the first to declare themselves openly professional, and were aggressive in recruiting the best available players. Twelve clubs, including most of the strongest clubs in the NABBP, ultimately declared themselves professional for the 1869 season.
The first attempt at forming a major league produced the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players, which lasted from 1871 to 1875. The now all-professional Chicago "White Stockings" (today the Chicago Cubs), financed by businessman William Hulbert, became a charter member of the league along with a new Red Stockings club (now the Atlanta Braves), formed in Boston with four former Cincinnati players. The Chicagos were close contenders all season, despite the fact that the Great Chicago Fire had destroyed the team's home field and most of their equipment. Chicago finished the season in second place, but were ultimately forced to drop out of the league during the city's recovery period, finally returning to National Association play in 1874. Over the next couple of seasons, the Boston club dominated the league and hoarded many of the game's best players, even those who were under contract with other teams. After Davy Force signed with Chicago, and then breached his contract to play in Boston, Hulbert became discouraged by the "contract jumping" as well as the overall disorganization of the N.A. (for example, weaker teams with losing records or inadequate gate receipts would simply decline to play out the season), and thus spearheaded the movement to form a stronger organization. The result of his efforts was the formation of a much more "ethical" league, which was named the National League of Professional Base Ball Clubs (NL). After a series of rival leagues were organized but failed (most notably the American Base Ball Association (1882–1891), which spawned the clubs which would ultimately become the Cincinnati Reds, Pittsburgh Pirates, St. Louis Cardinals and Brooklyn Dodgers), the current American League (AL), evolving from the minor Western League of 1893, was established in 1901.
Rise of the major leagues
and the Midwest until after World War II.]]
In 1870, a schism developed between professional and amateur ballplayers. The NABBP split into two groups. The National Association of Professional Base Ball Players operated from 1871 through 1875 and is considered by some to have been the first major league. Its amateur counterpart disappeared after only a few years.
William Hulbert's National League, which was formed after the National Association proved ineffective, put its emphasis on "clubs" rather than "players". Clubs now had the ability to enforce player contracts and prevent players from jumping to higher-paying clubs. Clubs in turn were required to play their full schedule of games, rather than forfeiting scheduled games once out of the running for the league championship, a practice that had been common under the National Association. A concerted effort was also made to reduce the amount of gambling on games which was leaving the validity of results in doubt.
Around this time, a gentlemen's agreement was struck between the clubs to exclude non-white players from professional baseball, a de facto ban that remained in effect until 1947. It is a common misconception that Jackie Robinson was the first African-American major-league ballplayer; he was actually only the first after a long gap (and the first in the modern era). Moses Fleetwood Walker and his brother Weldy Walker were unceremoniously dropped from major and minor-league rosters in the 1880s, as were other African-Americans in baseball. An unknown number of African-Americans played in the major leagues by representing themselves as Indians, or South or Central Americans, and a still larger number played in the minor leagues and on amateur teams. In the majors, however, it was not until the signing of Robinson (in the National League) and Larry Doby (in the American League) that baseball began to relax its ban on African-Americans.
team]]
The early years of the National League were tumultuous, with threats from rival leagues and a rebellion by players against the hated "reserve clause", which restricted the free movement of players between clubs. Competitive leagues formed regularly, and disbanded just as regularly. The most successful of these was the American Association of 1882–1891, sometimes called the "beer and whiskey league" for its tolerance of the sale of alcoholic beverages to spectators. For several years, the National League and American Association champions met in a postseason World's Championship Series—the first attempt at a World Series.
The Union Association survived for only one season (1884), as did the Players' League (1890), which was an attempt to return to the National Association structure of a league controlled by the players themselves. Both leagues are considered major leagues by many baseball researchers because of the perceived high caliber of play and the number of star players featured. However, some researchers have disputed the major league status of the Union Association, pointing out that franchises came and went and contending that the St. Louis club, which was deliberately "stacked" by the league's president (who owned that club), was the only club that was anywhere close to major-league caliber.
(1875)]]
In fact, there were dozens of leagues, large and small, in the late 19th century. What made the National League "major" was its dominant position in the major cities, particularly the edgy, emotional nerve center of baseball that was New York City. Large, concentrated populations offered baseball teams national media distribution systems and fan bases that could generate sufficient revenues to afford the best players in the country.
A number of the other leagues, including the venerable Eastern League, threatened the dominance of the National League. The Western League, founded in 1893, became particularly aggressive. Its fiery leader Ban Johnson railed against the National League and promised to grab the best players and field the best teams. The Western League began play in April 1894 with teams in Detroit (now the American League Detroit Tigers, the only league team that has not moved since), Grand Rapids, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Sioux City and Toledo. Prior to the 1900 season, the league changed its name to the American League and moved several franchises to larger, strategic locations. In 1901 the American League declared its intent to operate as a major league.
The resulting bidding war for players led to widespread contract-breaking and legal disputes. One of the most famous involved star second baseman Napoleon Lajoie, who in 1901 went across town in Philadelphia from the National League Phillies to the American League Athletics. Barred by a court injunction from playing baseball in the state of Pennsylvania the next year, Lajoie was traded to the Cleveland team, where he played and managed for many years.
The war between the American and National leagues caused shock waves across the baseball world. At a meeting in 1901, the other baseball leagues negotiated a plan to maintain their independence. On September 5, 1901, Eastern League president Patrick T. Powers announced the formation of the second National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues, the NABPL (NA).
These leagues did not consider themselves "minor"—a term that did not come into vogue until St. Louis Cardinals general manager Branch Rickey pioneered the farm system in the 1930s. Nevertheless, these financially troubled leagues, by beginning the practice of selling players to the more affluent National and American leagues, embarked on a path that eventually led to the loss of their independent status.
vs. Georgetown University baseball game, , by John E. Sheridan.]]
Ban Johnson had other designs for the NA. While the NA continues to this day, he saw it as a tool to end threats from smaller rivals who might some day want to expand in other territories and threaten his league's dominance.
After 1902 both leagues and the NABPL signed a new National Agreement which achieved three things:
* First and foremost, it governed player contracts that set up mechanisms to end the cross-league raids on rosters and reinforced the power of the hated reserve clause that kept players virtual slaves to their baseball owner/masters.
* Second, it led to the playing of a "World Series" in 1903 between the two major league champions. The first World Series was won by Boston of the American League.
* Lastly, it established a system of control and dominance for the major leagues over the independents. There would not be another Ban Johnson-like rebellion from the ranks of leagues with smaller cities. Selling off player contracts was rapidly becoming a staple business of the independent leagues. During the rough and tumble years of the American–National struggle, player contracts were violated at the independents as well, as players that a team had developed would sign with the majors without any form of compensation to the indy club.
The new agreement tied independent contracts to the reserve-clause national league contracts. Baseball players were a commodity, like cars. A player's skill set had a price of $5,000. It set up a rough classification system for independent leagues that regulated the dollar value of contracts, the forerunner of the system refined by Rickey and used today.
It also gave the NA great power. Many independents walked away from the 1901 meeting. The deal with the NA punished those other indies who had not joined the NA and submitted to the will of the majors. The NA also agreed to the deal so as to prevent more pilfering of players with little or no compensation for the players' development. Several leagues, seeing the writing on the wall, eventually joined the NA, which grew in size over the next several years.
In the very early part of the 20th century, known as the "dead-ball era", baseball rules and equipment favored the "inside game" and the game was played more violently and aggressively than it is today. This period ended in the 1920s with several changes that gave advantages to hitters. In the largest parks, the outfield fences were brought closer to the infield. In addition, the strict enforcement of new rules governing the construction and regular replacement of the ball caused it to be easier to hit, and be hit harder.
The first professional black baseball club, the Cuban Giants, was organized in 1885. Subsequent professional black baseball clubs played each other independently, without an official league to organize the sport. Rube Foster, a former ballplayer, founded the Negro National League in 1920. A second league, the Eastern Colored League, was established in 1923. These became known as the Negro leagues, though these leagues never had any formal overall structure comparable to the Major Leagues. The Negro National League did well until 1930, but folded during the Great Depression.
From 1942 to 1948, the Negro World Series was revived. This was the golden era of Negro league baseball, a time when it produced some of its greatest stars. In 1947, Jackie Robinson signed a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers, breaking the color barrier that had prevented talented African-American players from entering the white-only major leagues. Although the transformation was not instantaneous, baseball has since become fully integrated. While the Dodgers' signing of Robinson was a key moment in baseball and civil rights history, it prompted the decline of the Negro leagues. The best black players were now recruited for the Major Leagues, and black fans followed. The last Negro league teams folded in the 1960s.
Pitchers dominated the game in the 1960s and early 1970s. In 1973, the designated hitter (DH) rule was adopted by the American League, while in the National League, the DH rule was not adopted until March 2022. The rule had been applied in a variety of ways during the World Series; until the adoption of the DH by the National League, the DH rule applied when Series games were played in an American League stadium, and pitchers would bat during Series games played in National League stadiums. There had been continued disagreement about the future of the DH rule in the World Series until league-wide adoption of the DH rule.
During the late 1960s, the Baseball Players Union became much stronger and conflicts between owners and the players' union led to major work stoppages in 1972, 1981, and 1994. The 1994 baseball strike led to the cancellation of the World Series, and was not settled until the spring of 1995. In the late 1990s, functions that had been administered separately by the two major leagues' administrations were united under the rubric of Major League Baseball (MLB).
The dead-ball era: 1901 to 1919
.]]
The period 1901–1919 is commonly called the "Dead-ball era", with low-scoring games dominated by pitchers such as Walter Johnson, Cy Young, Christy Mathewson, and Grover Cleveland Alexander. The term also accurately describes the condition of the baseball itself. Baseballs cost three dollars each in 1901, a unit price which would be equal to $ today. In contrast, modern baseballs purchased in bulk as is the case with professional teams cost about seven dollars each as of 2021 and thus make up a negligible portion of a modern MLB team's operating budget. Due to the much larger relative cost, club owners in the early 20th century were reluctant to spend much money on new balls if not necessary. It was not unusual for a single baseball to last an entire game, nor for a baseball to be reused for the next game especially if it was still in relatively good condition as would likely be the case for a ball introduced late in the game. By the end of the game, the ball would usually be dark with grass, mud, and tobacco juice, and it would be misshapen and lumpy from contact with the bat. Balls were replaced only if they were hit into the crowd and lost, and many clubs employed security guards expressly for the purpose of retrieving balls hit into the stands — a practice unthinkable today.
As a consequence, home runs were rare, and the "inside game" dominated—singles, bunts, stolen bases, the hit-and-run play, and other tactics dominated the strategies of the time.
Despite this, there were also several superstar hitters, the most famous being Honus Wagner, held to be one of the greatest shortstops to ever play the game, and Detroit's Ty Cobb, the "Georgia Peach." His career batting average of .366 has yet to be bested.
The Merkle incident
The 1908 pennant races in both the AL and NL were among the most exciting ever witnessed. The conclusion of the National League season, in particular, involved a bizarre chain of events. On September 23, 1908, the New York Giants and Chicago Cubs played a game in the Polo Grounds. Nineteen-year-old rookie first baseman Fred Merkle, later to become one of the best players at his position in the league, was on first base, with teammate Moose McCormick on third with two outs and the game tied. Giants shortstop Al Bridwell socked a single, scoring McCormick and apparently winning the game. However, Merkle, instead of advancing to second base, ran toward the clubhouse to avoid the spectators mobbing the field, which at that time was a common, acceptable practice. The Cubs' second baseman, Johnny Evers, noticed this. In the confusion that followed, Evers claimed to have retrieved the ball and touched second base, forcing Merkle out and nullifying the run scored. Evers brought this to the attention of the umpire that day, Hank O'Day, who after some deliberation called the runner out. Because of the state of the field O'Day thereby called the game. Despite the arguments by the Giants, the league upheld O'Day's decision and ordered the game replayed at the end of the season, if necessary. It turned out that the Cubs and Giants ended the season tied for first place, so the game was indeed replayed, and the Cubs won the game, the pennant, and subsequently the World Series (the last Cubs Series victory until 2016).
For his part, Merkle was doomed to endless ridicule throughout his career (and to a lesser extent for the rest of his life) for this lapse, which went down in history as "Merkle's Boner". In his defense, some baseball historians have suggested that it was not customary for game-ending hits to be fully "run out", it was only Evers's insistence on following the rules strictly that resulted in this unusual play. In fact, earlier in the 1908 season, the identical situation had been brought to the umpires' attention by Evers; the umpire that day was the same Hank O'Day. While the winning run was allowed to stand on that occasion, the dispute raised O'Day's awareness of the rule, and directly set up the Merkle controversy.
New places to play
Turn-of-the-century baseball attendances were modest by later standards. The average for the 1,110 games in the 1901 season was 3,247. However, the first 20 years of the 20th century saw an unprecedented rise in the popularity of baseball. Large stadiums dedicated to the game were built for many of the larger clubs or existing grounds enlarged, including Tiger Stadium in Detroit, Shibe Park in Philadelphia, Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, the Polo Grounds in Manhattan, Boston's Fenway Park along with Wrigley Field and Comiskey Park in Chicago. Likewise from the Eastern League to the small developing leagues in the West, and the rising Negro leagues professional baseball was being played all across the country. Average major league attendances reached a pre-World War I peak of 5,836 in 1909. Where there weren't professional teams, there were semi-professional teams, traveling teams barnstorming, company clubs and amateur men's leagues that drew small but fervent crowds.
The "Black Sox"
The fix of baseball games by gamblers and players working together had been suspected as early as the 1850s. Hal Chase was particularly notorious for throwing games, but played for a decade after gaining this reputation; he even managed to parlay these accusations into a promotion to manager. Even baseball stars such as Ty Cobb and Tris Speaker have been credibly alleged to have fixed game outcomes. When MLB's complacency during this "Golden Age" was eventually exposed after the 1919 World Series, it became known as the Black Sox scandal.
After an excellent regular season (88–52, .629 W%), the Chicago White Sox were heavy favorites to win the 1919 World Series. Arguably the best team in baseball, the White Sox had a deep lineup, a strong pitching staff, and a good defense. Even though the National League champion Cincinnati Reds had a superior regular season record (96–44, .689 W%,) no one, including gamblers and bookmakers, anticipated the Reds having a chance. When the Reds triumphed 5–3, many pundits cried foul.
At the time of the scandal, the White Sox were arguably the most successful franchise in baseball, with excellent gate receipts and record attendance. At the time, most baseball players were not paid especially well and had to work other jobs during the winter to survive. Some elite players on the big-city clubs made very good salaries, but Chicago was a notable exception.
For many years, the White Sox were owned and operated by Charles Comiskey, who paid the lowest player salaries, on average, in the American League. The White Sox players all intensely disliked Comiskey and his penurious ways, but were powerless to do anything, thanks to baseball's so-called "reserve clause" that prevented players from switching teams without their team owner's consent.
By late 1919, Comiskey's tyrannical reign over the Sox had sown deep bitterness among the players, and White Sox first baseman Arnold "Chick" Gandil decided to conspire to throw the 1919 World Series. He persuaded gambler Joseph "Sport" Sullivan, with whom he had had previous dealings, that the fix could be pulled off for $100,000 total (which would be equal to $}} today), paid to the players involved. New York gangster Arnold Rothstein supplied the $100,000 that Gandil had requested through his lieutenant Abe Attell, a former featherweight boxing champion.
After the 1919 series, and through the beginning of the 1920 baseball season, rumors swirled that some of the players had conspired to purposefully lose. At last, in 1920, a grand jury was convened to investigate these and other allegations of fixed baseball games. Eight players (Charles "Swede" Risberg, Arnold "Chick" Gandil, "Shoeless" Joe Jackson, Oscar "Happy" Felsch, Eddie Cicotte, George "Buck" Weaver, Fred McMullin, and Claude "Lefty" Williams) were indicted and tried for conspiracy. The players were ultimately acquitted.
However, the damage to the reputation of the sport of baseball led the team owners to appoint Federal judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis to be the first commissioner of baseball. His first act as commissioner was to ban the "Black Sox" from professional baseball for life. The White Sox, meanwhile,
would not return to the World Series until 1959, and it was not until their next appearance in 2005 they won the World Series.
The Negro leagues
Until July 5, 1947, baseball had two histories. One fills libraries, while baseball historians are only just beginning to chronicle the other fully: African Americans have played baseball as long as white Americans. Players of color, both African-American and Hispanic, played for white baseball clubs throughout the very early days of the growing amateur sport. Moses Fleetwood Walker is considered the first African American to play at the major league level, in 1884. But soon, and dating through the first half of the 20th century, an unwritten but iron-clad color line fenced African-Americans and other players of color out of the "majors".
The Negro leagues were American professional baseball leagues comprising predominantly African-American teams. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be used narrowly for the seven relatively successful leagues beginning 1920 that are sometimes termed "Negro major leagues".
The first professional team, established in 1885, achieved great and lasting success as the Cuban Giants, while the first league, the National Colored Base Ball League, failed in 1887 after only two weeks due to low attendance. The Negro American League of 1951 is considered the last major league season and the last professional club, the Indianapolis Clowns, operated amusingly rather than competitively from the mid-1960s to 1980s.
The first international leagues
While many of the players that made up the black baseball teams were African Americans, many more were Latin Americans (mostly, but not exclusively, black), from nations that deliver some of the greatest talents that make up the Major League rosters of today. Black players moved freely through the rest of baseball, playing in Canadian Baseball, Mexican Baseball, Caribbean Baseball, and Central America and South America, where more than a few achieved a level of fame that was unavailable in the country of their birth.
Babe Ruth and the end of the dead-ball era
in 1920.]]
It was not the Black Sox scandal which put an end to the dead-ball era, but a rule change and a single player.
Some of the increased offensive output can be explained by the 1920 rule change that outlawed tampering with the ball. Pitchers had developed a number of techniques for producing "spitballs", "shine balls" and other trick pitches which had "unnatural" flight through the air. Umpires were now required to put new balls into play whenever the current ball became scuffed or discolored. This rule change was enforced all the more stringently following the death of Ray Chapman, who was struck in the temple by a pitched ball from Carl Mays in a game on August 16, 1920; he died the next day. Discolored balls, harder for batters to see and therefore harder for batters to dodge, have been rigorously removed from play ever since. This meant that batters could now see and hit the ball with less difficulty. With the added prohibition on the ball being purposely wetted or scuffed in any way, pitchers had to rely on pure athletic skill—changes in grip, wrist angle, arm angle and throwing dynamics, plus a new and growing appreciation of the aerodynamic effect of the spinning ball's seams—to pitch with altered trajectories and hopefully confuse or distract batters.
At the end of the 1919 season Harry Frazee, then owner of the Boston Red Sox, sold a group of his star players to the New York Yankees. Among them was George Herman Ruth, known affectionately as "Babe". Ruth's career mirrors the shift in dominance from pitching to hitting at this time. He started his career as a pitcher in 1914, and by 1916 was considered one of the dominant left-handed pitchers in the game. When Edward Barrow, managing the Red Sox, converted him to an outfielder, ballplayers and sportswriters were shocked. It was apparent, however, that Ruth's bat in the lineup every day was far more valuable than Ruth's arm on the mound every fourth day. Ruth swatted 29 home runs in his last season in Boston. The next year, as a Yankee, he would hit 54 and in 1921 he hit 59. His 1927 mark of 60 home runs would last until 1961.
]]
Ruth's power hitting ability demonstrated a dramatic new way to play the game, one that was extremely popular with fans. Accordingly, ballparks were expanded, sometimes by building outfield "bleacher" seating which shrunk the size of the outfield and made home runs more frequent. In addition to Ruth, hitters such as Rogers Hornsby also took advantage, with Hornsby compiling extraordinary figures for both power and average in the early 1920s. By the late 1920s and 1930s all the good teams had their home-run hitting "sluggers": the Yankees' Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx in Philadelphia, Hank Greenberg in Detroit and in Chicago Hack Wilson were the most storied. While the American League championship, and to a lesser extent the World Series, would be dominated by the Yankees, there were many other excellent teams in the inter-war years. The National League's St. Louis Cardinals, for example, would win three titles in nine years, the last with a group of players known as the "Gashouse Gang".
The first radio broadcast of a baseball game was on August 5, 1921, over Westinghouse station KDKA from Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Harold Arlin announced the Pirates–Phillies game. Attendances in the 1920s were consistently better than they had been before WWI. The interwar peak average attendance was 8,211 in 1930, but baseball was hit hard by the Great Depression and in 1933 the average fell below five thousand for the only time between the wars. At first wary of radio's potential to impact ticket sales at the park, owners began to make broadcast deals and by the late 1930s, all teams' games went out over the air.
1933 also saw the introduction of the yearly All-Star game, a mid-season break in which the greatest players in each league play against one another in a hard-fought but officially meaningless demonstration game. In 1936 the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, was instituted and five players elected: Ty Cobb, Walter Johnson, Christy Mathewson, Babe Ruth and Honus Wagner. The Hall formally opened in 1939 and, of course, remains open to this day.
The war years
In 1941, a year which saw the premature death of Lou Gehrig, Boston's great left fielder Ted Williams had a batting average over .400—the last time anyone has achieved that feat. During the same season Joe DiMaggio hit successfully in 56 consecutive games, an accomplishment both unprecedented and unequaled.
After the United States entered World War II after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Landis asked Franklin D. Roosevelt whether professional baseball should continue during the war. In the "Green Light Letter", the US president replied that baseball was important to national morale, and asked for more night games so day workers could attend. Thirty-five Hall of Fame members and more than 500 Major League Baseball players served in the war, but with the exception of D-Day, games continued. Both Williams and DiMaggio would miss playing time in the services, with Williams also flying later in the Korean War. During this period Stan Musial led the St. Louis Cardinals to the 1942, 1944 and 1946 World Series titles. The war years also saw the founding of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.
Baseball boomed after World War II. 1945 saw a new attendance record and the following year average crowds leapt nearly 70% to 14,914. Further records followed in 1948 and 1949, when the average reached 16,913. While average attendances slipped to somewhat lower levels through the 1950s, 1960s and the first half of the 1970s, they remained well above pre-war levels, and total seasonal attendance regularly hit new highs from 1962 onward as the number of major league teams—and games—increased.
Racial integration in baseball<!--This section is linked by Jackie Robinson-->
The post-War years in baseball also witnessed the racial integration of the sport. Participation by African Americans in organized baseball had been precluded since the 1890s by formal and informal agreements, with only a few players being surreptitiously included in lineups on a sporadic basis.
American society as a whole moved toward integration in the post-War years, partially as a result of the distinguished service by African American military units such as the Tuskegee Airmen, 366th Infantry Regiment, and others. During the baseball winter meetings in 1943, noted African-American athlete and actor Paul Robeson campaigned for integration of the sport. After World War II ended, several team managers considered recruiting members of the Negro leagues for entry into organized baseball. In the early 1920s, New York Giants' manager John McGraw tried to slip a black player, Charlie Grant, into his lineup (reportedly by passing him off to the front office as an Indian), and McGraw's wife reported finding names of dozens of black players that McGraw fantasized about signing, after his death. Pittsburgh Pirates owner Bill Bensawanger reportedly signed Josh Gibson to a contract in 1943, and the Washington Senators were also said to be interested in his services. But those efforts (and others) were opposed by Kenesaw Mountain Landis, baseball's powerful commissioner and a staunch segregationist. Bill Veeck claimed that Landis blocked his purchase of the Philadelphia Phillies because he planned to integrate the team. While this account is disputed, Landis was in fact opposed to integration, and his death in 1944 (and subsequent replacement as Commissioner by Happy Chandler) removed a major obstacle for black players in the Major Leagues.
in 1954]]
The general manager who would be eventually successful in breaking the color barrier was Branch Rickey of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Rickey himself had experienced the issue of segregation. While playing and coaching for his college team at Ohio Wesleyan University, Rickey had a black teammate named Charles Thomas. On a road trip through southern Ohio, his fellow player was refused a room in a hotel. Although Rickey was able to get the player into his room for that night, he was taken aback when he reached his room to find Thomas upset and crying about this injustice. Rickey related this incident as an example of why he wanted a full desegregation of not only baseball, but the entire nation.
In the mid-1940s, Rickey had compiled a list of Negro league ballplayers for possible Major League contracts. Realizing that the first African-American signee would be a magnet for prejudiced sentiment, however, Rickey was intent on finding a player with the distinguished personality and character that would allow him to tolerate the inevitable abuse. Rickey's sights eventually settled on Jackie Robinson, a shortstop with the Kansas City Monarchs. Although probably not the best player in the Negro leagues at the time, Robinson was an exceptional talent, was college-educated, and had the marketable distinction of having served as an officer during World War II. Even more importantly, Rickey judged Robinson to possess the inner strength to withstand the inevitable harsh animosity to come. To prepare him for the task, Rickey played Robinson in 1946 for the Dodgers' minor league team, the Montreal Royals, which proved an arduous emotional challenge, though Robinson enjoyed fervently enthusiastic support from the Montreal fans. On April 15, 1947, Robinson broke the color barrier, which had been tacitly recognized for almost 75 years, with his appearance for the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field.
Eleven weeks later, on July 5, 1947, the American League was integrated by the signing of Larry Doby to the Cleveland Indians. Over the next few years, a handful of black baseball players made appearances in the majors, including Roy Campanella (teammate to Robinson in Brooklyn) and Satchel Paige (teammate to Doby in Cleveland). Paige, who had pitched more than 2,400 innings in the Negro leagues, sometimes two and three games a day, was still effective at 42, and still playing at 59. His ERA in the Major Leagues was 3.29.
However, the initial pace of integration was slow. By 1953, only six of the sixteen major league teams had a black player on the roster. The Boston Red Sox became the last major league team to integrate its roster with the addition of Pumpsie Green on July 21, 1959. While limited in numbers, the on-field performance of early black Major League players was outstanding. In the fourteen years from 1947 to 1960, black players won one or more of the Rookie of the Year awards nine times. As a result of this on-field experience, minorities began to experience long-delayed gains in managerial positions within baseball. In 1975, Frank Robinson (who had been the 1956 Rookie of the Year with the Cincinnati Reds) was named player-manager of the Cleveland Indians, making him the first African-American manager in the major leagues.
Although these front-office gains continued, Major League Baseball saw a lengthy slow decline in the percentage of black players after the mid-1970s. By 2007, African Americans made up less than 9% of Major League players. While this trend is largely attributed to an increased emphasis on recruitment of players from Latin America (with the number of Hispanic players in the major leagues rising to 29% by 2007), other factors have been cited as well. Hall of Fame player Dave Winfield, for instance, has pointed out that urban America provides fewer resources for youth baseball than in the past.
Arturo Moreno became the first Hispanic owner of an MLB franchise when he purchased the Anaheim Angels in 2004.
In 2005, a Racial and Gender Report Card on Major League Baseball was issued, which generally found positive results on the inclusion of African Americans and Latinos in baseball, and gave Major League Baseball a grade of "A" or better for opportunities for players, managers and coaches as well as for MLB's central office. At that time, 37% of major league players were people of color: Latino (26 percent), African American (9 percent) or Asian (2 percent). Also by 2004, 29% of the professional staff in MLB's central office were people of color, 11% of team vice presidents were people of color, and seven of the league's managers were of color (four African Americans and three Latinos). The only California expansion team—and also the first in Major League Baseball in over 70 years—was the Los Angeles Angels (later the California Angels, the Anaheim Angels, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, before reverting to Los Angeles Angels in 2016), who brought the American League to southern California in 1961. Northern California, however, would later gain its own American League team, in 1968, when the Athletics would move again, settling in Oakland, across San Francisco Bay from the Giants.1961–1962Along with the Angels, the other 1961 expansion team was the Washington Senators, who joined the American League and took over the nation's capital when the previous Senators moved to Minnesota and became the Twins. 1961 is also noted as being the year in which Roger Maris surpassed Babe Ruth's single season home run record, hitting 61 for the New York Yankees, albeit in a slightly longer season than Ruth's. To keep pace with the American League—which now had ten teams—the National League likewise expanded to ten teams, in 1962, with the addition of the Houston Colt .45s and New York Mets.1969
In 1969, the American League expanded when the Kansas City Royals and Seattle Pilots, the latter in a longtime PCL stronghold, were admitted to the league. The Pilots stayed just one season in Seattle before moving to Milwaukee and becoming today's Milwaukee Brewers. The National League also added two teams that year, the Montreal Expos and San Diego Padres. Given the size of the expanded leagues, 12 teams apiece, each split into East and West divisions, with a playoff series to determine the pennant winner and World Series contender—the first post-season baseball instituted since the advent of the World Series itself.
The Padres were the last of the core PCL teams to be absorbed. The Coast League did not die, though. After reforming and moving into new markets, it successfully transformed into a Class AAA league.
1972–2013
game, played by 1886 rules. Vintage games are live contests that seek to portray the authenticity of the early game. (The term "reenactment" is a common misnomer; games are contested and not meant to recreate a specific historical event.)]]
In 1972, the second Washington Senators moved to the Dallas–Fort Worth area and became the Texas Rangers.
In 1977, the American League expanded to fourteen teams, with the newly formed Seattle Mariners and Toronto Blue Jays. Sixteen years later, in 1993, the National League likewise expanded to fourteen teams, with the newly formed Colorado Rockies and Florida Marlins (now Miami Marlins).
Beginning with the 1994 season, both the AL and the NL were divided into three divisions (East, West, and Central), with the addition of a wild card team (the team with the best record among those finishing in second place) to enable four teams in each league to advance to the preliminary division series. However, due to the 1994–95 Major League Baseball strike (which canceled the 1994 World Series), the new rules did not go into effect until the 1995 World Series.
In 1998, the AL and the NL each added a fifteenth team, for a total of thirty teams in Major League Baseball. The Arizona Diamondbacks joined the National League, and the Tampa Bay Devil Rays—now called simply the Rays—joined the American League. In order to keep the number of teams in each league at an even number—with 14 in the AL and 16 in the NL—Milwaukee changed leagues and became a member of the National League. Two years later, the NL and AL ended their independent corporate existences and merged into a new legal entity named Major League Baseball; the two leagues remained as playing divisions. In 2001, MLB took over the struggling Montreal Expos franchise and, after the 2004 season, moved it to Washington, DC, which had been clamoring for a team ever since the second Senators' departure in 1972; the club was renamed the Nationals.
In 2013, in keeping with Commissioner Bud Selig's desire for expanded interleague play, the Houston Astros were shifted from the National to the American League; with an odd number (15) in each league, an interleague contest was played somewhere almost every day during the season. At this time the divisions within each league were shuffled to create six equal divisions of five teams.
Pitching dominance and rules changes
By the late 1960s, the balance between pitching and hitting had swung back to favor of the pitchers once more. In 1968 Carl Yastrzemski won the American League batting title with an average of just .301, the lowest in history. That same year, Detroit Tigers pitcher Denny McLain won 31 games—making him the last pitcher to win 30 games in a season. St. Louis Cardinals starting pitcher Bob Gibson achieved an equally remarkable feat by allowing an ERA of just 1.12.
In response to these events, major league baseball implemented certain rule changes in 1969 to benefit the batters. The pitcher's mound was lowered, and the strike zone was reduced.
In 1973 the American League, which had been suffering from much lower attendance than the National League, made a move to increase scoring even further by initiating the designated hitter rule.
Players assert themselves
, who refused to re-sign his contract and held out in 1966]]
From the time of the formation of the Major Leagues to the 1960s, the team owners controlled the game. After the so-called "Brotherhood Strike" of 1890 and the failure of the Brotherhood of Professional Base Ball Players and its Players National League, the owners' control of the game seemed absolute. It lasted over 70 years despite a number of short-lived players organizations. In 1966, however, the players enlisted the help of labor union activist Marvin Miller to form the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA). The same year, Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale—both Cy Young Award winners for the Los Angeles Dodgers—refused to re-sign their contracts, jointly holding out for better contracts. The era of the reserve clause, which held players to one team, was drawing to an end.
The first legal challenge came in 1970. Backed by the MLBPA, St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Curt Flood took the leagues to court to negate a player trade, citing the 13th Amendment and antitrust legislation. In 1972, he finally lost his case before the United States Supreme Court by a vote of 5 to 3, but gained large-scale public sympathy, and the damage had been done. The reserve clause survived, but it had been irrevocably weakened. In 1975, Andy Messersmith of the Dodgers and Dave McNally of the Montreal Expos played without contracts, and then declared themselves free agents in response to an arbitrator's ruling. Handcuffed by concessions made in the Flood case, the owners had no choice but to accept the collective bargaining package offered by the MLBPA, and the reserve clause was effectively ended, to be replaced by the current system of free-agency and arbitration.
While the legal challenges were going on, the game continued. In 1969, the "Miracle Mets", just seven years after their formation, recorded their first winning season, won the National League East and finally the World Series.
On the field, the 1970s saw some of the longest-standing records fall, along with the rise of two powerhouse dynasties. In Oakland, the Swinging A's were overpowering, winning the Series in 1972, 1973 and 1974, and five straight division titles. The strained relationships between teammates, who included Catfish Hunter, Vida Blue and Reggie Jackson, gave the lie to the need for "chemistry" between players. The National League, on the other hand, belonged to the Big Red Machine in Cincinnati, where Sparky Anderson's team, which included Pete Rose as well as Hall of Famers Tony Pérez, Johnny Bench and Joe Morgan, succeeded the A's run in 1975.
The decade also contained great individual achievements. On April 8, 1974, Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves hit his 715th career home run, surpassing Babe Ruth's all-time record. He would retire in 1976 with 755, and that was just one of numerous records he achieved, many of which, including total bases, still stand today. There was great pitching too: between 1973 and 1975, Nolan Ryan threw four "no-hit" games. He would add a record-breaking fifth in 1981 and two more before his retirement in 1993, by which time he had also accumulated 5,714 strikeouts, another record, in a 27-year career.
The marketing and hype era
From the 1980s onward, the major league game changed dramatically, due to the combined effects of free agency, improvements in the science of sports conditioning, changes in the marketing and television broadcasting of sporting events, and the push by brand-name products for greater visibility. These events lead to greater labor difficulties, fan disaffection, rapidly rising prices, changes in game-play, and problems with the use of performance-enhancing substances like steroids tainting the race for records. In spite of all this, stadium crowds generally grew. Average attendances first broke 20,000 in 1979 and 30,000 in 1993. That year total attendance hit 70 million, but baseball was hit hard by a strike in 1994, and as of 2005 it had marginally improved on those 1993 records. (Update: Between 2009 and 2017, average attendance hovered just over the 30,000 mark, with numbers falling into the 28,000s in '18 and '19. The 2019 season saw a million fewer tickets sold than the banner year of 2007, however revenues to major league baseball from media rights fees increased total revenue to $10 billion in 2018, a 70% rise from a decade before.)
The science of the sport changes the game
During the 1980s, significant advances were made in the science of physical conditioning. Weight rooms and training equipment were improved. Trainers and doctors developed better diets and regimens to make athletes bigger, healthier, and stronger than they had ever been.
Another major change that had been occurring during this time was the adoption of the pitch count. Starting pitchers who played complete games had not been an unusual thing in baseball's history. Now, pitchers were throwing harder than ever and pitching coaches watched to see how many pitches a player had thrown over the game. At anywhere from 100 to 125, pitchers increasingly would be pulled out to preserve their arms. Bullpens began to specialize more, with more pitchers being trained as middle relievers, and a few hurlers, usually possessing high velocity but not much durability, as closers. The science of maximizing effectiveness and career duration, while attempting to minimize injury and downtime, is an ongoing pursuit by coaches and kinesiologists.
Along with the expansion of teams, the addition of more pitchers needed to play a complete game stressed the total number of quality players available in a system that restricted its talent searches at that time to America, Canada, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
Television
The arrival of live televised sports in the 1950s increased attention and revenue for all major league clubs at first. The television programming was extremely regional, hurting the non-televised minor and independent leagues most. People stayed home to watch Maury Wills rather than watch unknowns at their local baseball park. Major League Baseball, as it always did, made sure that it controlled rights and fees charged for the broadcasts of all games, just as it had on radio.
The national networks began televising national games of the week, opening the door for a national audience to see particular clubs. While most teams were broadcast in the course of a season, emphasis tended toward the league leaders with famous players and the major market franchises that could draw the largest audience.
The rise of cable
In the 1970s the cable revolution began. The Atlanta Braves became a power contender with greater revenues generated by WTBS, Ted Turner's Atlanta-based Super-Station, broadcast as "America's Team" to cable households nationwide. The roll-out of ESPN, then regional sports networks (now mostly under the umbrella of Fox Sports Net) changed sports news in general and particularly baseball with its relatively huge number of games-per-season. Now under the microscope of news organizations that needed to fill 24 programming hours per day, the amount of attention—and salary—paid to major league players grew exponentially. Players who would have sought off-season jobs to make ends meet just 20 years earlier were now well-paid professionals at least, and multi-millionaires in many cases. This super-star status often rested on careers that were not as compelling as those of the baseball heroes of a less media-intense time.
As player contract values soared, and the number of broadcasters, commentators, columnists, and sports writers also multiplied. The competition for a fresh angle on any story became fierce. Media pundits began questioning the high salaries paid to players when on-field performance was deemed less than deserving. Critical commentary was more of a draw than praise, and coverage began to become intensely negative. Players' personal lives, which had always been off-limits except under extreme circumstances, became the fodder of editorials, insider stories on TV, and features in magazines. When the use of performance-enhancing drugs became an issue, drawing scornful criticism from fans and pundits, the gap between the sports media and the players whom they covered widened further.
With the development of satellite television and digital cable, Major League Baseball launched channels with season-subscription fees, making it possible for fans to watch virtually every game played, in both major leagues, everywhere, in real time.
Team networks
The next refinement of baseball on cable was the creation of single-team cable networks. YES Network & NESN, the New York Yankees & Boston Red Sox cable television networks, respectively, took in millions to broadcast games not only in New York and Boston but around the country. These networks generated as much revenue as, or more than, revenue annually for large-market teams' baseball operations. By fencing these channels off in separate corporate entities, owners were able to exclude the income from consideration during contract negotiations.
Merchandise, endorsements and sponsorships
The first merchandise produced in response to the growing popularity of the game was the baseball trading card. The earliest known player cards were produced in 1868 by a pair of New York baseball-equipment purveyors. Since that time, many enterprises, notably tobacco and candy companies, have used trading cards to promote and sell their products. These cards rarely, if ever, provided any benefit directly to the players, but a growing mania for collecting and trading cards helped personalize baseball, giving some fans a more personal connection to their favorite players and introducing them to new ones. Eventually, older cards became “vintage” and rare cards gained in value until the secondary market for trading cards became a billion-dollar industry in itself, with the rarest individuals bringing mid-six-figures to millions of dollars at auction. The advent of the Internet and websites such as eBay provided huge new venues for buyers, sellers and traders, some of whom have made baseball cards their living.
In recent years baseball cards have disassociated from unrelated products like tobacco and bubble-gum, to become products in their own right. Following the exit of competitor Donruss from the baseball-card industry, former bubble-gum giants Topps and Fleer came to dominate that market through exclusive contracts with players and Major League Baseball. Fleer, in turn, exited the market in 2007, leaving Topps as the only card manufacturer with an MLB contract.
Other genuine baseball memorabilia also trades and sells, often at high prices. Much of what is for sale as "memorabilia" is manufactured strictly for sale and rarely has a direct connection to teams or players beyond the labeling, unless signed in person by a player. Souvenir balls caught by fans during important games, especially significant home run balls, have great rarity value, and balls signed by players have always been treasured, traded and sold. The high value of autographs has created new businessmen whose sole means of making a living was acquiring autographs and memorabilia from the athletes. Memorabilia hounds fought with fans to get signatures worth $20, $60, or even $100 or more in their inventory.
Of great value to individual top players are endorsement contracts wherein the player's fame is used to sell anything from sports equipment to automobiles, soda and underwear. Top players can receive as much as a million dollars a year or more directly from the companies.
In deals with players, teams and Major League Baseball, large corporations like NIKE and Champion pay big money to make sure that their logos are seen on the clothing and shoes worn by athletes on the field. This "association branding" has become a significant revenue stream. In the late 1990s and into the 21st century, the dugout, the backstops behind home plate, and anywhere else that might be seen by a camera, became fair game for the insertion of advertising.
Player wealth
Beginning with the 1972 Flood v. Kuhn Supreme Court case, management's grip on players, as embodied in the reserve clause, began to slip. In 1976, the Messersmith/McNally Arbitration, also known as the Seitz Decision effectively destroyed the reserve clause. Players who had been dramatically underpaid for generations came to be replaced by players who were paid extremely well for their services.Sports agentsA new generation of sports agents arose, hawking the talents of free-agent players who knew baseball but didn't know the business end of the game. The agents broke down what the teams were generating in revenue off of the players' performances. They calculated what their player might be worth to energize a television contract, or provide more merchandise revenue, or put more fans into stadium seats. Management pushed back; the dynamic produced a variety of compromises which ideally left all parties unsatisfied.BusinessUnder the Major League Baseball contract, players must play for minimum salary for six years, at which time they become free agents. With players seeking greener pastures when their six years had passed, fewer players remained career members of one ball club. Large-market clubs like the New York Yankees, the Boston Red Sox, and the Los Angeles Dodgers, given big revenues from their cable television operations, signed more and more of the best—and best-known—players away from mid-sized and smaller-market clubs that could not afford to compete on salaries. Major League Baseball, unlike many other sports, does not impose a salary cap on teams. The League does attempt to level the field, as it were, by imposing a luxury tax on teams with very high payrolls, but management is still free to pay players whatever they can afford to attract talent. Some television reporters, commentators, and print sports writers question the kind of money being paid to these players, but just as many on the other side of the debate feel players should bargain for whatever they can get. Still others complain that minor-league players are not fairly compensated by MLB. The tug-of-war between players and management is complex, ongoing, and of great interest to serious students of the professional game.
Owners and players feud in the 1980s
All was not well with major league baseball. The many contractual disputes between players and owners came to a head in 1981. Previous players' strikes (in 1972, 1973 and 1980) had been held in preseason, with only the 1972 stoppage—over benefits—causing disruption to the regular season from April 1 to April 13. Also, in 1976 the owners had locked the players out of Spring training in a dispute over free agency.
The crux of the 1981 dispute was compensation for the loss of players to free agency. After seeing a top-rank player sign with another team, the aggrieved owner wanted a mid-rank player in return, the so-called sixteenth player (each club was allowed to protect 15 players from this rule). Under this arrangement, losing lower-rated free agents would produce correspondingly smaller compensation. While this seemed reasonable and fair to owners, players only recently freed from the bondage of the reserve clause found it unacceptable, and withdrew their labor, striking on June 12. Immediately, the U.S. Government's National Labor Relations Board ruled that the owners had not been negotiating in good faith, and installed a federal mediator to reach a solution. Seven weeks and 713 games were lost in the middle of the season, before the owners backed down on July 31, settling for proportionally lower-ranked players as compensation. The damaged season was continued as distinct halves starting August 9, with the playoffs reorganized to reflect this.1994–95 Major League Baseball strike
Labor relations were still strained. There had been a two-day strike in 1985 (over the division of television revenue money), and a 32-day spring training lockout in 1990 (again over salary structure and benefits). By far the worst action would come in 1994. The seeds were sown earlier: in 1992 the owners sought to renegotiate salary and free-agency terms, but little progress was made. The standoff continued until early 1994 when the existing agreement expired, with no agreement on what was to replace it. Adding to the conflict was the perception that "small market" teams, such as the struggling Seattle Mariners could not compete with high-spending teams such as those in New York or Los Angeles. Their plan was to institute TV revenue sharing to increase equity among the teams and impose a salary cap to keep expenditures down. Players felt that such a cap would reduce their potential earnings. It wasn't until later, in 2003, that MLB instituted a luxury tax on high-spending teams in an attempt to encourage more equitable player outlays.
Meanwhile, back in 1994, players officially went on strike on August 12. In September 1994, Major League Baseball announced the cancellation of the World Series for the first time since 1904.
Home run mania and the second coming of baseball
hits a home run during his last Major League season in 2001]]
The cancellation of the 1994 World Series was a severe embarrassment for Major League Baseball. Fans were outraged and frustrated, their love of the game shaken to its core. The strike was declared an act of war, and fought back: attendance figures and broadcast ratings were lower in 1995 than before the strike. It would be a decade before baseball recovered from the disruption.
On September 6, 1995, Baltimore Orioles shortstop, Cal Ripken Jr., played his 2,131st consecutive game, breaking Lou Gehrig's 56-year-old record. This was the first celebratory moment in baseball after the strike. Ripken continued his streak for another three years, voluntarily ending it at 2,632 consecutive games played on September 20, 1998.
In 1997, the expansion Florida Marlins won the World Series in just their fifth season. This made them the third-youngest team to win the Fall Classic (behind the 1903 Boston Red Sox and later the 2001 Arizona Diamondbacks, who won in their fourth season). Virtually all the key players on the 1997 Marlins team were soon traded or let go to save payroll costs (although the 2003 Marlins did win a second world championship).
In 1998, St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Mark McGwire and Chicago Cubs outfielder Sammy Sosa engaged in a home run race for the ages. With both rapidly approaching Roger Maris's record of 61 home runs (set in 1961), the entire nation watched as the two power hitters raced to be the first to break into uncharted territory. McGwire reached 62 first on September 8, 1998, with Sosa right behind. Sosa finished the season with 66 home runs, well behind McGwire's unheard-of 70. However, recent steroid allegations have marred the season in the minds of many fans.
That same year, the New York Yankees won a record 125 games, including going 11–2 in the postseason, to win the World Series as what many consider to be one of the greatest teams of all time.
McGwire's record of 70 would last a mere three years following the meteoric rise of veteran San Francisco Giants left fielder Barry Bonds in 2001. In 2001 Bonds knocked out 73 home runs, breaking the record set by McGwire by hitting his 71st on October 5, 2001. In addition to the home run record, Bonds also set single-season marks for base on balls with 177 (breaking the previous record of 170, set by Babe Ruth in 1923) and slugging percentage with .863 (breaking the mark of .847 set by Ruth in 1920). Bonds continued his torrid home run hitting in the next few seasons, hitting his 660th career home run on April 12, 2004, tying him with his godfather Willie Mays for third place on the all-time career home runs list. He hit his 661st home run the next day, April 13, to take sole possession of third place. Only three years later Bonds surpassed the great Hank Aaron to become baseball's most prolific home run hitter.
However, none of Bonds's accomplishments in the 2000s have been without controversy. During his run, journalists questioned McGwire about his use of the steroid-precursor androstenedione, and in March 2005 he was unforthcoming when questioned as part of a Congressional inquiry into steroids. Bonds has also been dogged by allegations of steroid use and his involvement in the BALCO drugs scandal, as his personal trainer Greg Anderson pleaded guilty to supplying steroids (without naming Bonds as a recipient). Neither Bonds nor McGwire has failed a drug test at any time since there was no steroid-testing until 2003 after the new August 7, 2002, agreement between owners and players was reached. McGwire retired after the 2001 season; in 2010, he admitted to having used steroids throughout his MLB career.
The 1990s also saw Major League Baseball expand into new markets as four new teams joined the league. In 1993, the Colorado Rockies and Florida Marlins began play, and in just their fifth year of existence, the Marlins became the first wild card team to win the championship.
The year 1998 brought two more teams into the mix, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and the Arizona Diamondbacks, the latter of which become the youngest expansion franchise to win the championship.
The late 1990s were dominated by the New York Yankees, who won four out of five World Series championships from 1996 to 2000.
The steroid era
Drugs, baseball, and records
The lure of big money pushed players harder and harder to achieve peak performance, while avoiding injury from over-training. The wearying travel schedule and 162-game season meant that amphetamines, usually in the form of pep pills known as "greenies", had been widespread in baseball since at least the 1960s. Baseball's drug scene was no particular secret, having been discussed in Sports Illustrated and in Jim Bouton's groundbreaking book Ball Four, but there was virtually no public backlash. Two decades later, however, some Major League players turned to newer performance-enhancing drugs, including ephedra and improved steroids. The eventual consequences for the game, the players and the fans were substantial.
A memo circulated in 1991 by baseball commissioner Fay Vincent stated that "The possession, sale or use of any illegal drug or controlled substance by Major League players and personnel is strictly prohibited ... [and those players involved] are subject to discipline by the commissioner and risk permanent expulsion from the game.... This prohibition applies to all illegal drugs and controlled substances, including steroids…" Some general managers of the time do not remember this memo; it was not emphasized or enforced and, confusingly, Vincent himself has disclaimed any direct responsibility for a ban on steroids, saying, "I didn't ban steroids...They were banned by Congress".
Ephedra, an herb used to cure cold symptoms, and also used in some allergy medications, sped up the heart and was considered by some to be a weight-loss short-cut. In 2003, Baltimore Orioles pitcher Steve Bechler had come to training camp 10 pounds overweight. During a workout on February 16, Bechler complained of dizziness and fatigue. His condition worsened while resting in the clubhouse and he was transported to an ambulance on a stretcher. Bechler spent the night in intensive care and died the following morning at the age of 23. The official cause of death was listed as "multi-organ failure due to heat exhaustion". The coroner's report stated it was likely that Bechler had taken three ephedra capsules on an empty stomach prior to working out. Many in the media linked Bechler's death to ephedra, raising concerns over the use of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball. Ephedra was banned, and soon the furor died down.
The 1998 home run race had generated nearly unbroken positive publicity, but Barry Bonds' run for the all-time home run record provoked a backlash over steroids, which increase a person's testosterone level and subsequently enable that person to bodybuild with much more ease. Some athletes have said that the main advantage to steroids is not so much the additional power or endurance that they can provide, but that they can drastically shorten rehab time from injury.
Commissioner Bud Selig was criticized, mostly after-the-fact, for a slow response to the rising tide of steroid use in the 1990s. In the early 2000s, as a safe and effective test for anabolic steroids came online and sanctions for their use began to be strictly enforced, some players adopted the use of harder-to-detect human growth hormone (HGH) to increase stamina and strength. Selig, still acting with some caution, imposed a strict anti-drug policy upon its minor league players, who are not part of the Major League Baseball Players Association (the PA). Random drug testing, education and treatment, and strict penalties for those caught became the rule of law. Anyone on a Major League team's forty man roster, including 15 minor leaguers that are on that list, were exempt from that program. Eventually, Selig and MLB had strict rules in place that carried meaningful sanctions against players who "juiced."
In a Sports Illustrated cover story in 2002, a year after his retirement, Ken Caminiti admitted that he had used steroids during his National League MVP-winning 1996 season, and for several seasons afterwards. Caminiti died unexpectedly of an apparent heart attack in The Bronx at the age of 41; he was pronounced dead on October 10, 2004, at New York's Lincoln Memorial Hospital. On November 1, the New York City Medical Examiners Office announced that Caminiti died from "acute intoxication due to the combined effects of cocaine and opiates", but possibly-steroid-induced coronary artery disease and cardiac hypertrophy (an enlarged heart) were also contributing factors.
In 2005, Jose Canseco published ''Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits & How Baseball Got Big'', admitting steroid usage and claiming that it was prevalent throughout major league baseball. When the United States Congress decided to investigate the use of steroids in the sport, some of the game's most prominent players came under scrutiny for possibly using steroids. These include Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, and Mark McGwire. Other players, such as Canseco and Gary Sheffield, have admitted to have either knowingly (in Canseco's case) or not (Sheffield's) using steroids. In confidential testimony to the BALCO Grand Jury (that was later leaked to the San Francisco Chronicle), Giambi also admitted steroid use. He later held a press conference in which he appeared to affirm this admission, without actually saying the words. And after an appearance before Congress where he (unlike McGwire) emphatically denied using steroids, "period", slugger Rafael Palmeiro became the first major star to be suspended (10 days) on August 1, 2005, for violating Major League Baseball's newly strengthened ban on controlled substances, including steroids, adopted on August 7, 2002, starting in the 2003 season. Many lesser players (mostly from the minor leagues) have tested positive for use, as well.
In 2006, Commissioner Selig tasked former United States Senator George J. Mitchell to lead an investigation into the use of performance-enhancing drugs in Major League Baseball (MLB) and on December 13, 2007, the 409-page Mitchell Report was released ('Report to the Commissioner of Baseball of an Independent Investigation into the Illegal Use of Steroids and Other Performance Enhancing Substances by Players in Major League Baseball'). The report described the use of anabolic steroids and human growth hormone (HGH) in MLB and assessed the effectiveness of the MLB Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program. Mitchell also advanced certain recommendations regarding the handling of past illegal drug use and future prevention practices. The report names 89 MLB players who are alleged to have used steroids or drugs.
Baseball has been taken to task for turning a blind eye to its drug problems. It benefited from these drugs in the ever-increasingly competitive fight for airtime and media attention. For example, Commissioner Selig sent a personal representative to the 2007 game where Barry Bonds broke Hank Aaron's career home run record, even though Bonds was widely believed at the time to be a steroid user and had been named in connection with the then-ongoing BALCO scandal; many viewed this as Selig giving wink-and-a-nod tacit approval to the use of PEDs. MLB and its Players Association finally announced tougher measures, but many felt that they did not go far enough.
In December 2009, Sports Illustrated named Baseball's Steroid Scandal as the number one sports story of the decade of the 2000s. In 2013, no player from the first "steroid class" of players eligible for the Baseball Hall of Fame was elected. Bonds and Clemens received less than half the number of votes needed, and some voters stated that they would not vote for any first-time candidate who played during the steroid era—whether accused of using banned substances or not—because of the effect the substances had on baseball.
The BALCO steroids scandal
In 2002, a major scandal arose when it was discovered that the company Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO), owned by Victor Conte, had been producing so-called "designer steroids", (specifically "the clear" and "the cream") which are steroids that could not be detected through drug tests at that time. In addition, the company had connections to several San Francisco Bay Area sports trainers and athletes, including the trainers of Jason Giambi and Barry Bonds. This revelation led to a vast criminal investigation into BALCO's connections with athletes from baseball and many other sports. Among the many athletes who have been linked to BALCO are Olympic sprinters Tim Montgomery and Marion Jones, Olympic shot-putter C. J. Hunter, as well as Giambi and Bonds.
Grand jury testimony in December 2003—which was illegally leaked to the San Francisco Chronicle and published in December 2004 under the bylines of Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams—revealed that the Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative did not merely manufacture nutritional supplements, but also distributed exotic steroids. Williams and Fairanu-Wada also provided compelling evidence that Barry Bonds, arguably the greatest player of his generation, was one of BALCO's steroid clients. The paper reported that these substances were probably designer steroids. Bonds said that Greg Anderson gave him a rubbing balm and a liquid substance that at the time he did not believe them to be steroids and thought they were flaxseed oil and other health supplements. Based on the testimony from many of the athletes, Conte and Anderson accepted plea agreements from the government in 2005, on charges they distributed steroids and laundered money, in order to avoid significant time in jail. Conte received a sentence of four months, Anderson received a sentence of three months. Also that year, James Valente, the vice-president of BALCO, and Remi Korchemny, a track coach affiliated with BALCO, pled guilty to distributing banned substances and received probation.
Various baseball pundits, fans, and even players have taken this as confirmation that Bonds used illegal steroids. Bonds never tested positive in tests performed in 2003, 2004, and 2005, which may be attributable to successful obfuscation of continued use as documented in the 2006 book Game of Shadows. Before-and-after photos of Bonds, early in his career and late in his career, have led most fans to conclude that he must have used steroids to achieve such startling changes in his physique.
The Power Age
in New York was built to favor teams built on pitching, defense, and speed.]]
While the introduction of steroids certainly increased the power production of greats, there were other factors that drastically increased the power surge after 1994. The factors cited are: smaller sized ballparks than in the past, the "juiced balls" theory claiming that the balls are wound tighter thus travel further following contact with the bat, and "watered down pitching" implying that lesser quality pitchers are up in the Major Leagues due to too many teams. Albeit these factors did play a large role in increasing home run thus scoring totals during this time, others that directly impact ballplayers have an equally important role. As noted earlier, one of those factors is the use of anabolic steroids for increasing muscle mass, which enables hitters to not only hit "mistake" pitches farther, but it also confers faster bat speed, giving hitters a fraction of a second more to adjust to "good" pitches such as a well-placed fastball, slider, changeup, or curveball. A more innocent, but also meaningful factor is better nutrition, as well as scientific training methods and advanced training facilities/equipment which can work without steroids to produce a more potent ballplayer.
In today's baseball age, players routinely reach 40 and 50 home runs in a season, a feat that was rare as recently as the 1980s. On the other hand, since the end of the steroid era, the emphasis on swinging for home runs has been accompanied by hitting in general falling off, with batting averages trending downwards towards 1960s levels and strikeouts reaching all-time highs: each of the eleven seasons from 2006 through 2016 broke the preceding MLB-total record for strikeouts.
Many modern baseball theorists believe that a new pitch will swing the balance of power back to the pitcher. A pitching revolution would not be unprecedented—several pitches have changed the game of baseball in the past, including the slider in the 1950s and 1960s and the split-fingered fastball in the 1970s to 1990s. Since the 1990s, the changeup has made a resurgence, being thrown masterfully by pitchers such as Tim Lincecum, Pedro Martínez, Trevor Hoffman, Greg Maddux, Matt Cain, Tom Glavine, Johan Santana, Marco Estrada, Justin Verlander, and Cole Hamels. Every so often, the time-honored knuckleball puts in another appearance to bedevil batters; pitchers like Phil Niekro, Jesse Haines, and Hoyt Wilhelm have made the Hall of Fame throwing knuckleballs.
Popularity in recent decades
, which counts down from a maximum of 18 seconds.]]
Baseball declined in popularity throughout the turn of the 21st century as other sports grew with the help of television broadcasting. Another factor in baseball's decline is that MLB games ended up being about 30 minutes longer on average since the 1960s. To combat this problem, MLB instituted the pitch clock, which forces pitchers to throw within a given time limit, in 2023 to make games end quicker. 62% of fans expressed support for the change during that year's season.
Banana Ball, an exhibition-style professional baseball league, has also made modifications to baseball to speed up the game, and has seen rising popularity as well. Summary of modern-era major league teams Note: The team names listed below are those currently in use. Some of the franchises have changed their names in the past, in some cases more than once. In the early years of the 20th century, many teams did not have official names, and were referred to by their league and city, or by nicknames created by sportswriters.
*1876 – National League is established
*1900 – National League "Classic Eight" lineup of teams is established: Chicago Cubs, Boston Braves, Brooklyn Dodgers, New York Giants, Philadelphia Phillies, Pittsburgh Pirates, Cincinnati Reds, and St. Louis Cardinals
*1901 – American League is established with eight teams: Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Guardians, Detroit Tigers, Philadelphia Athletics, Washington Senators, Milwaukee Brewers, and Baltimore Orioles
*1902 – Milwaukee Brewers move to St. Louis and become the Browns
*1903 – Baltimore Orioles move to New York and become the Yankees
*1953 – Boston Braves move to Milwaukee
*1954 – St. Louis Browns move to Baltimore and become the Orioles
*1955 – Philadelphia Athletics move to Kansas City
*1958 – New York Giants move to San Francisco; Brooklyn Dodgers move to Los Angeles
*1961 – Washington Senators move to Minneapolis–Saint Paul and become the Minnesota Twins; new Washington Senators (AL) and Los Angeles Angels (AL) created as expansion teams
*1962 – Houston Astros (NL) and New York Mets (NL) created as expansion teams
*1966 – Milwaukee Braves move to Atlanta
*1968 – Kansas City Athletics move to Oakland
*1969 – San Diego Padres (NL), Montreal Expos (NL), Kansas City Royals (AL), and Seattle Pilots (AL) created as expansion teams
*1970 – Seattle Pilots move to Milwaukee and become the Brewers
*1972 – Washington Senators move to Dallas–Fort Worth and become the Texas Rangers
*1977 – Seattle Mariners (AL) and Toronto Blue Jays (AL) created as expansion teams
*1993 – Colorado Rockies (NL) and Miami Marlins (NL) created as expansion teams
*1998 – Arizona Diamondbacks (NL) and Tampa Bay Rays (AL) created as expansion teams; Milwaukee Brewers switch from AL to NL
*2005 – Montreal Expos move to Washington and become the Nationals
*2013 – Houston Astros switch from NL to AL
*2025 – Oakland Athletics move to Sacramento
See also
* Fantography
* Timeline of Major League Baseball
* History of baseball outside the United States
* Variations of baseball#History
References
Further reading
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* Pepe, Phil. (2005). ''Catfish, Yaz, and Hammerin' Hank: The Unforgettable Era That Transformed Baseball''. Chicago, Triumph Books.
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* External links
* [https://www.facebook.com/baseballhistoryshorts/ A History of How the Game Has Changed]
* [http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/spaldinghtml/spaldinghome.html Library of Congress: Spalding Base Ball Guides, 1889–1939]
* [http://www.cycleback.com/museumbb.html Cycleback's Online Museum of Early Baseball Memorabilia]
* [http://www.seth.com/coll_histbseballs_tn.html Seth Swirsky's Baseball Memorabilia Collection]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170708154733/http://www.mcfarlandbooks.com/customers/journals/base-ball-a-journal-of-the-early-game/ Base Ball: A Journal of the Early Game] (archived 8 July 2017)
* [http://sabr.org/content/baseball-research-journal-archives/ Baseball Research Journal Archives]
Category:History of baseball
Category:History of the United States by topic | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_baseball_in_the_United_States | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.640238 |
3858 | Major League Baseball Most Valuable Player Award | The Major League Baseball Most Valuable Player Award (MVP) is an annual Major League Baseball (MLB) award given to one outstanding player in the American League and one in the National League. The award has been presented by the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) since 1931.
History
Since 1931, the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) has bestowed a most valuable player award to a player in the National League and a player in the American League. Before 1931, two similar awards were issued: the League Award was issued during 1922–1928 in the American League and during 1924–1929 in the National League. During 1911–1914, the Chalmers Award was issued to a player in each league. Criteria and a list of winners for these two earlier awards are detailed in below sections.
MVP voting takes place before the postseason, but the results are not announced until after the World Series. The BBWAA began by polling three writers in each league city in 1938, reducing that number to two per league city in 1961. The BBWAA does not offer a clear-cut definition of what "most valuable" means, instead leaving the judgment to the individual voters.
In 1944, the award was named after Kenesaw Mountain Landis, the first Commissioner of Baseball, who served from 1920 until his death on November 25, 1944. Formally named the Kenesaw Mountain Landis Memorial Baseball Award, that naming appeared on a plaque given to winning players. Starting in 2020, Landis' name no longer appears on the MVP plaque, after the BBWAA received complaints from several former MVP winners about Landis' role against the integration of MLB.
First basemen, with 35 winners, have won the most MVPs among infielders, followed by second basemen (16), third basemen (15), and shortstops (15). Of the 25 pitchers who have won the award, 15 are right-handed while 10 are left-handed. Walter Johnson, Carl Hubbell, and Hal Newhouser are the only pitchers who have won multiple times, with Newhouser winning consecutively in 1944 and 1945.
Hank Greenberg, Stan Musial, Alex Rodriguez, and Robin Yount have won at different positions, Rodriguez and Andre Dawson are the only players to win the award while on a last-place team, the 2003 Texas Rangers and 1987 Chicago Cubs, respectively. Barry Bonds has won the most often (seven times) and the most consecutively (four from 2001 to 2004). Jimmie Foxx was the first player to win multiple times. Ten players have won three times, and 19 have won twice. Frank Robinson and Shohei Ohtani are the only players to win the award in both the American and National Leagues, with Ohtani being the first to win in both leagues in consecutive seasons.
The award's only tie occurred in the National League in 1979, when Keith Hernandez and Willie Stargell received an equal number of points. There have been 23 unanimous winners, who received all the first-place votes. and in 2023, he became the first player in MLB history to win MVP by unanimous vote twice. Since the creation of the Cy Young Award in 1956, he is the only pitcher to win an MVP award without winning a Cy Young in the same year (Don Newcombe, Sandy Koufax, Bob Gibson, Denny McLain, Vida Blue, Rollie Fingers, Willie Hernández, Roger Clemens, Dennis Eckersley, Verlander, and Kershaw all won a Cy Young award in their MVP seasons). Ohtani is also the only MVP winner to have played most of his games as a designated hitter (DH), a position that normally does not contribute on defense. In 2024, after winning his third career unanimous MVP award, Ohtani became the first MVP winner to have played exclusively as a DH in a season. To date, Ohtani is the only player to win both the MVP and the Edgar Martínez Award, an award given to the most outstanding DH in a season.
There was no award given by either league in 1930, which meant that one of the single greatest performances ever went unheralded when Hack Wilson of the Chicago Cubs set the current MLB record for RBI with 191. He also batted .356 and set the NL record with 56 HRs, a record which stood for 68 years until Mark McGwire (70) and Sammy Sosa (66) both eclipsed him.Key{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders"
|-
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|Year
|Links to the article about the corresponding Major League Baseball season
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|
|Member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame as a player
|-
!scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#cfecec;"|^
|Player is still active
|-
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|§
|Unanimous selection Ty Cobb and Nap Lajoie of the Cleveland Indians. On the last day of the season, Lajoie overtook Cobb's batting average with seven bunt hits against the St. Louis Browns. American League President Ban Johnson said a recalculation showed that Cobb had won the race anyway, and Chalmers ended up awarding cars to both players.
|-
|
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|Boston Red Sox || OF
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|
| || 2B ||
|-
|
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
| || RHP
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|
|Brooklyn Superbas || 1B ||
|-
|
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
| || 2B
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
| || 2B ||
|}
League Awards (1922–1929)
In 1922, the American League created a new award to honor "the baseball player who is of the greatest all-around service to his club." Winners, voted on by a committee of eight baseball writers chaired by James Crusinberry, received a bronze medal and a cash prize. Voters were required to select one player from each team, and player-coaches and prior award winners were ineligible. Famously, these criteria resulted in Babe Ruth winning only a single MVP award before it was dropped after 1928. The National League award, without these restrictions, lasted from 1924 to 1929.
|-
|
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|New York Yankees || OF
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|—
| || ||
|-
|
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|Washington Senators || RHP
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
| || RHP ||
|-
|
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|
|Washington Senators || SS
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|St. Louis Cardinals || 2B ||
|-
|
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|
|Cleveland Indians || 1B
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|
|St. Louis Cardinals || C ||
|-
|
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|New York Yankees || 1B
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|Pittsburgh Pirates || OF ||
|-
|
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
| || C
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|St. Louis Cardinals || 1B ||
|-
|
!scope"row" style"text-align:center"|—
| ||
! scope"row" style"text-align:center; background:#ffb;"|}}
|Chicago Cubs || 2B ||
|}
BBWAA Most Valuable Player (1931–present)
The Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) was first awarded the modern MVP after the 1931 season, adopting the format the National League used to distribute its league award. One writer in each city with a team filled out a ten-place ballot, with ten points for the recipient of a first-place vote, nine for a second-place vote, and so on. In 1938, the BBWAA raised the number of voters to three per city and gave 14 points for a first-place vote. The only significant change since then occurred in 1961 when the number of voters was reduced to two per league city.
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || || 1B|| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Philadelphia Phillies || OF ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Philadelphia Athletics || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || * || LHP ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Detroit Tigers* || C || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || St. Louis Cardinals* || RHP ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> || Detroit Tigers* || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Chicago Cubs* || C ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || New York Yankees* || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> (2) || New York Giants* || LHP ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Detroit Tigers || 2B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || St. Louis Cardinals || OF ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (3) || Boston Red Sox || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Cincinnati Reds || C ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || New York Yankees* || OF || || Cincinnati Reds* || RHP ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Detroit Tigers* || OF || || Cincinnati Reds* || 1B ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || New York Yankees* || OF || || * || 1B ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || New York Yankees* || 2B || || St. Louis Cardinals* || RHP ||
|-
||| || New York Yankees* || RHP || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || St. Louis Cardinals* || OF ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Detroit Tigers || LHP || || St. Louis Cardinals* || SS ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Detroit Tigers* || LHP || || Chicago Cubs* || 1B ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Boston Red Sox* || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || St. Louis Cardinals* || 1B ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (3) || New York Yankees* || OF || || || 3B ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Cleveland Indians* || SS || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (3) || St. Louis Cardinals || OF ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Boston Red Sox || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Brooklyn Dodgers* || 2B ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || New York Yankees* || SS || || Philadelphia Phillies* || RHP ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || New York Yankees* || C || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Brooklyn Dodgers || C ||
|-
| || || || LHP || || Chicago Cubs || OF ||
|-
||| <sup>§</sup> || Cleveland Indians || 3B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Brooklyn Dodgers* || C ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || New York Yankees || C || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || New York Giants* || OF ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (3) || New York Yankees* || C || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (3) || Brooklyn Dodgers* || C ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> || New York Yankees* || OF || || Brooklyn Dodgers* || RHP ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || New York Yankees* || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || * || OF ||
|-
||| || Boston Red Sox || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Chicago Cubs || SS ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"|<sup>†</sup> || Chicago White Sox* || 2B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Chicago Cubs || SS ||
|-
||| || New York Yankees* || OF || || Pittsburgh Pirates* || SS ||
|-
||| (2) || New York Yankees* || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Cincinnati Reds* || OF ||
|-
||| style"background:#ffb;"|<sup>†</sup> (3) || New York Yankees* || OF || || Los Angeles Dodgers || SS ||
|-
| || || New York Yankees* || C || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Los Angeles Dodgers* || LHP ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Baltimore Orioles || 3B || || St. Louis Cardinals* || 3B ||
|-
| || || Minnesota Twins* || SS || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2)|| San Francisco Giants || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> (2) || Baltimore Orioles* || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Pittsburgh Pirates || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Boston Red Sox* || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> || St. Louis Cardinals* || 1B ||
|-
| || <sup>§</sup> || Detroit Tigers* || RHP || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || St. Louis Cardinals* || RHP ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Minnesota Twins || 3B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || San Francisco Giants || 1B ||
|-
| || || Baltimore Orioles* || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Cincinnati Reds* || C ||
|-
| ||| || Oakland Athletics || LHP || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || St. Louis Cardinals || 3B ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Chicago White Sox || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Cincinnati Reds* || C ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> || Oakland Athletics* || OF || || Cincinnati Reds || OF ||
|-
| ||| || Texas Rangers || OF || || Los Angeles Dodgers* || 1B ||
|-
| || || Boston Red Sox* || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Cincinnati Reds* || 2B ||
|-
| || || New York Yankees* || C || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Cincinnati Reds* || 2B ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Minnesota Twins || 1B || || Cincinnati Reds || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Boston Red Sox || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Pittsburgh Pirates || OF ||
|-
|rowspan"2"| ||rowspan"2"| ||rowspan"2"| ||rowspan"2"| LF/DH || || St. Louis Cardinals || 1B ||rowspan"2"|
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Milwaukee Brewers || RHP || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Philadelphia Phillies || 3B ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Milwaukee Brewers* || SS || || Atlanta Braves || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Baltimore Orioles* || SS || (2) || Atlanta Braves || OF ||
|-
| || || Detroit Tigers* || LHP || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Chicago Cubs || 2B ||
|-
| || || New York Yankees || 1B || || St. Louis Cardinals* || OF ||
|-
| || || Boston Red Sox* || RHP || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (3) || Philadelphia Phillies || 3B ||
|-
| || || Toronto Blue Jays || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Chicago Cubs || OF ||
|-
| || <sup>§</sup> || Oakland Athletics* || OF || || Los Angeles Dodgers* || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Milwaukee Brewers || OF || || San Francisco Giants* || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Oakland Athletics* || OF || || Pittsburgh Pirates || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Baltimore Orioles || SS || || Atlanta Braves* || 3B ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Oakland Athletics || RHP || (2) || Pittsburgh Pirates || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> || Chicago White Sox || 1B || (3) || San Francisco Giants || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> (2) || Chicago White Sox || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> || Houston Astros || 1B ||
|-
| || || Boston Red Sox || 1B || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Cincinnati Reds || SS ||
|-
| || || Texas Rangers || OF || <sup>§</sup> || San Diego Padres || 3B ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†§</sup> || Seattle Mariners || OF || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Colorado Rockies || OF ||
|-
| || (2) || Texas Rangers || OF || || Chicago Cubs || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Texas Rangers || C || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Atlanta Braves* || 3B ||
|-
| || || Oakland Athletics || 1B || || San Francisco Giants || 2B ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Seattle Mariners || OF || (4) || San Francisco Giants || OF ||
|-
| ||| || Oakland Athletics || SS || <sup>§</sup> (5) || San Francisco Giants* || OF ||
|-
| ||| || Texas Rangers || SS || (6) || San Francisco Giants || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || || OF || (7) || San Francisco Giants || OF ||
|-
| ||| (2) || New York Yankees || 3B || || St. Louis Cardinals || 1B ||
|-
| || || Minnesota Twins || 1B || | || Philadelphia Phillies || 1B ||
|-
| ||| (3) || New York Yankees || 3B || || Philadelphia Phillies || SS ||
|-
| ||| || Boston Red Sox || 2B || (2) || St. Louis Cardinals || 1B ||
|-
| || style"background:#ffb;"| <sup>†</sup> || Minnesota Twins || C || <sup>§</sup> (3) || St. Louis Cardinals || 1B ||
|-
| || || Texas Rangers* || OF ||| || Cincinnati Reds || 1B ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"| <sup>^</sup> || Detroit Tigers || RHP ||| || Milwaukee Brewers || OF ||
|-
| || || Detroit Tigers* || 3B ||| || San Francisco Giants* || C ||
|-
| || (2) || Detroit Tigers || 3B || style"background:#cfecec;"| <sup>^</sup> || Pittsburgh Pirates || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"| <sup>^§</sup> || Los Angeles Angels || OF || style"background:#cfecec;"| <sup>^</sup> || Los Angeles Dodgers || LHP ||
|-
| || || Toronto Blue Jays || 3B || style"background:#cfecec;"| <sup>^§</sup> || Washington Nationals || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"| <sup>^</sup> (2) || Los Angeles Angels || OF || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup> || Chicago Cubs* || 3B/OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup>|| Houston Astros* || 2B ||style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup>|| Miami Marlins || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup>|| Boston Red Sox* ||OF|| style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup>|| Milwaukee Brewers || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup> (3) ||Los Angeles Angels || OF || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup>|| Los Angeles Dodgers || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup> ||Chicago White Sox || 1B || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup>|| Atlanta Braves || 1B ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^§</sup> ||Los Angeles Angels || RHP/DH || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup> (2) || Philadelphia Phillies || OF ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^</sup>|| New York Yankees || OF || style"background:#cfecec;"| <sup>^</sup> || St. Louis Cardinals || 1B ||
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^§</sup>(2) || Los Angeles Angels || RHP/DH || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^§</sup>|| Atlanta Braves||OF
|
|-
| || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^§</sup>(2) || New York Yankees* || OF || style"background:#cfecec;"|<sup>^§</sup>(3) || Los Angeles Dodgers* || DH
|
|}
Wins by team
{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Teams !!Awards !!Years
|-
|New York Yankees
|24
|1923, 1927, 1936, 1939, 1941–1943, 1947, 1950, 1951, 1954–1957, 1960–1963, 1976, 1985, 2005, 2007, 2022, 2024
|-
|St. Louis Cardinals
|21
|1925, 1926, 1928, 1931, 1934, 1937, 1942–1944, 1946, 1948, 1964, 1967, 1968, 1971, 1979, 1985, 2005, 2008, 2009, 2022
|-
|Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers
|15
|1913, 1924, 1941, 1949, 1951, 1953, 1955, 1956, 1962, 1963, 1974, 1988, 2014, 2019, 2024
|-
|New York/San Francisco Giants
|14
|1912, 1933, 1936, 1954, 1965, 1969, 1989, 1993, 2000–2004, 2012
|-
|Philadelphia/Oakland Athletics
|13
|1914, 1928, 1931–1933, 1952, 1971, 1973, 1988, 1990, 1992, 2000, 2002
|-
|Cincinnati Reds
|rowspan=3|12
|1938–1940, 1961, 1970, 1972, 1973, 1975–1977, 1995, 2010
|-
|Detroit Tigers
| 1911, 1934, 1935, 1937, 1940, 1944, 1945, 1968, 1984, 2011–2013
|-
|Boston Red Sox
|1912, 1938, 1946, 1949, 1958, 1967, 1975, 1978, 1986, 1995, 2008, 2018
|-
|Chicago Cubs
|11
|1911, 1929, 1935, 1945, 1952, 1958, 1959, 1984, 1987, 1998, 2016
|-
|Boston/Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves
|9
|1914, 1947, 1957, 1982, 1983, 1991, 1999, 2020, 2023
|-
|Washington Senators/Minnesota Twins
| rowspan="3" |8
|1913, 1924, 1925, 1965, 1969, 1977, 2006, 2009
|-
|Pittsburgh Pirates
|1927, 1960, 1966, 1978, 1979, 1990, 1992, 2013
|-
|Philadelphia Phillies
|1932, 1950, 1980, 1981, 1986, 2006, 2007, 2021
|-
|California/Anaheim/Los Angeles Angels
|7
|1979, 2004, 2014, 2016, 2019, 2021, 2023
|-
|Baltimore Orioles/St. Louis Browns
| rowspan="2" |6
|1922, 1964, 1966, 1970, 1983, 1991
|-
|Texas Rangers
|1974, 1996, 1998, 1999, 2003, 2010
|-
|Milwaukee Brewers
| rowspan="2" |5
|1981, 1982, 1989, 2011, 2018
|-
|Chicago White Sox
|1959, 1972, 1993, 1994, 2020
|-
|Cleveland Indians / Guardians
|3
|1926, 1948, 1953
|-
|Seattle Mariners
|rowspan=3|2
|1997, 2001
|-
|Toronto Blue Jays
|1987, 2015
|-
|Houston Astros
|1994, 2017
|-
|Kansas City Royals
|rowspan=5|1
|1980
|-
|San Diego Padres
|1996
|-
|Colorado Rockies
|1997
|-
|Washington Nationals
|2015
|-
|Miami Marlins
|2017
|-
|Arizona Diamondbacks
|rowspan=3|0
|none
|-
|New York Mets
|none
|-
|Tampa Bay Rays
|none
|}
Multiple MVP Winners
{| class="wikitable"
|-
|Barry Bonds (7)
|-
|Yogi Berra (3)
|-
|Roy Campanella (3)
|-
|Joe DiMaggio (3)
|-
|Jimmie Foxx (3)
|-
|Mickey Mantle (3)
|-
|Stan Musial (3)
|-
|Shohei Ohtani (3)
|-
|Albert Pujols (3)
|-
|Alex Rodriguez (3)
|-
|Mike Schmidt (3)
|-
|Mike Trout (3)
|-
|Ernie Banks (2)
|-
|Johnny Bench (2)
|-
|Miguel Cabrera (2)
|-
|Mickey Cochrane (2)
|-
|Lou Gehrig (2)
|-
|Juan González (2)
|-
|Hank Greenberg (2)
|-
|Bryce Harper (2)
|-
|Rogers Hornsby (2)
|-
|Carl Hubbell (2)
|-
|Walter Johnson (2)
|-
|Aaron Judge (2)
|-
|Roger Maris (2)
|-
|Willie Mays (2)
|-
|Joe Morgan (2)
|-
|Dale Murphy (2)
|-
|Hal Newhouser (2)
|-
|Cal Ripken Jr. (2)
|-
|Frank Robinson (2)
|-
|Frank Thomas (2)
|-
|Ted Williams (2)
|-
|Robin Yount (2)
See also
*"Players Choice Awards" Player of the Year (in MLB; all positions) (there are also Outstanding Player and Outstanding Pitcher awards (in each league))
*Baseball America Major League Player of the Year (in MLB; all positions)
*Baseball Digest Player of the Year (in MLB; position players only; from 1969 to 1993, included all positions; in 1994, a separate Pitcher of the Year award was added)
*Best Major League Baseball Player ESPY Award (in MLB; all positions)
*"GIBBY/Esurance MLB Awards" Best Major Leaguer (in MLB; all positions) (there are also Best Hitter and Best Pitcher awards) (discontinued in 2017)
*The Sporting News Most Valuable Player Award (in each league) (discontinued in 1946)
*The Sporting News Player of the Year (in MLB; position players only)
*List of Major League Baseball awards
*Baseball awards
Notes
* A player is considered inactive if he has announced his retirement or has not played for a full season.
* A unanimous victory indicates that the player received all possible first-place votes.
* Torre is a member of the Hall of Fame, but not as a player. He was inducted in as a manager.
* Hernandez and Stargell both received 216 points in the 1979 voting.<ref name"1979 awards"/>ReferencesExternal links
*[https://www.baseball-reference.com/awards/mvp_cya.shtml Most Valuable Player MVP Awards & Cy Young Awards Winners] (1911–present) (and "Multiple Winners of the MVP and Cy Young Awards"). Baseball Reference. Retrieved 2016-11-07.
Category:Major League Baseball most valuable player awards
Most Valuable Player Award
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
Category:Awards established in 1931 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_Most_Valuable_Player_Award | 2025-04-05T18:26:35.739323 |
3859 | Major League Baseball Rookie of the Year Award | In Major League Baseball, the Rookie of the Year Award is given annually to two outstanding rookie players, one each for the American League (AL) and National League (NL), as voted on by the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA). The award was established in 1940 by the Chicago chapter of the BBWAA, which selected an annual winner from 1940 through 1946. The award became national in 1947; Jackie Robinson, the Brooklyn Dodgers' second baseman, won the inaugural award. One award was presented for all of MLB in 1947 and 1948; since 1949, the honor has been given to one player each in the NL and AL. Originally, the award was known as the J. Louis Comiskey Memorial Award, named after the Chicago White Sox owner of the 1930s. The award was renamed the Jackie Robinson Award in July 1987, 40 years after Robinson broke the baseball color line.
Nineteen players have been elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame—Robinson, seven AL players, and eleven others from the NL. The award has been shared twice: once by Butch Metzger and Pat Zachry of the NL in 1976; and once by John Castino and Alfredo Griffin of the AL in 1979. Members of the Brooklyn and Los Angeles Dodgers have won the most awards of any franchise (with 18). Fred Lynn and Ichiro Suzuki are the only two players who have been named Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player in the same year, and Fernando Valenzuela is the only player to have won Rookie of the Year and the Cy Young Award in the same year. Sam Jethroe is the oldest player to have won the award, at age 32, 33 days older than 2000 winner Kazuhiro Sasaki (also 32). Luis Gil of the New York Yankees and Paul Skenes of the Pittsburgh Pirates are the most recent winners.
Qualifications and voting
thumb|right|200px|alt=A man stretches his arms behind his head while wearing a baseball glove and a white baseball uniform with green sleeves and cap.|Hideo Nomo won in 1995, the first of several players to win with past professional baseball experience in Nippon Professional Baseball.
From 1947 through 1956, each BBWAA voter used discretion as to who qualified as a rookie. In 1957, the term was first defined as someone with fewer than 75 at-bats or 45 innings pitched in any previous Major League season.
Since 1980, each voter names three rookies: a first-place choice is given five points, a second-place choice three points, and a third-place choice one point. The award goes to the player who receives the most overall points. Edinson Vólquez received three second-place votes in 2008 balloting despite no longer being a rookie under the award's definition.
The award has drawn criticism in recent years because several players with experience in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) have won the award, such as Hideo Nomo in 1995, Kazuhiro Sasaki in 2000, Ichiro Suzuki in 2001, and Shohei Ohtani in 2018. The current definition of rookie status for the award is based only on Major League experience, but some feel that past NPB players are not true rookies because of their past professional experience. Others, however, believe it should make no difference since the first recipient and the award's namesake played for the Negro leagues before his MLB career and thus could also not be considered a "true rookie". This issue arose in 2003 when Hideki Matsui narrowly lost the AL award to Ángel Berroa. Jim Souhan of the Minneapolis Star Tribune said he did not see Matsui as a rookie in 2003 because "it would be an insult to the Japanese league to pretend that experience didn't count." Boston Braves SS.322 batting average
3 home runs
48 runs batted in
American League winners (1949–present)
thumb|right|200px|Luis Gil, 2024 AL winner
YearPlayerTeamPosition Selected statistics RefSt. Louis BrownsOF.306 batting average
16 home runs
91 runs batted inBoston Red Sox1B.322 batting average
34 home runs
144 runs batted inNew York Yankees3B.306 batting average
14 home runs
63 runs batted inP3.31 earned run average
15 complete games
15–15 record in 37 appearances (28 games started)Detroit TigersSS.308 batting average
94 runs scored
209 hitsNew York YankeesP3.26 earned run average
199 innings pitched
20–6 record in 37 appearances (20 games started)Cleveland IndiansP2.85 earned run average
innings pitched
16–10 record in 32 games started†Chicago White SoxSS.266 batting average
21 stolen bases
69 runs scoredNew York YankeesSS.297 batting average
56 runs scored
39 runs batted inWashington SenatorsOF.275 batting average
3 home runs
63 runs scoredWashington SenatorsOF.261 batting average
30 home runs
85 runs batted inBaltimore OriolesSS.255 batting average
22 home runs
86 runs batted inBoston Red SoxP3.22 earned run average
innings pitched
15–7 record in 25 games startedNew York YankeesSS.286 batting average
20 home runs
93 runs batted inChicago White SoxP2.33 earned run average
243 innings pitched
19–8 record in 41 appearances (30 games started)†Minnesota TwinsOF.323 batting average
32 home runs
94 runs batted inBaltimore OriolesOF.260 batting average
22 home runs
70 runs batted inChicago White SoxOF.273 batting average
44 stolen bases
98 runs scored
29.3 Power-Speed #+†Minnesota Twins2B.292 batting average
8 home runs
66 runs scoredNew York YankeesP2.05 earned run average
innings pitched
17–12 record in 34 games startedKansas City RoyalsOF.282 batting average
11 home runs
68 runs batted inNew York YankeesC.302 batting average
53 runs batted in
52% caught stealing percentage in the fieldCleveland Indians1B.275 batting average
9 home runs
48 runs batted in†§Boston Red SoxC.293 batting average
22 home runs
61 runs batted inBaltimore OriolesOF.337 batting average
11 triples
73 runs scoredTexas Rangers1B.323 batting average
.395 on-base percentage
66 runs batted inBoston Red SoxOF.331 batting average
47 doubles
105 runs batted inDetroit TigersP2.34 earned run average
24 complete games
19–9 record in 29 games started†Baltimore OriolesDH.283 batting average
27 home runs
88 runs batted inDetroit Tigers2B.285 batting average
3 home runs
58 runs batted in*Minnesota Twins3B.285 batting average
8 triples
52 runs batted inToronto Blue JaysSS.287 batting average
10 triples
81 runs scoredCleveland IndiansOF.289 batting average
23 home runs
87 runs batted inNew York YankeesP2.05 earned run average
innings pitched
8–4 record in 15 games started†Baltimore OriolesSS.264 batting average
28 home runs
93 runs batted inChicago White SoxOF.254 batting average
35 home runs
100 runs batted inSeattle Mariners1B.284 batting average
27 home runs
116 runs batted inChicago White SoxSS.273 batting average
9 triples
71 runs scoredOakland AthleticsOF.240 batting average
33 home runs
117 runs batted in§Oakland Athletics1B.289 batting average
49 home runs
118 runs batted inOakland AthleticsSS.250 batting average
3 home runs
39 runs batted inBaltimore OriolesP1.69 earned run average
85 innings pitched
27 saves§Cleveland IndiansC.290 batting average
9 home runs
66 runs batted inMinnesota Twins2B.281 batting average
25 stolen bases
78 runs scoredMilwaukee BrewersSS.290 batting average
54 stolen bases
93 runs scored§OF.283 batting average
31 home runs
95 runs batted inKansas City RoyalsDH.282 batting average
24 home runs
65 runs batted inMinnesota TwinsOF.277 batting average
24 home runs
84 runs batted in†§New York YankeesSS.314 batting average
10 home runs
104 runs scored§Boston Red SoxSS.306 batting average
30 home runs
122 runs scoredOakland AthleticsOF.288 batting average
18 home runs
89 runs batted inKansas City RoyalsOF.293 batting average
22 home runs
108 runs batted inSeattle MarinersP3.16 earned run average
78 strikeouts
37 saves†Seattle MarinersOF.350 batting average
56 stolen bases+
242 Hits+
127 runs scoredToronto Blue Jays3B.279 batting average
24 home runs
84 runs batted inKansas City RoyalsSS.287 batting average
21 stolen bases
92 runs scoredOakland AthleticsSS.239 batting average
22 home runs
64 runs batted inOakland AthleticsP1.72 earned run average
innings pitched
23 saves^Detroit TigersP
3.63 earned run average
186 innings pitched
17–9 record in 30 games startedBoston Red Sox2B
.317 batting average
39 doubles
86 runs scored§Tampa Bay Rays3B.272 batting average
27 home runs
85 runs batted inOakland AthleticsP1.84 earned run average
innings pitched
26 savesTexas RangersP2.73 earned run average
innings pitched
40 savesTampa Bay RaysP2.95 earned run average
117 strikeouts
13–10 record in 29 games started^§Los Angeles AngelsOF.326 batting average
30 home runs
129 runs scored
49 stolen bases^Tampa Bay RaysOF.293 batting average
13 home runs
53 runs batted in^§Chicago White Sox1B.317 batting average
36 home runs
107 runs batted in^Houston AstrosSS.279 batting average
22 home runs
68 runs batted in^Detroit TigersP3.06 earned run average
132 strikeouts
11–7 record in 26 games started^§New York YankeesOF.284 batting average
52 home runs
114 runs batted in
128 runs scored^Los Angeles AngelsP/DH.285 batting average
22 home runs
4–2 record in 11 games started
63 strikeouts^§Houston AstrosDH/OF.313 batting average
27 home runs
78 runs batted in
58 runs scored^§Seattle MarinersOF.267 batting average
11 home runs
28 runs batted in
37 runs scored^Tampa Bay RaysOF.274 batting average
20 home runs
69 runs batted in
94 runs scored^Seattle MarinersOF.284 batting average
28 home runs
25 stolen bases
75 runs batted in
84 runs scored^§Baltimore OriolesSS/3B.255 batting average
28 home runs
82 runs batted in
100 runs scored^New York YankeesP3.50 earned run average
171 strikeouts
15–7 record in 29 games started
National League winners (1949–present)
thumb|right|200px|Paul Skenes, 2024 NL winner
YearPlayerTeamPosition Selected statistics RefP
3.17 earned run average
5 shutouts
17–8 record in 31 games startedOF
.273 batting average
35 stolen bases
100 runs scored†OF
.274 batting average
20 home runs
68 runs batted inP
2.15 earned run average
15 saves
15–4 record in 56 appearances2B
.278 batting average
17 triples
125 runs scoredSt. Louis CardinalsOF
.304 batting average
12 home runs
106 runs scoredSt. Louis CardinalsOF
.281 batting average
17 home runs
68 runs batted in†§Cincinnati RedsOF
.290 batting average
38 home runs
122 runs scoredPhiladelphia PhilliesP
3.08 earned run average
188 strikeouts
19–8 record in 33 games started†§San Francisco Giants1B
.312 batting average
25 home runs
96 runs batted in†§San Francisco Giants1B
.354 batting average
13 home runs
38 runs batted inLos Angeles DodgersOF
.268 batting average
23 home runs
77 runs batted in†Chicago CubsOF
.278 batting average
25 home runs
86 runs batted inChicago Cubs2B
.260 batting average
90 runs scored
Gold Glove AwardCincinnati Reds2B
.273 batting average
9 triples
101 runs scored†Philadelphia Phillies3B
.318 batting average
13 triples
125 runs scoredLos Angeles Dodgers2B
.250 batting average
12 home runs
69 runs batted inCincinnati Reds2B
.284 batting average
9 home runs
72 runs scored†New York MetsP
2.76 earned run average
251 innings pitched
16–13 record in 34 games started†Cincinnati RedsC
.275 batting average
15 home runs
82 runs batted inLos Angeles Dodgers2B
.271 batting average
4 home runs
69 runs scoredMontreal ExposP
3.60 earned run average
innings pitched
18–11 record in 43 appearances (37 games started)Atlanta BravesC
.260 batting average
33 home runs
87 runs batted inNew York MetsP
2.32 earned run average
244 innings pitched
15–10 record in 32 games startedSan Francisco GiantsOF
.300 batting average
12 home runs
74 runs scoredSt. Louis CardinalsOF
.309 batting average
30 stolen bases
81 runs scoredSan Francisco GiantsP
2.88 earned run average
215 strikeouts
15–9 record on 34 games started*San Diego PadresP
2.92 earned run average
16 saves
11–4 record in 77 appearancesCincinnati RedsP
2.74 earned run average
204 innings pitched
14–7 record in 38 appearances (28 games started)†Montreal ExposOF
.282 batting average
19 home runs
65 runs batted inAtlanta Braves3B.266 batting average
23 home runs
63 runs batted inLos Angeles DodgersP3.46 earned run average
242 innings pitched
17–10 record in 39 appearances (30 games started)Los Angeles DodgersP2.66 earned run average
innings pitched
17 savesLos Angeles DodgersP
2.48 earned run average
8 shutouts
13–7 record in 25 games startedLos Angeles Dodgers2B.282 batting average
49 stolen bases
88 runs scoredNew York MetsOF.257 batting average
26 home runs
74 runs batted inNew York MetsP2.60 earned run average
276 strikeouts+
17–9 record in 31 games started
218 innings pitched
7 Complete Games/3 Shutouts
1.073 WHIP+
1.69 FIP+§St. Louis CardinalsOF.267 batting average
110 stolen bases+
107 runs scoredSt. Louis CardinalsP2.08 earned run average
innings pitched
36 saves§San Diego PadresC.300 batting average
18 home runs
79 runs batted inCincinnati Reds3B.271 batting average
46 stolen bases
74 runs scoredChicago CubsOF.293 batting average
24 stolen bases
64 runs scoredAtlanta BravesOF.282 batting average
28 home runs
78 runs batted in †Houston Astros1B.294 batting average
15 home runs
82 runs batted inLos Angeles Dodgers1B.257 batting average
20 home runs
88 runs batted in †§Los Angeles DodgersC.318 batting average
35 home runs
112 runs batted in§Los Angeles DodgersOF.306 batting average
16 home runs
56 runs batted inLos Angeles DodgersP2.54 earned run average
236 strikeouts
13–6 record in 28 games startedLos Angeles DodgersOF.291 batting average
12 home runs
59 runs batted in†§Philadelphia Phillies3B
.283 batting average
21 home runs
92 runs batted inChicago CubsP3.40 earned run average
233 strikeouts
13–6 record in 26 games startedCincinnati RedsP2.41 earned run average
19 saves
12–7 record in 62 appearancesAtlanta BravesSS.295 batting average
40 stolen bases
87 runs scored§St. Louis Cardinals3B.329 batting average
37 home runs
130 runs batted inColorado RockiesP4.52 earned run average
innings pitched
16–8 record in 32 games startedFlorida MarlinsP3.30 earned run average
innings pitched
14–6 record in 27 games startedPittsburgh PiratesOF.282 batting average
26 home runs
82 runs batted inPhiladelphia Phillies1B.288 batting average
22 home runs
63 runs batted inFlorida MarlinsSS.292 batting average
51 stolen bases
119 runs scoredMilwaukee Brewers3B.324 batting average
34 home runs
97 runs batted inChicago CubsC.285 batting average
23 home runs
86 runs batted inFlorida MarlinsOF.321 batting average
162 base hits
84 runs scoredSan Francisco GiantsC.305 batting average
18 home runs
67 runs batted in^§Atlanta BravesP2.10 earned run average
127 strikeouts in 77 innings pitched
46 saves^Washington NationalsOF.270 batting average
22 home runs
59 runs batted inMiami MarlinsP2.19 earned run average
0.98 WHIP
12 wins^New York MetsP2.69 earned run average
1.14 WHIP
9 wins^§Chicago Cubs3B.275 batting average
26 home runs
99 runs batted in^§Los Angeles DodgersSS.308 batting average
26 home runs
72 runs batted in^§Los Angeles Dodgers1B.267 batting average
39 home runs
97 runs batted in^Atlanta BravesOF.293 batting average
26 home runs
64 runs batted in^New York Mets1B.260 batting average
53 home runs+
120 runs batted in
103 runs scored^Milwaukee BrewersP0.33 earned run average
0.63 WHIP
53 strikeouts in 27 innings pitched^Cincinnati Reds2B.269 batting average
21 home runs
69 runs batted in
98 runs scored^Atlanta BravesOF.297 batting average
19 home runs
64 runs batted in
75 runs scored^ §Arizona DiamondbacksOF.285 batting average
25 home runs
76 runs batted in
116 runs scored
54 stolen bases^Pittsburgh PiratesP1.96 earned run average
0.95 WHIP
170 strikeouts in 133 innings pitched
11–3 record in 23 games started
Wins by team
Following Corbin Carroll winning the award as a member of the Arizona Diamondbacks, every MLB franchise has had at least one Rookie of the Year winner. The Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers have won more than any other team with 18.
Teams Awards YearsBrooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers181947, 1949, 1952, 1953, 1960, 1965, 1969, 1979–1982, 1992–1996, 2016, 2017New York Yankees101951, 1954, 1957, 1962, 1968, 1970, 1981, 1996, 2017, 2024Boston/Atlanta Braves91948, 1950, 1971, 1978, 1990, 2000, 2011, 2018, 2022Philadelphia/Oakland Athletics81952, 1986–1988, 1998, 2004, 2005, 2009St. Louis Browns/Baltimore Orioles1949, 1960, 1965, 1973, 1977, 1982, 1989, 2023Cincinnati Reds1956, 1963, 1966, 1968, 1976, 1988, 1999, 2021Washington Senators/Minnesota Twins71958, 1959, 1964, 1967, 1979, 1991, 1995St. Louis Cardinals61954, 1955, 1974, 1985, 1986, 2001Boston Red Sox1950, 1961, 1972, 1975, 1997, 2007New York/San Francisco Giants1951, 1958, 1959, 1973, 1975, 2010Chicago White Sox1956, 1963, 1966, 1983, 1985, 2014Chicago Cubs1961, 1962, 1989, 1998, 2008, 2015New York Mets1967, 1972, 1983, 1984, 2014, 2019Detroit Tigers51953, 1976, 1978, 2006, 2016Seattle Mariners1984, 2000, 2001, 2020, 2022Cleveland Guardians41955, 1971, 1980, 1990Kansas City Royals1969, 1994, 1999, 2003Philadelphia Phillies1957, 1964, 1997, 2005Miami Marlins2003, 2006, 2009, 2013Tampa Bay Rays2008, 2011, 2013, 2021Montreal Expos/Washington Nationals31970, 1977, 2012Los Angeles Angels1993, 2012, 2018Houston Astros1991, 2015, 2019Milwaukee Brewers1992, 2007, 2020Pittsburgh Pirates22004, 2024San Diego Padres1976, 1987Toronto Blue Jays1979, 2002Texas Rangers1974, 2010Arizona Diamondbacks12023Colorado Rockies2002
See also
Esurance MLB Awards Best Rookie (in MLB)
Players Choice Awards Outstanding Rookie (in each league)
Baseball America Rookie of the Year (in MLB)
Sporting News Rookie of the Year Award (in each league)
Rookie of the Month
Topps All-Star Rookie Teams
Baseball awards
Rookie of the Year (award) (all sports)
References
General
Inline citations
Rookie of the Year
Category:Awards established in 1947
Category:1947 establishments in the United States | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_Rookie_of_the_Year_Award | 2025-04-05T18:26:36.923887 |
3860 | National League Championship Series | standing with the NLCS logo at Dodger Stadium in 2016]]
The National League Championship Series (NLCS) is a best-of-seven playoff and one of two League Championship Series comprising the penultimate round of Major League Baseball's (MLB) postseason. It is contested by the winners of the two National League (NL) Division Series. The winner of the NLCS wins the NL pennant and advances to the World Series, MLB's championship series, to play the winner of the American League's (AL) Championship Series. The NLCS began in 1969 as a best-of-five playoff and used this format until 1985, when it changed to a best-of-seven format.
History
Before 1969, the National League champion (the "pennant winner") was determined by the best win–loss record at the end of the regular season. There were four ad hoc three-game playoff series due to ties under this formulation (in 1946, 1951, 1959, and 1962).
A structured postseason series began in 1969, when both the National and American Leagues were reorganized into two divisions each, East and West. The two division winners within each league played each other in a best-of-five series to determine who would advance to the World Series. In 1985, the format changed to best-of-seven.
The NLCS and ALCS, since the expansion to seven games, are always played in a 2–3–2 format: games 1, 2, 6, and 7 are played in the stadium of the team that has home field advantage, and games 3, 4, and 5 are played in the stadium of the team that does not. Home field advantage is given to the team that has the better record, except a division champion would always get home advantage over a Wild Card team. From 1969 to 1993, home field advantage was alternated between divisions each year regardless of regular season record and from 1995 to 1997 home field advantage was predetermined before the season.
In 1981, a one-off division series was held due to a split season caused by a players' strike.
In 1994, the league was restructured into three divisions, with the three division winners and a wild card team advancing to a best-of-five postseason round, the now-permanent National League Division Series (NLDS). The winners of that round advance to the best-of-seven NLCS; however, due to the player's strike later that season, no postseason was played and the new format did not formally begin until 1995. The playoffs were expanded in 2012 to include a second Wild Card team and in 2022 to include a third Wild Card team.
Seven managers have led a team to the NLCS in three consecutive seasons; however, the most consecutive NLCS appearances by one manager is held by Bobby Cox, who led the Atlanta Braves to eight straight from 1991 to 1999. The Braves (1991–1999) are also the only team in the National League to have made more than three consecutive National League Championship Series appearances. Tony La Russa and Jim Leyland are the only managers to lead their teams to three consecutive League Championship Series appearances in both leagues.
The Milwaukee Brewers, an American League team between 1969 and 1997, and the Houston Astros, a National League team between 1962 and 2012, are the only franchises to play in both the ALCS and NLCS. The Astros are the only team to have won both an NLCS (2005) and an ALCS (2017, 2019, 2021, and 2022). The Astros made four NLCS appearances before moving to the AL in 2013. Every current National League franchise has appeared in the NLCS and all teams except the Brewers have won an NL pennant via the NLCS.
For the first time in history, two wild card teams played in the 2022 National League Championship Series.
Championship Trophy
The Warren C. Giles Trophy is awarded to the NLCS winner. Warren Giles served as president of the National League from 1951 to 1969.Most Valuable Player Award
:See: League Championship Series Most Valuable Player Award#National League winners
A Most Valuable Player (MVP) award is given to the outstanding player in the NLCS. No MVP award is given for Division Series play.
The MVP award has been given to a player on the losing team twice, in 1986 to Mike Scott of the Houston Astros and in 1987 to Jeffrey Leonard of the San Francisco Giants.
Although the National League began its LCS MVP award in 1977, the American League did not begin its LCS MVP award until 1980. The winners are listed in several locations:
* in the below NLCS results table, in the "Series MVP" column
* in the article League Championship Series Most Valuable Player Award
* on the MLB website<ref name"mlb_mlb_com" />Results
{| class"wikitable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|+Key
!scope="row"|
|Wild card
|-
!scope="row"|
|MVP did not play for winning team
|}
{| class"wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|-
! scope="col" | Year
! scope="col" | Winning team
! scope="col" | Manager
! scope"col" class"unsortable" | Games
! scope="col" | Losing team
! scope="col" | Manager
! scope="col" | Series MVP
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1969
| New York Mets ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Atlanta Braves ||
| rowspan"8" bgcolorlightgray|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1970
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1971
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| San Francisco Giants ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1972
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1973
| New York Mets ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1974
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1975
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1976
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1977
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
| Dusty Baker, Los Angeles
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1978
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
| Steve Garvey, Los Angeles
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1979
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Cincinnati Reds ||
| Willie Stargell, Pittsburgh
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1980
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Houston Astros ||
| Manny Trillo, Philadelphia
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1981
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Montreal Expos ||
| Burt Hooton, Los Angeles
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1982
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Atlanta Braves ||
| Darrell Porter, St. Louis
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1983
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
| Gary Matthews, Philadelphia
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1984
| San Diego Padres ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Chicago Cubs ||
| Steve Garvey, San Diego
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1985
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
| Ozzie Smith, St. Louis
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1986
| New York Mets ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Houston Astros ||
| Mike Scott, Houston*
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1987
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| San Francisco Giants ||
| Jeffrey Leonard, San Francisco*
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1988
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| New York Mets ||
| Orel Hershiser, Los Angeles
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1989
| San Francisco Giants ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Chicago Cubs ||
| Will Clark, San Francisco
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1990
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
| Rob Dibble and Randy Myers, Cincinnati
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1991
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
| Steve Avery, Atlanta
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1992
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Pittsburgh Pirates ||
| John Smoltz, Atlanta
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1993
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Atlanta Braves ||
| Curt Schilling, Philadelphia
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1994
| colspan"6" align"center" |No Series due to a players' strike.
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1995
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| Cincinnati Reds ||
| Mike Devereaux, Atlanta
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1996
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
| Javy López, Atlanta
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1997
| Florida Marlins}} ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Atlanta Braves ||
| Liván Hernández, Florida
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1998
| San Diego Padres ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Atlanta Braves ||
| Sterling Hitchcock, San Diego
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1999
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| New York Mets}} ||
| Eddie Pérez, Atlanta
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2000
| New York Mets}} ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
| Mike Hampton, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2001
| Arizona Diamondbacks ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Atlanta Braves ||
| Craig Counsell, Arizona
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2002
| San Francisco Giants}} ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
| Benito Santiago, San Francisco
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2003
| Florida Marlins}} ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Chicago Cubs ||
| Iván Rodríguez, Florida
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2004
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Houston Astros}} ||
| Albert Pujols, St. Louis
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2005
| Houston Astros}} ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
| Roy Oswalt, Houston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2006
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| New York Mets ||
| Jeff Suppan, St. Louis
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2007
| Colorado Rockies}} ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| Arizona Diamondbacks ||
| Matt Holliday, Colorado
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2008
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
| Cole Hamels, Philadelphia
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2009
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
| Ryan Howard, Philadelphia
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2010
| San Francisco Giants ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
| Cody Ross, San Francisco
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2011
| St. Louis Cardinals}} ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Milwaukee Brewers ||
| David Freese, St. Louis
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2012
| San Francisco Giants ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| St. Louis Cardinals}} ||
| Marco Scutaro, San Francisco
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2013
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
| Michael Wacha, St. Louis
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2014
| San Francisco Giants}} ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
| Madison Bumgarner, San Francisco
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2015
| New York Mets ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| Chicago Cubs}} ||
| Daniel Murphy, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2016
| Chicago Cubs ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
| Javier Báez and Jon Lester, Chicago
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2017
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Chicago Cubs ||
| Chris Taylor and Justin Turner, Los Angeles
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2018
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Milwaukee Brewers ||
| Cody Bellinger, Los Angeles
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2019
| Washington Nationals}} ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
| Howie Kendrick, Washington
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2020
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Atlanta Braves ||
| Corey Seager, Los Angeles
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2021
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Los Angeles Dodgers}} ||
| Eddie Rosario, Atlanta
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2022
| Philadelphia Phillies}} ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| San Diego Padres}}||
| Bryce Harper, Philadelphia
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2023
| Arizona Diamondbacks}} ||
|align=center| 4–3
| Philadelphia Phillies}} ||
| Ketel Marte, Arizona
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2024
|Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align=center|4–2
| New York Mets}} ||
| Tommy Edman, Los Angeles
|}
Appearances by team
{| class"sortable wikitable" style"text-align:center;"
!Apps
!Team
!Wins
!Losses
!Win %
!Most recent<br>win
!Most recent<br>appearance
!Games<br>won
!Games<br>lost
!Game<br>win %
|-
||16|| style="text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Dodgers||9||7||||2024||2024||43||44||
|-
||14|| style="text-align:left;" |St. Louis Cardinals||7||7||||2013||2019||38||43||
|-
||13|| style="text-align:left;" |Atlanta Braves||6||7||||2021||2021||34||39||
|-
||11|| style="text-align:left;" |Philadelphia Phillies||6||5||||2022||2023||29||25||
|-
||9|| style="text-align:left;" |Pittsburgh Pirates||2||7||||1979||1992||17||25||
|-
||8|| style="text-align:left;" |Cincinnati Reds||5||3||||1990||1995||18||14||
|-
||9|| style="text-align:left;" |New York Mets||5||4||||2015||2024||28||21||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |San Francisco Giants||5||2||||2014||2014||24||15||
|-
||6|| style="text-align:left;" |Chicago Cubs||1||5||||2016||2017||11||21||
|-
||4|| style"text-align:left;" |Houston Astros ||1||3||||2005||2005||11||13||
|-
||3|| style="text-align:left;" |Arizona Diamondbacks||2||1||||2023||2023||8||8||
|-
||3|| style="text-align:left;" |San Diego Padres||2||1||||1998||2022||8||8||
|-
||2|| style="text-align:left;" |Miami Marlins||2||0||||2003||2003||8||5||
|-
||2|| style="text-align:left;" |Washington Nationals||1||1||||2019||2019||6||3||
|-
||2|| style="text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers||0||2||||Never||2018||5||8||
|-
||1|| style="text-align:left;" |Colorado Rockies||1||0||||2007||2007||4||0||
|}
Years of appearance
In the sortable table below, teams are ordered first by number of wins, then by number of appearances, and finally by year of first appearance. In the "Season(s)" column, bold years indicate winning appearances.
{| class"wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
!scope="col"|
!scope="col"|Team
!scope="col"|Wins
!scope="col"|Losses
!scope="col"|Win %
!scope"col" class"unsortable"| Season(s)
|-
||16|| style"text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Dodgers||9||7|||| align"left" | 1974, 1977, 1978, 1981, 1983, 1985, 1988, 2008, 2009, 2013, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2020, 2021, 2024
|-
||14|| style"text-align:left;" |St. Louis Cardinals||7||7|||| align"left" |1982, 1985, 1987, 1996, 2000, 2002, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2019
|-
||13|| style"text-align:left;" |Atlanta Braves||6||7|||| align"left" | 1969, 1982, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2020, 2021
|-
||11|| style"text-align:left;" |Philadelphia Phillies||6||5|||| align"left" | 1976, 1977, 1978, 1980, 1983, 1993, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2022, 2023
|-
||9|| style"text-align:left;" |New York Mets||5||4|||| align"left" | 1969, 1973, 1986, 1988, 1999, 2000, 2006, 2015, 2024
|-
||8|| style"text-align:left;" |Cincinnati Reds||5||3|||| align"left" | 1970, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1976, 1979, 1990, 1995
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |San Francisco Giants||5||2|||| align"left" | 1971, 1987, 1989, 2002, 2010, 2012, 2014
|-
||9|| style"text-align:left;" |Pittsburgh Pirates||2||7|||| align"left" | 1970, 1971, 1972, 1974, 1975, 1979, 1990, 1991, 1992
|-
||3|| style"text-align:left;" |San Diego Padres||2||1|||| align"left" |1984, 1998, 2022
|-
||3|| style"text-align:left;" |Arizona Diamondbacks||2||1|||| align"left" |2001, 2007, 2023
|-
||2|| style"text-align:left;" |Miami Marlins||2||0|||| align"left" | 1997, 2003
|-
||6|| style"text-align:left;" |Chicago Cubs||1||5|||| align"left" | 1984, 1989, 2003, 2015, 2016, 2017
|-
||4|| style"text-align:left;" |Houston Astros ||1||3|||| align="left" | 1980, 1986, 2004, 2005
|-
||2|| style"text-align:left;" |Washington Nationals||1||1|||| align"left" |1981, 2019
|-
||1|| style"text-align:left;" |Colorado Rockies||1||0|||| align"left" |2007
|-
||2|| style"text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers||0||2|||| align"left" |2011, 2018
|}
Frequent matchups
{| class"wikitable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
! Count
! Matchup
! Record
! Years
|-
|align="center"| 5
| Cincinnati Reds vs. Pittsburgh Pirates
| Reds, 4–1
| 1970, 1972, 1975, 1979, 1990
|-
|align="center"| 5
| Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Philadelphia Phillies
| Phillies, 3–2
| 1977, 1978, 1983, 2008, 2009
|-
|align="center"| 4
| San Francisco Giants vs. St. Louis Cardinals
| Giants, 3–1
| 1987, 2002, 2012, 2014
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Atlanta Braves vs. New York Mets
| Tied, 1–1
| 1969, 1999
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Atlanta Braves vs. St. Louis Cardinals
| Tied, 1–1
| 1982, 1996
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Atlanta Braves vs. Pittsburgh Pirates
| Braves, 2–0
| 1991, 1992
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Atlanta Braves vs. Los Angeles Dodgers
| Tied, 1–1
| 2020, 2021
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Houston Astros vs. St. Louis Cardinals
| Tied, 1–1
| 2004, 2005
|-
|align="center"| 2
| New York Mets vs. St. Louis Cardinals
| Tied, 1–1
| 2000, 2006
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Los Angeles Dodgers vs. St. Louis Cardinals
| Cardinals, 2–0
| 1985, 2013
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Chicago Cubs vs. Los Angeles Dodgers
| Tied, 1–1
| 2016, 2017
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Los Angeles Dodgers vs. New York Mets
| Dodgers, 2–0
| 1988, 2024
|}
See also
*List of National League pennant winners
*List of National League Wild Card winners
*National League Division Series
*American League Championship Series
Notes
References
External links
* [https://www.baseball-almanac.com/League_Championship_Series.shtml League Championship Series History] at Baseball Almanac
* [https://www.baseball-reference.com/postseason/ World Series and MLB Playoffs] at Baseball-Reference.com
* [https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/MISC/masterPS.htm Post-Season Games Directory] at Retrosheet
Category:Recurring sporting events established in 1969
Category:Annual events in Major League Baseball | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_League_Championship_Series | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.028673 |
3861 | American League Championship Series | designated hitter David Ortiz jumps onto home plate after winning Game 4 of the 2004 American League Championship Series at Fenway Park]]
The American League Championship Series (ALCS) is a best-of-seven playoff and one of two League Championship Series comprising the penultimate round of Major League Baseball's (MLB) postseason. The winner of the ALCS wins the AL pennant and advances to the World Series, MLB's championship series, to play the winner of the National League's (NL) Championship Series. The ALCS began in 1969 as a best-of-five playoff and used this format until 1985, when it changed to its current best-of-seven format.
History
Prior to 1969, the American League champion (the "pennant winner") was determined by the best win–loss record at the end of the regular season. There was one ad hoc single-game playoff held, in , due to a tie under this formulation.
The ALCS started in 1969, when the AL reorganized into two divisions, East and West. The winners of each division played each other in a best-of-five series to determine who would advance to the World Series. In 1985, the format changed to best-of-seven.
In 1981, a division series was held due to a split season caused by a players' strike.
In 1994, the league was restructured into three divisions, with the three division winners and a Wild Card team advancing to a best-of-five postseason round, known as the American League Division Series (ALDS). The winners of that round then advanced to the best-of-seven ALCS; however, due to the player's strike later that season, no postseason was played and the new format did not formally begin until 1995. The playoffs were expanded in 2012 to include a second Wild Card team and in 2022 to include a third Wild Card team.
The ALCS and NLCS, since the expansion to best-of-seven, are always played in a 2–3–2 format: Games 1, 2, 6, and 7 are played in the stadium of the team that has home field advantage, and Games 3, 4, and 5 are played in the stadium of the team that does not. The series concludes when one team records its fourth win. Since 1998, home field advantage has been given to the team that has the better regular season record, except a division champion would always get home advantage over a Wild Card team. If both teams have identical records in the regular season, then home field advantage goes to the team that has the winning head-to-head record. From 1969 to 1993, home-field advantage alternated between the two divisions, and from 1995 to 1997 home-field advantage was determined before the season.
Nine managers have led a team to the ALCS in three consecutive seasons; the record for most consecutive ALCS appearances by a manager is jointly held by Joe Torre, who led the New York Yankees to four in a row (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001), and Dusty Baker, who led the Houston Astros to four in a row (2020, 2021, 2022, 2023). The Astros (2017–2023) are also the only team in the American League to have made seven consecutive American League Championship Series appearances. Tony La Russa and Jim Leyland are the only managers to lead their teams to three consecutive League Championship Series appearances in both leagues.
The Milwaukee Brewers, an American League team between 1969 and 1997, and the Houston Astros, a National League team between 1962 and 2012, are the only franchises to play in both the ALCS and NLCS. The Astros are the only team to have won both an NLCS (2005) and an ALCS (2017, 2019, 2021, and 2022). Every current American League franchise has appeared in the ALCS.
Championship Trophy
The William Harridge Trophy is awarded to the ALCS champion. Will Harridge served as American League president from 1931 to 1959.
Most Valuable Player Award
:See: League Championship Series Most Valuable Player Award#American League winners
The Lee MacPhail Most Valuable Player (MVP) award is given to the outstanding player in the ALCS. No MVP award is given for Division Series play.
Although the National League began its LCS MVP award in 1977, the American League did not begin its LCS MVP award till 1980. The winners are listed in several locations:
* in the below ALCS results table, in the "Series MVP" column
* in the article League Championship Series Most Valuable Player Award
* on the MLB websiteResults
{| class"wikitable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|+Key
!scope="row"|
|Wild card
|-
!scope="row"|
|MVP did not play for winning team
|}
{| class"wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|-
! scope="col" | Year
! scope="col" | Winning team
! scope="col" | Manager
! scope"col" class"unsortable" | Games
! scope="col" | Losing team
! scope="col" | Manager
! scope="col" | Series MVP
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1969
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Minnesota Twins ||
| rowspan"11" bgcolorlightgrey|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1970
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Minnesota Twins ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1971
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1972
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Detroit Tigers ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1973
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1974
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1975
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1976
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Kansas City Royals ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1977
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Kansas City Royals ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1978
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Kansas City Royals ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1979
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| California Angels ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1980
| Kansas City Royals ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| New York Yankees ||
| Frank White, Kansas City
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1981
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Oakland Athletics ||
| Graig Nettles, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1982
| Milwaukee Brewers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| California Angels ||
| Fred Lynn, California*
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1983
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Chicago White Sox ||
| Mike Boddicker, Baltimore
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1984
| Detroit Tigers ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Kansas City Royals ||
| Kirk Gibson, Detroit
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1985
| Kansas City Royals ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Toronto Blue Jays ||
| George Brett, Kansas City
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1986
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| California Angels ||
| Marty Barrett, Boston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1987
| Minnesota Twins ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Detroit Tigers ||
| Gary Gaetti, Minnesota
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1988
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| Boston Red Sox ||
| Dennis Eckersley, Oakland
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1989
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Toronto Blue Jays ||
| Rickey Henderson, Oakland
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1990
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| Boston Red Sox ||
| Dave Stewart, Oakland
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1991
| Minnesota Twins ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Toronto Blue Jays ||
| Kirby Puckett, Minnesota
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1992
| Toronto Blue Jays ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Oakland Athletics ||
| Roberto Alomar, Toronto
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1993
| Toronto Blue Jays ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Chicago White Sox ||
| Dave Stewart, Toronto
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1994
| colspan"6" align"center" |No Series due to a players' strike.
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1995
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Seattle Mariners ||
| Orel Hershiser, Cleveland
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1996
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Baltimore Orioles}} ||
| Bernie Williams, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1997
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Baltimore Orioles ||
| Marquis Grissom, Cleveland
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1998
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Cleveland Indians ||
| David Wells, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1999
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
| Orlando Hernández, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2000
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Seattle Mariners}} ||
| David Justice, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2001
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Seattle Mariners ||
| Andy Pettitte, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2002
| Anaheim Angels}} ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Minnesota Twins ||
| Adam Kennedy, Anaheim
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2003
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
| Mariano Rivera, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2004
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| New York Yankees ||
| David Ortiz, Boston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2005
| Chicago White Sox ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim ||
| Paul Konerko, Chicago
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2006
| Detroit Tigers}} ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| Oakland Athletics ||
| Plácido Polanco, Detroit
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2007
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Cleveland Indians ||
| Josh Beckett, Boston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2008
| Tampa Bay Rays ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
| Matt Garza, Tampa Bay
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2009
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim ||
| CC Sabathia, New York
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2010
| Texas Rangers ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| New York Yankees}} ||
| Josh Hamilton, Texas
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2011
| Texas Rangers ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Detroit Tigers ||
| Nelson Cruz, Texas
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2012
| Detroit Tigers ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| New York Yankees ||
| Delmon Young, Detroit
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2013
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Detroit Tigers ||
| Koji Uehara, Boston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2014
| Kansas City Royals}} ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| Baltimore Orioles ||
| Lorenzo Cain, Kansas City
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2015
| Kansas City Royals ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Toronto Blue Jays ||
| Alcides Escobar, Kansas City
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2016
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Toronto Blue Jays}} ||
| Andrew Miller, Cleveland
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2017
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| New York Yankees}} ||
| Justin Verlander, Houston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2018
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Houston Astros ||
| Jackie Bradley Jr., Boston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2019
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| New York Yankees ||
| Jose Altuve, Houston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2020
| Tampa Bay Rays ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Houston Astros }}||
| Randy Arozarena, Tampa Bay
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2021
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 4–2
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
| Yordan Alvarez, Houston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2022
|Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 4–0
| New York Yankees ||
| Jeremy Peña, Houston
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2023
|Texas Rangers}} ||
|align="center"| 4–3
| Houston Astros ||
| Adolis García, Texas
|-
| ! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 2024
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 4–1
| Cleveland Guardians ||
| Giancarlo Stanton, New York
|}
Appearances by team
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|-
!Apps
!Team
!Wins
!Losses
!Win %
!Most recent<br>win
!Most recent<br>appearance
!Games<br>won
!Games<br>lost
!Game<br>win %
|-
||19 || style="text-align:left;" |New York Yankees||12||7||||2024||2024||54||45||
|-
||12|| style="text-align:left;" |Boston Red Sox||6||6||||2018||2021||32||36||
|-
||11|| style="text-align:left;" |Athletics||6||5||||1990||2006||23||23||
|-
||10|| style="text-align:left;" |Baltimore Orioles||5||5||||1983||2014||21||20||
|-
||8|| style="text-align:left;" |Kansas City Royals||4||4||||2015||2015||20||17||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |Detroit Tigers||3||4||||2012||2013||18||15||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |Houston Astros||4||3||||2022||2023||23||19||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |Toronto Blue Jays||2||5||||1993||2016||16||24||
|-
||6|| style="text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Angels||1||5||||2002||2009||13||19||
|-
||6|| style="text-align:left;" |Cleveland Guardians||3||3||||2016||2024||18||17||
|-
||5|| style="text-align:left;" |Minnesota Twins||2||3||||1991||2002||9||12||
|-
||3|| style="text-align:left;" |Chicago White Sox||1||2||||2005||2005||7||8||
|-
||3|| style="text-align:left;" |Seattle Mariners||0||3||||Never||2001||5||12||
|-
||3|| style="text-align:left;" |Texas Rangers||3||0||||2023||2023||12||7||
|-
||2|| style="text-align:left;" |Tampa Bay Rays||2||0||||2020||2020||8||6||
|-
||1|| style"text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers ||1||0||||1982||1982||3||2||
|}
Years of appearance
In the sortable table below, teams are ordered first by number of wins, then by number of appearances, and finally by year of first appearance. In the "Season(s)" column, bold years indicate winning appearances.
{| class"wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
!scope="col"|
!scope="col"|Team
!scope="col"|Wins
!scope="col"|Losses
!scope="col"|Win %
!scope"col" class"unsortable"| Season(s)
|-
||19|| style"text-align:left;" |New York Yankees||12||7|||| align"left" | 1976, 1977, 1978, 1980, 1981, 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2003, 2004, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2017, 2019, 2022, 2024
|-
||12|| style"text-align:left;" |Boston Red Sox||6||6|||| align"left" | 1975, 1986, 1988, 1990, 1999, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2013, 2018, 2021
|-
||11|| style"text-align:left;" |Athletics||6||5|||| align"left" | 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1981, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1992, 2006
|-
||10|| style"text-align:left;" |Baltimore Orioles||5||5|||| align"left" | 1969, 1970, 1971, 1973, 1974, 1979, 1983, 1996, 1997, 2014
|-
||8|| style"text-align:left;" |Kansas City Royals||4||4|||| align"left" | 1976, 1977, 1978, 1980, 1984, 1985, 2014, 2015
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Houston Astros||4||3|||| align"left" |2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Detroit Tigers||3||4|||| align"left" | 1972, 1984, 1987, 2006, 2011, 2012, 2013
|-
||6|| style"text-align:left;" |Cleveland Guardians||3||3|||| align"left" | 1995, 1997, 1998, 2007, 2016, 2024
|-
||3|| style"text-align:left;" |Texas Rangers||3||0|||| align"left" | 2010, 2011, 2023
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Toronto Blue Jays||2||5|||| align"left" |1985, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, 2015, 2016
|-
||5|| style"text-align:left;" |Minnesota Twins||2||3|||| align"left" | 1969, 1970, 1987, 1991, 2002
|-
||2|| style"text-align:left;" |Tampa Bay Rays||2||0|||| align"left" |2008, 2020
|-
||6|| style"text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Angels||1||5|||| align"left" | 1979, 1982, 1986, 2002, 2005, 2009
|-
||3|| style"text-align:left;" |Chicago White Sox||1||2|||| align"left" | 1983, 1993, 2005
|-
||1|| style"text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers ||1||0|||| align="left" |1982
|-
||3|| style"text-align:left;" |Seattle Mariners||0||3|||| align"left" | 1995, 2000, 2001
|}
Recurring matchups
{| class"wikitable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|-
! Count
! Matchup
! Record
! Years
|-
|align="center"| 4
| Kansas City Royals vs. New York Yankees
| Yankees, 3–1
| 1976, 1977, 1978, 1980
|-
|align="center"| 3
| Houston Astros vs. New York Yankees
| Astros, 3–0
| 2017, 2019, 2022
|-
|align="center"| 3
| Boston Red Sox vs. New York Yankees
| Yankees, 2–1
| 1999, 2003, 2004
|-
|align="center"| 3
| Baltimore Orioles vs. Athletics
| Athletics, 2–1
| 1971, 1973, 1974
|-
|align="center"| 3
| Boston Red Sox vs. Athletics
| Athletics, 2–1
| 1975, 1988, 1990
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Baltimore Orioles vs. Minnesota Twins
| Orioles, 2–0
| 1969, 1970
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Detroit Tigers vs. Athletics
| Tied, 1–1
| 1972, 2006
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Kansas City Royals vs. Toronto Blue Jays
| Royals, 2–0
| 1985, 2015
|-
|align="center"| 2
| New York Yankees vs. Seattle Mariners
| Yankees, 2–0
| 2000, 2001
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Cleveland Guardians vs. New York Yankees
| Yankees, 2–0
| 1998, 2024
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Athletics vs. Toronto Blue Jays
| Tied, 1–1
| 1989, 1992
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Boston Red Sox vs. Houston Astros
| Tied, 1–1
| 2018, 2021
|}
See also
*List of American League pennant winners
*List of American League Wild Card winners
*American League Division Series
*National League Championship Series
Notes
References
External links
* [https://www.baseball-almanac.com/League_Championship_Series.shtml League Championship Series History] at Baseball Almanac
* [https://www.baseball-reference.com/postseason/ World Series and MLB Playoffs] at Baseball-Reference.com
* [https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/MISC/masterPS.htm Post-Season Games Directory] at Retrosheet
Category:Recurring sporting events established in 1969
Category:Annual events in Major League Baseball | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_League_Championship_Series | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.110176 |
3862 | American League Division Series | In Major League Baseball, the American League Division Series (ALDS) determines which two teams from the American League will advance to the American League Championship Series. The Division Series consists of two best-of-five series, featuring each of the two division winners with the best records and the winners of the wild-card play-off.
History
The Division Series was implemented in 1981 as a one-off tournament because of a midseason strike, with the first place teams before the strike taking on the teams in first place after the strike. In 1981, a split-season format forced the first ever divisional playoff series, in which the New York Yankees won the Eastern Division series over the Milwaukee Brewers (who were in the American League until 1998) in five games while in the Western Division, the Oakland Athletics swept the Kansas City Royals (the only team with an overall losing record to ever make the postseason).
In 1994, it was returned permanently when Major League Baseball (MLB) restructured each league into three divisions, but with a different format than in 1981. Each of the division winners, along with one wild card team, qualify for the Division Series. Despite being planned for the 1994 season, the postseason was cancelled that year due to the 1994–95 Major League Baseball strike. In 1995, the first season to feature a division series, the Western Division champion Seattle Mariners defeated the wild card New York Yankees three games to two, while the Central Division champion Cleveland Indians defeated the Eastern Division champion Boston Red Sox in a three-game sweep.
From 1994 to 2011, the wild card was given to the team in the American League with the best overall record that was not a division champion. Beginning with the 2012 season, a second wild card team was added, and the two wild card teams play a single-game playoff to determine which team would play in the ALDS. For the 2020 Major League Baseball season only, there was an expanded playoff format, owing to an abbreviated 60-game regular season due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Eight teams qualified from the American League: the top two teams in each division plus the next two best records among the remaining teams. These eight teams played a best-of-three-game series to determine placement in the ALDS. The regular format returned for the 2021 season.
As of 2022, the Yankees have played in and won the most division series, with thirteen wins in twenty-two appearances. In 2015, the Toronto Blue Jays and Houston Astros were the final American League teams to make their first appearances in the ALDS. The Astros had been in the National League through 2012, and had played in the National League Division Series (NLDS) seven times. The Astros are the only team to win the ALDS in six consecutive seasons. The Yankees record of four consecutive victories was broken by the Astros with their victory in the 2021 ALDS against the Chicago White Sox.
Determining the matchups
The ALDS is a best-of-five series where the divisional winner with the best winning percentage in the regular season hosts the winner of the Wild Card Series between the top two wild card teams in one matchup, and the divisional winner with the second best winning percentage hosts the winner of the series between the lowest-seeded divisional winner and the lowest-seeded wild card team. (From 2012 to 2021, the wild card team was assigned to play the divisional winner with the best winning percentage in the regular season in one series, and the other two division winners met in the other series. From 1998 to 2011, if the wild-card team and the division winner with the best record were from the same division, the wild-card team played the division winner with the second-best record, and the remaining two division leaders played each other.) The two series winners move on to the best-of-seven ALCS. According to Nate Silver, the advent of this playoff series, and especially of the wild card, has caused teams to focus more on "getting to the playoffs" rather than "winning the pennant" as the primary goal of the regular season.
From 2012 to 2021, the wild card team that advances to the Division Series was to face the number 1 seed, regardless whether or not they are in the same division. The two series winners move on to the best-of-seven ALCS. Beginning with the 2022 season, the winner between the lowest-ranked division winner and lowest-ranked wild card team faces the number 2 seed division winner in the Division Series, while the 4 v. 5 wild card winner still faces the number 1 seed, as there is no reseeding even if the 6-seeded wild card advances. Home-field advantage goes to the team with the better regular season record (or head-to-head record if there is a tie between two or more teams), except for the wild-card team, which never receives the home field advantage.
Beginning in 2003, MLB has implemented a new rule to give the team from the league that wins the All-Star Game with the best regular season record a slightly greater advantage. In order to spread out the Division Series games for broadcast purposes, the two ALDS series follow one of two off-day schedules. Starting in 2007, after consulting the MLBPA, MLB has decided to allow the team with the best record in the league that wins the All-Star Game to choose whether to use the seven-day schedule (1-2-off-3-4-off-5) or the eight-day schedule (1-off-2-off-3-4-off-5). The team only gets to choose the schedule; the opponent is still determined by win–loss records.
Initially, the best-of-5 series played in a 2–3 format, with the first two games set at home for the lower seed team and the last three for the higher seed. Since 1998, the series has followed a 2–2–1 format, where the higher seed team plays at home in Games 1 and 2, the lower seed plays at home in Game 3 and Game 4 (if necessary), and if a Game 5 is needed, the teams return to the higher seed's field. When MLB added a second wild card team in 2012, the Division Series re-adopted the 2–3 format due to scheduling conflicts. However, it reverted to the 2–2–1 format starting the next season, 2013.
Results
{| class"wikitable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|+Key
!scope="row"|
|Wild card
|}
{| class"sortable wikitable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|-
! scope="col" | Year
! scope="col" | Winning team
! scope="col" | Manager
! scope"col" class"unsortable" | Games
! scope="col" | Losing team
! scope="col" | Manager
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 1981
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Milwaukee Brewers ||
|-
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Kansas City Royals ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1994
| colspan"5" align"center" |No Series due to a players' strike.
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 1995
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Boston Red Sox ||
|-
| Seattle Mariners ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| New York Yankees}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 1996
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Texas Rangers ||
|-
| Baltimore Orioles}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Cleveland Indians ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 1997
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Seattle Mariners ||
|-
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| New York Yankees}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 1998
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Texas Rangers ||
|-
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 1999
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Texas Rangers ||
|-
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Cleveland Indians ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2000
| Seattle Mariners}} ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Chicago White Sox ||
|-
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2001
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Oakland Athletics}} ||
|-
| Seattle Mariners ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Cleveland Indians ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2002
| Minnesota Twins ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
| Anaheim Angels}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| New York Yankees ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2003
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Minnesota Twins ||
|-
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2004
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Minnesota Twins ||
|-
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Anaheim Angels ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2005
| Chicago White Sox ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|-
| Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| New York Yankees ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2006
| Detroit Tigers}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| New York Yankees ||
|-
| Oakland Athletics ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Minnesota Twins ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2007
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim ||
|-
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| New York Yankees}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2008
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim ||
|-
| Tampa Bay Rays ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Chicago White Sox ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2009
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Minnesota Twins ||
|-
| Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2010
| Texas Rangers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Tampa Bay Rays ||
|-
| New York Yankees}} ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Minnesota Twins ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2011
| Texas Rangers ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Tampa Bay Rays}} ||
|-
| Detroit Tigers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| New York Yankees ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2012
| Detroit Tigers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Baltimore Orioles}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2013
| Detroit Tigers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Tampa Bay Rays}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2014
| Baltimore Orioles ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Detroit Tigers ||
|-
| Kansas City Royals}} ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2015
| Toronto Blue Jays ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Texas Rangers ||
|-
| Kansas City Royals ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Houston Astros}} ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2016
| Cleveland Indians ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Boston Red Sox ||
|-
| Toronto Blue Jays}} ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Texas Rangers ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2017
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Boston Red Sox ||
|-
| New York Yankees}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Cleveland Indians ||
|-
! scope"row" rowspan"2" style="text-align:center"| 2018
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Cleveland Indians ||
|-
| Boston Red Sox ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| New York Yankees}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2019
| New York Yankees ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Minnesota Twins ||
|-
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Tampa Bay Rays}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2020
| Tampa Bay Rays ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| New York Yankees ||
|-
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Oakland Athletics ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2021
| Boston Red Sox}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Tampa Bay Rays ||
|-
| Houston Astros ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Chicago White Sox ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2022
| Houston Astros || || align="center"| 3–0 || Seattle Mariners}} ||
|-
| New York Yankees || || align="center"| 3–2 || Cleveland Guardians ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2023
| Texas Rangers}} || || align="center"| 3–0 || Baltimore Orioles ||
|-
| Houston Astros || || align="center"| 3–1 || Minnesota Twins ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2024
| New York Yankees || || align="center"|3–1 || Kansas City Royals}} ||
|-
| Cleveland Guardians || || align="center"|3–2 || Detroit Tigers}} ||
|}
Appearances by team
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
!Apps
!Team
!Wins
!Losses
!Win %
!Most recent<br />win
!Most recent<br />appearance
!Games<br />won
!Games<br />lost
!Game<br />win %
|-
||24|| style="text-align:left;" |New York Yankees||15||9||||2024||2024||59||43||
|-
||14|| style="text-align:left;" |Boston Red Sox||8||6||||2021||2021||26||26||
|-
||12|| style="text-align:left;" |Cleveland Guardians||6||6||||2024||2024||27||24||
|-
||9|| style="text-align:left;" |Athletics||2||7||||2006||2020||19||21||
|-
||8|| style="text-align:left;" |Houston Astros||7||1||||2023||2023||23||9||
|-
||8|| style="text-align:left;" |Texas Rangers||3||5||||2023||2023||12||18||
|-
||8|| style="text-align:left;" |Minnesota Twins||1||7||||2002||2023||6||23||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Angels||3||4||||2009||2014||10||15||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |Tampa Bay Rays||2||5||||2020||2021||13||18||
|-
||6|| style="text-align:left;" |Detroit Tigers||4||2||||2013||2024||14||13||
|-
||5|| style="text-align:left;" |Seattle Mariners||3||2||||2001||2022||10||10||
|-
||5|| style="text-align:left;" |Baltimore Orioles||3||2||||2014||2023||11||8||
|-
||4|| style="text-align:left;" |Chicago White Sox||1||3||||2005||2021||5||9||
|-
||4|| style="text-align:left;" |Kansas City Royals||2||2||||2015||2024||7||8||
|-
||2|| style="text-align:left;" |Toronto Blue Jays||2||0||||2016||2016||6||2||
|-
||1|| style"text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers||0||1||||Never||1981||2||3||
|}
Years of appearance
In the sortable table below, teams are ordered first by number of wins, then by number of appearances, and finally by year of first appearance. In the "Season(s)" column, bold years indicate winning appearances.
{| class"wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
!scope="col"|
!scope="col"|Team
!scope="col"|Wins
!scope="col"|Losses
!scope="col"|Win %
!scope"col" class"unsortable"| Season(s)
|-
||24|| style"text-align:left;" |New York Yankees||15||9|||| align"left" | 1981, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2022, 2024
|-
||14|| style"text-align:left;" |Boston Red Sox||8||6|||| align"left" | 1995, 1998, 1999, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2013, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2021
|-
||8|| style"text-align:left;" |Houston Astros||7||1|||| align"left" | 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023
|-
||12|| style"text-align:left;" |Cleveland Guardians||6||6|||| align"left" | 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2007, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2022, 2024
|-
||6|| style"text-align:left;" |Detroit Tigers||4||2|||| align"left" | 2006, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2024
|-
||8|| style"text-align:left;" |Texas Rangers||3||5|||| align"left" | 1996, 1998, 1999, 2010, 2011, 2015, 2016, 2023
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Angels||3||4|||| align"left" | 2002, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2014
|-
||5|| style"text-align:left;" |Seattle Mariners||3||2|||| align"left" | 1995, 1997, 2000, 2001, 2022
|-
||5|| style"text-align:left;" |Baltimore Orioles||3||2|||| align"left" | 1996, 1997, 2012, 2014, 2023
|-
||9|| style"text-align:left;" |Athletics||2||7|||| align"left" | 1981, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2012, 2013, 2020
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Tampa Bay Rays||2||5|||| align"left" | 2008, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2019, 2020, 2021
|-
||4|| style"text-align:left;" |Kansas City Royals||2||2|||| align"left" | 1981, 2014, 2015, 2024
|-
||2|| style"text-align:left;" |Toronto Blue Jays||2||0|||| align"left" | 2015, 2016
|-
||8|| style"text-align:left;" |Minnesota Twins||1||7|||| align"left" | 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2009, 2010, 2019, 2023
|-
||4|| style"text-align:left;" |Chicago White Sox||1||3|||| align"left" | 2000, 2005, 2008, 2021
|-
||1|| style"text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers ||0||1|||| align="left" | 1981
|}
Frequent matchups
{| class"wikitable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|-
! Count
! Matchup
! Record
! Years
|-
|align="center"| 5
| New York Yankees vs. Minnesota Twins
| Yankees, 5–0
| 2003, 2004, 2009, 2010, 2019
|-
|align="center"| 4
| Boston Red Sox vs. Los Angeles Angels
| Red Sox, 3–1
| 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009
|-
|align="center"| 4
| Cleveland Guardians vs. Boston Red Sox
| Guardians, 3–1
| 1995, 1998, 1999, 2016
|-
|align="center"| 4
| Cleveland Guardians vs. New York Yankees
| Tied, 2–2
| 1997, 2007, 2017, 2022
|-
|align="center"| 3
| Texas Rangers vs. New York Yankees
| Yankees, 3–0
| 1996, 1998, 1999
|-
|align="center"| 2
| New York Yankees vs. Athletics
| Yankees, 2–0
| 2000, 2001
|-
|align="center"| 2
| New York Yankees vs. Anaheim-LA Angels
| Angels, 2–0
| 2002, 2005
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Texas Rangers vs. Tampa Bay Rays
| Rangers, 2–0
| 2010, 2011
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Athletics vs. Minnesota Twins
| Tied, 1–1
| 2002, 2006
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Detroit Tigers vs. New York Yankees
| Tigers, 2–0
| 2006, 2011
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Detroit Tigers vs. Athletics
| Tigers, 2–0
| 2012, 2013
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Texas Rangers vs. Toronto Blue Jays
| Blue Jays, 2–0
| 2015, 2016
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Boston Red Sox vs. Tampa Bay Rays
| Red Sox, 2–0
| 2013, 2021
|}
See also
<!-- Please keep entries in alphabetical order & add a short description WP:SEEALSO -->
*National League Division Series (NLDS)
*List of American League pennant winners
*List of National League pennant winners
*List of World Series champions
*MLB division winners
*MLB postseason
<!-- please keep entries in alphabetical order -->
Notes
References
External links
*[https://www.baseball-reference.com/postseason/ Baseball-Reference.com] - annual playoffs
*[http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/history/postseason/mlb_ds.jsp MLB.com] - MLB's Division Series historical reference - box scores, highlights, etc.
Category:Recurring sporting events established in 1981
Category:Annual events in Major League Baseball | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_League_Division_Series | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.169033 |
3863 | National League Division Series | In Major League Baseball, the National League Division Series (NLDS) determines which two teams from the National League will advance to the National League Championship Series. The Division Series consists of two best-of-five series, featuring each of the two division winners with the best records and the winners of the wild-card playoffs.
History
The Division Series was implemented in 1981 as a one-off tournament because of a midseason strike, with the first place teams before the strike taking on the teams in first place after the strike. In 1981, a split-season format forced the first ever divisional playoff series, in which the Montreal Expos won the Eastern Division series over the Philadelphia Phillies in five games while in the Western Division, the Los Angeles Dodgers defeated the Houston Astros, also in five games (the Astros were members of the National League until 2012).
In 1994, it was returned permanently when Major League Baseball (MLB) restructured each league into three divisions, but with a different format than in 1981. Each of the division winners, along with one wild card team, qualify for the Division Series. Despite being planned for the 1994 season, the post-season was cancelled that year due to the 1994–95 Major League Baseball strike. In 1995, the first season to feature a division series, the Eastern Division champion Atlanta Braves defeated the wild card Colorado Rockies three games to one, while the Central Division champion Cincinnati Reds defeated the Western Division champion Los Angeles Dodgers in a three-game sweep.
From 1994 to 2011, the wild card was given to the team in the National League with the best overall record that was not a division champion. Beginning with the 2012 season, a second wild card team was added, and the two wild card teams play a single-game playoff to determine which team would play in the NLDS. For the 2020 Major League Baseball season only, there was an expanded playoff format, owing to an abbreviated 60-game regular season due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Eight teams qualified from the National League: the top two teams in each division plus the next two best records among the remaining teams. These eight teams played a best-of-three-game series to determine placement in the NLDS. The regular format returned for the 2021 season.
As of 2021, the Atlanta Braves have currently played in the most NL division series with seventeen appearances. The St. Louis Cardinals have currently won the most NL division series, winning eleven of the fourteen series in which they have played. The Pittsburgh Pirates (who finished with a losing record from 1993 to 2012) were the last team to make their first appearance in the NL division series, making their debut in 2013 after winning the 2013 National League Wild Card Game. In 2008, the Milwaukee Brewers became the first team to play in division series in both leagues when they won the National League wild card, their first postseason berth since winning the American League East Division title in 1982 before switching leagues in 1998. Milwaukee had competed in an American League Division Series in the strike-shortened 1981 season.
Format
The NLDS is a best-of-five series where the divisional winner with the best winning percentage in the regular season hosts the winner of the Wild Card Series between the top two wild card teams in one matchup, and the divisional winner with the second best winning percentage hosts the winner of the other Wild Card Series between the lowest-seeded divisional winner and the lowest-seeded wild card team. (From 2012 to 2021, the wild card team was assigned to play the divisional winner with the best winning percentage in the regular season in one series, and the other two division winners met in the other series. From 1998 to 2011, if the wild-card team and the division winner with the best record were from the same division, the wild-card team played the division winner with the second-best record, and the remaining two division leaders played each other.) The two series winners move on to the best-of-seven NLCS. According to Nate Silver, the advent of this playoff series, and especially of the wild card, has caused teams to focus more on "getting to the playoffs" rather than "winning the pennant" as the primary goal of the regular season.
From 2012 to 2021, the wild card team that advances to the Division Series was to face the number 1 seed, regardless whether or not they are in the same division. The two series winners move on to the best-of-seven NLCS. Beginning with the 2022 season, the winner between the lowest-ranked division winner and lowest-ranked wild card team faces the #2 seed division winner in the Division Series, while the 4 v. 5 wild card winner faces the #1 seed, as there is no reseeding even if the 6 seed wild card advances. Home-field advantage goes to the team with the better regular season record (or head-to-head record if there is a tie between two or more teams), except for the wild-card team, which never receives the home-field advantage.
Beginning in 2003, MLB has implemented a new rule to give the team with the best regular season record from the league that wins the All-Star Game a slightly greater advantage. In order to spread out the Division Series games for broadcast purposes, the two NLDS series follow one of two off-day schedules. Starting in 2007, after consulting the MLBPA, MLB has decided to allow the team with the best record in the league that wins the All-Star Game to choose whether to use the seven-day schedule (1-2-off-3-4-off-5) or the eight-day schedule (1-off-2-off-3-4-off-5). The team only gets to choose the schedule; the opponent is still determined by win–loss records.
Initially, the best-of-5 series played in a 2–3 format, with the first two games set at home for the lower seed team and the last three for the higher seed. Since 1998, the series has followed a 2–2–1 format, where the higher seed team plays at home in Games 1 and 2, the lower seed plays at home in Game 3 and Game 4 (if necessary), and if a Game 5 is needed, the teams return to the higher seed's field. When MLB added a second wild card team in 2012, the Division Series re-adopted the 2–3 format due to scheduling conflicts. However, it reverted to the 2–2–1 format starting the next season, 2013.
Results
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|+Key
!scope="row"|
|Wild card
|}
{| class"wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
|-
! scope="col" | Year
! scope="col" | Winning team
! scope="col" | Manager
! scope"col" class"unsortable" | Games
! scope="col" | Losing team
! scope="col" | Manager
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 1981
| Montreal Expos ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|-
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Houston Astros ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" | 1994
| colspan"5" align"center" |No Series due to a players' strike.
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 1995
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Colorado Rockies}} ||
|-
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 1996
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Los Angeles Dodgers}} ||
|-
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| San Diego Padres ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 1997
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Houston Astros ||
|-
| Florida Marlins}} ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| San Francisco Giants ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 1998
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Chicago Cubs}} ||
|-
| San Diego Padres ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Houston Astros ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 1999
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Houston Astros ||
|-
| New York Mets}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Arizona Diamondbacks ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2000
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
| New York Mets}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| San Francisco Giants ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2001
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Houston Astros ||
|-
| Arizona Diamondbacks ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| St. Louis Cardinals}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2002
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Arizona Diamondbacks ||
|-
| San Francisco Giants}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2003
| Chicago Cubs ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
| Florida Marlins}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| San Francisco Giants ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2004
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|-
| Houston Astros}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2005
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| San Diego Padres ||
|-
| Houston Astros}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2006
| New York Mets ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Los Angeles Dodgers}} ||
|-
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| San Diego Padres ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2007
| Colorado Rockies}} ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|-
| Arizona Diamondbacks ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Chicago Cubs ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2008
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Chicago Cubs ||
|-
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Milwaukee Brewers}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2009
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|-
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Colorado Rockies}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2010
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|-
| San Francisco Giants ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Atlanta Braves}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2011
| St. Louis Cardinals}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Philadelphia Phillies ||
|-
| Milwaukee Brewers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Arizona Diamondbacks ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2012
| San Francisco Giants ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Cincinnati Reds ||
|-
| St. Louis Cardinals}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Washington Nationals ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2013
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Pittsburgh Pirates}} ||
|-
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2014
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|-
| San Francisco Giants}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Washington Nationals ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2015
| New York Mets ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|-
| Chicago Cubs}} ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2016
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Washington Nationals ||
|-
| Chicago Cubs ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| San Francisco Giants}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2017
| Chicago Cubs ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Washington Nationals ||
|-
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Arizona Diamondbacks}} ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2018
| Milwaukee Brewers ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Colorado Rockies }} ||
|-
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2019
| Washington Nationals }} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|-
| St. Louis Cardinals ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| Atlanta Braves ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2020
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| Miami Marlins ||
|-
| Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|align="center"| 3–0
| San Diego Padres ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2021
| Atlanta Braves ||
|align="center"| 3–1
| Milwaukee Brewers ||
|-
| Los Angeles Dodgers}} ||
|align="center"| 3–2
| San Francisco Giants ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2022
| San Diego Padres}} || ||align="center"|3–1 || Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|-
|Philadelphia Phillies}} || ||align="center"|3–1 || Atlanta Braves ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2023
| Philadelphia Phillies}} || || align=center|3–1 || Atlanta Braves ||
|-
| Arizona Diamondbacks}} || || align=center|3–0 || Los Angeles Dodgers ||
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align:center" rowspan="2"| 2024
| Los Angeles Dodgers || || align=center|3–2 || San Diego Padres}} ||
|-
| New York Mets}} || || align=center|3–1 || Philadelphia Phillies ||
|}
Appearances by team
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
!Apps
!Team
!Wins
!Losses
!Win %
!Most recent<br>win
!Most recent<br>appearance
!Games<br>won
!Games<br>lost
!Game<br>win %
|-
||19|| style="text-align:left;" |Atlanta Braves||8||11||||2021||2023||38||36||
|-
||19|| style="text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Dodgers||10||9||||2024||2024||37||37||
|-
||14|| style="text-align:left;" |St. Louis Cardinals||11||3||||2019||2019||36||20||
|-
||9|| style="text-align:left;" |San Francisco Giants||4||5||||2014||2021||17||21||
|-
||9|| style="text-align:left;" |Philadelphia Phillies||5||4||||2023||2024||20||16||
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Houston Astros||2||5||||2005||2005||10||18||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |Chicago Cubs||4||3||||2017||2017||12||15||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |Arizona Diamondbacks||3||4||||2023||2023||12||14||
|-
||7|| style="text-align:left;" |San Diego Padres||2||5||||2022||2024||9||17||
|-
||6|| style="text-align:left;" |Washington Nationals||2||4||||2019||2019||13||16||
|-
||5|| style="text-align:left;" |New York Mets||5||0||||2024||2024||15||5||
|-
||4|| style="text-align:left;" |Colorado Rockies||1||3||||2007||2018||5||9||
|-
||4|| style="text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers||2||2||||2018||2021||8||8||
|-
||3|| style="text-align:left;" |Cincinnati Reds||1||2||||1995||2012||5||6||
|-
||3|| style="text-align:left;" |Miami Marlins||2||1||||2003||2020||6||4||
|-
||1|| style="text-align:left;" |Pittsburgh Pirates||0||1||||Never||2013||2||3||
|}
Years of appearance
In the sortable table below, teams are ordered first by number of wins, then by number of appearances, and finally by year of first appearance. In the "Season(s)" column, bold years indicate winning appearances.
{| class"wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
!scope="col"|
!scope="col"|Team
!scope="col"|Wins
!scope="col"|Losses
!scope="col"|Win %
!scope"col" class"unsortable"| Season(s)
|-
||14|| style"text-align:left;" |St. Louis Cardinals||11||3|||| align"left" | 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2009, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2019
|-
||19|| style"text-align:left;" |Los Angeles Dodgers||10||9|||| align"left" | 1981, 1995, 1996, 2004, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024
|-
||19|| style"text-align:left;" |Atlanta Braves||8||11|||| align"left" | 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2010, 2013, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023
|-
||9|| style"text-align:left;" |Philadelphia Phillies||5||4|||| align"left" | 1981, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2022, 2023, 2024
|-
||5|| style"text-align:left;" |New York Mets||5||0|||| align"left" | 1999, 2000, 2006, 2015, 2024
|-
||9|| style"text-align:left;" |San Francisco Giants||4||5|||| align"left" | 1997, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2021
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Chicago Cubs||4||3|||| align"left" | 1998, 2003, 2007, 2008, 2015, 2016, 2017
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Arizona Diamondbacks||3||4|||| align"left" | 1999, 2001, 2002, 2007, 2011, 2017, 2023
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |Houston Astros ||2||5|||| align="left" | 1981, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2004, 2005
|-
||7|| style"text-align:left;" |San Diego Padres||2||5|||| align"left" | 1996, 1998, 2005, 2006, 2020, 2022, 2024
|-
||6|| style"text-align:left;" |Washington Nationals||2||4|||| align"left" | 1981, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2019
|-
||4|| style"text-align:left;" |Milwaukee Brewers||2||2|||| align"left" | 2008, 2011, 2018, 2021
|-
||3|| style"text-align:left;" |Miami Marlins||2||1|||| align"left" | 1997, 2003, 2020
|-
||4|| style"text-align:left;" |Colorado Rockies||1||3|||| align"left" | 1995, 2007, 2009, 2018
|-
||3|| style"text-align:left;" |Cincinnati Reds||1||2|||| align"left" | 1995, 2010, 2012
|-
||1|| style"text-align:left;" |Pittsburgh Pirates||0||1|||| align"left" | 2013
|}
Frequent matchups
{| class"wikitable" style"font-size:1.00em; line-height:1.5em;"
! Count
! Matchup
! Record
! Years
|-
|align="center"| 5
| Atlanta Braves vs. Houston Astros
| Braves, 3–2
| 1997, 1999, 2001, 2004, 2005
|-
|align="center"| 3
| San Diego Padres vs. St. Louis Cardinals
| Cardinals, 3–0
| 1996, 2005, 2006
|-
|align="center"| 3
| St. Louis Cardinals vs. Los Angeles Dodgers
| Cardinals, 2–1
| 2004, 2009, 2014
|-
|align="center"| 3
| Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Atlanta Braves
| Dodgers, 2–1
| 1996, 2013, 2018
|-
|align="center"| 3
| Los Angeles Dodgers vs. San Diego Padres
|Dodgers, 2–1
| 2020, 2022, 2024
|-
|align="center"| 2
| St. Louis Cardinals vs. Arizona Diamondbacks
| Tied, 1–1
| 2001, 2002
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Florida Marlins vs. San Francisco Giants
| Marlins, 2–0
| 1997, 2003
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Chicago Cubs vs. Atlanta Braves
| Tied, 1–1
| 1998, 2003
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Philadelphia Phillies vs. Colorado Rockies
| Tied, 1–1
| 2007, 2009
|-
|align="center"| 2
| San Francisco Giants vs. Atlanta Braves
| Giants, 2–0
| 2002, 2010
|-
|align="center"| 2
| New York Mets vs. Los Angeles Dodgers
| Mets, 2–0
| 2006, 2015
|-
|align="center"| 2
| St. Louis Cardinals vs. Atlanta Braves
|Cardinals, 2–0
| 2000, 2019
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Washington Nationals
|Tied, 1–1
| 2016, 2019
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Arizona Diamondbacks
|Tied, 1–1
| 2017, 2023
|-
|align="center"| 2
| Atlanta Braves vs. Philadelphia Phillies
|Phillies, 2–0
| 2022, 2023
|}
NOTE: With the Houston Astros move to the American League at the conclusion of the 2012 season, the Braves vs. Astros series is not currently possible.
See also
<!-- Please keep entries in alphabetical order & add a short description WP:SEEALSO -->
*American League Division Series (ALDS)
*List of American League pennant winners
*List of National League pennant winners
*List of World Series champions
*MLB division winners
*MLB postseason
<!-- please keep entries in alphabetical order -->
Notes
References
External links
*[https://www.baseball-reference.com/postseason/ Baseball-Reference.com] - annual playoffs
*[http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/history/postseason/mlb_ds.jsp MLB.com] - MLB's Division Series historical reference - box scores, highlights, etc.
Category:Annual events in Major League Baseball | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_League_Division_Series | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.247705 |
3864 | 2001 World Series | , GA: 2
| runnerup = New York Yankees (3)
| runnerup_manager = Joe Torre
| runnerup_games = 95–65, , GA:
| date = October 27 – November 4
| venue = Bank One Ballpark (Arizona)<br />Yankee Stadium (New York)
| MVP = Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling (Arizona)
| television = Fox (United States)<br />MLB International (International)
| announcers = Joe Buck and Tim McCarver (Fox)<br />Gary Thorne and Rick Sutcliffe (MLB International)
| radio_network = ESPN<br />WABC (NYY)<br />KTAR (AZ)
| radio_announcers = Jon Miller and Joe Morgan (ESPN)<br />John Sterling and Michael Kay (WABC)<br />Thom Brennaman, Greg Schulte, Rod Allen and Jim Traber (KTAR)
| umpires = Steve Rippley (crew chief), Mark Hirschbeck, Dale Scott, Ed Rapuano, Jim Joyce, Dana DeMuth
| HOFers = Diamondbacks: <br />Randy Johnson<br />Yankees:<br />Derek Jeter<br />Mike Mussina<br />Mariano Rivera<br />Joe Torre (manager)
| ALCS = New York Yankees over Seattle Mariners (4–1)
| NLCS = Arizona Diamondbacks over Atlanta Braves (4–1)
| image2 = 2001 World Series Program.gif
}}
The 2001 World Series was the championship series of Major League Baseball's (MLB) 2001 season. The 97th edition of the World Series, it was a best-of-seven playoff between the National League (NL) champion Arizona Diamondbacks and the three-time defending World Series champions and American League (AL) champion New York Yankees. The underdog Diamondbacks defeated the heavily favored Yankees, four games to three to win the series. Considered one of the greatest World Series of all time,
its memorable aspects included two extra-inning games and three late-inning comebacks. Diamondbacks pitchers Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling were both named World Series Most Valuable Players.
The Yankees advanced to the World Series by defeating the Oakland Athletics, three games to two, in the AL Division Series, and then the Seattle Mariners in the AL Championship Series, four games to one. It was the Yankees' fourth consecutive World Series appearance, after winning championships in , , and . The Diamondbacks advanced to the World Series by defeating the St. Louis Cardinals, three games to two, in the NL Division Series, and then the Atlanta Braves in the NL Championship Series, four games to one. It was the franchise's first appearance in a World Series.
The Series began later than usual as a result of a delay in the regular season after the September 11 attacks and was the first to extend into November. The Diamondbacks won the first two games at home, limiting the Yankees to just one run. The Yankees responded with a close win in Game 3, at which U.S. President George W. Bush threw out the ceremonial first pitch. In Games 4 and 5, the Yankees won in comeback fashion, hitting game-tying home runs off Diamondbacks closer Byung-hyun Kim with one out remaining in consecutive games, before winning in extra innings. The Diamondbacks won Game 6 in a blowout, forcing a decisive Game 7. In the final game, the Yankees led in the ninth inning before the Diamondbacks staged a comeback against closer Mariano Rivera, capped off by a walk-off, bases-loaded bloop single by Luis Gonzalez to clinch Arizona's championship victory. This was the third World Series to end in a bases-loaded, walk-off hit, following and , and to this date, the last Series to end on a walk-off of any kind. This series held the record for the latest date that a Series ended (November 4), until that record was tied during the 2009 World Series and broken during the 2022 World Series.
Among several firsts, the 2001 World Series was the first World Series championship for the Diamondbacks; the first World Series played in the state of Arizona or the Mountain Time Zone; the first championship for a Far West state other than California; the first major professional sports team from the state of Arizona to win a championship; and the earliest an MLB franchise had won a World Series (the Diamondbacks had only existed for four years). The home team won every game in the Series, which had only happened twice before, in 1987 and 1991, both won by the Minnesota Twins. The Diamondbacks outscored the Yankees, 37–14, as a result of large margins of victory achieved by Arizona at Bank One Ballpark (now known as Chase Field) relative to the one-run margins the Yankees achieved at Yankee Stadium. Arizona's pitching held powerhouse New York to a .183 batting average, the lowest in a seven-game World Series ever, surpassing the St. Louis Cardinals, who hit .185 in the 1985 World Series. This and the 2002 World Series were the last two consecutive World Series to have game sevens until the World Series of 2016 and 2017. The 2001 World Series was the subject of an HBO documentary, Nine Innings from Ground Zero, in 2004. It is often referred to as the greatest World Series of all time.BackgroundArizona Diamondbacks
The Arizona Diamondbacks began play in 1998, along with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, as the youngest expansion team in Major League Baseball (MLB). After a mediocre debut season, the Diamondbacks finished the following year first in the National League (NL) West with a record, but lost to the New York Mets in the National League Division series. With several All-Star players like Randy Johnson and Matt Williams, the Diamondbacks had high expectations for the 2000 season, but finished third in the NL West with an record. During the offseason, team manager Buck Showalter was fired, and replaced by sportscaster Bob Brenly. Most of the Diamondbacks players were above the age of 30, and had already played on a number of teams prior to the 2001 season. In fact, the Diamondbacks starting lineup for the World Series did not include a player under the age of 31, making them the oldest team by player age in World Series history.
Although the Diamondbacks were only one game above .500 by the end of April, Gonzalez had a particularly memorable start to the season, in which he tied the MLB record with 13 home runs during the month of April. Johnson and Schilling also had the two lowest earned run averages (ERA) in the NL, with 2.49 and 2.98 respectively. The Diamondbacks were also one of the best defensive teams in MLB that year, second in fewest errors committed, and tied with the Seattle Mariners for the best fielding percentage.
The Diamondbacks entered the postseason as the #2 seed in the National League, and played the #4 seed St. Louis Cardinals in the National League Division Series. Craig Counsell hit a three-run home run late in Game 3 to give the Diamondbacks a 2–1 series lead, The Diamondbacks clinched the series in Game 5, when Tony Womack hit a game winning single that scored Danny Bautista. Schilling threw a complete game in Game 3, and the Diamondbacks scored 11 runs in a Game 4 victory to take a 3–1 series lead. The Diamondbacks clinched the series in Game 5 with another strong performance from Johnson. Following the Yankees win over the Braves in the 1999 World Series, sportscaster Bob Costas called the Yankees "the team of the decade, [and] most successful franchise of the century." the latest start date for a World Series until the 2009 World Series, which started on October 28. The last three games were the first major-league games (other than exhibitions) played in the month of November. The previous three occurrences were in (no series), (series held in September because of World War I), and (series cancelled by the players' strike). Game 7 was played on November 4; at the time this was the latest date a World Series game was played, and still tied with Game 6 of the 2009 Series for the second-latest date of a World Series game (only behind 's Game 6, played on November 5).
Additionally, the Series took place in New York City only seven weeks after the attacks, representing a remarkable boost in morale for the fatigued city. According to Port Authority sergeant Antonio Scannella, "We wanted a place America could see this flag so they could see the rips in it, but it still flies."
President George W. Bush threw out the ceremonial first pitch before Game 3 at Yankee Stadium. Security was extremely tight at Yankee Stadium before the game, with bomb sniffing dogs sweeping the property, snipers positioned around the stadium, and vendors screened by federal agents. A Secret Service agent dressed as an umpire and stood on the field with the other umpires before the game, briefly appearing on the TV broadcast. Bush wore a bulletproof vest underneath an FDNY sweater. Having been counseled by Derek Jeter to throw from the rubber on top of the pitcher's mound rather than the base of the mound, Bush strode to the rubber, gave a thumbs up to the crowd, and fired a strike over home plate as the crowd chanted "U-S-A".Summary
Matchups
Game 1
(pictured with the Boston Red Sox) held the Yankees' offense to just one run and picked up the win in Game 1.]]
pm (MST)
|Location=Bank One Ballpark in Phoenix, Arizona
|RoadNew York|RoadAbrNYY
|R11|R20|R30|R40|R50|R60|R70|R80|R90|RR1|RH3|RE2
|HomeArizona|HomeAbrAZ
|H11|H20|H34|H44|H50|H60|H70|H80|H9X|HR9|HH10|HE0
|RSP|HSP
|WPCurt Schilling (1–0)|LPMike Mussina (0–1)|SV|RoadHR|HomeHR=Craig Counsell (1), Luis Gonzalez (1)
|BoxURL=https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/2001/B10270ARI2001.htm
|Other=, roof open, Mostly Cloudy}}
The Series commenced on October 27, which was the latest a World Series had started, beating the previous record by four days (1999 World Series, October 23). The Yankees struck first in Game 1 when Derek Jeter was hit by a pitch with one out in the first and scored on Bernie Williams's double two batters later. However, Arizona's Curt Schilling and two relievers, Mike Morgan and Greg Swindell held the Yankees scoreless afterward. They managed to get only two walks and two hits for the rest of the game, Scott Brosius's double in the second and Jorge Posada's single in the fourth, both with two outs.
Meanwhile, the Diamondbacks tied the game on Craig Counsell's one-out home run in the first off of Mike Mussina. After a scoreless second, Mussina led off the third by hitting Tony Womack with a pitch. He moved to second on Counsell's sacrifice bunt before Luis Gonzalez's home run put the Diamondbacks up 3–1. A single and right fielder David Justice's error put runners on second and third before Matt Williams's sacrifice fly put Arizona up 4–1. After Mark Grace was intentionally walked, Damian Miller's RBI double gave Arizona a 5–1 lead.
Next inning, Gonzalez hit a two-out double off of Randy Choate. Reggie Sanders was intentionally walked before Gonzalez scored on Steve Finley's single. An error by third baseman Brosius scored Sanders, put Finley at third, and Williams at second. Both men scored on Mark Grace's double, putting Arizona up 9–1. Though the Diamondbacks got just one more hit for the rest of the game off of Sterling Hitchcock and Mike Stanton (Williams' leadoff single in the seventh), they went up 1–0 in the series.
The Diamondbacks' win in Game 1 was the first World Series game won by a non-New York City team since 1997. In every World Series between 1997 and 2001, either both teams were from New York City or a New York City team won in a sweep (1998 and 1999).
Game 2
(pictured in 2015) hit a three-run home run for the Diamondbacks in the bottom of the seventh to seal a Game 2 win for Arizona.]]
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Arizona continued to take control of the Series with the strong pitching performance of Randy Johnson. The Big Unit pitched a complete-game shutout, allowing only four baserunners and three hits while striking out 11 Yankees. Andy Pettitte meanwhile nearly matched him, retiring Arizona in order in five of the seven innings he pitched. In the second, he allowed a leadoff single to Reggie Sanders, who scored on Danny Bautista's double. Bautista was the only Arizona runner stranded for the entire game. In the seventh, Pettitte hit Luis Gonzalez with a pitch before Sanders grounded into a forceout. After Bautista singled, Matt Williams's three-run home run put Arizona up 4–0. They won the game with that score and led the series two games to none as it moved to New York City. This was the 1,000th game played in the history of the MLB postseason.
Game 3
pitched a three-hitter and struck out nine to clinch Game 3 for the Yankees.]]
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The game was opened in New York City by President George W. Bush, who threw the ceremonial first pitch, a strike to Yankees backup catcher Todd Greene. Bush became the first incumbent U.S. president to throw a World Series first pitch since Jimmy Carter in . He also threw the baseball from the mound where the pitcher would be set (unlike most ceremonial first pitches which are from in front of the mound) and threw it for a strike. Chants of "U-S-A, U-S-A" rang throughout Yankee Stadium. Yankees starter Roger Clemens was outstanding allowing only three hits and struck out nine in seven innings of work. Yankees closer Mariano Rivera pitched two innings for the save.
Jorge Posada's leadoff home run off of Brian Anderson in the second put the Yankees up 1–0. The Diamondbacks loaded the bases in the fourth on two walks and one hit before Matt Williams's sacrifice fly tied the game. Bernie Williams hit a leadoff single in the sixth and moved to second on a wild pitch one out later before Posada walked. Mike Morgan relieved Anderson and struck out David Justice before Scott Brosius broke the tie with an RBI single. That would be all the scoring as Morgan and Greg Swindell pitched the rest of the game for the Diamondbacks. The Yankees cut Arizona's series lead to 2–1 with the win.
Game 4
's walk off solo home run for the Yankees evened the series up at two games apiece and also earned him the nickname of "Mr. November".]]
pm (EST)
|Location=Yankee Stadium in Bronx, New York
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Game 4 saw the Yankees send Orlando Hernández to the mound while the Diamondbacks elected to bring back Curt Schilling on three days' rest. Both pitchers gave up home runs, with Schilling doing so to Shane Spencer in the third inning and Hernandez doing so to Mark Grace in the fourth. Hernandez pitched solid innings, giving up four hits while Schilling went seven innings and gave up one.
With the game still tied entering the eighth, Arizona struck. After Mike Stanton recorded the first out of the inning, Luis Gonzalez singled and Erubiel Durazo hit a double to bring him in. Matt Williams followed by grounding into a fielder's choice off of Ramiro Mendoza, which scored pinch runner Midre Cummings and gave the team a 3–1 lead.
With his team on the verge of taking a commanding 3–1 series lead, Diamondbacks manager Bob Brenly elected to bring in closer Byung-hyun Kim in the bottom of the eighth for a two-inning save. Kim, at 22, became the first Korean-born player to play in the MLB World Series. Kim struck out the side in the eighth, but ran into trouble in the ninth.
Derek Jeter led off by trying to bunt for a hit but was thrown out by Williams. Paul O'Neill then lined a single in front of Gonzalez. After Bernie Williams struck out, Kim seemed to be out of trouble with Tino Martinez coming to the plate. However, Martinez drove the first pitch he saw from Kim into the right-center field bleachers, tying the score at 3–3. The Yankees were not done, as Jorge Posada walked and David Justice moved him into scoring position with a single. Kim struck Spencer out to end the threat.
When the scoreboard clock in Yankee Stadium passed midnight, World Series play in November began, with the message on the scoreboard "Welcome to November Baseball".
Mariano Rivera took the hill for the Yankees in the tenth and retired the Diamondbacks in order. Kim went out for a third inning of work and retired Scott Brosius and Alfonso Soriano, but Jeter hit an opposite field home run on a 3–2 pitch count from Kim. This home run gave the Yankees a 4–3 victory and tied the Series at two games apiece which guaranteed a return trip to Arizona and made Jeter the first player to hit a November home run and earning him the tongue-in-cheek nickname of "Mr. November".
Game 5
hit the game-winning single for the Yankees in the bottom of the twelfth inning, bringing the Yankees one win away from a title.]]
pm (EST)
|Location=Yankee Stadium in Bronx, New York
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|RSP|HSP
|WPSterling Hitchcock (1–0)|LPAlbie Lopez (0–1)|SV|RoadHRSteve Finley (1), Rod Barajas (1)|HomeHR=Scott Brosius (1)
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Game 5 saw the Yankees return to Mike Mussina for the start while the Diamondbacks sent Miguel Batista, who had not pitched in twelve days, to the mound. Batista pitched a strong scoreless innings, striking out six, and reliever Greg Swindell got the last out of the eighth inning. Mussina bounced back from his poor Game 1 start, recording ten strikeouts, but allowed solo home runs in the fifth inning to Steve Finley and Rod Barajas.
In the top of the ninth, the soon to be retired Paul O'Neill was honored by Yankee fans who chanted his name to which O'Neill, who was visibly in tears, tipped his hat. With the Diamondbacks leading 2–0 in the ninth, Byung-hyun Kim was called upon for the save despite having thrown three innings the night before. Jorge Posada doubled to open the inning, but Kim got Shane Spencer to ground out and then struck out Chuck Knoblauch. As had happened the previous night, Kim could not hold the lead as Scott Brosius hit a 1–0 pitch over the left field wall, the second straight game tying home run in the bottom of the ninth for the Yankees. Kim was pulled from the game in favor of Mike Morgan who recorded the final out.
Morgan retired the Yankees in order in the 10th and 11th innings, while the Diamondbacks got to Mariano Rivera in the 11th. Danny Bautista and Erubiel Durazo opened the inning with hits and Matt Williams advanced them into scoring position with a sacrifice bunt. Rivera then intentionally walked Steve Finley to load the bases, then got Reggie Sanders to line out and Mark Grace grounded out to end the inning.
Arizona went to midseason trade acquisition Albie Lopez in the 12th, and in his first at bat he gave up a single to Knoblauch (who had entered the game as a pinch runner). Brosius moved him over with a bunt, and then Alfonso Soriano ended the game with an RBI single to give the Yankees a 3–2 victory and a 3–2 series lead as the series went back to Phoenix. Lopez would not pitch again in the series. Sterling Hitchcock got the win for the Yankees after he relieved Rivera for the twelfth.
Game 6
allowed just two runs and struck out seven to pick up his second win of the series.]]
pm (MST)
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With Arizona in a must-win situation, Randy Johnson pitched seven innings and struck out seven, giving up just two runs, and Bobby Witt and Troy Brohawn finished the blowout. The Diamondbacks struck first when Tony Womack hit a leadoff double off of Andy Pettitte and scored on Danny Bautista's single in the first. Next inning, Womack's bases-loaded single scored two and Bautista's single scored another. The Yankees loaded the bases in the third on a single and two walks, but Johnson struck out Jorge Posada to end the inning. The Diamondbacks broke the game open with eight runs in the bottom half. Pettitte allowed a leadoff walk to Greg Colbrunn and subsequent double to Matt Williams before being relieved by Jay Witasick, who allowed four straight singles to Reggie Sanders, Jay Bell, Damian Miller, and Johnson that scored three runs. After Womack struck out, Bautista's single scored two more runs and Luis Gonzalez's double scored another, with Bautista being thrown out at home. Colbrunn's single and Williams's double scored a run each before Sanders struck out to end the inning. In the fourth, Bell reached first on a strike-three wild pitch before scoring on Miller's double. Johnson struck out before Womack singled to knock Witasick out of the game. With Randy Choate pitching, Yankees second baseman Alfonso Soriano's error on Bautista's ground ball allowed Miller to score and put runners on first and second before Gonzalez's single scored the Diamondbacks' final run. Choate and Mike Stanton kept them scoreless for the rest of the game. Pettitte was charged with six runs in two innings while Witasick was charged with nine runs in innings, the most runs allowed by any pitcher in a World Series game since Hall of Famer Walter Johnson also allowed nine runs in Game 7 of the 1925 World Series. The Yankees scored their only runs in the sixth on back-to-back one-out singles by Shane Spencer and Luis Sojo with runners on second and third, but by then the score had become so far out of reach that it didn't do the Yankees much good. The Diamondbacks hit six doubles and Danny Bautista batted 3-for-4 with five RBIs. The team set a World Series record with 22 hits and defeated the New York Yankees in its most lopsided postseason loss in 293 postseason games, since surpassed by a 16–1 loss to the Boston Red Sox in Game 3 of the 2018 American League Division Series. The 15–2 win evened the series at three games apiece and set up a Game 7 for the ages between Roger Clemens and Curt Schilling.Game 7
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It was a matchup of two 20-game winners in the Series finale. Roger Clemens, at 39 years old, became the oldest Game 7 starter. Curt Schilling had already started two games of the Series and pitched his 300th inning of the season on just three days' rest. The two aces matched each other inning by inning and after seven full innings, the game was tied at 1–1. The Diamondbacks scored first in the sixth inning with a Steve Finley single and a Danny Bautista double (Bautista, trying to stretch it into a triple, was called out at third base). The Yankees responded with an RBI single from Tino Martinez, which drove in Derek Jeter who had singled earlier. Brenly stayed with Schilling into the eighth, and the move backfired as Alfonso Soriano hit a home run on an 0–2 pitch. After Schilling struck out Scott Brosius (who, like O'Neill, would also retire following the series), he gave up a single to David Justice, and he left the game trailing 2–1. When Brenly came to the mound to remove Schilling, he was heard on the Sounds of the Game microphone telling his clearly upset pitcher, "love you brother, you're my hero" and assuring him that "that ain't gonna beat us, we're gonna get that back and then some." He then brought in Game 5 starter Miguel Batista to get Jeter out and then in an unconventional move, brought in the previous night's starter and winner Randy Johnson, who had thrown 104 pitches, in relief to keep it a one-run game. It proved to be a smart move, as Johnson retired pinch hitter Chuck Knoblauch (who batted for the left handed Paul O'Neill) on a fly out to Bautista in right field, then returned to the mound for the top of the ninth where he got Bernie Williams to fly out to Steve Finley in center field and Martinez to ground out to Tony Womack at shortstop, and then struck out catcher Jorge Posada to send the game to the bottom of the ninth inning.
With the Yankees ahead 2–1 in the bottom of the eighth, manager Joe Torre decided to relieve setup man Mike Stanton, who had got the last two outs, to his ace closer Mariano Rivera for a two-inning save. Rivera struck out the side in the eighth, including Arizona's Luis Gonzalez, Matt Williams, and Bautista. Although he was effective in the eighth, this game would end in the third ninth-inning comeback of the Series.
Mark Grace led off the inning with a single to center on a 1–0 pitch. Rivera's errant throw to second base on a bunt attempt by catcher Damian Miller on an 0–1 pitch put runners on first and second. Jeter tried to reach for the ball, but got tangled in the legs of pinch-runner David Dellucci, who was sliding in an attempt to break up the double play. During the next at bat, Rivera appeared to regain control when he fielded pinch hitter Jay Bell's (who was hitting for Johnson) bunt and threw out Dellucci at third base, but third baseman Brosius decided to hold onto the baseball instead of throwing to first to complete the double play. Midre Cummings was sent in to pinch-run for Damian Miller, who had reached second base safely. With Cummings at second and Bell at first, the next batter, Womack, hit a double down the right-field line on a 2–2 pitch that tied the game and earned Rivera a blown save, his first in a postseason since 1997. Bell advanced to third and the Yankees pulled the infield and outfield in as the potential winning run (Bell) stood at third with fewer than two outs. After Rivera hit Craig Counsell unintentionally with an 0–1 pitch, the bases were loaded. On an 0–1 pitch, with Williams in the on-deck circle, Gonzalez lofted a soft floater single over the drawn-in Jeter that barely reached the outfield grass, plating Jay Bell with the winning run.
Gonzalez's single ended New York's bid for a fourth consecutive title (and fifth in six seasons) and brought Arizona its first championship in its fourth year of existence, making the Diamondbacks the fastest expansion team to win a World Series (beating out the 1997 Florida Marlins, who had done it in their fifth season at that time). It was also the first, and remains the only, major professional sports championship for the state of Arizona. Randy Johnson picked up his third win of the Series, becoming the first pitcher since Mickey Lolich of the 1968 Tigers to win three games in a World Series. Rivera took the loss, his only postseason loss in his career. Coincidentally, this was also the second World Series in a 5-year span (1997 to 2001) to end with a game-winning RBI single. Edgar Renteria hit the game-winner in the 1997 series, while Gonzalez hit it here, with Craig Counsell being on the basepaths for each. No other World Series has ended with a game-winning hit since 2001.
In 2009, Game 7 of the 2001 World Series was chosen by Sports Illustrated as the Best Postseason Game of the Decade (2000–2009).
In the years that have followed, many fans regardless of team allegiance consider Game 7 of the 2001 World Series to be one of the greatest games ever played in the history of professional baseball.
Composite box
2001 World Series (4–3): Arizona Diamondbacks (N.L.) over New York Yankees (A.L.)
Media coverage
For the second consecutive year, Fox carried the World Series with its top broadcast team, Joe Buck and Tim McCarver (himself a Yankees broadcaster). This was the first year of Fox's exclusive rights to the World Series (in the previous contract, Fox only broadcast the World Series in even numbered years while NBC broadcast it in odd numbered years), which it has held since. This particular contract also had given Fox exclusive rights to the entire baseball postseason, which aired over its family of networks, but shortly after the World Series, Fox sold its cable outlet Fox Family Channel, on which it aired Division Series games, shortly after the World Series ended, to Disney, which renamed the channel to ABC Family; since this made the channel a corporate sibling of ESPN, Disney would move those games to ESPN in 2003 after airing them for one more season on ABC Family.
ESPN Radio provided national radio coverage for the fourth consecutive year, with Jon Miller and Joe Morgan calling the action.
Locally, the Series was broadcast by KTAR-AM in Phoenix with Thom Brennaman, Greg Schulte, Rod Allen and Jim Traber, and by WABC-AM in New York City with John Sterling and Michael Kay. This was WABC's last broadcast of Yankees baseball after twenty-one seasons as the team's flagship, and also the last time Sterling and Kay broadcast together after ten seasons. Sterling and the Yankees joined WCBS-AM the next season on the radio side, while Kay was promoted to television as the YES Network launched for 2002.
Books and films
Buster Olney, who covered the Yankees for The New York Times before joining ESPN, would write a book titled The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty, published in 2004. The book is a play by play account of Game 7 in addition to stories about key players, executives, and moments from the 1996–2001 dynasty. In a 2005 reprinting, Olney included a new epilogue covering the aftermath of the 2001 World Series up to the Boston Red Sox epic comeback from down 3–0 in the 2004 ALCS.
The official MLB Productions documentary film of the series was released in 2001.
In 2004, HBO released Nine Innings from Ground Zero, a documentary focusing on the special role that baseball, and particularly the Yankees, played in helping to heal New York after 9/11. The film features interviews with players, fans who lost family members, firefighters, sportswriters, and then United States President George W. Bush.
In 2005, A&E Home Video released the New York Yankees Fall Classic Collectors Edition (1996–2001) DVD set. Game 4 of the 2001 World Series is included in the set. In 2008, The Arizona Diamondbacks 2001 World Series DVD set was released. All seven games are included on this set.
Aftermath
The duo of Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson were awarded the World Series Most Valuable Player, the first players to split the award since Steve Yeager, Ron Cey, and Pedro Guerrero did so for the Dodgers in the 1981 World Series, and last to do so, to date. This would not be the only award they split as both were named Sports Illustrated Sportsperson of the Year for 2001.
Rivera's blown save and the Yankees' loss proved to be life-saving for Yankees utility player Enrique Wilson. Had the Yankees won, Wilson was planning to fly home to the Dominican Republic on American Airlines Flight 587 on November 12 after what would have been a Yankees victory parade down the Canyon of Heroes. But after the Yankees lost (and thus no parade occurred), Wilson decided to fly home earlier. Flight 587 would crash in Belle Harbor, Queens, killing everyone on board. Rivera later said, "I am glad we lost the World Series because it means that I still have a friend."
During the offseason, several Yankees moved on to other teams or retired, the most notable changes being the free agent departures of Martinez and Knoblauch to the St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Royals, and Brosius and O'Neill retiring. Martinez would later return to the Yankees to finish his career in 2005.
After winning the NL West again in 2002 the Diamondbacks were swept 3–0 by St. Louis in the NLDS. From here they declined, losing 111 games in 2004 as Bob Brenly was fired during that season. Arizona would not win another NL West title until 2007. Schilling was traded to the Boston Red Sox after the 2003 season and in 2004 helped lead them to their first World Series championship since 1918. He helped them win another championship in 2007 and retired after four years with Boston, missing the entire 2008 season with a shoulder injury. Johnson was traded to the Yankees after the 2004 season, a season that saw him throw a perfect game against the Atlanta Braves, though he would be traded back to the Diamondbacks two years later and finish his career with the San Francisco Giants in 2009. The last player from the 2001 Diamondbacks roster, Lyle Overbay, retired following the 2014 season with the Milwaukee Brewers while the last player from the 2001 Yankees, Randy Choate, retired following the 2016 season.
From 2002 through 2007, the Yankees' misfortune in the postseason continued, with the team losing the ALDS to the Anaheim Angels in 2002, the World Series to the Florida Marlins in 2003, the ALCS to the Boston Red Sox (in the process becoming the first team in postseason history to blow a 3–0 series lead) in 2004, the ALDS again to the Angels in 2005, and then losing the ALDS to the Detroit Tigers and the Cleveland Indians in 2006 and 2007, respectively. In addition, including the World Series loss in 2001, every World Series champion from 2001 to 2004 won the title at the Yankees' expense in postseason play, which is an AL record and as of 2023 tied for the MLB record with the Los Angeles Dodgers from 2016 to 2019. Joe Torre's contract was allowed to expire and he was replaced by Joe Girardi in 2008, a season in which the Yankees would miss the playoffs for the first time since 1993. The Yankees won their 27th World Series championship in 2009, defeating the defending 2008 champion Philadelphia Phillies in six games, but could not pull off another dynasty like they did during the late 1990s and early 2000s; in fact, they failed to reach the World Series during the entirety of the 2010s. The Yankees would finally return to the World Series in 2024 only to fall in five games to the Los Angeles Dodgers. Since 2001, the Yankees have played in four World Series and lost three of them ('01, ´03, '24)
This is the state of Arizona's only championship among the four major North American men's professional sports. However, the WNBA's Phoenix Mercury have won three championships since then (2007, 2009, and 2014).
The Diamondbacks and the Baltimore Ravens, who won the Super Bowl earlier in 2001, created the first instance of two major sports teams winning a championship game or series on their first attempts. This would not occur again until 2019, when the Toronto Raptors and Washington Nationals accomplished this feat.
The Diamondbacks would not return to the World Series again until 2023; this time, they would go on to lose to the Texas Rangers in five games.
Quotes
See also
* 2001 Japan Series
General sources
*
Citations
External links
* [http://www.euchner.us: Book on 2001 WS is "the last word on the inside game of baseball"]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20011008213831/http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/baseball/mlb/2001/postseason/ SI.com: MLB Postseason 2001]
* [https://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/01play/index.htm USA Today: Quest for a Title]
* [http://www.sportsline.com/u/baseball/mlb/2001/playoffs/ CBS Sportsline: 2001 MLB Playoffs]
}}
Category:2000s in Phoenix, Arizona
Category:2000s in the Bronx
World Series
World Series
World Series
Category:Baseball competitions in New York City
Category:Baseball competitions in Phoenix, Arizona
World Series
Category:Arizona Diamondbacks postseason
Category:New York Yankees postseason
World Series
World Series
Category:World Series | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001_World_Series | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.277577 |
3865 | 1903 World Series | , GA:
| runnerup = Pittsburgh Pirates (3)
| runnerup_manager = Fred Clarke (player/manager)
| runnerup_games = 91–49, , GA:
| date = October 1–13
| venue = Huntington Avenue Grounds (Boston)<br />Exposition Park (Pittsburgh)
| MVP = <!-- none -->
| television = <!-- none -->
| announcers = <!-- none -->
| radio_network = <!-- none -->
| radio_announcers = <!-- none -->
| umpires = Hank O'Day (NL)<br />Tom Connolly (AL)
| HOFers = Umpires:<br />Tom Connolly<br />Hank O'Day<br />Americans:<br />Jimmy Collins<br />Cy Young<br />Pirates:<br />Fred Clarke<br />Honus Wagner
| ALCS = <!-- none -->
| NLCS = <!-- none -->
| previous = 1900<br>Chronicle-Telegraph Cup
}}
The 1903 World Series was the first modern World Series to be played in Major League Baseball. It matched the American League (AL) champion Boston Americans against the National League (NL) champion Pittsburgh Pirates in a best-of-nine series, with Boston prevailing five games to three, winning the last four. The first three games were played in Boston, the next four in Allegheny (home of the Pirates), and the eighth (last) game in Boston.
Pittsburgh pitcher Sam Leever injured his shoulder while trap shooting, so his teammate Deacon Phillippe pitched five complete games. Phillippe won three of his games, but it was not enough to overcome the club from the new American League. Boston pitchers Bill Dinneen and Cy Young led Boston to victory. In Game 1, Phillippe struck out ten Boston batters. The next day, Dinneen bettered that mark, striking out 11 Pittsburgh batters in Game 2.
Honus Wagner, bothered by injuries, batted only 6-for-27 (.222) in the Series and committed six errors. The shortstop was deeply distraught by his performance. The following spring, Wagner (who in 1903 led the National League in batting average) refused to send his portrait to a "Hall of Fame" for batting champions. "I was too bum last year", he wrote. "I was a joke in that Boston-Pittsburgh Series. What does it profit a man to hammer along and make a few hits when they are not needed only to fall down when it comes to a pinch? I would be ashamed to have my picture up now."
Due to overflow crowds at the Exposition Park games in Allegheny City, if a batted ball rolled under a rope in the outfield that held spectators back, a "ground-rule triple" would be scored. 17 ground-rule triples were hit in the four games played at the stadium.
In the series, Boston came back from a three games to one deficit, winning the final four games to capture the title. Such a large comeback would not happen again until the Pirates came back to defeat the Washington Senators in the 1925 World Series, and has happened only 11 times in baseball history. (The Pirates themselves repeated this feat in against the Baltimore Orioles.) Much was made of the influence of Boston's "Royal Rooters", who traveled to Exposition Park and sang their theme song "Tessie" to distract the opposing players (especially Wagner). Boston wound up winning three out of four games in Allegheny City.
Pirates owner Barney Dreyfuss added his share of the gate receipts to the players' share, so the losing team's players actually finished with a larger individual share than the winning team's.
The Series brought the new American League prestige and proved its best could beat the best of the National League, thus strengthening the demand for future World Series competitions.
Background
A new league
In 1901, Ban Johnson, president of the Western League, a minor league organization, formed the American League to take advantage of the National League's 1900 contraction from twelve teams to eight. Johnson and fellow owners raided the National League and signed away many star players, including Cy Young and Jimmy Collins. Johnson had a list of 46 National Leaguers he targeted for the American League; by 1902, all but one had made the jump.
The teams
}}
}}
The Pirates won their third straight pennant in 1903 thanks to a powerful lineup that included legendary shortstop Honus Wagner, who hit .355 and drove in 101 runs, player-manager Fred Clarke, who hit .351, and Ginger Beaumont, who hit .341 and led the league in hits and runs. The Pirates' pitching was weaker than it had been in previous years but boasted 24-game winner Deacon Phillippe and 25-game winner Sam Leever.
| score2=Pittsburgh Pirates – 0, Boston Americans – 3
| date2=October 2
| loc2=Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds
| time2=1:47
| att2=9,415
| ref2
| score3=Pittsburgh Pirates – 4, Boston Americans – 2
| date3=October 3
| loc3=Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds
| time3=1:50
| att3=18,801
| ref3
| score4=Boston Americans – 4, Pittsburgh Pirates – 5
| date4=October 6
| loc4=Exposition Park (III)
| time4=1:30
| att4=7,600
| ref4
| score5=Boston Americans – 11, Pittsburgh Pirates – 2
| date5=October 7
| loc5=Exposition Park (III)
| time5=2:00
| att5=12,322
| ref5
| score6=Boston Americans – 6, Pittsburgh Pirates – 3
| date6=October 8
| loc6=Exposition Park (III)
| time6=2:02
| att6=11,556
| ref6
| score7=Boston Americans – 7, Pittsburgh Pirates – 3
| date7=October 10
| loc7=Exposition Park (III)
| time7=1:45
| att7=17,038
| ref7
| score8=Pittsburgh Pirates – 0, Boston Americans – 3
| date8=October 13
| loc8=Huntington Avenue Baseball Grounds
| time8=1:35
| att8=7,455
| ref8
}}
Matchups
Game 1
hit the first home run in World Series history, an inside-the-park home run in Game 1.]]
The Pirates started Game 1 strong, scoring six runs in the first four innings, and held on to win the first World Series game in modern baseball history. They extended their lead to 7–0 on an inside-the-park home run by Jimmy Sebring in the seventh, the first home run in World Series history. Boston scored a few runs in the last three innings, but it was too little, too late; they ended up losing 7–3 in the first ever World Series game. Both Phillippe and Young threw complete games, with Phillippe striking out ten and Young fanning five, but Young also gave up twice as many hits and allowed three earned runs to Phillippe's two.
Game 2
hit the first over-the-fence home run in World Series history.]]
After starting out strong in Game 1, the Pirates simply shut down offensively, eking out a mere three hits, all singles. Pittsburgh starter Sam Leever went 1 inning and gave up three hits and two runs, before his ailing arm forced him to leave in favor of Bucky Veil, who finished the game. Bill Dinneen struck out 11 and pitched a complete game for the Americans, while Patsy Dougherty hit home runs in the first and sixth innings for two of the Boston's three runs. The Americans' Patsy Dougherty led off the Boston scoring with an inside-the-park home run, the first time a lead-off batter did just that until Alcides Escobar of the Kansas City Royals duplicated the feat in the 2015 World Series, 112 years later. Dougherty's second home run was the first in World Series history to actually sail over the fence, an incredibly rare feat at the time.
Game 3
at Huntington Avenue Grounds during the series]]
Phillippe, pitching after only a single day of rest, started Game 3 for the Pirates and didn't let them down, hurling his second complete-game victory of the Series to put Pittsburgh up two games to one.
Game 4
]]
After two days of rest, Phillippe was ready to pitch a second straight game. He threw his third complete-game victory of the series against Bill Dinneen, who was making his second start of the series. But Phillippe's second straight win was almost not to be, as the Americans, down 5–1 in the top of the ninth, rallied to narrow the deficit to one run. The comeback attempt failed, as Phillippe managed to put an end to it and give the Pirates a commanding 3–1 series lead.
Game 5
]]
Game 5 was a pitcher's duel for the first five innings, with Boston's Cy Young and Pittsburgh's Brickyard Kennedy giving up no runs. That changed in the top of the sixth, however, when the Americans scored a then-record six runs before being retired. Young, on the other hand, managed to keep his shutout intact before finally giving up a pair of runs in the bottom of the eighth. He went the distance and struck out four for his first World Series win.
Game 6
]]
Game 6 was a rematch between the starters of Game 2, Boston's Dinneen and Pittsburgh's Leever. Leever pitched a complete game this time but so did Dinneen, who outmatched him to earn his second complete-game victory of the series. After losing three of the first four games of the World Series, the underdog Americans had tied the series at three games apiece.
Game 7
The fourth and final game in Allegheny saw Phillippe start his fourth game of the Series for the Pirates. This time, however, he did not fare as well as he did in his first three starts. Cy Young, in his third start of the Series, held the Pirates to three runs and put the Americans ahead for the first time as the Series moved back to Boston.
Game 8
The final game of this inaugural World Series started out as an intense pitcher's duel, scoreless until the bottom of the fourth when Hobe Ferris hit a two-run single. Phillippe started his fifth and final game of the series and Dinneen his fourth. As he did in Game 2, Dinneen threw a complete-game shutout, striking out seven and leading his Americans to victory, while Phillippe pitched respectably but could not match Dinneen because his arm had been worn out with five starts in the eight games, giving up three runs to give the first 20th-century World Championship to the Boston Americans, Honus Wagner striking out to end the Series.
Composite line score
1903 World Series (5–3): Boston Americans (A.L.) over Pittsburgh Pirates (N.L.)
Series Statistics
Boston Americans
Batting
Note: GPGames Played; ABAt Bats; RRuns; HHits; 2BDoubles; 3BTriples; HRHome Runs; RBIRuns Batted In; BBWalks; AVGBatting Average; OBPOn Base Percentage; SLGSlugging Percentage
{|class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
! width="16%" |Player
! width="9%" |GP
! width="9%" |AB
!R
! width="9%" |H
!2B
!3B
! width="9%" |HR
! width="9%" |RBI
!BB
! width="9%" |AVG
!OBP
!SLG
!Reference
|-
|Jimmy Collins||8||36
|5||9
|1
|2||0||1
|1||.250
|.270
|.389
|
|-
|Lou Criger||8||26
|1||6
|0
|0||0||4
|2||.231
|.286
|.231
|
|-
|Bill Dinneen||4||12
|1||2
|2
|1||0||0
|1||.167
|.231
|.167
|
|-
|Patsy Dougherty||8||34
|3||8
|0
|2||2||5
|2||.235
|.297
|.529
|
|-
|Duke Farrell||2||2
|0||0
|0
|0||0||1
|0||.000
|.000
|.000
|
|-
|Hobe Ferris||8||31
|3||9
|0
|1||0||5
|0||.290
|.313
|.355
|
|-
|Buck Freeman||8||32
|6||9
|0
|3||0||4
|2||.281
|.324
|.469
|
|-
|Long Tom Hughes||1||0
|0||0
|0
|0||0||0
|0||.000
|.000
|.000
|
|-
|Candy LaChance||8||27
|5||6
|2
|1||0||4
|3||.222
|.300
|.370
|
|-
|Jack O'Brien||2||2
|0||0
|0
|0||0||0
|0||.000
|.000
|.000
|
|-
|Freddy Parent||8||32
|8||9
|0
|3||0||4
|1||.281
|.324
|.469
|
|-
|Chick Stahl||8||33
|6||10
|1
|3||0||3
|1||.303
|.324
|.515
|
|-
|Cy Young||4||15
|1||1
|0
|1||0||3
|0||.067
|.067
|.200
|
|}
Pitching
Note: GGames Played; GSGames Started; ERAEarned Run Average; WWins; LLosses; SVSaves; IPInnings Pitched; HHits; RRuns; ER Earned Runs; BBWalks; SO Strikeouts
{|class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
! width="16%" |Player
! width="5%" |G
! width="5%" |GS
! width="5%" |ERA
! width="5%" |W
! width="5%" |L
!SV
! width="5%" |IP
! width="5%" |H
! width="5%" |R
! width="5%" |ER
! width="5%" |BB
! width="5%" |SO
!Reference
|-
| Bill Dinneen || 4 || 4 || 2.06 || 3 || 1
|0|| 35.0 || 29 || 8 || 8 || 8 || 28
|
|-
| Tom Hughes || 1 || 1 || 9.00 || 0 || 1
|0|| 2.0 || 4 || 3 || 2 || 2 || 0
|
|-
| Cy Young || 4 || 3 || 1.85 || 2 || 1
|0|| 34.0 || 31 || 13 || 7 || 4 || 17
|
|}
Pittsburgh Pirates
Batting
Note: GPGames Played; ABAt Bats; RRuns; HHits; 2BDoubles; 3BTriples; HRHome Runs; RBIRuns Batted In; BBWalks; AVGBatting Average; OBPOn Base Percentage; SLGSlugging Percentage
{|class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
! width="16%" |Player
! width="9%" |GP
! width="9%" |AB
!R
! width="9%" |H
!2B
!3B
! width="9%" |HR
! width="9%" |RBI
!BB
! width="9%" |AVG
!OBP
!SLG
!Reference
|-
| Ginger Beaumont || 8 || 34
|6|| 9
|0
|1|| 0 || 2
|2|| .265
|.306
|.324
|
|-
| Kitty Bransfield || 8 || 29
|3|| 6
|0
|2|| 0 || 1
|1|| .207
|.233
|.345
|
|-
| Fred Clarke || 8 || 34
| 3|| 9
|2
|1|| 0 || 0
|1|| .265
|.286
| .382
|
|-
| Brickyard Kennedy || 1 || 2
|0|| 1
|1
|0|| 0 || 0
|0|| .500
|.500
|1.000
|
|-
| Tommy Leach || 8 || 33
| 3|| 9
|0
|4|| 0 || 8
|1|| .273
|.294
| .515
|
|-
| Sam Leever || 2 || 4
| 0|| 0
|0
|0|| 0 || 0
|0|| .000
|.000
| .000
|
|-
| Ed Phelps || 8 || 26
|1|| 6
|2
|0|| 0 || 1
|1|| .231
|.259
|.308
|
|-
| Deacon Phillippe || 5 || 18
| 1|| 4
|0
|0|| 0 || 1
|0|| .222
|.222
| .222
|
|-
| Claude Ritchey || 8 || 27
| 2|| 4
|1
|0|| 0 || 2
|4|| .148
|.258
| .185
|
|-
| Jimmy Sebring || 8 || 30
| 3|| 10
|0
|1|| 1 || 4
|1|| .333
|.355
| .500
|
|-
| Harry Smith || 1 || 3
| 0|| 0
|0
|0|| 0 || 0
|0|| .000
|.000
| .000
|
|-
| Gus Thompson || 1 || 1
| 0|| 0
|0
|0|| 0 || 0
|0|| .000
|.000
| .000
|
|-
| Bucky Veil || 1 || 2
| 0|| 0
|0
|0|| 0 || 0
|0|| .000
|.000
| .000
|
|-
| Honus Wagner || 8 || 27
|2|| 6
|1
|0|| 0 || 3
|3|| .222
|.323
|.259
|
|}
Pitching
Note: GGames Played; GSGames Started; ERAEarned Run Average; WWins; LLosses; SVSaves; IPInnings Pitched; HHits; RRuns; ER Earned Runs; BBWalks; SO Strikeouts
{|class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
! width="16%" |Player
! width="5%" |G
! width="5%" |GS
! width="5%" |ERA
! width="5%" |W
! width="5%" |L
!SV
! width="5%" |IP
! width="5%" |H
! width="5%" |R
! width="5%" |ER
! width="5%" |BB
! width="5%" |SO
!Reference
|-
| Brickyard Kennedy || 1 || 1 || 5.14 || 0 || 1
|0|| 7.0 || 10 || 10 || 4 || 3 || 3
|
|-
| Sam Leever || 2 || 2 || 5.40 || 0 || 2
|0|| 10.0 || 13 || 8 || 6 || 3 || 2
|
|-
| Deacon Phillippe || 5 || 5 || 3.07 || 3 || 2
|0|| 44.0 || 38 || 19 || 15 || 3 || 22
|
|-
| Gus Thompson || 1 || 0 || 4.50 || 0 || 0
|0|| 2.0 || 3 || 1 || 1 || 0 || 1
|
|-
| Bucky Veil || 1 || 0 || 1.29 || 0 || 0
|0|| 7.0 || 5 || 1 || 1 || 5 || 1
|
|}
Notes
References
Further reading
*
*
*
*
External links
Category:Boston Red Sox postseason
Category:Pittsburgh Pirates postseason
Category:World Series
World Series
World Series
World Series
Category:1900s in Boston
Category:1900s in Pittsburgh
World Series
Category:Baseball competitions in Boston
Category:Baseball competitions in Pittsburgh
Category:October 1903 in the United States | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1903_World_Series | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.322171 |
3866 | Bluetongue disease | thumb|Electron micrograph of Bluetongue virus, scale bar = 50 nm
Bluetongue (BT) disease is a noncontagious, arthropod-borne viral disease affecting ruminants, primarily sheep and other domestic or wild ruminants, including cattle, yaks, goats, buffalo, deer, dromedaries, and antelope. It is caused by Bluetongue virus (BTV), a non-enveloped, double-stranded RNA virus belongs to the genus Orbivirus within the family Reoviridae. BTV has a widespread geographical distribution, encompassing numerous continents and regions, including Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and various tropical and subtropical regions. At present, there are more than 28 recognized serotypes of BTV. Bluetongue outbreaks have had a significant economic impact, with estimated global losses reaching approximately 3 billion USD.
Clinical signs
thumb|Infected sheep
thumb|A domestic yak is infected with Bluetongue virus. The tongue is swollen, cyanotic, and protruding from the mouth.
In sheep, BTV causes an acute disease with high morbidity and mortality. BTV also infects goats, cattle, and other domestic animals, as well as wild ruminants (for example, blesbuck, white-tailed deer, elk, and pronghorn antelope).
Major signs are high fever, excessive salivation, swelling of the face and tongue, and cyanosis (in severe conditions) of the tongue. Torsion of the neck (opisthotonos or torticollis) is observed in severely affected animals.
Not all animals develop signs, but all those that do lose condition rapidly, and the sickest die within a week. For affected animals that do not die, recovery is very slow, lasting several months.
The incubation period is 5–20 days, and all signs usually develop within a month. The mortality rate is normally low, but it is high in susceptible breeds of sheep. In Africa, local breeds of sheep may have no mortality, but in imported breeds, it may be up to 90%.
The manifestation of clinical signs in cattle is contingent upon the strain of virus. BTV-8 has been documented to cause a severe disease state and mortality in cattle. The current circulation of BTV-3 in Northern Europe is epidemiologically noteworthy due to the presentation of clinical signs in cattle and a higher sheep mortality rate than that observed with BTV-8. Other ruminants, such as goats, typically exhibit minimal or no clinical signs despite high virus levels in blood. Therefore, they could serve as potential virus reservoirs of BTV.
Lamb infected in utero can develop congenital hydranencephaly. This abnormality is a condition in which the brain's cerebral hemispheres are like swiss cheese, or absent, and replaced by sacs filled with cerebrospinal fluid. Ewes infected with bluetongue virus while pregnant can have lambs with this defect, as well as giving birth to lambs who are small, weak, deformed or blind. These affected lambs die within a few days of birth, or are born dead.
Microbiology
Bluetongue is caused by the pathogenic vector-borne RNA virus, Bluetongue virus (BTV), The structure of the 70 nm core was determined in 1998 and was at the time the largest atomic structure to be solved.
The 10 viral genome segments have been found to encode 7 structural (VP1–VP7) and 5 non-structural (NS1, NS2, NS3/NS3A, NS4 and NS5) proteins.
Evolution
The viral genome is replicated via structural protein VP1, an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase. Evidence suggests this is due to purifying selection across the genome as the virus is transmitted alternately through its insect and animal hosts. Reassortment can lead to a rapid shift in phenotypes independent of the slow rate of mutation. During this process, gene segments are not randomly reassorted. Rather, there appears to be a mechanism for selecting for or against certain segments from the parental serotypes present. However, this selective mechanism is still poorly understood.
To date, BTV serotypes 25 and above have been identified as the causative agents of infection in small ruminants. The infection is subclinical, which likely explains why these serotypes, which are less or non-virulent, have not been identified earlier through laboratory diagnosis studies. It is noteworthy that BTV serotypes 25 and higher are transmitted without midges, indicating that direct contact between sheep or goats may be a potential vector.
Viral survival and vector longevity is seen during milder winters.
A significant contribution to the northward spread of bluetongue disease has been the ability of C. obsoletus and C.pulicaris to acquire and transmit the pathogen, both of which are spread widely throughout Europe. This is in contrast to the original C.imicola vector, which is limited to North Africa and the Mediterranean. The relatively recent novel vector has facilitated a far more rapid spread than the simple expansion of habitats north through global warming.
In August 2006, cases of bluetongue were found in the Netherlands, then Belgium, Germany, and Luxembourg.
In 2007, the first case of bluetongue in the Czech Republic was detected in one bull near Cheb at the Czech-German border.
In September 2007, the UK reported its first ever suspected case of the disease, in a Highland cow on a rare-breeds farm near Ipswich, Suffolk.
Since then, the virus has spread from cattle to sheep in Britain.
By October 2007, bluetongue had become a serious threat in Scandinavia and Switzerland
and the first outbreak in Denmark was reported. In autumn 2008, several cases were reported in the southern Swedish provinces of Småland, Halland, and Skåne,
as well as in areas of the Netherlands bordering Germany, prompting veterinary authorities in Germany to intensify controls.
Norway had its first finding in February 2009, when cows at two farms in Vest-Agder in the south of Norway showed an immune response to bluetongue. A number of countries, including Norway and Finland, were certified as free of the disease in 2011 and 2021, respectively.
In 2023, Europe witnessed a series of notable epizootic occurrences at higher latitudes, partially attributable to the emergence of a novel serotype, BTV-3. The serotype was first identified in the Netherlands in September 2023 and has since been documented in numerous European countries, including Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Spain, the UK, Norway, and Sweden.
Although the disease is not a threat to humans, the most vulnerable common domestic ruminants are cattle, goats, and especially, sheep.
Overwintering
A puzzling aspect of BTV is its survival between midge seasons in temperate regions. Adults of Culicoides are killed by cold winter temperatures, and BTV infections typically do not last for more than 60 days, which is not long enough for BTV to survive until the next spring. It is believed that the virus somehow survives in overwintering midges or animals. Multiple mechanisms have been proposed. A few adult Culicoides midges infected with BTV may survive the mild winters of the temperate zone. Some midges may even move indoors to avoid the cold temperature of the winter. Additionally, BTV could cause a chronic or latent infection in some animals, providing another means for BTV to survive the winter. BTV can also be transmitted from mother to fetus. The outcome is abortion or stillbirth if fetal infection occurs early in gestation and survival if infection occurs late. However infection at an intermediate stage, before the fetal immune system is fully developed, may result in a chronic infection that lingers until the first months after birth of the lamb. Midges then spread the pathogen from the calves to other animals, starting a new season of infection.
Climate change
The spread of bluetongue to Southern, Central, and Northern Europe provides an illustrative example of the complex interactions between climate change, vector habitat suitability, animal population density, distribution, and movement, which collectively influence the patterns of disease emergence and transmission. Prevention is effected via quarantine, vaccination, and control of the midges vector, including inspection of aircraft. The recurrent emergence of novel strains and the occurrence of new outbreaks with significant socio-economic impacts highlight the urgent need for effective antiviral strategies. The current vaccines for bluetongue virus (BTV) are serotype-specific, which limits their utility and has led to interest in host-targeted antiviral strategies that offer broader activity against multiple serotypes and a reduced risk of resistance development.
Immunization with any of the available vaccines, though, precludes later serological monitoring of affected cattle populations, a problem that could be resolved using next-generation subunit vaccines.
In January 2015, the vaccine Raksha Blu was launched in India. It is designed to protect livestock against five strains of the bluetongue virus.
The vaccine Syvazul BTV was authorized for veterinary use in the European Union in January 2019.
In January 2025, the Committee for Veterinary Medicinal Products (CVMP) of the European Medicines Agency adopted a positive opinion, recommending the granting of a marketing authorization for the veterinary medicinal product Bluevac-3, suspension for injection, intended for cattle and sheep. The CVMP also adopted a positive opinion, recommending the granting of a marketing authorization for the veterinary medicinal product Syvazul BTV 3, suspension for injection, intended for sheep.
History
In the early stages of its identification, BT was referred to by a number of different names, including "epizootic catarrh," "fever," "malarial catarrhal fever of sheep," and "epizootic malignant catarrhal fever of sheep." and derived from the Afrikaans term "bloutong," which refers to the condition of cyanosis of the tongue in clinically affected sheep. in the early 19th century, a comprehensive description of the disease was not published until the first decade of the 20th century. In 1906, Arnold Theiler showed that bluetongue was caused by a filterable agent. He also created the first bluetongue vaccine, which was developed from an attenuated BT V strain. For many decades, bluetongue was thought to be confined to Africa. The first confirmed outbreak outside of Africa occurred in Cyprus in 1943.
Related diseases
African horse sickness is related to bluetongue and is spread by the same midges (Culicoides species). It can kill the horses it infects and mortality may go as high as 90% of the infected horses during an epidemic.
Epizootic hemorrhagic disease virus is closely related and crossreacts with Bluetongue virus on many blood tests.
References
Further reading
External links
Canadian Food Inspection Agency Animal Disease Information
Bluetongue disease fact sheet
Biosecurity training video
Farm-level biosecurity practices
News and announcements on the Bluetongue outbreak in the UK, Farmers Guardian
Category:Insect-borne diseases
Category:Ruminant diseases
Category:Animal viral diseases | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetongue_disease | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.381399 |
3869 | Bruce Perens | ) is an American computer programmer and advocate in the free software movement. He created The Open Source Definition and published the first formal announcement and manifesto of open source. He co-founded the Open Source Initiative (OSI) with Eric S. Raymond.
In 2005, Perens represented Open Source at the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society, at the invitation of the United Nations Development Programme. He has appeared before national legislatures and is often quoted in the press, advocating for open source and the reform of national and international technology policy.
Perens is also an amateur radio operator, with call sign K6BP. He promotes open radio communications standards and open-source hardware.
In 2016 Perens, along with Boalt Hall (Berkeley Law) professor Lothar Determann, co-authored "Open Cars" which appeared in the Berkeley Technology Law Journal.
In 2018 Perens founded the Open Research Institute (ORI), a non-profit research and development organization to address technologies involving Open Source, Open Hardware, Open Standards, Open Content, and Open Access to Research. In April 2022 he divorced himself from the organization and reported he was starting a new charity, HamOpen.org, to redirect his focus, and align with the ARRL organization for their liability insurance benefit. HamOpen has been most visible supporting the convention exhibitions of projects Perens supports, including M17 and FreeDV.
Companies
Perens operates two companies: Algoram is a start-up which is creating a web-based control system for radio transmitters and other devices. Legal Engineering is a legal-technical consultancy which specializes in resolving copyright infringement in relation to open source software.
Early life
Perens grew up in Long Island, New York. He was born with cerebral palsy, which caused him to have slurred speech as a child, a condition that led to a misdiagnosis of him as developmentally disabled in school and led the school to fail to teach him to read. He developed an interest in technology at an early age: besides his interest in amateur radio, he ran a pirate radio station in the town of Lido Beach and briefly engaged in phone phreaking.
No-Code International
Perens founded No-Code International in 1998 with the goal of ending the Morse Code test then required for an amateur radio license. His rationale was that amateur radio should be a tool for young people to learn advanced technology and networking, rather than something that preserved antiquity and required new hams to master outmoded technology before they were allowed on the air.
Perens lobbied intensively on the Internet, at amateur radio events in the United States, and during visits to other nations. One of his visits was to Iceland, where he had half of that nation's radio amateurs in the room, and their vote in the International Amateur Radio Union was equivalent to that of the entire United States.Debian Social ContractIn 1997, Perens was carbon-copied on an email conversation between Donnie Barnes of Red Hat and Ean Schuessler, who was then working on Debian. Schuessler bemoaned that Red Hat had never stated its social contract with the developer community. Perens took this as inspiration to create a formal social contract for Debian. In a blog posting, Perens claims not to have made use of the Three Freedoms (later the Four Freedoms) published by the Free Software Foundation in composing his document. Perens proposed a draft of the Debian Social Contract to the Debian developers on the debian-private mailing list early in June 1997. Debian developers contributed discussion and changes for the rest of the month while Perens edited, and the completed document was then announced as Debian project policy. Part of the Debian Social Contract was the Debian Free Software Guidelines, a set of 10 guidelines for determining whether a set of software can be described as "free software", and thus whether it could be included in Debian.
Open Source Definition and The Open Source Initiative
On February 3, 1998, a group of people (not including Perens) met at VA Linux Systems to discuss the promotion of Free Software to business in pragmatic terms, rather than the moral terms preferred by Richard Stallman. Christine Petersen of the nanotechnology organization Foresight Institute, who was present because Foresight took an early interest in Free Software, suggested the term "Open Source". The next day, Eric S. Raymond recruited Perens to work with him on the formation of Open Source. Perens modified the Debian Free Software Guidelines into the Open Source Definition by removing Debian references and replacing them with "Open Source".
The original announcement of The Open Source Definition was made on February 9, 1998, on Slashdot and elsewhere; the definition was given in Linux Gazette on February 10, 1998. But in the following 2000s he spoke about Open source again. (Progeny Linux Systems would end operations in 2007.)
Hewlett-Packard
From December 2000 to September 2002, Perens served as "Senior Global Strategist for Linux and Open Source" at Hewlett-Packard, internally evangelizing for the use of Linux and other open-source software. He was fired as a result of his anti-Microsoft statements, which especially became an issue after HP acquired Compaq, a major manufacturer of Microsoft Windows-based PCs, in 2002.SourceLabsPerens was an employee of SourceLabs, a Seattle-based open source software and services company, from June 2005 until December 2007. He produced a video commercial, Impending Security Breach, for SourceLabs in 2007. (SourceLabs was acquired by EMC in 2009.)University faculty
Between 1981 and 1986, Perens was on the staff of the New York Institute of Technology Computer Graphics Lab as a Unix kernel programmer.
In 2002, Perens was a remote Senior Scientist for Open Source with the Cyber Security Policy Laboratory of George Washington University under the direction of Tony Stanco. Stanco was director of the laboratory for a year, while its regular director was on sabbatical.
Between 2006 and 2007, Perens was a visiting lecturer and researcher for the University of Agder under a three-year grant from the Competence Fund of Southern Norway. During this time he consulted the Norwegian Government and other entities on government policy issues related to computers and software. After this time Perens worked remotely on Agder programs, mainly concerning the European Internet Accessibility Observatory.
Other activities
In 2007, some of Perens's government advisory roles included a meeting with the President of the Chamber of Deputies (the lower house of parliament) in Italy and testimony to the Culture Committee of the Chamber of Deputies; a keynote speech at the foundation of Norway's Open Source Center, following Norway's Minister of Governmental Reform (Perens is on the advisory board of the center); he provided input on the revision of the European Interoperability Framework; and he was keynote speaker at a European Commission conference on Digital Business Ecosystems at the Centre Borschette, Brussels, on November 7.
In 2009, Perens acted as an expert witness on open source in the Jacobsen v. Katzer U.S. Federal lawsuit. His report, which was made publicly available by Jacobsen, presented the culture and impact of open-source software development to the federal courts.
Perens delivered one of the keynote addresses at the 2012 linux.conf.au conference in Ballarat, Australia. He discussed the need for open source software to market itself better to non-technical users. He also discussed some of the latest developments in open-source hardware, such as Papilio and Bus Pirate.
In 2013, Perens spoke in South America, as the closing keynote at Latinoware 2013. He was the keynote of CISL – Conferencia Internacional de Software Libre, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and keynoted a special event along with the Minister of software and innovation of Chubut Province, in Puerto Madrin, Patagonia, Argentina. He keynoted the Festival de Software Libre 2013, in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.
In 2014–2015, Perens took a break from Open Source conferences, having spoken at them often since 1996. In 2016, he returned to the conference circuit, keynoting the Open Source Insight conference in Seoul, sponsored by the Copyright Commission of South Korea. Perens web site presently advertises his availability to keynote conferences as long as travel and lodging expenses are compensated.
In 2020, Perens delivered the talk, "What Comes After Open Source?" for DebConf 2020. He discussed the future of open source licensing and the need to develop alternative licensing structures so that open source developers could get paid for their work.ViewsPerens poses "Open Source" as a means of marketing the free and open-source software idea to business people and mainstream who might be more interested in the practical benefits of an open source development model and ecosystem than abstract ethics. He states that open source and free software are only two ways of talking about the same phenomenon, a point of view not shared by Stallman and his free software movement. Perens postulated in 2004 an economic theory for business use of Open Source in his paper The Emerging Economic Paradigm of Open Source and his speech Innovation Goes Public. This differs from Raymond's theory in The Cathedral and the Bazaar, which having been written before there was much business involvement in open source, explains open source as a consequence of programmer motivation and leisure.
In February 2008, for the 10th anniversary of the phrase "open source", Perens published a message to the community called "State of Open Source Message: A New Decade For Open Source". Around the same time the ezine RegDeveloper published an interview with Perens where he spoke of the successes of open source, but also warned of dangers, including a proliferation of OSI-approved licenses which had not undergone legal scrutiny. He advocated the use of the GPLv3 license, especially noting Linus Torvalds' refusal to switch away from GPLv2 for the Linux kernel.
Bruce Perens supported Bernie Sanders for President and he claims that his experience with the open source movement influenced that decision. On July 13, 2016, following Sanders's endorsement of Hillary Clinton for president, Perens endorsed Clinton.
In January 2013, Perens advocated for abolishment of the Second Amendment to the U.S. constitution, stating that he does "not believe in private ownership of firearms" and that he would "take away guns currently held by individuals, without compensation for their value." He reiterated this view in a June 2014 interview in Slashdot, and in November 2017 on his Twitter account.
Amateur radio and other activities
Perens is an avid amateur radio enthusiast (call sign K6BP) and maintained technocrat.net, which he closed in late 2008, because its revenues did not cover its costs.
Media appearances
Perens is featured in the 2001 documentary film Revolution OS and the 2006 BBC television documentary The Code-Breakers.
From 2002 to 2006, Prentice Hall PTR published the Bruce Perens' Open Source Series, a set of 24 books covering various open source software tools, for which Perens served as the series editor. It was the first book series to be published under an open license.Personal lifePerens lives in Berkeley, California with his wife, Valerie, and son, Stanley, born in 2000.<ref name"spoke out" /><ref name"meet the perens" />ReferencesExternal links
*
* [https://lwn.net/1998/0528/a/lsb.html Project Proposal and Call for Participation: The Linux Standard Base]
* [http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/1999/02/msg01641.html "It's Time to Talk About Free Software Again", 1999]
* [http://www.linux-magazin.de/news/video_bruce_perens_ueber_open_source_lizenzen Video with Bruce Perens at Hannover Industry Trade Fair, Germany, May 2008]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070829053313/http://www.spiderlessweb.com/?p=11 A talk about open source recorded in Rome in June 2007]
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Category:20th-century American scientists
Category:Year of birth missing (living people) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Perens | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.395299 |
3870 | Bundle theory | Bundle theory, originated by the 18th century Scottish philosopher David Hume, is the ontological theory about objecthood in which an object consists only of a collection (bundle) of properties, relations or tropes.
According to bundle theory, an object consists of its properties and nothing more; thus, there cannot be an object without properties and one cannot conceive of such an object. For example, when we think of an apple, we think of its properties: redness, roundness, being a type of fruit, etc. There is nothing above and beyond these properties; the apple is nothing more than the collection of its properties. In particular, there is no substance in which the properties are inherent.
Bundle theory has been contrasted with the ego theory of the self, which views the egoic self as a soul-like substance existing in the same manner as the corporeal self.
Arguments in favor
The difficulty in conceiving and or describing an object without also conceiving and or describing its properties is a common justification for bundle theory, especially among current philosophers in the Anglo-American tradition.
The inability to comprehend any aspect of the thing other than its properties implies, this argument maintains, that one cannot conceive of a bare particular (a substance without properties), an implication that directly opposes substance theory. The conceptual difficulty of bare particulars was illustrated by John Locke when he described a substance by itself, apart from its properties as "something, I know not what. [...] The idea then we have, to which we give the general name substance, being nothing but the supposed, but unknown, support of those qualities we find existing, which we imagine cannot subsist sine re substante, without something to support them, we call that support substantia; which, according to the true import of the word, is, in plain English, standing under or upholding."
Whether a relation of an object is one of its properties may complicate such an argument. However, the argument concludes that the conceptual challenge of bare particulars leaves a bundle of properties and nothing more as the only possible conception of an object, thus justifying bundle theory.
Objections
Bundle theory maintains that properties are bundled together in a collection without describing how they are tied together. For example, bundle theory regards an apple as red, wide, and juicy but lacking an underlying substance. The apple is said to be a bundle of properties including redness, being wide, and juiciness.
Hume used the term "bundle" in this sense, also referring to the personal identity, in his main work: "I may venture to affirm of the rest of mankind, that they are nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux and movement".
Critics question how bundle theory accounts for the properties' compresence (the togetherness relation between those properties) without an underlying substance. Critics also question how any two given properties are determined to be properties of the same object if there is no substance in which they both inhere. This argument is done away with if one considers spatio-temporal location to be a property as well.
Traditional bundle theory explains the compresence of properties by defining an object as a collection of properties bound together. Thus, different combinations of properties and relations produce different objects. Redness and juiciness, for example, may be found together on top of the table because they are part of a bundle of properties located on the table, one of which is the "looks like an apple" property.
By contrast, substance theory explains the compresence of properties by asserting that the properties are found together because it is the substance that has those properties. In substance theory, a substance is the thing in which properties inhere. For example, redness and juiciness are found on top of the table because redness and juiciness inhere in an apple, making the apple red and juicy.
The bundle theory of substance explains compresence. Specifically, it maintains that properties' compresence itself engenders a substance. Thus, it determines substancehood empirically by the togetherness of properties rather than by a bare particular or by any other non-empirical underlying strata. The bundle theory of substance thus rejects the substance theories of Aristotle, Descartes, Leibniz, and more recently, J. P. Moreland, Jia Hou, Joseph Bridgman, Quentin Smith, and others.
Buddhism
The Indian Madhyamaka philosopher, Chandrakirti, used the aggregate nature of objects to demonstrate the lack of essence in what is known as the sevenfold reasoning. In his work, Guide to the Middle Way (Sanskrit: Madhyamakāvatāra), he says:
He goes on to explain what is meant by each of these seven assertions, but briefly in a subsequent commentary he explains that the conventions of the world do not exist essentially when closely analyzed, but exist only through being taken for granted, without being subject to scrutiny that searches for an essence within them.
Another view of the Buddhist theory of the self, especially in early Buddhism, is that the Buddhist theory is essentially an eliminativist theory. According to this understanding, the self can not be reduced to a bundle because there is nothing that answers to the concept of a self. Consequently, the idea of a self must be eliminated.
See also
Anattā
Platonic realism
Substance theory
References
Further reading
David Hume (1738), A Treatise of Human Nature, Book I, Part IV, Section VI
Derek Parfit (1984), Reasons and Persons
External links
Category:Metaphysical theories
Category:Ontology
Category:Madhyamaka
Category:Buddhist philosophy | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundle_theory | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.406348 |
3873 | Bernard Montgomery | | image = General Sir Bernard Montgomery in England, 1943.jpg
| image_size | alt
| caption = Montgomery in 1943
| nickname =
| birth_date
| birth_place = Kennington, Surrey<!-- Do not change to London, Kennington was part of Surrey in 1887-->, England
| death_date
| death_place = Alton, Hampshire, England
| placeofburial = Holy Cross Churchyard, Binsted, Hampshire
| allegiance = United Kingdom
| branch = British Army
| serviceyears = 1908–1958
| rank = Field Marshal
| servicenumber = 8742
| unit = Royal Warwickshire Regiment
| commands =
| battles =
* First World War
* Anglo-Irish War
* Arab revolt in Palestine
* Second World War
** Battle of France
*** Battle of Dunkirk
*** Dunkirk evacuation
** North African Campaign
*** Battle of Alam el Halfa
*** Second Battle of El Alamein
*** Battle of El Agheila
*** Tunisian Campaign
**** Battle of Medenine
**** Battle of the Mareth Line
** Italian campaign
*** Sicilian Campaign
*** Allied invasion of Italy
** Operation Overlord
*** Battle for Caen
**** Operation Goodwood
*** Operation Cobra
*** Battle of the Falaise Pocket
*** Liberation of Paris
** Siegfried Line Campaign
*** Operation Market Garden
*** Clearing the Channel Coast
** Battle of the Bulge
** Western Allied invasion of Germany
*** Operation Veritable
*** Operation Varsity
*** Operation Plunder
*** Battle of the Ruhr Pocket
*** Battle of Hamburg
** Palestine Emergency
| awards =
| spouse
| alma_mater = Royal Military College, Sandhurst
| laterwork
| signature = Bernard Montgomery Signature.svg
| signature_size = 200
| module
}}
Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein (; 17 November 1887 – 24 March 1976), nicknamed "Monty", was a senior British Army officer who served in the First World War, the Irish War of Independence and the Second World War.
Montgomery first saw action in the First World War as a junior officer of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. At Méteren, near the Belgian border at Bailleul, he was shot through the right lung by a sniper, during the First Battle of Ypres. On returning to the Western Front as a general staff officer, he took part in the Battle of Arras in AprilMay 1917. He also took part in the Battle of Passchendaele in late 1917 before finishing the war as chief of staff of the 47th (2nd London) Division. In the inter-war years he commanded the 17th (Service) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers and, later, the 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment before becoming commander of the 9th Infantry Brigade and then general officer commanding (GOC), 8th Infantry Division.
During the Western Desert campaign of the Second World War, Montgomery commanded the British Eighth Army from August 1942. He subsequently commanded the British Eighth Army during the Allied invasion of Sicily and the Allied invasion of Italy and was in command of all Allied ground forces during the Battle of Normandy (Operation Overlord), from D-Day on 6 June 1944 until 1 September 1944. He then continued in command of the 21st Army Group for the rest of the North West Europe campaign, including the failed attempt to cross the Rhine during Operation Market Garden. When German armoured forces broke through the US lines in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge, Montgomery received command of the northern shoulder of the Bulge. Montgomery's 21st Army Group, including the US Ninth Army and the First Allied Airborne Army, crossed the Rhine in Operation Plunder in March 1945. By the end of the war, troops under Montgomery's command had taken part in the encirclement of the Ruhr Pocket, liberated the Netherlands, and captured much of north-west Germany. On 4 May 1945, Montgomery accepted the surrender of the German forces in north-western Europe at Lüneburg Heath, south of Hamburg, after the surrender of Berlin to the USSR on 2 May.
After the war he became Commander-in-Chief of the British Army of the Rhine (BAOR) in Germany and then Chief of the Imperial General Staff (1946–1948). From 1948 to 1951, he served as Chairman of the Commanders-in-Chief Committee of the Western Union. He then served as NATO's Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe until his retirement in 1958.
Early life
Montgomery was born in Kennington, Surrey, in 1887, the fourth child of nine, to a Church of Ireland minister, Henry Montgomery, and his wife Maud (née Farrar). The Montgomerys, an Ulster Scots 'Ascendancy' gentry family, were the County Donegal branch of the Clan Montgomery. The Rev. Henry Montgomery, at that time Vicar of St Mark's Church, Kennington, was the second son of Sir Robert Montgomery, a native of Inishowen in County Donegal in the north-west of Ulster, and a noted colonial administrator in British India. Sir Robert died a month after his grandson's birth. He was probably a descendant of Colonel Alexander Montgomery. Bernard's mother, Maud, was the daughter of Frederic William Canon Farrar, the famous preacher, and was eighteen years younger than her husband.
After the death of Sir Robert Montgomery, Henry inherited the Montgomery ancestral estate of New Park in Moville, a small town in Inishowen in the north of County Donegal in Ulster, the northern province in Ireland. There was still £13,000 to pay on a mortgage, a large debt in the 1880s (equivalent to £}} in ) and Henry was at the time still only an Anglican vicar. Despite selling off all the farms that were in the townland of Ballynally, on the north-western shores of Lough Foyle, "there was barely enough to keep up New Park and pay for the blasted summer holiday" (i.e., at New Park).
It was a financial relief of some magnitude when, in 1889, Henry was made Bishop of Tasmania, then still a British colony, and Bernard spent his formative years there. Bishop Montgomery considered it his duty to spend as much time as possible in the rural areas of Tasmania and was away for up to six months at a time. While he was away, his wife, still in her mid-twenties, gave her children "constant" beatings, then ignored them most of the time. Of Bernard's siblings, Sibyl died prematurely in Tasmania, and Harold, Donald and Una all emigrated. Maud Montgomery took little active interest in the education of her young children other than to have them taught by tutors brought from Britain, although he briefly attended the then coeducational St Michael's Collegiate School. The loveless environment made Bernard something of a bully, as he himself recalled: "I was a dreadful little boy. I don't suppose anybody would put up with my sort of behaviour these days." Later in life Montgomery refused to allow his son David to have anything to do with his grandmother, and refused to attend her funeral in 1949. In 1901, Bishop Montgomery became secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, and the family returned to London. Montgomery attended St Paul's School and then the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from which he was almost expelled for rowdiness and violence. On graduation in September 1908 he was commissioned into the 1st Battalion the Royal Warwickshire Regiment as a second lieutenant, and first saw overseas service later that year in India. and in 1912 became adjutant of the 1st Battalion of his regiment at Shorncliffe Army Camp. He saw action at the Battle of Le Cateau that month and during the retreat from Mons.}}
After recovering in early 1915, he was appointed brigade major, first of the 112th Infantry Brigade, and then with 104th Infantry Brigade, then training in Lancashire. He returned to the Western Front in early 1916 with his brigade, seeing service with it during the Battle of the Somme later in the year. In January 1917 he was assigned as a general staff officer, grade 2 (GSO2) with the 33rd Division and took part in the Battle of Arras in AprilMay. and brevet major in June. He finished the war in November 1918 as GSO1 (effectively chief of staff) of the 47th (2nd London) Division, A photograph from October 1918, reproduced in many biographies, shows the then unknown Lieutenant-Colonel Montgomery standing in front of Winston Churchill (then the Minister of Munitions) at the parade following the liberation of Lille.
Montgomery was profoundly influenced by his experiences during the war, in particular by the leadership, or rather the lack of it, being displayed by the senior commanders. He later wrote:
Between the world wars
1920s and Ireland
After the First World War, Montgomery commanded the 17th (Service) Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, a battalion in the British Army of the Rhine, before reverting to his substantive rank of captain (brevet major) in November 1919. He had not at first been selected for the Staff College in Camberley, Surrey (his only hope of ever achieving high command). But at a tennis party in Cologne, he was able to persuade the Commander-in-chief (C-in-C) of the British Army of Occupation, Field Marshal Sir William Robertson, to add his name to the list.
After graduating from the Staff College, he was appointed brigade major in the 17th Infantry Brigade in January 1921. The brigade was stationed in County Cork, Ireland, carrying out counter-guerilla operations during the final stages of the Irish War of Independence.}}
In one noteworthy incident on 2 May 1922, Montgomery led a force of 60 soldiers and 4 armoured cars to the town of Macroom to search for four British officers who were missing in the area. While he had hoped the show of force would assist in finding the men, he was under strict orders not to attack the IRA. On arriving in the town square in front of Macroom Castle, he summoned the IRA commander, Charlie Browne, to parley. At the castle gates Montgomery spoke to Browne, explaining what would happen should the officers not be released. Once finished, Browne responded with his own ultimatum to Montgomery to "leave town within 10 minutes". Browne then turned heels and returned to the Castle. At this point another IRA officer, Pat O'Sullivan, whistled to Montgomery drawing his attention to scores of IRA volunteers who had quietly taken up firing positions all around the square—surrounding Montgomery's forces. Realising his precarious position, Montgomery led his troops out of the town, a decision which raised hostile questions in the House of Commons but was later approved by Montgomery's own superiors. Unknown to Montgomery at this time, the four missing officers had already been executed.
In May 1923, Montgomery was posted to the 49th (West Riding) Infantry Division, a Territorial Army (TA) formation. From January 1926 to January 1929 he served as Deputy Assistant Adjutant General at the Staff College, Camberley, in the temporary rank of lieutenant-colonel.
Marriage and family
In 1925, in his first known courtship of a woman, Montgomery, then in his late thirties, proposed to a 17-year-old girl, Betty Anderson. His approach included drawing diagrams in the sand of how he would deploy his tanks and infantry in a future war, a contingency which seemed very remote at that time. She respected his ambition and single-mindedness but declined his proposal.
In 1927, he met and married Elizabeth (Betty) Carver, née Hobart. Montgomery's son, David, was born in August 1928. After Montgomery's death, John Carver wrote that his mother had arguably done the country a favour by keeping his personal oddities—his extreme single-mindedness, and his intolerance of and suspicion of the motives of others—within reasonable bounds long enough for him to have a chance of attaining high command.
Both of Montgomery's stepsons became army officers in the 1930s (both were serving in India at the time of their mother's death), and both served in the Second World War, each eventually attaining the rank of colonel. While serving as a GSO2 with Eighth Army, Dick Carver was sent forward during the pursuit after El Alamein to help identify a new site for Eighth Army HQ. He was taken prisoner at Mersa Matruh on 7 November 1942. Montgomery wrote to his contacts in England asking that inquiries be made via the Red Cross as to where his stepson was being held, and that parcels be sent to him. Like many British POWs, the most famous being General Richard O'Connor, Dick Carver escaped in September 1943 during the brief hiatus between Italy's departure from the war and the German seizure of the country. He eventually reached British lines on 5 December 1943, to the delight of his stepfather, who sent him home to Britain to recuperate.
1930s
In January 1929 Montgomery was promoted to brevet lieutenant-colonel. That month he returned to the 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment again, as Commander of Headquarters Company; he went to the War Office to help write the Infantry Training Manual in mid-1929. and became the Commanding officer (CO) of the 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment and saw service in Palestine and British India. He attended and was then recommended to become an instructor at the Indian Army Staff College (now the Pakistan Command and Staff College) in Quetta, British India.
On completion of his tour of duty in India, Montgomery returned to Britain in June 1937 where he took command of the 9th Infantry Brigade with the temporary rank of brigadier. His wife died that year. and took command of the 8th Infantry Division in the British mandate of Palestine. He returned in July 1939 to Britain, suffering a serious illness on the way, to command the 3rd Infantry Division.Second World WarBritish Expeditionary ForcePhoney warBritain declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939 and the 3rd Division, together with its new General Officer Commanding (GOC), was deployed to France as part of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), commanded by General Lord Gort. Shortly after the division's arrival overseas, Montgomery faced serious trouble from his military superiors and the clergy for his frank attitude regarding the sexual health of his soldiers, but was defended from dismissal by his superior Alan Brooke, commander of II Corps, of which Montgomery's division formed a part. Montgomery had issued a circular on the prevention of venereal disease, worded in such "obscene language" that both the Church of England and Roman Catholic senior chaplains objected; Brooke told Monty that he did not want any further errors of this kind, though deciding not to get him to formally withdraw it as it would remove any "vestige of respect" left for him.
, GOC 4th Infantry Division, pictured here in either 1939 or 1940]]
Although Montgomery's new command was a Regular Army formation, comprising the 7th (Guards), and the 8th and 9th Infantry Brigades along with supporting units, he was not impressed with its readiness for battle. As a result, while most of the rest of the BEF set about preparing defences for an expected German attack sometime in the future, Montgomery began training his 3rd Division in offensive tactics, organising several exercises, each of which lasted for several days at a time. Mostly they revolved around the division advancing towards an objective, often a river line, only to come under attack and forced to withdraw to another position, usually behind another river. These exercises usually occurred at night with only very minimal lighting being allowed. By the spring of 1940 Montgomery's division had gained a reputation of being a very agile and flexible formation. By then the Allies had agreed to Plan D, where they would advance deep into Belgium and take up positions on the River Dyle by the time the German forces attacked. Brooke, Montgomery's corps commander, was pessimistic about the plan but Montgomery, in contrast, was not concerned, believing that he and his division would perform well regardless of the circumstances, particularly in a war of movement.
Battle of France
Montgomery's training paid off when the Germans began their invasion of the Low Countries on 10 May 1940 and the 3rd Division advanced to its planned position, near the Belgian city of Louvain. Soon after arrival, the division was fired on by members of the Belgian 10th Infantry Division who mistook them for German paratroopers; Montgomery resolved the incident by approaching them and offering to place himself under Belgian command, although Montgomery himself took control when the Germans arrived. During this time he began to develop a particular habit, which he would keep throughout the war, of going to bed at 21:30 every night without fail and giving only a single order—that he was not to be disturbed—which was only very rarely disobeyed.
The 3rd Division saw comparatively little action but, owing to the strict training methods of Montgomery, the division always managed to be in the right place at the right time, especially so during the retreat into France. By 27 May, when the Belgian Army on the left flank of the BEF began to disintegrate, the 3rd Division achieved something very difficult, the movement at night from the right to the left of another division and only 2,000 yards behind it. This was performed with great professionalism and occurred without any incidents and thereby filled a very vulnerable gap in the BEF's defensive line. On 29/30 May, Montgomery temporarily took over from Brooke, who received orders to return to the United Kingdom, as GOC of II Corps for the final stages of the Dunkirk evacuation.
The 3rd Division, temporarily commanded by Kenneth Anderson in Montgomery's absence, returned to Britain intact with minimal casualties. Operation Dynamo—codename for the Dunkirk evacuation—saw 330,000 Allied military personnel, including most of the BEF, to Britain, although the BEF was forced to leave behind a significant amount of equipment.Service in the United Kingdom 1940−1942On his return Montgomery antagonised the War Office with trenchant criticisms of the command of the BEF He was made a Companion of the Order of the Bath. These invasion plans also did not go ahead. Montgomery was then ordered to prepare plans for the invasion of neutral Ireland and to seize Cork, Cobh and Cork harbour. Promoted to temporary lieutenant-general in July, overseeing the defence of Kent, Sussex and Surrey. In December Montgomery was given command of South-Eastern Command. He renamed his command the South-Eastern Army to promote offensive spirit. During this time he further developed and rehearsed his ideas and trained his soldiers, culminating in Exercise Tiger in May 1942, a combined forces exercise involving 100,000 troops.
North Africa and Italy
Montgomery's early command
tank in North Africa, November 1942]]
In 1942, a new field commander was required in the Middle East, where Auchinleck was fulfilling both the role of C-in-C of Middle East Command and commander Eighth Army. He had stabilised the Allied position at the First Battle of El Alamein, but after a visit in August 1942, the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, replaced him as C-in-C with General Sir Harold Alexander and William Gott as commander of the Eighth Army in the Western Desert. However, after Gott was killed flying back to Cairo, Churchill was persuaded by Brooke, who by this time was Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS), to appoint Montgomery, who had only just been nominated to replace Alexander, as commander of the British First Army for Operation Torch, the invasion of French North Africa.
A story, probably apocryphal but popular at the time, is that the appointment caused Montgomery to remark that "After having an easy war, things have now got much more difficult." A colleague is supposed to have told him to cheer up—at which point Montgomery said "I'm not talking about me, I'm talking about Rommel!"
Montgomery's assumption of command transformed the fighting spirit and abilities of the Eighth Army. Taking command on 13 August 1942, he immediately became a whirlwind of activity. He ordered the creation of the X Corps, which contained all armoured divisions, to fight alongside his XXX Corps, which was all infantry divisions. This arrangement differed from the German Panzer Corps: one of Rommel's Panzer Corps combined infantry, armour and artillery units under one corps commander. The only common commander for Montgomery's all-infantry and all-armour corps was the Eighth Army Commander himself. Writing post-war the English historian Correlli Barnett commented that Montgomery's solution "was in every way opposite to Auchinleck's and in every way wrong, for it carried the existing dangerous separatism still further." Montgomery reinforced the long front line at El Alamein, something that would take two months to accomplish. He asked Alexander to send him two new British divisions (51st Highland and 44th Home Counties) that were then arriving in Egypt and were scheduled to be deployed in defence of the Nile Delta. He moved his field HQ to Burg al Arab, close to the Air Force command post in order to better coordinate combined operations. he told his officers at the first meeting he held with them in the desert, though, in fact, Auchinleck had no plans to withdraw from the strong defensive position he had chosen and established at El Alamein.
, the new GOC XIII Corps, discussing troop dispositions at 22nd Armoured Brigade HQ, 20 August 1942. The brigade commander, Brigadier George Roberts is on the right (in beret).]]
Montgomery made a great effort to appear before troops as often as possible, frequently visiting various units and making himself known to the men, often arranging for cigarettes to be distributed. Although he still wore a standard British officer's cap on arrival in the desert, he briefly wore an Australian broad-brimmed hat before switching to wearing the black beret (with the badge of the Royal Tank Regiment and the British General Officer's cap badge) for which he became notable. The black beret was offered to him by Jim Fraser while the latter was driving him on an inspection tour. Both Brooke and Alexander were astonished by the transformation in atmosphere when they visited on 19 August, less than a week after Montgomery had taken command. Montgomery was criticised for not counter-attacking the retreating forces immediately, but he felt strongly that his methodical build-up of British forces was not yet ready. A hasty counter-attack risked ruining his strategy for an offensive on his own terms in late October, planning for which had begun soon after he took command. He was confirmed in the permanent rank of lieutenant-general in mid-October.
The conquest of Libya was essential for airfields to support Malta and to threaten the rear of Axis forces opposing Operation Torch. Montgomery prepared meticulously for the new offensive after convincing Churchill that the time was not being wasted. (Churchill sent a telegram to Alexander on 23 September 1942 which began, "We are in your hands and of course a victorious battle makes amends for much delay.") He was determined not to fight until he thought there had been sufficient preparation for a decisive victory, and put into action his beliefs with the gathering of resources, detailed planning, the training of troops—especially in clearing minefields and fighting at night—and in the use of 252 of the latest American-built Sherman tanks, 90 M7 Priest self-propelled howitzers, and making a personal visit to every unit involved in the offensive. By the time the offensive was ready in late October, Eighth Army had 231,000 men on its ration strength.
El Alamein
in a posed photograph during the Second Battle of El Alamein]]<!-- Do not confuse this photo (E 18474) with another (E 18908). -->
The Second Battle of El Alamein began on 23 October 1942, and ended 12 days later with one of the first large-scale, decisive Allied land victories of the war. Montgomery correctly predicted both the length of the battle and the number of casualties (13,500).
Historian Correlli Barnett has pointed out that the rain also fell on the Germans, and that the weather is therefore an inadequate explanation for the failure to exploit the breakthrough, but nevertheless the Battle of El Alamein had been a great success. Over 30,000 prisoners of war were taken, including the German second-in-command, General von Thoma, as well as eight other general officers.
Tunisia
with military leaders during his visit to Tripoli. The group includes: Lieutenant-General Sir Oliver Leese, General Sir Harold Alexander, General Sir Alan Brooke and General Sir Bernard Montgomery.]]
Montgomery was advanced to KCB and promoted to full general. At the Mareth Line, 20 to 27 March, when Montgomery encountered fiercer frontal opposition than he had anticipated, he switched his major effort into an outflanking inland pincer, backed by low-flying RAF fighter-bomber support. For his role in North Africa he was awarded the Legion of Merit by the United States government in the rank of Chief Commander. Inter-Allied tensions grew as the American commanders, Patton and Omar Bradley (then commanding US II Corps under Patton), took umbrage at what they saw as Montgomery's attitudes and boastfulness.Italy
aircraft (location and date unknown)]]
, Harry Broadhurst, Montgomery, Sir Bernard Freyberg, Miles Dempsey and Charles Allfrey]]
Montgomery's Eighth Army was then fully involved in the Allied invasion of Italy in early September 1943, becoming the first of the Allied forces to land in Western Europe. Led by Lieutenant General Sir Miles Dempsey's XIII Corps, the Eighth Army landed on the toe of Italy in Operation Baytown on 3 September, four years to the day after Britain declared war on Germany. They encountered little enemy resistance. The Germans had made the decision to fall back and did what they could to stall the Eighth Army's advance, including blowing up bridges, laying mines, and setting up booby-traps. All of these slowed the Army's advance north on the awful Italian roads, although it was Montgomery who was later much criticised for the lack of progress. On 9 September the British 1st Airborne Division landed at the key port of Taranto in the heel of Italy as part of Operation Slapstick, capturing the port unopposed. He was assigned to command the 21st Army Group consisting of all Allied ground forces participating in Operation Overlord, codename for the Allied invasion of Normandy. Overall direction was assigned to the Supreme Allied Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Forces, American General Dwight D. Eisenhower. However Montgomery's patron, General Sir Alan Brooke, firmly argued that Montgomery was a much superior general to Alexander and ensured his appointment. Montgomery attempted to take Caen with the 3rd Infantry Division, the 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division and the 3rd Canadian Division, but was stopped from 6–8 June by the 21st Panzer Division and 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend, who hit the advancing Anglo-Canadian troops very hard. The 12th Waffen SS Division Hitlerjugend, as its name implies, was drawn entirely from the more fanatical elements of the Hitler Youth, and commanded by the ruthless SS-Brigadeführer Kurt Meyer, aka "Panzer Meyer". Rommel followed up this success by ordering the 2nd Panzer Division to Caen while Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt received permission from Hitler to have the elite 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler and 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich sent to Caen as well. Broadly, there has been a "British school" which accepts Montgomery's post-war claim that he never intended to take Caen at once, and instead the Anglo-Canadian operations around Caen were a "holding operation" intended to attract the bulk of the German forces towards the Caen sector to allow the Americans to stage the "break out operation" on the left flank of the German positions, which was all part of Montgomery's "Master Plan" that he had conceived long before the Normandy campaign. Letters written by Eisenhower at the time of the battle make it clear that Eisenhower was expecting from Montgomery "the early capture of the important focal point of Caen". Later, when this plan had clearly failed, Eisenhower wrote that Montgomery had "evolved" the plan to have the US forces achieve the break-out instead.
, GOC 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division, pictured here in Normandy, 20 June 1944]]
As the campaign progressed, Montgomery altered his initial plan for the invasion and continued the strategy of attracting and holding German counter-attacks in the area north of Caen rather than to the south, to allow the U.S. First Army in the west to take Cherbourg. A memo summarising Montgomery's operations written by Eisenhower's chief of staff, General Walter Bedell Smith who met with Montgomery in late June 1944 says nothing about Montgomery conducting a "holding operation" in the Caen sector, and instead speaks of him seeking a "breakout" into the plains south of the Seine. On 12 June, Montgomery ordered the 7th Armoured Division into an attack against the Panzer Lehr Division that made good progress at first, but ended when the Panzer Lehr was joined by the 2nd Panzer Division. At the Battle of Villers-Bocage on 13 June, the British lost twenty Cromwell tanks to five Tiger tanks led by SS Obersturmführer Michael Wittmann, in about five minutes. Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder complained that it was impossible to move fighter squadrons to France until Montgomery had captured some airfields, something he asserted that Montgomery appeared incapable of doing. The first V-1 flying bomb attacks on London, which started on 13 June, further increased the pressure on Montgomery from Whitehall to speed up his advance. Epsom began well with O'Connor's assault force (the British 15th Scottish Division) breaking through and with the 11th Armoured Division stopping the counter-attacks of the 12th SS Division. Montgomery told General Sir Miles Dempsey, the commander of Second British Army: "Go on hitting, drawing the German strength, especially some of the armour, onto yourself—so as to ease the way for Brad [Bradley]." The Germans had deployed twelve divisions, of which six were Panzer divisions, against the British while deploying eight divisions, of which three were Panzer divisions, against the Americans. This was broadly as Montgomery had planned, albeit not with the same speed as he outlined at St Paul's, although as the American historian Carlo D'Este pointed out the actual situation in Normandy was "vastly different" from what was envisioned at the St. Paul's conference, as only one of four goals outlined in May had been achieved by 10 July.
On 7 July, Montgomery began Operation Charnwood with a carpet bombing offensive that turned much of the French countryside and the city of Caen into a wasteland. The British and Canadians succeeded in advancing into northern Caen before the Germans, who used the ruins to their advantage and stopped the offensive. On 10 July, Montgomery ordered Bradley to take Avranches, after which U.S. Third Army would be activated to drive towards Le Mans and Alençon. On 14 July 1944, Montgomery wrote to his patron Brooke, saying he had chosen on a "real show down on the eastern flanks, and to loose a Corps of three armoured divisions in the open country about the Caen-Falaise road ... The possibilities are immense; with seven hundred tanks loosed to the South-east of Caen, and the armoured cars operating far ahead, anything can happen." The French Resistance had launched Plan Violet in June 1944 to systematically destroy the telephone system of France, which forced the Germans to use their radios more and more to communicate, and as the code-breakers of Bletchley Park had broken many of the German codes, Montgomery had, thanks to "Ultra" intelligence, a good idea of the German situation. Montgomery thus knew German Army Group B had lost 96,400 men while receiving 5,200 replacements and the Panzer Lehr Division now based at St. Lô was down to only 40 tanks.
An American break-out was achieved with Operation Cobra and the encirclement of German forces in the Falaise pocket at the cost of British losses with the diversionary Operation Goodwood. On the early morning of 18 July 1944, Operation Goodwood began with British heavy bombers beginning carpet bombing attacks that further devastated what was left of Caen and the surrounding countryside. A British tank crewman from the Guards Armoured Division later recalled: "At 0500 hours a distant thunder in the air brought all the sleepy-eyed tank crews out of their blankets. 1,000 Lancasters were flying from the sea in groups of three or four at . Ahead of them the pathfinders were scattering their flares and before long the first bombs were dropping." A German tankman from the 21st Panzer Division at the receiving end of this bombardment remembered: "We saw little dots detach themselves from the planes, so many of them that the crazy thought occurred to us: are those leaflets? ... Among the thunder of the explosions, we could hear the wounded scream and the insane howling of men who had [been] driven mad." The British bombing had badly smashed the German front-line units. Initially, the three British armoured divisions assigned to lead the offensive, the 7th, 11th and the Guards, made rapid progress and were soon approaching the Borguebus ridge, which dominated the landscape south of Caen, by noon.
If the British could take the Borguebus Ridge, the way to the plains of northern France would be wide open, and potentially Paris could be taken, which explains the ferocity with which the Germans defended the ridge. One German officer, Lieutenant Baron von Rosen, recalled that to motivate a Luftwaffe officer commanding a battery of four 88 mm guns to fight against the British tanks, he had to hold his handgun to the officer's head "and asked him whether he would like to be killed immediately or get a high decoration. He decided for the latter." The well dug-in 88 mm guns around the Borguebus Ridge began taking a toll on the British Sherman tanks, and the countryside was soon dotted with dozens of burning Shermans. One British officer reported with worry: "I see palls of smoke and tanks brewing up with flames belching forth from their turrets. I see men climbing out, on fire like torches, rolling on the ground to try and douse the flames." "Ultra" decrypts indicated that the Germans now facing Bradley were seriously understrength, with Operation Cobra about to commence. During Operation Goodwood, the British had 400 tanks knocked out, with many recovered returning to service. The casualties were 5,500 with of ground gained.}}
The long-running dispute over what Montgomery's "master plan" in Normandy led historians to differ greatly about the purpose of Goodwood. The British journalist Mark Urban wrote that the purpose of Goodwood was to draw German troops to their left flank to allow the American forces to break out on the right flank, arguing that Montgomery had to lie to his soldiers about the purpose of Goodwood, as the average British soldier would not have understood why they were being asked to create a diversion to allow the Americans to have the glory of staging the breakout with Operation Cobra. Power noted that Goodwood and Cobra were supposed to take effect on the same day, 18 July 1944, but Cobra was cancelled owing to heavy rain in the American sector, and argued that both operations were meant to be breakout operations to trap the German armies in Normandy. American military writer Drew Middleton wrote that there is no doubt that Montgomery wanted Goodwood to provide a "shield" for Bradley, but at the same time Montgomery was clearly hoping for more than merely diverting German attention away from the American sector. British historian John Keegan pointed out that Montgomery made differing statements before Goodwood about the purpose of the operation. Keegan wrote that Montgomery engaged in what he called a "hedging of his bets" when drafting his plans for Goodwood, with a plan for a "break out if the front collapsed, if not, sound documentary evidence that all he had intended in the first place was a battle of attrition". Again Bradley confirmed Montgomery's plan and that the capture of Caen was only incidental to his mission, not critical. The American magazine LIFE quoted Bradley in 1951:
With Goodwood drawing the Wehrmacht towards the British sector, U.S. First Army enjoyed a two-to-one numerical superiority. Bradley accepted Montgomery's advice to begin the offensive by concentrating at one point instead of a "broad front" as Eisenhower would have preferred.
Operation Goodwood almost cost Montgomery his job, as Eisenhower seriously considered sacking him and only chose not to do so because to sack the popular "Monty" would have caused such a political backlash in Britain against the Americans at a critical moment in the war that the resulting strains in the Atlantic alliance were not considered worth it. Montgomery expressed his satisfaction at the results of Goodwood when calling the operation off. Eisenhower was under the impression that Goodwood was to be a break-out operation. Either there was a miscommunication between the two men or Eisenhower did not understand the strategy. Bradley fully understood Montgomery's intentions. Both men would not give away to the press the true intentions of their strategy.
(left) and Omar Bradley (centre) at 21st Army Group HQ, 7 July 1944]]
Many American officers had found Montgomery a difficult man to work with, and after Goodwood, pressured Eisenhower to fire Montgomery. An American officer wrote in his diary that Tedder had come to see Eisenhower to "pursue his current favourite subject, the sacking of Monty". With Tedder leading the "sack Monty" campaign, it encouraged Montgomery's American enemies to press Eisenhower to fire Montgomery. The success of Cobra was aided by Operation Spring, when the II Canadian Corps under General Guy Simonds (the only Canadian general whose skill Montgomery respected) began an offensive south of Caen that made little headway, but which the Germans regarded as the main offensive. Once Third Army arrived, Bradley was promoted to take command of the newly created 12th Army Group, consisting of U.S. First and Third Armies. Following the American breakout, there followed the Battle of Falaise Gap. British, Canadian, and Polish soldiers of 21st Army Group commanded by Montgomery advanced south, while the American and French soldiers of Bradley's 12th Army Group advanced north to encircle the German Army Group B at Falaise, as Montgomery waged what Urban called "a huge battle of annihilation" in August 1944. A dissatisfied Montgomery sacked Bucknall for being insufficiently aggressive and replaced him with General Brian Horrocks. On 11 August, Montgomery changed his plan, with the Canadians to take Falaise and to meet the Americans at Argentan. In view of the slow Canadian advance, Patton requested permission to take Falaise, but was refused by Bradley on 13 August. This prompted much controversy, many historians arguing that Bradley lacked aggression and that Montgomery should have overruled Bradley.
The so-called Falaise Gap was closed on 22 August 1944, but several American generals, most notably Patton, accused Montgomery of being insufficiently aggressive in closing it. About 60,000 German soldiers were trapped in Normandy, but before 22 August, about 20,000 Germans had escaped through the Falaise Gap. The successful conclusion of the Normandy campaign saw the beginning of the debate between the "American school" and "British school" as both American and British generals started to advance claims about who was most responsible for this victory. About Montgomery's conduct of the Normandy campaign, Badsey wrote:
Replaced as Ground Forces Commander
, Georgy Zhukov and Jean de Lattre de Tassigny]]
Eisenhower took over Ground Forces Command on 1 September, while continuing as Supreme Commander, with Montgomery continuing to command the 21st Army Group, now consisting mainly of British and Canadian units. Montgomery vehemently opposed this change, although it had been agreed before the D-Day invasion, instead proposing that either he or Bradley should remain in the job of Ground Forces command. He argued that the two roles were fundamentally different and that Eisenhower possessed the skillset for the former but not the latter; as such, he was liable to neglect the duties of one or the other, rendering the force off-balance. Instead, there was a need for a single decisive master plan under a leader free from the more administrative and political duties of the Supreme Commander - Montgomery felt he was the best equipped to deliver this, but was clear that he would also have been willing to work under Bradley.
Eisenhower and many others failed to grasp this however, and would misinterpret this as Montgomery's pride being wounded at having command removed. As such, they would attempt to placate him by reassuring him of the areas remaining under his command, and Winston Churchill had Montgomery promoted to Field Marshal by way of compensation. Advance to the Rhine By September, ports like Cherbourg were too far away from the front line, causing the Allies great logistical problems. Antwerp was the third largest port in Europe. It was a deep water inland port connected to the North Sea via the river Scheldt. The Scheldt was wide enough and dredged deep enough to allow the passage of ocean-going ships.
On 3 September 1944 Hitler ordered Fifteenth Army, which had been stationed in the Pas de Calais region and was withdrawing north into the Low Countries, to hold the mouth of the river Scheldt to deprive the Allies of the use of Antwerp. Von Rundstedt, the German commander of the Western Front, ordered General Gustav-Adolf von Zangen, the commander of 15th Army, that: "The attempt of the enemy to occupy the West Scheldt in order to obtain the free use of the harbor of Antwerp must be resisted to the utmost" (emphasis in the original). Rundstedt argued with Hitler that as long as the Allies could not use the port of Antwerp, the Allies would lack the logistical capacity for an invasion of Germany.
The Witte Brigade (White Brigade) of the Belgian resistance had captured the Port of Antwerp before the Germans could destroy key port facilities, and on 4 September, Antwerp was captured by Horrocks with its harbour mostly intact. The British declined to immediately advance over the Albert Canal, and an opportunity to destroy the German Fifteenth Army was lost. and to clear the Scheldt, a task that Crerar stated was impossible as he lacked enough troops to perform both operations at once. Montgomery refused Crerar's request to have British XII Corps under Neil Ritchie assigned to help clear the Scheldt as Montgomery stated he needed XII Corps for Operation Market Garden. On 6 September 1944, Montgomery told Crerar that "I want Boulogne badly" and that city should be taken no matter what the cost. After an attempt to storm the Leopold Canal by the 4th Canadian Division had been badly smashed by the German defenders, Simonds ordered a stop to further attempts to clear the river Scheldt until his mission of capturing the French ports on the English Channel had been accomplished; this allowed the German Fifteenth Army ample time to dig into its new home on the Scheldt. The only port that was not captured by the Canadians was Dunkirk, as Montgomery ordered the 2nd Canadian Division on 15 September to hold his flank at Antwerp as a prelude for an advance up the Scheldt.
in his mobile headquarters.]]
Montgomery pulled away from the First Canadian Army (temporarily commanded now by Simonds as Crerar was ill), the British 51st Highland Division, 1st Polish Division, British 49th (West Riding) Division and 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade, and sent all of these formations to help the Second British Army to expand the Market Garden salient with Operations Constellation, Aintree, and towards the end of October Pheasant. However, Simonds seems to have regarded the Scheldt campaign as a test of his ability, and he felt he could clear the Scheldt with only three Canadian divisions, despite having to take on the entire Fifteenth Army, which held strongly fortified positions in a landscape that favoured the defence. Simonds never complained about the lack of air support (made worse by the cloudy October weather), shortages of ammunition or having insufficient troops, regarding these problems as challenges for him to overcome, rather than a cause for complaint. As it was, Simonds made only slow progress in October 1944 during the fighting in the Battle of the Scheldt, although he was praised by Copp for imaginative and aggressive leadership who managed to achieve much, despite all of the odds against him. Montgomery had little respect for the Canadian generals, whom he dismissed as mediocre, with the exception of Simonds, whom he consistently praised as Canada's only "first-rate" general in the entire war. Operation Market Garden Montgomery was able to persuade Eisenhower to allow him to test his strategy of a single thrust to the Ruhr with Operation Market Garden in September 1944. The offensive was strategically bold, for SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force) considered Montgomery's narrow-thrust strategy to be "logistically unrealistic",
Both Churchill and Montgomery claimed that the operation was nearly or 90% successful, "since they had got nine-tenths of the way to Arnhem", prompting Air Chief Marshal Tedder to derisively comment that "one jumps off a cliff with an even higher success rate, until the last few inches."
, GOC U.S. XVI Corps. Behind are General Bradley and Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke.]]
SHAEF believed the Wehrmacht was no longer capable of launching a major offensive, and that no offensive could be launched through such rugged terrain as the Ardennes Forest. Because of this, the area was held by refitting and newly arrived American formations. If the attack were to succeed in capturing Antwerp, the whole of 21st Army Group, along with U.S. Ninth Army and most of U.S. First Army would be trapped without supplies behind German lines.
The attack initially advanced rapidly, splitting U.S. 12th Army Group in two, with all of U.S. Ninth Army and the bulk of U.S. First Army on the northern shoulder of the German 'bulge'. The 12th Army Group commander, Bradley, was located in Luxembourg, making command of the U.S. forces north of the bulge problematic. As Montgomery was the nearest army group commander on the ground, on 20 December, Eisenhower temporarily transferred command of U.S. Ninth Army and U.S. First Army to Montgomery's 21st Army Group. Bradley was "concerned because it might discredit the American command" but that it might mean Montgomery would commit more of his reserves to the battle. In practice the change led to "great resentment on the part of many Americans, particularly at Headquarters, 12th Army Group, and Third Army".
With the British and American forces under Montgomery's command holding the northern flank of the German assault, General Patton's Third Army, which was to the south, turned north and fought its way through the severe weather and German opposition to relieve the besieged American forces in Bastogne. Four days after Montgomery took command of the northern flank, the bad weather cleared and the USAAF and RAF resumed operations, inflicting heavy casualties on German troops and vehicles. Six days after Montgomery took command of the northern flank, Patton's Third Army relieved the besieged American forces in Bastogne. Unable to advance further, and running out of fuel, the Wehrmacht abandoned the offensive.
Morelock states that Montgomery was preoccupied with leading a "single thrust offensive" to Berlin as the overall commander of Allied ground forces, and that he accordingly treated the Ardennes counteroffensive "as a sideshow, to be finished with the least possible effort and expenditure of resources."
Montgomery subsequently wrote of his actions:
After the war Hasso von Manteuffel, who commanded the 5th Panzer Army in the Ardennes, was imprisoned awaiting trial for war crimes. During this period he was interviewed by B. H. Liddell Hart, a British author who has since been accused of putting words in the mouths of German generals, and attempting to "rewrite the historical record". After conducting several interviews via an interpreter, Liddell Hart in a subsequent book attributed to Manteuffel the following statement about Montgomery's contribution to the battle in the Ardennes:
}}
However, American historian Stephen Ambrose, writing in 1997, maintained that "Putting Monty in command of the northern flank had no effect on the battle". Ambrose wrote that: "Far from directing the victory, Montgomery had gotten in everyone's way, and had botched the counter-attack." General Omar Bradley blamed Montgomery's "stagnating conservatism" for his failure to counter-attack when ordered to do so by Eisenhower.
Command of U.S. First Army reverted to 12th Army Group on 17 January 1945, whilst command of U.S. Ninth Army remained with 21st Army Group for the coming operations to cross the Rhine.
Crossing the Rhine
Sir Arthur Coningham (centre) and the Commander of the British Second Army, Lieutenant-General Sir Miles Dempsey, talking after a conference in which Montgomery gave the order for the Second Army to begin Operation Plunder]]
on 5 June 1945. Dwight Eisenhower, Georgy Zhukov and Sir Arthur Tedder were also present.]]
In February 1945, Montgomery's 21st Army Group advanced to the Rhine in Operation Veritable and Operation Grenade. It crossed the Rhine on 24 March 1945, in Operation Plunder, which took place two weeks after U.S. First Army had crossed the Rhine after capturing the Ludendorff Bridge during the Battle of Remagen.
21st Army Group's river crossing was followed by the encirclement of the Ruhr Pocket. During this battle, U.S. Ninth Army, which had remained part of 21st Army Group after the Battle of the Bulge, formed the northern arm of the envelopment of German Army Group B, with U.S. First Army forming the southern arm. The two armies linked up on 1 April 1945, encircling 370,000 German troops, and on 4 April 1945, Ninth Army reverted to Omar Bradley's 12th Army Group.
By the war's end, the remaining formations of 21st Army group, First Canadian Army and British Second Army, had liberated the northern part of the Netherlands and captured much of north-west Germany, occupied Hamburg and Rostock and sealed off the Danish peninsula.
On 4 May 1945, on Lüneburg Heath, Montgomery accepted the surrender of German forces in north-west Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands.
Later life
Post-war military career
Marshals Zhukov (red sash) and Rokossovsky (medal with solid red ribbon) with General Sokolovsky (medal with red and white ribbon) leave the Brandenburg Gate on 12 July 1945 after being decorated by Montgomery.]]
After the war, Montgomery became the C-in-C of the British Army of the Rhine (BAOR), the name given to the British Occupation Forces, and was the British member of the Allied Control Council.
Chief of the Imperial General Staff
Montgomery was Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS) from 1946 to 1948, succeeding Alan Brooke.
However, Montgomery was barely on speaking terms with his fellow service chiefs, sending his deputy Kenneth Crawford to attend their meetingsWestern Union Defence Organization
in 1947]]
Montgomery was then appointed Chairman of the Western Union Defence Organization's C-in-C committee.
NATO
On the creation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation's Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe in 1951, Montgomery became Eisenhower's deputy. He would continue to serve under Eisenhower's successors, Generals Matthew Ridgway and Al Gruenther, until his retirement, aged nearly 71, in 1958.
Personal
Montgomery was created 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein in 1946.
Montgomery's mother, Maude Montgomery, died in 1949. Montgomery did not attend the funeral, claiming he was "too busy".
He was chairman of the governing body of St. John's School in Leatherhead, Surrey, from 1951 to 1966, and a generous supporter.
He was also President of Portsmouth Football Club between 1944 and 1961.
In the mid-1950s, the Illustrated London News published sets of photographs taken by Montgomery while flying over the Swiss Alps. In February 1957, views of Mount Toedi taken with a Rolleiflex camera were reproduced.
Opinions
Memoirs
with Lord Wavell, Viceroy of India, and Auchinleck, Commander in Chief Indian Army. Delhi 1946]]
Montgomery's memoirs (1958) criticised many of his wartime comrades in harsh terms, including Eisenhower. He was threatened with legal action by Field Marshal Auchinleck for suggesting that Auchinleck had intended to retreat from the Alamein position if attacked again, and had to give a radio broadcast (20 November 1958) expressing his gratitude to Auchinleck for having stabilised the front at the First Battle of Alamein.
The 1960 paperback edition of Montgomery's memoirs contains a publisher's note drawing attention to that broadcast, and stating that although the reader might assume from Montgomery's text that Auchinleck had been planning to retreat "into the Nile Delta or beyond" in the publisher's view it had been Auchinleck's intention to launch an offensive as soon as the Eighth Army was "rested and regrouped". Montgomery was stripped of his honorary citizenship of Montgomery, Alabama, and was challenged to a duel by an Italian lawyer.
Montgomery mentioned to the American journalist John Gunther in April 1944 that (like Alanbrooke) he kept a secret diary. Gunther remarked that it would surely be an essential source for historians. When Montgomery asked whether it would be worth money one day, Gunther suggested "at least $100,000." This was converted into pounds sterling, and he is supposed to have grinned and said "Well, I guess I won't die in the poor house after all."Military opinionsMontgomery twice met Israeli general Moshe Dayan. After an initial meeting in the early 1950s, Montgomery met Dayan again in the 1960s to discuss the Vietnam War, which Dayan was studying. Montgomery was harshly critical of US strategy in Vietnam, which involved deploying large numbers of combat troops, aggressive bombing attacks, and uprooting entire village populations and forcing them into strategic hamlets. Montgomery said that the Americans' most important problem was that they had no clear objective, and allowed local commanders to set military policy. At the end of their meeting, Montgomery asked Dayan to tell the Americans, in his name, that they were "insane".
During a visit to the Alamein battlefields in May 1967, he bluntly told high-ranking Egyptian Army officers that they would lose any war with Israel, a warning that was shown to be justified only a few weeks later in the Six-Day War.
Social opinions
In retirement, Montgomery publicly supported apartheid after a visit to South Africa in 1962, and after a visit to China declared himself impressed by the Chinese leadership led by Chairman Mao Tse-tung. He spoke out against the legalisation of homosexuality in the United Kingdom, arguing that the Sexual Offences Act 1967 was a "charter for buggery" and that "this sort of thing may be tolerated by the French, but we're British—thank God".
Montgomery was a non-smoking teetotaller, a vegetarian, and a Christian.Death
, London, by Oscar Nemon, unveiled in 1980]]
Montgomery died in 1976 at his home Isington Mill in Isington, Hampshire, aged 88. After a funeral at St George's Chapel, Windsor, his body was buried in Holy Cross churchyard, in Binsted, Hampshire.
* Montgomery's portrait by Frank O. Salisbury (1945) hangs in the National Portrait Gallery.
* A statue of Montgomery by Oscar Nemon stands outside the Ministry of Defence in Whitehall, alongside those of Field Marshal Lord Slim and Field Marshal Lord Alanbrooke.
* Montgomery gave his name to the French commune Colleville-Montgomery in Normandy.
in London]]
* The Imperial War Museum holds a variety of material relating to Montgomery in its collections. These include Montgomery's Grant command tank (on display in the atrium at the museum's London branch), his command caravans as used in North West Europe (on display at IWM Duxford), and his papers are held by the museum's Department of Documents. The museum maintains a permanent exhibition about Montgomery, entitled Monty: Master of the Battlefield.
* The World Champion Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band from Northern Ireland is named after him.
* Montgomery's Rolls-Royce staff car is on display at the Royal Logistic Corps Museum, Worthy Down, Hampshire.
* The Montgomery cocktail is a martini mixed at a ratio of 15 parts gin to 1 part vermouth, and popular with Ernest Hemingway at Harry's Bar in Venice. The drink was facetiously named for Montgomery's supposed refusal to go into battle unless his numerical advantage was at least fifteen to one, and it appeared in Hemingway's 1950 novel Across the River and into the Trees. Ironically, following severe internal injuries received in the First World War, Montgomery himself could neither smoke nor drink.Casualty conservation policyThe British high command were not only concerned with winning the war and defeating Germany, but also with ensuring that it retained sufficient influence in the post-war world to govern global policy. Suffering heavy losses in Normandy would diminish British leadership and prestige within its empire and in post-war Europe in particular. Many of Montgomery's clashes with Eisenhower were based on his determination to pursue the war "on lines most suitable to Britain".
The fewer the number of combat-experienced divisions the British had left at the end of the war, the smaller Britain's influence in Europe was likely to be, compared to the emerging superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union. Montgomery was thus caught in a dilemma—the British Army needed to be seen to be pulling at least half the weight in the liberation of Europe, but without incurring the heavy casualties that such a role would inevitably produce. 21st Army Group scarcely possessed sufficient forces to achieve such a military prominence, and the remaining divisions had to be expended sparingly.
In 1944, Britain did not possess the manpower to rebuild shattered divisions and it was imperative for Montgomery to protect the viability of the British army. It was reported to the War Office that "Montgomery has to be very careful of what he does on his eastern flank because on that flank is the only British Army there is left in this part of the world". The context of British casualties and the shortage of reinforcements, prompted Montgomery to "excessive caution". Dempsey wrote on 13 June, that Caen could only be taken by a "set piece assault and we did not have the men or the ammunition for that at the time".
Montgomery's solution to the dilemma was to attempt to remain Commander of All Land Forces until the end of the war, so that any victory attained on the Western front—although achieved primarily by American formations—would accrue in part to him and thus to Britain. He would also be able to ensure that British units were spared some of the high-attrition actions, but would be most prominent when the final blows were struck. When that strategy failed, he persuaded Eisenhower to occasionally put some American formations under the control of the 21st Army Group, so as to bolster his resources while still maintaining the outward appearance of successful British effort.
Montgomery initially remained prepared to push Second (British) Army hard to capture the vital strategic town of Caen, and consequently incur heavy losses. In the original Overlord plan, Montgomery was determined to push past Caen to Falaise as quickly as possible. However, after the heavy casualties incurred in capturing Caen, he changed his mind.PersonalityThroughout the war, Montgomery was notorious for his lack of tact and diplomacy. Even his "patron", the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Sir Alan Brooke, frequently mentions it in his war diaries: "he is liable to commit untold errors in lack of tact" and "I had to haul him over the coals for his usual lack of tact and egotistical outlook which prevented him from appreciating other people's feelings". Montgomery suffered from "an overbearing conceit and an uncontrollable urge for self-promotion." General Hastings Ismay, who was at the time Winston Churchill's chief staff officer and trusted military adviser, once said of him: "I have come to the conclusion that his love of publicity is a disease, like alcoholism or taking drugs, and that it sends him equally mad." The psychiatrist Michael Fitzgerald has argued that Montgomery was likely autistic, and it has been speculated that this was the cause of many of apparent behaviours and eccentricities.
A notorious instance of Montgomery's behaviour occurred during the North African campaign when he bet Walter Bedell Smith that he could capture Sfax by the middle of April 1943. Smith jokingly replied that if Montgomery could do it he would give him a Flying Fortress complete with crew. Smith promptly forgot all about it, but Montgomery did not, and when Sfax was taken on 10 April, he sent a message to Smith "claiming his winnings". Smith tried to laugh it off, but Montgomery insisted on his aircraft. The incident was finally resolved by Eisenhower who, with his renowned skill in diplomacy, ensured Montgomery did get his Flying Fortress, though at a great cost in ill feeling.
Antony Beevor, in discussing Montgomery's counterproductive lack of tact in the final months of the war, described him as "insufferable". Beevor says that in January 1945 Montgomery had tried to claim far too much credit for the British (and for himself) in defeating the German counter-attack in the Ardennes in December 1944. This "crass and unpleasant blunder" helped make it impossible for Churchill and Alan Brooke to persuade Eisenhower of the need for an immediate thrust—to be led by Montgomery—through Germany to Berlin. Eisenhower did not accept the viability of the "dagger thrust" approach, it had already been agreed that Berlin would fall into the future Soviet occupation zone, and he was not willing to accept heavy casualties for no gain, so Eisenhower disregarded the British suggestions and continued with his conservative broad front strategy, and the Red Army reached Berlin well ahead of the Western Allies.
In August 1945, while Brooke, Sir Andrew Cunningham and Sir Charles Portal were discussing their possible successors as "Chiefs of Staff", they concluded that Montgomery would be very efficient as CIGS from the Army's point of view but that he was also very unpopular with a large proportion of the Army. Despite this, Cunningham and Portal were strongly in favour of Montgomery succeeding Brooke after his retirement. Churchill, by all accounts a faithful friend, is quoted as saying of Montgomery, "In defeat, unbeatable; in victory, unbearable."Honours and awards* Viscountcy as Montgomery of Alamein (UK, January 1946)
* Knight Grand Cross of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath (UK, 1945) KCB – 11 November 1942, CB – 11 July 1940
* Companion of the Distinguished Service Order (UK, 1914) 13 January 1944)
* Croix de Guerre 1914-1918 (France, 1919)
* Grand Cross of the Légion d'honneur (France, May 1945)
* Médaille militaire (France, 9 September 1958)
* Distinguished Service Medal (US, 1947)
* Chief Commander of the Legion of Merit (US, 10 August 1943)
* Member of the Order of Victory (USSR, 21 June 1945)
* Knight of the Order of the Elephant (Denmark, 2 August 1945)
* Grand Commander of the Order of George I (Greece, 20 June 1944)
* Silver Cross (V Class) of the Virtuti Militari (Poland, 31 October 1944)
* Grand Cross of the Military Order of the White Lion (Czechoslovakia, 1947)
* Grand Cordon of the Seal of Solomon (Ethiopia, 1949)
* Grand Officer with Palm of the Order of Leopold II (Belgium, 1947)
* Croix de Guerre 1940 with Palm (Belgium)
* Grand Cross of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav (Norway) (1951)
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See also
* Afrika Korps
* M. E. Clifton James (Montgomery's double during the Second World War)
* Tex Banwell (another double)
* Irish military diaspora
* Panzer Army Africa
* ''I Was Monty's Double'', 1958 film adapted from the autobiography of M. E. Clifton James
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* [http://www.unithistories.com/officers/Army_officers_M02.html#Montgomery_BL British Army Officers 1939–1945]
* [http://www.generals.dk/general/Montgomery/Bernard_Law/Great_Britain.html Generals of World War II]
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* [https://web.archive.org/web/20190105044239/http://www.polishsoldier.nl/chapter-8-the-process-of-polish-rehabilitation-in-2006/ Montgomery and Anglo Polish relations during WWII]
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* [https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Montgomery.html Biography of Montgomery], Jewish Virtual Library website. Retrieved 10 April 2014.
* [http://desertwar.net/bernard-montgomery.html Profile], desertwar.net. Retrieved 10 April 2014.
* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p009y0ss Viscount Montgomery of Alamein] interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 20 December 1969
*
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Category:Pakistan Command and Staff College alumni | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Montgomery | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.487332 |
3874 | Herman Boerhaave | |birth_place = Voorhout, Dutch Republic
|death_date
|death_place = Leiden, Dutch Republic
|nationality = Dutch
|field = Medicine
|work_institutions = University of Leiden
|education = University of Leiden (M.A., 1690)<br>University of Harderwijk (M.D., 1693)
|doctoral_advisor |academic_advisors Burchard de Volder
|doctoral_students |notable_students Gerard van Swieten
|known_for = Founder of clinical teaching
|author_abbrev_bot = Boerh.
|thesis1_title = De distinctione mentis a corpore (On the Difference of the Mind from the Body)
|thesis1_url https://books.google.com/books?idZwlpAAAAcAAJ&dq|thesis1_year 1690
|thesis2_title = De utilitate explorandorum in aegris excrementorum ut signorum (The Utility of Examining Signs of Disease in the Excrement of the Sick)
|thesis2_url https://books.google.com/books?idwDZlAAAAcAAJ&dq|thesis2_year 1693
}}
Herman Boerhaave (, 31 December 1668 – 23 September 1738) was a Dutch chemist, botanist, Christian humanist, and physician of European fame. He is regarded as the founder of clinical teaching and of the modern academic hospital and is sometimes referred to as "the father of physiology," along with Venetian physician Santorio Santorio (1561–1636). Boerhaave introduced the quantitative approach into medicine, along with his pupil Albrecht von Haller (1708–1777) and is best known for demonstrating the relation of symptoms to lesions. He was the first to isolate the chemical urea from urine. He was the first physician to put thermometer measurements to clinical practice. His motto was Simplex veri sigillum: 'Simplicity is the sign of the truth'. He is often hailed as the "Dutch Hippocrates". in his youth Boerhaave studied for a divinity degree and wanted to become a preacher. After the death of his father, however, he was offered a scholarship and he entered the University of Leiden, where he took his master's degree in philosophy in 1690, with a dissertation titled De distinctione mentis a corpore (On the Difference of the Mind from the Body). There he attacked the doctrines of Epicurus, Thomas Hobbes and Baruch Spinoza. He then turned to the study of medicine. He earned his medical doctorate from the University of Harderwijk (present-day Gelderland) in 1693, with a dissertation titled De utilitate explorandorum in aegris excrementorum ut signorum (The Utility of Examining Signs of Disease in the Excrement of the Sick).
In 1701 he was appointed lecturer on the institutes of medicine at Leiden; in his inaugural discourse, De commendando Hippocratis studio, he recommended to his pupils that great physician as their model. In 1709 he became professor of botany and medicine, and in that capacity he did good service, not only to his own university, but also to botanical science, by his improvements and additions to the botanic garden of Leiden, and by the publication of numerous works descriptive of new species of plants.
On 14 September 1710, Boerhaave married Maria Drolenvaux (1686–1746), the daughter of the rich merchant, Alderman Abraham Drolenvaux. They had four children, of whom one daughter, Maria Johanna (1712–1791) – wife of german art collector with various influential political ties Frederic Count de Thoms (1696–1746), lived to adulthood. In 1722, he began to suffer from an extreme case of gout, recovering the next year.
In 1714, when he was appointed rector of the university, he succeeded Govert Bidloo in the chair of practical medicine, and in this capacity he introduced the modern system of clinical instruction. Four years later he was appointed to the chair of chemistry as well. In 1728 he was elected into the French Academy of Sciences, and two years later into the Royal Society of London. In 1729 declining health obliged him to resign the chairs of chemistry and botany; and he died, after a lingering and painful illness, at Leiden.
Legacy
His reputation so increased the fame of the University of Leiden, especially as a school of medicine, that it became popular with visitors from every part of Europe. All the princes of Europe sent him pupils, who found in this skilful professor not only an indefatigable teacher, but an affectionate guardian. When Peter the Great went to Holland in 1716 (he had been in Holland before in 1697 to instruct himself in maritime affairs), he also took lessons from Boerhaave. Voltaire travelled to see him, as did Carl Linnaeus, who became a close friend and named the genus Boerhavia for him. His reputation was not confined to Europe; a Chinese mandarin sent him a letter addressed to "the illustrious Boerhaave, physician in Europe," and it reached him in due course.
The operating theatre of the University of Leiden in which he once worked as an anatomist is now at the centre of a museum named after him; the Boerhaave Museum. Asteroid 8175 Boerhaave is named after Boerhaave. From 1955 to 1961 Boerhaave's image was printed on Dutch 20-guilder banknotes. The Leiden University Medical Centre organises medical trainings called Boerhaave-courses.
He had a prodigious influence on the development of medicine and chemistry in Scotland. British medical schools credit Boerhaave for developing the system of medical education upon which their current institutions are based. Every founding member of the Edinburgh Medical School had studied at Leyden and attended Boerhaave's lectures on chemistry including John Rutherford and Francis Home. Boerhaave's Elementa Chemiae (1732) is recognised as the first text on chemistry.
Boerhaave first described Boerhaave syndrome, which involves tearing of the oesophagus, usually a consequence of vigorous vomiting. Notoriously, in 1724 he described the case of Baron Jan van Wassenaer, a Dutch admiral who died of this condition following a gluttonous feast and subsequent regurgitation. The condition was uniformly fatal prior to modern surgical techniques allowing repair of the oesophagus.
Boerhaave was critical of his Dutch contemporary Baruch Spinoza, attacking him in his 1688 dissertation. At the same time, he admired Isaac Newton and was a devout Christian who often wrote about God in his works. Among other things, he considered nature as God's Creation, and he used to say that the poor were his best patients because God was their paymaster.
Medical contributions
Boerhaave devoted himself intensively to the study of the human body. He was strongly influenced by the mechanistic theories of René Descartes, and those of the 17th-century astronomer and mathematician Giovanni Borelli, who described animal movements in terms of mechanical motion. On such premises Boerhaave proposed a hydraulic model of human physiology. His writings refer to simple machines such as levers and pulleys and similar mechanisms, and he saw the bodily organs and members as being assembled from pipe-like structures. The physiology of veins, for example, he compared to the operation of pipes. He asserted the importance of a proper balance of fluid pressure, noting that fluids should be able to move around the body freely, without obstacles. For its well-being the body needed to be self-regulating, so as to maintain a healthy state of equilibrium. Boerhaave's concept of the body as apparatus centred his medical attention on material problems rather than upon ontological or esoteric explanations of illness.
Boerhaave's teaching of his knowledge and philosophy drew many students to the University of Leiden. He emphasised the importance of anatomical research based on practical observation and scientific experiment. His concept of the bodily system took hold throughout Europe, and helped to transform medical education in the European schools. His insights aroused great interest among other critical medical thinkers, not least in Friedrich Hoffmann, who strongly advocated the importance of physico-mechanical principles for the preservation or indeed the restoration of health. As a professor at Leiden, Boerhaave influenced many students. Some in their experiments upheld and furthered his philosophy, while others rejected it and proposed alternative theories of human physiology. He produced a great many textbooks and writings through which the digested brilliance of his lectures at Leiden was circulated widely in Europe. In 1708 his publication of the Institutiones Medicae was issued in over five languages, and went into approximately ten editions. His Elementa Chemia, a world-renowned chemistry textbook, was published in 1732.
The mechanistic concept of the human body departed from the age-old precepts laid down by Galen and Aristotle. In place of a servile dependence upon teachings handed down from antiquity, Boerhaave understood the importance of establishing definitive findings through his own investigation, and by the direct application of his own methods of testing. This new reasoning expanded the field of Renaissance anatomy: it opened the way to reforms of medical practice and understanding in the field of iatrochemistry.
Works
*Oratio academica qua probatur, bene intellectam a Cicerone et confutatam esse sententiam Epicuri de summo bono (Leiden, 1688)
*Het Nut der Mechanistische Methode in de Geneeskunde (Leiden, 1703)
*Institutiones medicae (Leiden, 1708)
*Aphorismi de cognoscendis et curandis morbis (Leiden, 1709), on which his pupil and assistant, Gerard van Swieten (1700–1772) published a commentary in 5 vols.
**
*
*
**
*Institutiones et Experimenta chemiae (Paris, 1724) (unauthorised). (Digital edition by the University and State Library Düsseldorf)
*
*
** Translated from the original Latin by Timothy Dallowe, MD.
**
*
**
<gallery>
Boerhaave, Herman – Historia plantarum quae in Horto Academico Lugduni-Batavorum crescunt, 1727 – BEIC 6963111.jpg|Historia plantarum quae in Horto Academico Lugduni-Batavorum crescunt, 1727
Elementa Chemiae-Boerhaave.jpg|Elementa Chemiae, 1732
</gallery>
References
* Guggenheim, K. Y. "Herman Boerhaave on nutrition." The Journal of Nutrition 118, no. 2 (1988): 141–143.
* Mendelsohn, Everett (2003). Transformation and Tradition in the Sciences. Cambridge University Press.
* Rina Knoeff (2002), "Herman Boerhaave (1668–1783): Calvinist chemist and physician." History of Science and Scholarship in the Netherlands, Volume 3. Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
* Underwood, E. Ashworth. "Boerhaave After Three Hundred Years." The British Medical Journal 4, no. 5634 (1968): 820–25.
Further reading
* Ducheyne, Steffen (2017) [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00033790.2017.1304574 "Different Shades of Newton: Herman Boerhaave on Isaac Newton mathematicus, philosophus, and opto-chemicus"], Annals of Science 74(2): 108–125.
* External links
*
*Samuel Johnson's 1739 biography of him online: [http://www.samueljohnson.com/boerhaave.html Life of Herman Boerhaave]
*[http://www.museumboerhaave.nl/ Museum Boerhaave] in Leiden, National Museum of the History of Science and Medicine
*[http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/extract/344/2/138 A recent discussion of Boerhaave's Syndrome] in the New England Journal of Medicine (subscription required)
*
*
*[https://openlibrary.org/authors/OL863081A Works] at [https://openlibrary.org Open Library]
*
*[https://archive.org/details/hermanniboerhaa00boergoog "Aphorismi de Cognoscendis et Curandis Morbis" (1709; “Aphorisms on the Recognition and Treatment of Diseases”)]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20120916115830/http://personal.telefonica.terra.es/web/rotochem/Boer.html "Elementa Chemiae" (1733) (Elements of Chemistry)]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20080612173212/http://usuarios.lycos.es/rotedu/Shaw.html "A New Method of Chemistry" (1741 & 1753) (English Translation of "Elementa Chemiae" by Peter Shaw)]
*[http://www.javed-chaudhry.com/zindagi-ka-khoya-howa-sira-by-javed-chaudhry/ Javed Chaudhry Article about Herman Boerhaave]
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Category:Writers about religion and science | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_Boerhaave | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.500931 |
3875 | Benjamin Disraeli | | image = Benjamin Disraeli by Cornelius Jabez Hughes, 1878.jpg
| caption = 1878 portrait
| alt = Disraeli in old age, wearing a double-breasted suit, bow tie and hat
| office1 = Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
| term_start1 = 20 February 1874
| term_end1 = 21 April 1880
| monarch1 = Victoria
| predecessor1 = William Ewart Gladstone
| successor1 = William Ewart Gladstone
| term_start2 = 27 February 1868
| term_end2 = 1 December 1868
| monarch2 = Victoria
| predecessor2 = The Earl of Derby
| successor2 = William Ewart Gladstone
| office3 = Leader of the Opposition
| term_start3 = 21 April 1880
| term_end3 = 19 April 1881
| predecessor3 = Marquess of Hartington
| successor3 = The Marquess of Salisbury
| monarch3 = Victoria
| primeminister3 = William Ewart Gladstone
| term_start4 = 1 December 1868
| term_end4 = 17 February 1874
| monarch4 = Victoria
| primeminister4 = William Ewart Gladstone
| predecessor4 = William Ewart Gladstone
| successor4 = William Ewart Gladstone
| office5 = Chancellor of the Exchequer
| term_start5 = 6 July 1866
| term_end5 = 29 February 1868
| primeminister5 = The Earl of Derby
| predecessor5 = William Ewart Gladstone
| successor5 = George Ward Hunt
| term_start6 = 26 February 1858
| term_end6 = 11 June 1859
| primeminister6 = The Earl of Derby
| predecessor6 = Sir George Cornewall Lewis
| successor6 = William Ewart Gladstone
| term_start7 = 27 February 1852
| term_end7 = 17 December 1852
| primeminister7 = The Earl of Derby
| predecessor7 = Sir Charles Wood, 3rd Baronet
| successor7 = William Ewart Gladstone
| birth_name = Benjamin D'Israeli
| birth_date
| death_date
| birth_place = Bloomsbury, Middlesex<!-- Not in London at the time -->, England
| death_place = Mayfair, London, England
| parents =
| spouse
| party = Conservative
| otherparty = Young England (1840s)
| signature = Benjamin Disraeli Signature 2.svg
| signature_alt = Cursive signature in ink
| module
* Vivian Grey
* Popanilla
* The Young Duke
* Contarini Fleming
* Ixion in Heaven
* The Wondrous Tale of Alroy
* The Rise of Iskander
* The Infernal Marriage
* Henrietta Temple
* Venetia
* Coningsby
* Sybil
* Tancred
* Lothair
* Endymion
}}
}}
}}
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield (21 December 1804 – 19 April 1881) was a British statesman, Conservative politician and writer who twice served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He played a central role in the creation of the modern Conservative Party, defining its policies and its broad outreach. Disraeli is remembered for his influential voice in world affairs, his political battles with the Liberal Party leader William Ewart Gladstone, and his one-nation conservatism or "Tory democracy". He made the Conservatives the party most identified with the British Empire and military action to expand it, both of which were popular among British voters. He is the only British prime minister to have been born Jewish.
Disraeli was born in Bloomsbury, at that time a part of Middlesex. His father left Judaism after a dispute at his synagogue; Benjamin became an Anglican at the age of 12. After several unsuccessful attempts, Disraeli entered the House of Commons in 1837. In 1846, Prime Minister Robert Peel split the party over his proposal to repeal the Corn Laws, which involved ending the tariff on imported grain. Disraeli clashed with Peel in the House of Commons, becoming a major figure in the party. When Lord Derby, the party leader, thrice formed governments in the 1850s and 1860s, Disraeli served as Chancellor of the Exchequer and Leader of the House of Commons.
Upon Derby's retirement in 1868, Disraeli became prime minister briefly before losing that year's general election. He returned to the Opposition before leading the party to a majority in the 1874 general election. He maintained a close friendship with Queen Victoria who, in 1876, elevated him to the peerage as Earl of Beaconsfield. Disraeli's second term was dominated by the Eastern question—the slow decay of the Ottoman Empire and the desire of other European powers, such as Russia, to gain at its expense. Disraeli arranged for the British to purchase a major interest in the Suez Canal Company in Egypt. In 1878, faced with Russian victories against the Ottomans, he worked at the Congress of Berlin to obtain peace in the Balkans at terms favourable to Britain and unfavourable to Russia, its longstanding enemy. This diplomatic victory established Disraeli as one of Europe's leading statesmen.
World events thereafter moved against the Conservatives. Controversial wars in Afghanistan and South Africa undermined his public support. He angered farmers by refusing to reinstitute the Corn Laws in response to poor harvests and cheap imported grain. With Gladstone conducting a massive speaking campaign, the Liberals defeated Disraeli's Conservatives at the 1880 general election. In his final months, Disraeli led the Conservatives in Opposition. Disraeli wrote novels throughout his career, beginning in 1826, and published his last completed novel, Endymion, shortly before he died at the age of 76.
Early life
Childhood
Disraeli was born on 21 December 1804 at 6 King's Road, Bedford Row, Bloomsbury, London, the second child and eldest son of Isaac D'Israeli, a literary critic and historian, and Maria (Miriam), née Basevi. Historians differ on Disraeli's motives for rewriting his family history: Bernard Glassman argues that it was intended to give him status comparable to that of England's ruling elite; Sarah Bradford believes "his dislike of the commonplace would not allow him to accept the facts of his birth as being as middle-class and undramatic as they really were".
, Maria and Sarah|alt=Three portraits; a man and two women]]
Disraeli's siblings were Sarah, Naphtali (born and died 1807), Ralph and James ("Jem"). He was close to his sister and on affectionate but more distant terms with his surviving brothers. Details of his schooling are sketchy. Two years later or so—the exact date has not been ascertained—he was sent as a boarder to Rev John Potticary's school at Blackheath.
Following a quarrel in 1813 with the Bevis Marks Synagogue, his father renounced Judaism and had the four children baptised into the Church of England in July and August 1817.|group n}} After Benjamin senior died in 1816, Isaac felt free to leave the congregation following a second dispute. Isaac's friend Sharon Turner, a solicitor, convinced him that although he could comfortably remain unattached to any formal religion it would be disadvantageous to the children if they did so. Turner stood as godfather when Benjamin was baptised, aged twelve, on 31 July 1817. It is not known whether Disraeli formed any ambition for a parliamentary career at the time of his baptism, but there is no doubt that he bitterly regretted his parents' decision not to send him to Winchester College, one of the great public schools which consistently provided recruits to the political elite. His two younger brothers were sent there, and it is not clear why Isaac chose to send his eldest son to a much less prestigious school. The boy evidently held his mother responsible for the decision; Bradford speculates that "Benjamin's delicate health and his obviously Jewish appearance may have had something to do with it."|}}
1820s
In November 1821, shortly before his seventeenth birthday, Disraeli was articled as a clerk to a firm of solicitors—Swain, Stevens, Maples, Pearse and Hunt—in the City of London. T F Maples was not only the young Disraeli's employer and a friend of his father, but also his prospective father-in-law: Isaac and Maples considered that the latter's only daughter might be a suitable match for Benjamin. A friendship developed, but there was no romance. The firm had a large and profitable business, and as the biographer R W Davis observes, the clerkship was "the kind of secure, respectable position that many fathers dream of for their children". He recalled: <blockquote>I had some scruples, for even then I dreamed of Parliament. My father's refrain always was 'Philip Carteret Webb', who was the most eminent solicitor of his boyhood and who was an MP. It would be a mistake to suppose that the two years and more that I was in the office of our friend were wasted. I have often thought, though I have often regretted the University, that it was much the reverse.</blockquote>
'' by Francis Grant. Disraeli as a young man—a retrospective portrayal painted in 1852|alt=A young man of vaguely Semitic appearance, with long and curly black hair]]
The year after joining Maples' firm, Benjamin changed his surname from D'Israeli to Disraeli. His reasons are unknown, but the biographer Bernard Glassman surmises that it was to avoid being confused with his father. Disraeli's sister and brothers adopted the new version of the name; Isaac and his wife retained the older form. Peel followed suit. The Times took several years before it dropped the apostrophe and used Disraeli's spelling. Even in the 1870s, towards the end of Disraeli's career, the practice continued.|group= n}}
Disraeli toured Belgium and the Rhine Valley with his father in the summer of 1824. He later wrote that while travelling on the Rhine he decided to abandon his position: "I determined when descending those magical waters that I would not be a lawyer." On their return to England he left the solicitors, at the suggestion of Maples, with the aim of qualifying as a barrister. He enrolled as a student at Lincoln's Inn and joined the chambers of his uncle, Nathaniel Basevy, and then those of Benjamin Austen, who persuaded Isaac that Disraeli would never make a barrister and should be allowed to pursue a literary career. He had made a tentative start: in May 1824 he submitted a manuscript to his father's friend, the publisher John Murray, but withdrew it before Murray could decide whether to publish it.
Released from the law, Disraeli did some work for Murray, but turned most of his attention to speculative dealing on the stock exchange. There was at the time a boom in shares in South American mining companies. Spain was losing its South American colonies in the face of rebellions. At the urging of George Canning the British government recognised the new independent governments of Argentina (1824), Colombia and Mexico (both 1825). With no money of his own, Disraeli borrowed money to invest. He became involved with the financier J. D. Powles, who was prominent among those encouraging the mining boom. In 1825, Disraeli wrote three anonymous pamphlets for Powles, promoting the companies. The pamphlets were published by John Murray, who invested heavily in the boom.
Murray had ambitions to establish a new morning paper to compete with The Times. The paper survived only six months, partly because the mining bubble burst in late 1825, and partly because, according to Blake, the paper was "atrociously edited".
The bursting of the mining bubble was ruinous for Disraeli. By June 1825 he and his business partners had lost £7,000. Disraeli could not pay off the last of his debts from this debacle until 1849. He turned to writing, motivated partly by his desperate need for money, and partly by a wish for revenge on Murray and others by whom he felt slighted. There was a vogue for what was called "silver-fork fiction"—novels depicting aristocratic life, usually by anonymous authors, read by the aspirational middle classes. Disraeli's first novel, Vivian Grey, published anonymously in four volumes in 1826–27, was a thinly veiled re-telling of the affair of The Representative. It sold well, but caused much offence in influential circles when the authorship was discovered. In later editions Disraeli made many changes, softening his satire, but the damage to his reputation proved long-lasting.1830–1837Together with his sister's fiancé, William Meredith, Disraeli travelled widely in southern Europe and beyond in 1830–31. The trip was financed partly by another high society novel, The Young Duke, written in 1829–30. The tour was cut short suddenly by Meredith's death from smallpox in Cairo in July 1831. Despite this tragedy, and the need for treatment for a sexually transmitted disease on his return, Disraeli felt enriched by his experiences. He became, in Parry's words, "aware of values that seemed denied to his insular countrymen. The journey encouraged his self-consciousness, his moral relativism, and his interest in Eastern racial and religious attitudes."
Disraeli wrote two novels in the aftermath of the tour. Contarini Fleming (1832) was avowedly a self-portrait. It is subtitled "a psychological autobiography" and depicts the conflicting elements of its hero's character: the duality of northern and Mediterranean ancestry, the dreaming artist and the bold man of action. As Parry observes, the book ends on a political note, setting out Europe's progress "from feudal to federal principles". He had already turned his attention to politics in 1832, during the great crisis over the Reform Bill. He contributed to an anti-Whig pamphlet edited by John Wilson Croker and published by Murray entitled England and France: or a cure for Ministerial Gallomania. The choice of a Tory publication was regarded as strange by Disraeli's friends and relatives, who thought him more of a Radical. Indeed, he had objected to Murray about Croker's inserting "high Tory" sentiment: Disraeli remarked, "it is quite impossible that anything adverse to the general measure of Reform can issue from my pen." Moreover, at the time Gallomania was published, Disraeli was electioneering in High Wycombe in the Radical interest.
Disraeli's politics at the time were influenced both by his rebellious streak and his desire to make his mark. In the early 1830s the Tories and the interests they represented appeared to be a lost cause. The other great party, the Whigs, were anathema to Disraeli: "Toryism is worn out & I cannot condescend to be a Whig." There was a by-election and a general election in 1832; Disraeli unsuccessfully stood as a Radical at High Wycombe in each.
Disraeli's political views embraced certain Radical policies, particularly electoral reform, and also some Tory ones, including protectionism. He began to move in Tory circles. In 1834 he was introduced to the former Lord Chancellor, Lord Lyndhurst, by Henrietta Sykes, wife of Sir Francis Sykes. She was having an affair with Lyndhurst and began another with Disraeli. Disraeli and Lyndhurst took an immediate liking to each other. Lyndhurst was an indiscreet gossip with a fondness for intrigue; this appealed greatly to Disraeli, who became his secretary and go-between. In 1835 Disraeli stood for the last time as a Radical, again unsuccessfully contesting High Wycombe.
and Labouchere|alt=Two men of Victorian appearance]]
In April 1835, Disraeli fought a by-election at Taunton as a Tory candidate. The Irish MP Daniel O'Connell, misled by inaccurate press reports, thought Disraeli had slandered him while electioneering at Taunton; he launched an outspoken attack, referring to Disraeli as:
Disraeli's public exchanges with O'Connell, extensively reproduced in The Times, included a demand for a duel with the 60-year-old O'Connell's son (which resulted in Disraeli's temporary detention by the authorities), a reference to "the inextinguishable hatred with which [he] shall pursue [O'Connell's] existence", and the accusation that O'Connell's supporters had a "princely revenue wrung from a starving race of fanatical slaves". Disraeli was highly gratified by the dispute, which propelled him to general public notice for the first time. He did not defeat the incumbent Whig member, Henry Labouchere, but the Taunton constituency was regarded as unwinnable by the Tories. Disraeli kept Labouchere's majority down to 170, a good showing that put him in line for a winnable seat in the near future.
With Lyndhurst's encouragement Disraeli turned to writing propaganda for his newly adopted party. His Vindication of the English Constitution, was published in December 1835. It was couched in the form of an open letter to Lyndhurst, and in Bradford's view encapsulates a political philosophy that Disraeli adhered to for the rest of his life: the value of benevolent aristocratic government, a loathing of political dogma, and the modernisation of Tory policies. The following year he wrote a series of satires on politicians of the day, which he published in The Times under the pen-name "Runnymede". His targets included the Whigs, collectively and individually, Irish nationalists, and political corruption. One essay ended:
Disraeli was elected to the exclusively Tory Carlton Club in 1836, and was also taken up by the party's leading hostess, Lady Londonderry. In June 1837 William IV died, the young Queen Victoria succeeded him, and parliament was dissolved. On the recommendation of the Carlton Club, Disraeli was adopted as a Tory parliamentary candidate at the ensuing general election.
Parliament
Back-bencher
In the election in July 1837, Disraeli won a seat in the House of Commons as one of two members, both Tory, for the constituency of Maidstone. The other was Wyndham Lewis, who helped finance Disraeli's election campaign, and who died the following year. In the same year Disraeli published a novel, Henrietta Temple, which was a love story and social comedy, drawing on his affair with Henrietta Sykes. He had broken off the relationship in late 1836, distraught that she had taken yet another lover. His other novel of this period is Venetia, a romance based on the characters of Shelley and Byron, written quickly to raise much-needed money.
Disraeli made his maiden speech in Parliament on 7 December 1837. He followed O'Connell, whom he sharply criticised for the latter's "long, rambling, jumbling, speech". He was shouted down by O'Connell's supporters.s parliamentary reports were in the third person: its account is, "He would sit down now, but the time would come when they would hear him." Blake has the words as, "I will sit down now, but the time will come when you will hear me."|groupn}} After this unpromising start Disraeli kept a low profile for the rest of the parliamentary session. He was a loyal supporter of the party leader Sir Robert Peel and his policies, with the exception of a personal sympathy for the Chartist movement that most Tories did not share. "Dizzy married me for my money", his wife said later, "But, if he had the chance again, he would marry me for love."
Finding the financial demands of his Maidstone seat too much, Disraeli secured a Tory nomination for Shrewsbury, winning one of the constituency's two seats at the 1841 general election, despite serious opposition, and heavy debts which opponents seized on. The election was a massive defeat for the Whigs across the country, and Peel became prime minister. Disraeli hoped, unrealistically, for ministerial office. Though disappointed at being left on the back benches, he continued his support for Peel in 1842 and 1843, seeking to establish himself as an expert on foreign affairs and international trade. The two terms were used concurrently thereafter, but in the 1840s they were not always seen as interchangeable. The historian Roy Douglas writes, "Perhaps the safest way to think about party origins is to consider that, around 1830, the Whig and Tory Parties both began to disintegrate, and it was not until the late 1860s that the Liberal and Conservative Parties had come into existence in a fully recognisable form." In the 1840s Disraeli applied the term "Conservatives" to the Peelites as opposed to the Tories from whom Peel had seceded.|group= n}} Disraeli was sympathetic to some of the aims of Chartism, and argued for an alliance between the landed aristocracy and the working class against the increasing power of the merchants and new industrialists in the middle class. After Disraeli won widespread acclaim in March 1842 for worsting Lord Palmerston in debate, he was taken up by a small group of idealistic new Tory MPs, with whom he formed the Young England group. They held that the landed interests should use their power to protect the poor from exploitation by middle-class businessmen.
Disraeli hoped to forge a paternalistic Tory-Radical alliance, but he was unsuccessful. Before the Reform Act 1867, the working class did not possess the vote and therefore had little political power. Although Disraeli forged a personal friendship with John Bright, a leading Radical, Disraeli was unable to persuade Bright to sacrifice his distinct position for parliamentary advancement. When Disraeli attempted to secure a Tory-Radical cabinet in 1852, Bright refused.
The first months of 1846 were dominated by a battle in Parliament between the free traders and the protectionists over the repeal of the Corn Laws, with the latter rallying around Disraeli and Lord George Bentinck. An alliance of free-trade Conservatives (the "Peelites"), Radicals, and Whigs carried repeal, and the Conservative Party split: the Peelites moved towards the Whigs, while a "new" Conservative Party formed around the protectionists, led by Disraeli, Bentinck, and Lord Stanley (later Lord Derby).
The split in the Tory party over the repeal of the Corn Laws had profound implications for Disraeli's political career: almost every Tory politician with experience of office followed Peel, leaving the rump bereft of leadership. In Blake's words, "[Disraeli] found himself almost the only figure on his side capable of putting up the oratorical display essential for a parliamentary leader." The Duke of Argyll wrote that Disraeli "was like a subaltern in a great battle where every superior officer was killed or wounded". If the Tory Party could muster the electoral support necessary to form a government, then Disraeli now seemed to be guaranteed high office, but with a group of men who possessed little or no official experience and who, as a group, remained personally hostile to Disraeli. In the event the Tory split soon had the party out of office, not regaining power until 1852. The Conservatives would not again have a majority in the House of Commons until 1874.Bentinck and the leadershipPeel successfully steered the repeal of the Corn Laws through Parliament and was then defeated by an alliance of his enemies on the issue of Irish law and order; he resigned in June 1846. The Tories remained split, and the Queen sent for Lord John Russell, the Whig leader. In the 1847 general election, Disraeli stood, successfully, for the Buckinghamshire constituency. The new House of Commons had more Conservative than Whig members, but the depth of the Tory schism enabled Russell to continue to govern. The Conservatives were led by Bentinck in the Commons and Stanley in the Lords.
Disraeli spoke in favour of the measure, arguing that Christianity was "completed Judaism", and asking the House of Commons "Where is your Christianity if you do not believe in their Judaism?" Russell and Disraeli's future rival Gladstone thought this brave; the speech was badly received by his own party. The Tories and the Anglican establishment were hostile to the bill. With the exception of Disraeli, every member of the future protectionist cabinet then in Parliament voted against the measure. The measure was voted down. In the aftermath of the debate Bentinck resigned the leadership and was succeeded by Lord Granby; Disraeli's speech, thought by many of his own party to be blasphemous, ruled him out for the time being.
While these intrigues played out, Disraeli was working with the Bentinck family to secure the necessary financing to purchase Hughenden Manor, in Buckinghamshire. The possession of a country house and incumbency of a county constituency were regarded as essential for a Tory with leadership ambitions. Disraeli and his wife alternated between Hughenden and several homes in London for the rest of their marriage. The negotiations were complicated by Bentinck's sudden death on 21 September 1848, but Disraeli obtained a loan of £25,000 from Bentinck's brothers Lord Henry Bentinck and Lord Titchfield.
Within a month of his appointment Granby resigned the leadership in the Commons and the party functioned without a leader in the Commons for the rest of the session. At the start of the next session, affairs were handled by a triumvirate of Granby, Disraeli, and John Charles Herries—indicative of the tension between Disraeli and the rest of the party, who needed his talents but mistrusted him. This confused arrangement ended with Granby's resignation in 1851; Disraeli effectively ignored the two men regardless.
Chancellor of the Exchequer
First Derby government
, Prime Minister 1852, 1858–59, 1866–68|alt=A stately-looking gentleman in a dark suit, sitting with a book]]
In March 1851, Lord John Russell's government was defeated over a bill to equalise the county and borough franchises, mostly because of divisions among his supporters. He resigned, and the Queen sent for Stanley, who felt that a minority government could do little and would not last long, so Russell remained in office. Disraeli regretted this, hoping for an opportunity, however brief, to show himself capable in office. Stanley, in contrast, deprecated his inexperienced followers as a reason for not assuming office: "These are not names I can put before the Queen."
At the end of June 1851, Stanley succeeded to the title of Earl of Derby. The Whigs were wracked by internal dissensions during the second half of 1851, much of which Parliament spent in recess. Russell dismissed Lord Palmerston from the cabinet, leaving the latter determined to deprive the Prime Minister of office. Palmerston did so within weeks of Parliament's reassembly on 4 February 1852, his followers combining with Disraeli's Tories to defeat the government on a Militia Bill, and Russell resigned. Derby had either to take office or risk damage to his reputation, and he accepted the Queen's commission as prime minister. Palmerston declined any office; Derby had hoped to have him as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Disraeli, his closest ally, was his second choice and accepted, though disclaiming any great knowledge in the financial field. Gladstone refused to join the government. Disraeli may have been attracted to the office by the £5,000 annual salary, which would help pay his debts. Few of the new cabinet had held office before; when Derby tried to inform the Duke of Wellington of the names of the ministers, the old Duke, who was somewhat deaf, inadvertently branded the new government by incredulously repeating "Who? Who?" Budget Disraeli's task as Chancellor was to devise a budget which would satisfy the protectionist elements who supported the Tories, without uniting the free-traders against it. His proposed budget, which he presented to the Commons on 3 December, lowered the taxes on malt and tea, provisions designed to appeal to the working class. To make his budget revenue-neutral, as funds were needed to provide defences against the French, he doubled the house tax and continued the income tax. Disraeli's overall purpose was to enact policies which would benefit the working classes, making his party more attractive to them. Although the budget did not contain protectionist features, the Opposition was prepared to destroy it—and Disraeli's career as Chancellor—in part out of revenge for his actions against Peel in 1846. MP Sidney Herbert predicted that the budget would fail because "Jews make no converts". and prepared to wind up the debate for the government on 16 December—it was customary for the Chancellor to have the last word. A massive defeat for the government was predicted. Disraeli attacked his opponents individually, and then as a force: "I face a Coalition ... This, too, I know, that England does not love coalitions." His speech of three hours was quickly seen as a parliamentary masterpiece. As MPs prepared to divide, Gladstone rose to his feet and began an angry speech, despite the efforts of Tory MPs to shout him down. The interruptions were fewer, as Gladstone gained control of the House, and in the next two hours painted a picture of Disraeli as frivolous and his budget as subversive. The government was defeated by 19 votes, and Derby resigned four days later. He was replaced by the Peelite Earl of Aberdeen, with Gladstone as his Chancellor. Because of Disraeli's unpopularity among the Peelites, no party reconciliation was possible while he remained Tory leader in the Commons.
Opposition
With the fall of the government, Disraeli and the Conservatives returned to the Opposition benches. Disraeli would spend three-quarters of his 44-year parliamentary career in Opposition. Derby was reluctant to seek to unseat the government, fearing a repetition of the Who? Who? Ministry and knowing that shared dislike of Disraeli was part of what had formed the governing coalition. Disraeli, on the other hand, was anxious to return to office. In the interim, Disraeli, as Conservative leader in the Commons, opposed the government on all major measures.
In June 1853 Disraeli was awarded an honorary degree by the University of Oxford. He had been recommended for it by Lord Derby, the university's Chancellor. The start of the Crimean War in 1854 caused a lull in party politics; Disraeli spoke patriotically in support. The British military efforts were marked by bungling, and in 1855 a restive Parliament considered a resolution to establish a committee on the conduct of the war. The Aberdeen government made this a motion of confidence; Disraeli led the Opposition to defeat the government, 305 to 148. Aberdeen resigned, and the Queen sent for Derby, who to Disraeli's frustration refused to take office. Palmerston was deemed essential to any Whig ministry, and he would not join any he did not head. The Queen reluctantly asked Palmerston to form a government. Under Palmerston, the war went better, and was ended by the Treaty of Paris in early 1856. Disraeli was early to call for peace but had little influence on events.
When a rebellion broke out in India in 1857, Disraeli took a keen interest, having been a member of a select committee in 1852 which considered how best to rule the subcontinent, and had proposed eliminating the governing role of the British East India Company. After peace was restored, and Palmerston in early 1858 brought in legislation for direct rule of India by the Crown, Disraeli opposed it. Many Conservative MPs refused to follow him, and the bill passed the Commons easily.
Palmerston's grip on the premiership was weakened by his response to the Orsini affair, in which an attempt was made to assassinate the French Emperor Napoleon III by an Italian revolutionary with a bomb made in Birmingham. At the request of the French ambassador, Palmerston proposed amending the conspiracy to murder statute to make creating an infernal device a felony. He was defeated by 19 votes on the second reading, with many Liberals crossing the aisle against him. He immediately resigned, and Lord Derby returned to office.
Second Derby government
Derby took office at the head of a purely "Conservative" administration, not in coalition. He again offered a place to Gladstone, who declined. Disraeli was once more leader of the House of Commons and returned to the Exchequer. As in 1852, Derby led a minority government, dependent on the division of its opponents for survival. As Leader of the House, Disraeli resumed his regular reports to Queen Victoria, who had requested that he include what she "could not meet in newspapers".
During its brief life of just over a year, the Derby government proved moderately progressive. The Government of India Act 1858 ended the role of the East India Company in governing the subcontinent. The Thames Purification Bill funded the construction of much larger sewers for London. Disraeli had supported efforts to allow Jews to sit in Parliament with a bill passed through the Commons allowing each house of Parliament to determine what oaths its members should take. This was grudgingly agreed to by the House of Lords, with a minority of Conservatives joining with the Opposition to pass it. In 1858, Baron Lionel de Rothschild became the first MP to profess the Jewish faith.
Faced with a vacancy, Disraeli and Derby tried yet again to bring Gladstone, still nominally a Conservative MP, into the government, hoping to strengthen it. Disraeli wrote a personal letter to Gladstone, asking him to place the good of the party above personal animosity: "Every man performs his office, and there is a Power, greater than ourselves, that disposes of all this." In response, Gladstone denied that personal feelings played any role in his decisions then and previously whether to accept office, while acknowledging that there were differences between him and Derby "broader than you may have supposed".
The Tories pursued a Reform Bill in 1859, which would have resulted in a modest increase to the franchise. The Liberals were healing the breaches between those who favoured Russell and the Palmerston loyalists, and in late March 1859, the government was defeated on a Russell-sponsored amendment. Derby dissolved Parliament, and the ensuing general election resulted in modest Tory gains, but not enough to control the Commons. When Parliament assembled, Derby's government was defeated by 13 votes on an amendment to the Address from the Throne. He resigned, and the Queen reluctantly sent for Palmerston again.
Opposition and third term as Chancellor
After Derby's second ejection from office, Disraeli faced dissension within Conservative ranks from those who blamed him for the defeat, or who felt he was disloyal to Derby—the former prime minister warned Disraeli of some MPs seeking his removal from the front bench. Among the conspirators were Lord Robert Cecil, a Conservative MP who would a quarter century later become prime minister as Lord Salisbury; he wrote that having Disraeli as leader in the Commons decreased the Conservatives' chance of holding office. When Cecil's father objected, Lord Robert stated, "I have merely put into print what all the country gentlemen were saying in private." Disraeli kept himself informed on foreign affairs, and on what was going on in cabinet, thanks to a source within it. When the American Civil War began in 1861, Disraeli said little publicly, but like most Englishmen expected the South to win. Less reticent were Palmerston, Gladstone, and Russell, whose statements in support of the South contributed to years of hard feelings in the United States. In 1862, Disraeli met Prussian Count Otto von Bismarck and said of him, "be careful about that man, he means what he says".
The party truce ended in 1864, with Tories outraged over Palmerston's handling of the territorial dispute between the German Confederation and Denmark known as the Schleswig-Holstein Question. Disraeli had little help from Derby, who was ill, but he united the party enough on a no-confidence vote to limit the government to a majority of 18—Tory defections and absentees kept Palmerston in office. Despite rumours about Palmerston's health as he turned 80, he remained personally popular, and the Liberals increased their margin in the July 1865 general election. In the wake of the poor election results, Derby predicted to Disraeli that neither of them would ever hold office again.
Political plans were thrown into disarray by Palmerston's death on 18 October 1865. Russell became prime minister again, with Gladstone clearly the Liberal Party's leader-in-waiting, and as Leader of the House Disraeli's direct opponent. One of Russell's early priorities was a Reform Bill, but the proposed legislation that Gladstone announced on 12 March 1866 divided his party. The Conservatives and the dissident Liberals repeatedly attacked Gladstone's bill, and in June finally defeated the government; Russell resigned on 26 June. The dissidents were unwilling to serve under Disraeli in the House of Commons, and Derby formed a third Conservative minority government, with Disraeli again as Chancellor.
Tory Democrat: the 1867 Reform Act
It was Disraeli's belief that if given the vote British people would use it instinctively to put their natural and traditional rulers, the gentlemen of the Conservative Party, into power. Responding to renewed agitation for popular suffrage, Disraeli persuaded a majority of the cabinet to agree to a Reform bill. With what Derby cautioned was "a leap in the dark", Disraeli had outflanked the Liberals who, as the supposed champions of Reform, dared not oppose him. In the absence of a credible party rival and for fear of having an election called on the issue, Conservatives felt obliged to support Disraeli despite their misgivings.
There were Tory dissenters, most notably Lord Cranborne (as Robert Cecil was by then known) who resigned from the government and spoke against the bill, accusing Disraeli of "a political betrayal which has no parallel in our Parliamentary annals". Even as Disraeli accepted Liberal amendments (although pointedly refusing those moved by Gladstone) that further lowered the property qualification, Cranborne was unable to lead an effective rebellion. Disraeli gained wide acclaim and became a hero to his party for the "marvellous parliamentary skill" with which he secured the passage of Reform in the Commons.
From the Liberal benches too there was admiration. MP for Nottingham Bernal Ostborne declared:
The Reform Act 1867 passed that August. It extended the franchise by 938,427 men—an increase of 88%—by giving the vote to male householders and male lodgers paying at least £10 for rooms. It eliminated rotten boroughs with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants, and granted constituencies to 15 unrepresented towns, with extra representation to large municipalities such as Liverpool and Manchester.
Prime Minister (1868)
First term
Derby had long had attacks of gout which left him bedbound, unable to deal with politics. As the new session of Parliament approached in February 1868, he was unable to leave his home but was reluctant to resign, as at 68 he was much younger than either Palmerston or Russell at the end of their premierships. Derby knew that his "attacks of illness would, at no distant period, incapacitate me from the discharge of my public duties"; doctors had warned him that his health required his resignation. In late February, with Parliament in session and Derby absent, he wrote to Disraeli asking for confirmation that "you will not shrink from the additional heavy responsibility". Reassured, he wrote to the Queen, resigning and recommending Disraeli as "only he could command the cordial support, en masse, of his present colleagues".First government, February–December 1868, Cairns, Hunt and Manning|altFour men, the second of whom wears a wig resembling that of a judge, and the fourth of whom wears clerical clothes]]
The Conservatives remained a minority in the House of Commons and the passage of the Reform Bill required the calling of a new election once the new voting register had been compiled. Disraeli's term as prime minister, which began in February 1868, would therefore be short unless the Conservatives won the general election. He made only two major changes in the cabinet: he replaced Lord Chelmsford as Lord Chancellor with Lord Cairns and brought in George Ward Hunt as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Derby had intended to replace Chelmsford once a vacancy in a suitable sinecure developed. Disraeli was unwilling to wait, and Cairns, in his view, was a far stronger minister.
Disraeli's first premiership was dominated by the heated debate over the Church of Ireland. Although Ireland was largely Roman Catholic, the Church of England represented most landowners. It remained the established church and was funded by direct taxation, which was greatly resented by the Catholics and Presbyterians. An initial attempt by Disraeli to negotiate with Archbishop Manning the establishment of a Catholic university in Dublin foundered in March when Gladstone moved resolutions to disestablish the Irish Church altogether. The proposal united the Liberals under Gladstone's leadership, while causing divisions among the Conservatives.
The Conservatives remained in office because the new electoral register was not yet ready; neither party wished a poll under the old roll. Gladstone began using the Liberal majority in the Commons to push through resolutions and legislation. Disraeli's government survived until the December general election, at which the Liberals were returned to power with a majority.
In its short life, the first Disraeli government passed noncontroversial laws. It ended public executions, and the Corrupt Practices Act did much to end electoral bribery. It authorised an early version of nationalisation, having the Post Office buy up the telegraph companies. Amendments to the school law, the Scottish legal system, and the railway laws were passed. In addition, the Public Health (Scotland) Act instituted sanitary inspectors and medical officers. According to one study, "better sanitation was enforced throughout Scotland." Disraeli sent the successful expedition against Tewodros II of Ethiopia under Sir Robert Napier.
Opposition leader; 1874 election
Given Gladstone's majority in the Commons, Disraeli could do little but protest as the government advanced legislation; he chose to await Liberal mistakes. He used this leisure time to write a new novel, Lothair (1870). A work of fiction by a former prime minister was a novelty for Britain, and the book became a bestseller.
By 1872 there was dissent in the Conservative ranks over the failure to challenge Gladstone. This was quieted as Disraeli took steps to assert his leadership, and as divisions among the Liberals became clear. Public support for Disraeli was shown by cheering at a thanksgiving service in 1872 on the recovery of the Prince of Wales from illness, while Gladstone was met with silence. Disraeli had supported the efforts of party manager John Eldon Gorst to put the administration of the Conservative Party on a modern basis. On Gorst's advice, Disraeli gave a speech to a mass meeting in Manchester that year. To roaring approval, he compared the Liberal front bench to "a range of exhausted volcanoes... But the situation is still dangerous. There are occasional earthquakes and ever and again the dark rumbling of the sea." Gladstone, Disraeli stated, dominated the scene and "alternated between a menace and a sigh".
At his first departure from 10 Downing Street in 1868, Disraeli had Victoria make his wife Mary Anne Viscountess Beaconsfield in her own right in lieu of a peerage for himself. Through 1872 the eighty-year-old peeress had stomach cancer. She died on 15 December. Urged by a clergyman to turn her thoughts to Jesus Christ in her final days, she said she could not: "You know Dizzy is my J.C."
In 1873, Gladstone brought forward legislation to establish a Catholic university in Dublin. This divided the Liberals, and on 12 March an alliance of Conservatives and Irish Catholics defeated the government by three votes. Gladstone resigned, and the Queen sent for Disraeli, who refused to take office. Without a general election, a Conservative government would be another minority; Disraeli wanted the power a majority would bring and felt he could gain it later by leaving the Liberals in office now. Gladstone's government struggled on, beset by scandal and unimproved by a reshuffle. As part of that change, Gladstone took on the office of Chancellor, leading to questions as to whether he had to stand for re-election on taking on a second ministry—until the 1920s, MPs becoming ministers had to seek re-election.
In January 1874, Gladstone called a general election, convinced that if he waited longer, he would do worse at the polls. Balloting was spread over two weeks, beginning on 1 February. As the constituencies voted, it became clear that the result would be a Conservative majority, the first since 1841. In Scotland, where the Conservatives were perennially weak, they increased from seven seats to nineteen. Overall, they won 350 seats to 245 for the Liberals and 57 for the Irish Home Rule League. Disraeli became prime minister for the second time.
Prime Minister (1874–1880)
Second term
(top) and Northcote|alt=Two gentlemen, the second bearded]]
Disraeli's cabinet of twelve, with six peers and six commoners, was the smallest since Reform. Of the peers, five of them had been in Disraeli's 1868 cabinet; the sixth, Lord Salisbury, was reconciled to Disraeli after negotiation and became Secretary of State for India. Lord Stanley (who had succeeded his father, the former prime minister, as Earl of Derby) became Foreign Secretary and Sir Stafford Northcote the Chancellor.
In August 1876, Disraeli was elevated to the House of Lords as Earl of Beaconsfield and Viscount Hughenden. The Queen had offered to ennoble him as early as 1868; he had then declined. She did so again in 1874, when he fell ill at Balmoral, but he was reluctant to leave the Commons for a house in which he had no experience. Continued ill health during his second premiership caused him to contemplate resignation, but his lieutenant, Derby, was unwilling, feeling that he could not manage the Queen. For Disraeli, the Lords, where the debate was less intense, was the alternative to resignation. Five days before the end of the 1876 session of Parliament, on 11 August, Disraeli was seen to linger and look around the chamber before departing. Newspapers reported his ennoblement the following morning.
In addition to the viscounty bestowed on Mary Anne Disraeli, The name Beaconsfield, a town near Hughenden, was given to a minor character in Vivian Grey. Disraeli made various statements about his elevation, writing to Selina, Lady Bradford on 8 August 1876, "I am quite tired of that place [the Commons]" but when asked by a friend how he liked the Lords, replied, "I am dead; dead but in the Elysian fields."Domestic policyLegislationUnder the stewardship of Richard Assheton Cross, the Home Secretary, Disraeli's new government enacted many reforms, including the Artisans' and Labourers' Dwellings Improvement Act 1875 (38 & 39 Vict. c. 36), the Sale of Food and Drugs Act 1875 (38 & 39 Vict. c. 63), and the Elementary Education Act 1876 (39 & 40 Vict. c. 70). The Employers and Workmen Act 1875, according to one study, "finally placed employers and employed on an equal footing before the law". The Conspiracy, and Protection of Property Act 1875 established the right to strike by providing that "an agreement or combination by one or more persons to do, or procure to be done, any act in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute between employers and workmen, shall not be indictable as a conspiracy if such act committed by one person would not be punishable as a crime".
As a result of these social reforms the Liberal-Labour MP Alexander Macdonald told his constituents in 1879, "The Conservative party have done more for the working classes in five years than the Liberals have in fifty."Civil Service
as Bishop of London may have cost him votes in the 1868 election.]]
Gladstone in 1870 had sponsored an Order in Council, introducing competitive examination into the Civil Service, diminishing the political aspects of government hiring. Disraeli did not agree, and while he did not seek to reverse the order, his actions often frustrated its intent. For example, Disraeli made political appointments to positions previously given to career civil servants. He was backed by his party, hungry for office and its emoluments after almost thirty years with only brief spells in government. Disraeli gave positions to hard-up Conservative leaders, even—to Gladstone's outrage—creating one office at £2,000 per year. Nevertheless, Disraeli made fewer peers (only 22, including one of Victoria's sons) than had Gladstone (37 during his just over five years in office).
As he had in government posts, Disraeli rewarded old friends with clerical positions, making Sydney Turner, son of a good friend of Isaac D'Israeli, Dean of Ripon. He favoured Low church clergymen in promotion, disliking other movements in Anglicanism for political reasons. In this, he came into disagreement with the Queen, who out of loyalty to her late husband Albert preferred Broad church teachings. One controversial appointment had occurred shortly before the 1868 election. When the position of Archbishop of Canterbury fell vacant, Disraeli reluctantly agreed to the Queen's preferred candidate, Archibald Tait, the Bishop of London. To fill Tait's vacant see, Disraeli was urged by many people to appoint Samuel Wilberforce, the former Bishop of Winchester. Disraeli disliked Wilberforce and instead appointed John Jackson, the Bishop of Lincoln. Blake suggested that, on balance, these appointments cost Disraeli more votes than they gained him.
Foreign policy
Disraeli always considered foreign affairs to be the most critical and interesting part of statesmanship. Nevertheless, his biographer Robert Blake doubts that his subject had specific ideas about foreign policy when he took office in 1874. He had rarely travelled abroad; since his youthful tour of the Middle East in 1830–1831, he had left Britain only for his honeymoon and three visits to Paris, the last of which was in 1856. As he had criticised Gladstone for a do-nothing foreign policy, he most probably contemplated what actions would reassert Britain's place in Europe. His brief first premiership, and the first year of his second, gave him little opportunity to make his mark in foreign affairs.Suez'', offering Victoria an imperial crown in exchange for a royal one. Disraeli cultivated a public image of himself as an Imperialist with grand gestures such as conferring on Queen Victoria the title "Empress of India".|altRefer to caption]]
The Suez Canal, opened in 1869, cut weeks and thousands of miles off the sea journey between Britain and India; in 1875, approximately 80% of the ships using the canal were British. In the event of another rebellion in India or a Russian invasion, the time saved at Suez might be crucial. Built by French interests, 56% of the stocks in the canal remained in their hands, while 44% of the stock belonged to Isma'il Pasha, the Khedive of Egypt. He was notorious for his profligate spending. The canal was losing money, and an attempt by Ferdinand de Lesseps, builder of the canal, to raise the tolls had fallen through when the Khedive had threatened military force to prevent it, and had also attracted Disraeli's attention. With much of the pre-canal trade and communications between Britain and India passing through the Ottoman Empire, Britain had done its best to prop up the Ottomans against the threat that Russia would take Constantinople, cutting those communications, and giving Russian ships unfettered access to the Mediterranean. The French might also threaten those lines. Britain had had the opportunity to purchase shares in the canal but had declined to do so.
Disraeli sent the Liberal MP Nathan Rothschild to Paris to enquire about buying de Lesseps's shares. Rather than seek the aid of the Bank of England, Disraeli borrowed funds from Lionel de Rothschild, who took a commission on the deal. The banker's capital was at risk as Parliament could have refused to ratify the transaction. The contract for purchase was signed at Cairo on 25 November and the shares deposited at the British consulate the following day.
Disraeli told the Queen, "it is settled; you have it, madam!" The public saw the venture as a daring statement of British dominance of the seas. Sir Ian Malcolm described the Suez Canal share purchase as "the greatest romance of Mr. Disraeli's romantic career". Disraeli's biographer, Adam Kirsch, suggests that Disraeli's obsequious treatment of his queen was part flattery, part belief that this was how a queen should be addressed by a loyal subject, and part awe that a middle-class man of Jewish birth should be the companion of a monarch. By the time of his second premiership, Disraeli had built a strong relationship with Victoria, probably closer to her than any of her prime ministers except her first, Lord Melbourne. When Disraeli returned as prime minister in 1874 and went to kiss hands, he did so literally, on one knee; according to Richard Aldous in his book on the rivalry between Disraeli and Gladstone, "Victoria and Disraeli would exploit their closeness for mutual advantage."
Victoria had long wished to have an imperial title, reflecting Britain's expanding domain. She was irked when Tsar Alexander II held a higher rank than her as an emperor, and was appalled that her daughter, the Prussian Crown Princess, would outrank her when her husband came to the throne. She also saw an imperial title as proclaiming Britain's increased stature in the world. The title "Empress of India" had been used informally for some time and she wished to have that title formally bestowed on her. The Queen prevailed upon Disraeli to introduce a Royal Titles Bill, and also told of her intent to open Parliament in person, which during this time she did only when she wanted something from legislators. Disraeli was cautious in response, as careful soundings of MPs brought a negative reaction, and he declined to place such a proposal in the Queen's Speech.
Once the desired bill was finally prepared, Disraeli's handling of it was not adept. He neglected to notify either the Prince of Wales or the Opposition and was met by irritation from the prince and a full-scale attack from the Liberals. An old enemy of Disraeli, former Liberal Chancellor Robert Lowe, alleged during the debate in the Commons that two previous prime ministers had refused to introduce such legislation for the Queen. Gladstone immediately stated that he was not one of them, and the Queen gave Disraeli leave to quote her saying she had never approached a prime minister with such a proposal. According to Blake, Disraeli "in a brilliant oration of withering invective proceeded to destroy Lowe", who apologised and never held office again. Disraeli said of Lowe that he was the only person in London with whom he would not shake hands: "he is in the mud and there I leave him."
Fearful of losing, Disraeli was reluctant to bring the bill to a vote in the Commons, but when he did it passed with a majority of 75. Once the bill was formally enacted, Victoria began signing her letters "Victoria R & I" (, Queen and Empress). According to Aldous, the bill "shattered Disraeli's authority in the House of Commons".
Balkans and Bulgaria
|alt=Cavalry wielding sabres fight men with guns on foot]]
In July 1875 Serb populations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, then provinces of the Ottoman Empire, revolted against the Turks, alleging religious persecution and poor administration. The following January, Sultan Abdülaziz agreed to reforms proposed by Hungarian statesman Julius Andrássy, but the rebels, suspecting they might win their freedom, continued their uprising, joined by militants in Serbia and Bulgaria. The Turks suppressed the Bulgarian uprising harshly, and when reports of these actions escaped, Disraeli and Derby stated in Parliament that they did not believe them. Disraeli called them "coffee-house babble" and dismissed allegations of torture by the Ottomans since "Oriental people usually terminate their connections with culprits in a more expeditious fashion".
Gladstone, who had left the Liberal leadership and retired from public life, was appalled by reports of atrocities in Bulgaria, and in August 1876, penned a hastily written pamphlet arguing that the Turks should be deprived of Bulgaria because of what they had done there. He sent a copy to Disraeli, who called it "vindictive and ill-written ... of all the Bulgarian horrors perhaps the greatest". Gladstone's pamphlet became an immense best-seller and rallied the Liberals to urge that the Ottoman Empire should no longer be a British ally. Disraeli wrote to Lord Salisbury on 3 September, "Had it not been for these unhappy 'atrocities', we should have settled a peace very honourable to England and satisfactory to Europe. Now we are obliged to work from a new point of departure, and dictate to Turkey, who has forfeited all sympathy." In spite of this, Disraeli's policy favoured Constantinople and Ottoman territorial integrity.
(Turkey), General Ignatieff (Russia), Lord Salisbury (Britain) and the Comte de Chaudordy (France)|alt=Four men]]
Disraeli and the cabinet sent Salisbury as lead British representative to the Constantinople Conference, which met in December 1876 and January 1877. In advance of the conference, Disraeli sent Salisbury private word to seek British military occupation of Bulgaria and Bosnia, and British control of the Ottoman Army. Salisbury ignored these instructions, which his biographer, Andrew Roberts deemed "ludicrous". The conference failed to reach agreement with the Turks.
Parliament opened in February 1877, with Disraeli now in the Lords as Earl of Beaconsfield. He spoke only once there in the 1877 session on the Eastern Question, stating on 20 February that there was a need for stability in the Balkans, and that forcing Turkey into territorial concessions would not secure it. The Prime Minister wanted a deal with the Ottomans whereby Britain would temporarily occupy strategic areas to deter the Russians from war, to be returned on the signing of a peace treaty, but found little support in his cabinet, which favoured partition of the Ottoman Empire. As Disraeli, by then in poor health, continued to battle within the cabinet, Russia invaded Turkey on 21 April, beginning the Russo-Turkish War.
Congress of Berlin
The Russians pushed through Ottoman territory and by December 1877 had captured the strategic Bulgarian town of Plevna. The war divided the British, but the Russian success caused some to forget the atrocities and call for intervention on the Turkish side. Others hoped for further Russian successes. The fall of Plevna was a major story for weeks, and Disraeli's warnings that Russia was a threat to British interests in the eastern Mediterranean were deemed prophetic. The jingoistic attitude of many Britons increased Disraeli's political support, and the Queen showed her favour by visiting him at Hughenden—the first time she had visited the country home of her prime minister since the Melbourne ministry. At the end of January 1878, the Ottoman Sultan appealed to Britain to save Constantinople. Amid war fever in Britain, the government asked Parliament to vote £6,000,000 to prepare the Army and Navy for war. Gladstone opposed the measure, but less than half his party voted with him. Popular opinion was with Disraeli, though some thought him too soft for not immediately declaring war on Russia.
With the Russians close to Constantinople, the Turks yielded and in March 1878, signed the Treaty of San Stefano, conceding a Bulgarian state covering a large part of the Balkans. It would be initially Russian-occupied and many feared that it would give them a client state close to Constantinople. Other Ottoman possessions in Europe would become independent; additional territory was to be ceded directly to Russia. This was unacceptable to the British, who protested, hoping to get the Russians to agree to attend an international conference which German Chancellor Bismarck proposed to hold at Berlin. The cabinet discussed Disraeli's proposal to position Indian troops at Malta for possible transit to the Balkans and call out reserves. Derby resigned in protest, and Disraeli appointed Salisbury as Foreign Secretary. Amid British preparations for war, the Russians and Turks agreed to discussions at Berlin.
In advance of the meeting, confidential negotiations took place between Britain and Russia in April and May 1878. The Russians were willing to make changes to the big Bulgaria, but were determined to retain their new possessions, Bessarabia in Europe and Batum and Kars on the east coast of the Black Sea. To counterbalance this, Britain required a possession in the Eastern Mediterranean where it might base ships and troops and negotiated with the Ottomans for the cession of Cyprus. Once this was secretly agreed, Disraeli was prepared to allow Russia's territorial gains.
in ''The Pas de deux (From the Scène de Triomphe in the Grand Anglo-Turkish Ballet d'Action)''|alt=Refer to caption]]
The Congress of Berlin was held in June and July 1878, the central relationship in it that between Disraeli and Bismarck. In later years, the German chancellor would show visitors to his office three pictures on the wall: "the portrait of my Sovereign, there on the right that of my wife, and on the left, there, that of Lord Beaconsfield". Disraeli caused an uproar in the congress by making his opening address in English, rather than in French, hitherto accepted as the international language of diplomacy. By one account, the British ambassador in Berlin, Lord Odo Russell, hoping to spare the delegates Disraeli's very poor French accent, told Disraeli that the congress was hoping to hear a speech in English by one of its masters.
Disraeli left much of the detailed work to Salisbury, concentrating his efforts on making it as difficult as possible for the broken-up big Bulgaria to reunite.
Disraeli gained agreement that Turkey should retain enough of its European possessions to safeguard the Dardanelles. By one account, when met with Russian intransigence, Disraeli told his secretary to order a special train to return them home to begin the war. Czar Alexander II later described the congress as "a European coalition against Russia, under Bismarck".
The Treaty of Berlin was signed on 13 July 1878 at the Radziwill Palace in Berlin. Disraeli and Salisbury returned home to heroes' receptions. At the door of 10 Downing Street, Disraeli received flowers sent by the Queen. There, he told the gathered crowd, "Lord Salisbury and I have brought you back peace—but a peace I hope with honour." The Queen offered him a dukedom, which he declined, though accepting the Garter, as long as Salisbury also received it. In Berlin, word spread of Bismarck's admiring description of Disraeli, "Der alte Jude, das ist der Mann! "
In the weeks after Berlin, Disraeli and the cabinet considered calling a general election to capitalise on the public applause he and Salisbury had received. Parliaments were then for a seven-year term, and it was the custom not to go to the country until the sixth year unless forced to by events. Only four and a half years had passed and they did not see any clouds on the horizon that might forecast Conservative defeat if they waited. This decision not to seek re-election has often been cited as a great mistake by Disraeli. Blake, however, pointed out that results in local elections had been moving against the Conservatives, and doubted if Disraeli missed any great opportunity by waiting.
Afghanistan to Zululand
, fought in 1880. Britain's victory in the Second Anglo-Afghan War proved a boost to Disraeli's government.]]
As successful invasions of India generally came through Afghanistan, the British had observed and sometimes intervened there since the 1830s, hoping to keep the Russians out. In 1878 the Russians sent a mission to Kabul; it was not rejected by the Afghans, as the British had hoped. The British proposed to send their own mission, insisting that the Russians be sent away. The Viceroy of India Lord Lytton concealed his plans to issue this ultimatum from Disraeli, and when the Prime Minister insisted he take no action, went ahead anyway. When the Afghans made no answer, Lord Cranbrook as Secretary of State for War, ordered the advance against them in the Second Anglo-Afghan War. Under Lord Roberts, the British easily defeated them and installed a new ruler, leaving a mission and garrison in Kabul.
British policy in South Africa was to encourage federation between the British-run Cape Colony and Natal, and the Boer republics, the Transvaal (annexed by Britain in 1877) and the Orange Free State. The governor of Cape Colony, Sir Bartle Frere, believing that the federation could not be accomplished until the native tribes acknowledged British rule, made demands on the Zulu and their king, Cetewayo, which they were certain to reject. As Zulu troops could not marry until they had washed their spears in blood, they were eager for combat. Frere did not send word to the cabinet of what he had done until the ultimatum was about to expire. Disraeli and the cabinet reluctantly backed him, and in early January 1879 resolved to send reinforcements. Before they could arrive, on 22 January, a Zulu impi (army), moving with great speed and endurance, destroyed a British encampment in South Africa in the Battle of Isandlwana. Over a thousand British and colonial troops were killed. Word of the defeat did not reach London until 12 February. Disraeli wrote the next day, "the terrible disaster has shaken me to the centre". He reprimanded Frere, but left him in charge, attracting fire from all sides. Disraeli sent General Sir Garnet Wolseley as High Commissioner and Commander in Chief, and Cetewayo and the Zulus were crushed at the Battle of Ulundi on 4 July 1879.
On 8 September 1879 Sir Louis Cavagnari, in charge of the mission in Kabul, was killed with his entire staff by rebelling Afghan soldiers. Roberts undertook a successful punitive expedition against the Afghans over the next six weeks.
1880 election
In December 1878, Gladstone was offered the Liberal nomination for Edinburghshire, a constituency popularly known as Midlothian. The small Scottish electorate was dominated by two noblemen, the Conservative Duke of Buccleuch and the Liberal Earl of Rosebery. The Earl, a friend of both Disraeli and Gladstone who would succeed the latter after his final term as prime minister, had journeyed to the United States to view politics there, and was convinced that aspects of American electioneering techniques could be translated to Britain. On his advice, Gladstone accepted the offer in January 1879, and later that year began his Midlothian campaign, speaking not only in Edinburgh, but across Britain, attacking Disraeli, to huge crowds.
Conservative chances of re-election were damaged by the poor weather, and consequent effects on agriculture. Four consecutive wet summers through 1879 had led to poor harvests. In the past, the farmer had the consolation of higher prices at such times, but with bumper crops cheaply transported from the United States, grain prices remained low. Other European nations, faced with similar circumstances, opted for protection, and Disraeli was urged to reinstitute the Corn Laws. He declined, stating that he regarded the matter as settled. Protection would have been highly unpopular among the newly enfranchised urban working classes, as it would raise their cost of living. Amid an economic slump generally, the Conservatives lost support among farmers.
Disraeli's health continued to fail through 1879. Owing to his infirmities, Disraeli was 45 minutes late for the Lord Mayor's Dinner at the Guildhall in November, at which it is customary that the Prime Minister speaks. Though many commented on how healthy he looked, it took him great effort to appear so, and when he told the audience he expected to speak to the dinner again the following year, attendees chuckled. Gladstone was then in the midst of his campaign. Despite his public confidence, Disraeli recognised that the Conservatives would probably lose the next election and was already contemplating his Resignation Honours.
Despite this pessimism, Conservatives hopes were buoyed in early 1880 with successes in by-elections the Liberals had expected to win, concluding with victory in Southwark, normally a Liberal stronghold. The cabinet had resolved to wait before dissolving Parliament; in early March they reconsidered, agreeing to go to the country as soon as possible. Parliament was dissolved on 24 March; the first borough constituencies began voting a week later.
Disraeli took no public part in the electioneering, it being deemed improper for peers to make speeches to influence Commons elections. This meant that the chief Conservatives—Disraeli, Salisbury, and India Secretary Lord Cranbrook—would not be heard from. The election was thought likely to be close. Once returns began to be announced, it became clear that the Conservatives were decisively beaten. The final result gave the Liberals an absolute majority of about 50.Final months, death, and memorials
Disraeli refused to cast blame for the defeat, which he understood was likely to be final for him. He wrote to Lady Bradford that it was just as much work to end a government as to form one, without any of the fun. Queen Victoria was bitter at his departure. Among the honours he arranged before resigning as Prime Minister on 21 April 1880 was one for his private secretary, Montagu Corry, who became Baron Rowton.
Returning to Hughenden, Disraeli brooded over his electoral dismissal, but also resumed work on Endymion, which he had begun in 1872 and laid aside before the 1874 election. The work was rapidly completed and published by November 1880. He carried on a correspondence with Victoria, with letters passed through intermediaries. When Parliament met in January 1881, he served as Conservative leader in the Lords, attempting to serve as a moderating influence on Gladstone's legislation.
Because of his asthma and gout, Disraeli went out as little as possible, fearing more serious episodes of illness. In March, he fell ill with bronchitis, and emerged from bed only for a meeting with Salisbury and other Conservative leaders on the 26th. As it became clear that this might be his final sickness, friends and opponents alike came to call. Disraeli declined a visit from the Queen, saying, "She would only ask me to take a message to Albert." Almost blind, when he received the last letter from Victoria of which he was aware on 5 April, he held it momentarily, then had it read to him by Lord Barrington, a Privy Councillor. One card, signed "A Workman", delighted its recipient: "Don't die yet, we can't do without you."
Despite the gravity of Disraeli's condition, the doctors concocted optimistic bulletins for public consumption. Prime Minister Gladstone called several times to enquire about his rival's condition, and wrote in his diary, "May the Almighty be near his pillow." There was intense public interest in Disraeli's struggles for life. Disraeli had customarily taken the sacrament at Easter; when this day was observed on 17 April, there was discussion among his friends and family if he should be given the opportunity, but those against, fearing that he would lose hope, prevailed. On the morning of the following day, Easter Monday, he became incoherent, then comatose. Disraeli's last confirmed words before dying at his home at 19 Curzon Street in the early morning of 19 April were "I had rather live but I am not afraid to die".}} in ).
Disraeli has a memorial in Westminster Abbey, erected by the nation on the motion of Gladstone in his memorial speech on Disraeli in the House of Commons. Gladstone had absented himself from the funeral, with his plea of the press of public business met with public mockery. His speech was widely anticipated, if only because his dislike for Disraeli was well known. In the event, the speech was a model of its kind, in which he avoided comment on Disraeli's politics while praising his personal qualities.
Legacy
Disraeli's literary and political career interacted over his lifetime and fascinated Victorian Britain, making him "one of the most eminent figures in Victorian public life", and occasioned a large output of commentary. Critic Shane Leslie noted three decades after his death that "Disraeli's career was a romance such as no Eastern vizier or Western plutocrat could tell. He began as a pioneer in dress and an aesthete of words ... Disraeli actually made his novels come true."
Literary
'' (1845)|alt=The cover of a book, entitled "Sybil; or, the Two Nations"]]
Disraeli's novels are his main literary achievement. They have from the outset divided critical opinion. The writer R. W. Stewart observed that there have always been two criteria for judging Disraeli's novels—political and artistic. The critic Robert O'Kell, concurring, writes, "It is after all, even if you are a Tory of the staunchest blue, impossible to make Disraeli into a first-rate novelist. And it is equally impossible, no matter how much you deplore the extravagances and improprieties of his works, to make him into an insignificant one." In some of his early fiction Disraeli also portrayed himself and what he felt to be his Byronic dual nature: the poet and the man of action. His most autobiographical novel was Contarini Fleming (1832), an avowedly serious work that did not sell well.
Of the other novels of the early 1830s, Alroy is described by Blake as "profitable but unreadable", and The Rise of Iskander (1833) and The Infernal Marriage and Ixion in Heaven (1834) made little impact. Henrietta Temple (1837) was Disraeli's next major success. Venetia (1837) was a minor work, written to raise much-needed cash.
In the 1840s Disraeli wrote a trilogy of novels with political themes. Coningsby attacks the evils of the Whig Reform Bill of 1832 and castigates the leaderless conservatives for not responding. Sybil; or, The Two Nations (1845) reveals Peel's betrayal over the Corn Laws. These themes are expanded in Tancred (1847). With Coningsby; or, The New Generation (1844), Disraeli, in Blake's view, "infused the novel genre with political sensibility, espousing the belief that England's future as a world power depended not on the complacent old guard, but on youthful, idealistic politicians."
Lothair was "Disraeli's ideological ''Pilgrim's Progress''", It tells a story of political life with particular regard to the roles of the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches. It reflected anti-Catholicism of the sort that was popular in Britain, and which fueled support for Italian unification ("Risorgimento"). Endymion, despite having a Whig as hero, is a last exposition of the author's economic policies and political beliefs. Disraeli continued to the last to pillory his enemies in barely disguised caricatures: the character St Barbe in Endymion is widely seen as a parody of Thackeray, who had offended Disraeli more than thirty years earlier by lampooning him in Punch as "Codlingsby".|group= n}} Disraeli left an unfinished novel in which the priggish central character, Falconet, is unmistakably a caricature of Gladstone.
Blake commented that Disraeli "produced an epic poem, unbelievably bad, and a five-act blank verse tragedy, if possible worse. Further he wrote a discourse on political theory and a political biography, the Life of Lord George Bentinck, which is excellent ... remarkably fair and accurate."
Political
'' by John Everett Millais, 1881]]
In the years after Disraeli's death, as Salisbury began his reign of more than twenty years over the Conservatives, the party emphasised the late leader's "One Nation" views, that the Conservatives at root shared the beliefs of the working classes, with the Liberals the party of the urban élite. The memory of Disraeli was used by the Conservatives to appeal to the working classes, with whom he was said to have had a rapport. This aspect of his policies has been re-evaluated by historians in the 20th and 21st centuries. In 1972 B. H. Abbott stressed that it was not Disraeli but Lord Randolph Churchill who invented the term "Tory democracy", though it was Disraeli who made it an essential part of Conservative policy and philosophy. In 2007 Parry wrote, "The tory democrat myth did not survive detailed scrutiny by professional historical writing of the 1960s [which] demonstrated that Disraeli had very little interest in a programme of social legislation and was very flexible in handling parliamentary reform in 1867." Despite this, Parry sees Disraeli, rather than Peel, as the founder of the modern Conservative party. The Conservative politician and writer Douglas Hurd wrote in 2013, "[Disraeli] was not a one-nation Conservative—and this was not simply because he never used the phrase. He rejected the concept in its entirety."
Disraeli's enthusiastic propagation of the British Empire has also been seen as appealing to working-class voters. Before his leadership of the Conservative Party, imperialism was the province of the Liberals, most notably Palmerston. Disraeli made the Conservatives the party that most loudly supported both the Empire and military action to assert its primacy. This came about in part because Disraeli's own views stemmed that way, in part because he saw advantage for the Conservatives, and partially in reaction against Gladstone, who disliked the expense of empire. Blake argued that Disraeli's imperialism "decisively orientated the Conservative party for many years to come, and the tradition which he started was probably a bigger electoral asset in winning working-class support during the last quarter of the century than anything else". Some historians have commented on a romantic impulse behind Disraeli's approach to Empire and foreign affairs: Abbott writes, "To the mystical Tory concepts of Throne, Church, Aristocracy and People, Disraeli added Empire." Others have identified a strongly pragmatic aspect to his policies. Gladstone's biographer Philip Magnus contrasted Disraeli's grasp of foreign affairs with that of Gladstone, who "never understood that high moral principles, in their application to foreign policy, are more often destructive of political stability than motives of national self-interest." In Parry's view, Disraeli's foreign policy "can be seen as a gigantic castle in the air (as it was by Gladstone), or as an overdue attempt to force the British commercial classes to awaken to the realities of European politics."
During his lifetime, Disraeli's opponents, and sometimes even his friends and allies, questioned whether he sincerely held the views he propounded, or whether they were adopted by him as politically essential and lacked conviction. Lord John Manners, in 1843 at the time of Young England, wrote, "could I only satisfy myself that D'Israeli believed all that he said, I should be more happy: his historical views are quite mine, but does he believe them?" Paul Smith, in his journal article on Disraeli's politics, argues that Disraeli's ideas were coherently argued over a political career of nearly half a century, and "it is impossible to sweep them aside as a mere bag of burglar's tools for effecting felonious entry to the British political pantheon."}}
Stanley Weintraub, in his biography of Disraeli, points out that his subject did much to advance Britain towards the 20th century, carrying one of the two great Reform Acts of the 19th despite the opposition of his Liberal rival, Gladstone. <blockquote>He helped preserve constitutional monarchy by drawing the Queen out of mourning into a new symbolic national role and created the climate for what became 'Tory democracy'. He articulated an imperial role for Britain that would last into World War II and brought an intermittently self-isolated Britain into the concert of Europe.</blockquote>
Frances Walsh comments on Disraeli's multifaceted public life:
Historian Llewellyn Woodward has evaluated Disraeli:
Historical writers have often played Disraeli and Gladstone against each other as great rivals. Roland Quinault, however, cautions not to exaggerate the confrontation:
Role of Jewishness
By 1882, 46,000 Jews lived in England, and by 1890 Jewish emancipation was complete. Since 1858, Parliament has never been without practicing Jewish members. The first Jewish Lord Mayor of London, Sir David Salomons, was elected in 1855, followed by the 1858 emancipation of the Jews. On 26 July 1858, Lionel de Rothschild was allowed to sit in the House of Commons when the hitherto specifically Christian oath of office was changed. Disraeli, a baptised Christian of Jewish parentage, was already an MP, as the mandated oath of office presented no barrier to him. In 1884 Nathan Mayer Rothschild, 1st Baron Rothschild, became the first Jewish member of the British House of Lords; Disraeli was already a member.
Disraeli as a leader of the Conservative Party, with its ties to the landed aristocracy, used his Jewish ancestry to claim an aristocratic heritage of his own. His biographer Jonathan Parry argues:
Todd Endelman points out that "The link between Jews and old clothes was so fixed in the popular imagination that Victorian political cartoonists regularly drew Benjamin Disraeli as an old clothes man in order to stress his Jewishness." He adds, "Before the 1990s...few biographers of Disraeli or historians of Victorian politics acknowledged the prominence of the antisemitism that accompanied his climb up the greasy pole or its role in shaping his own singular sense of Jewishness."
According to Michael Ragussis:
Popular culture
'', 30 January 1869. Caricatures led to a rapid increase in demand for the magazine.]]
Historian Michael Diamond asserts that for British music hall patrons in the 1880s and 1890s, "xenophobia and pride in empire" were reflected in the halls' most popular political heroes: all were Conservatives and Disraeli stood out above all, even decades after his death, while Gladstone was used as a villain. Film historian Roy Armes has argued that historical films helped maintain the political status quo in Britain in the 1920s and 1930s by imposing an establishment viewpoint that emphasized the greatness of monarchy, empire, and tradition. The films created "a facsimile world where existing values were invariably validated by events in the film and where all discord could be turned into harmony by an acceptance of the status quo".
Steven Fielding has argued that Disraeli was an especially popular film hero: "historical dramas favoured Disraeli over Gladstone and, more substantively, promulgated an essentially deferential view of democratic leadership." Stage and screen actor George Arliss was known for his portrayals of Disraeli, winning the Academy Award for Best Actor for 1929's Disraeli. Fielding says Arliss "personified the kind of paternalistic, kindly, homely statesmanship that appealed to a significant proportion of the cinema audience ... Even workers attending Labour party meetings deferred to leaders with an elevated social background who showed they cared."
John Gielgud portrayed Disraeli in 1941, in Thorold Dickinson's morale-boosting film The Prime Minister, which followed the politician from the age of 30 to that of 70.
Alec Guinness portrayed him in The Mudlark (1950).
Ian McShane starred in the four-part 1978 ATV miniseries Disraeli: Portrait of a Romantic, written by David Butler. Presented in the U.S. on PBS's Masterpiece Theatre in 1980, it was nominated for the Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series.
Richard Pasco played Disraeli in the ITV series Number 10 in 1983.
In the 1997 film Mrs Brown, Disraeli was played by Antony Sher.
Works
Novels
* Vivian Grey (1826, revised 1853)
* Popanilla (1828)
* The Young Duke (1831, revised 1853)
* Contarini Fleming (1832)
* Ixion in Heaven (1832-33)
* The Wondrous Tale of Alroy (1833) – heavily revised as Alroy: A Romance (1846 and 1871)
* The Rise of Iskander (1833)
* The Infernal Marriage (unfinished; 1834)
* A Year at Hartlebury, or The Election – with Sarah Disraeli (1834)
* Henrietta Temple (1837)
* Venetia (1837)
* Lothair (1870)
* Endymion (1880)
* Falconet (unfinished, 1881; posthumously published in 1905)
Young England Trilogy
# Coningsby, or the New Generation (1844)
# Sybil, or The Two Nations (1845)
# Tancred, or the New Crusade (1847)
Poetry
* The Revolutionary Epick (1834)
Drama
* The Tragedy of Count Alarcos (1839)
Non-fiction
* An Inquiry into the Plans, Progress, and Policy of the American Mining Companies (1825)
* Lawyers and Legislators: or, Notes, on the American Mining Companies (1825)
* The present state of Mexico (1825)
* England and France, or a Cure for the Ministerial Gallomania (1832)
* What Is He? (1833)
* The Vindication of the English Constitution (1835)
* The Letters of Runnymede (1836)
* Lord George Bentinck (1852)
Arms
Notes and references
Notes
References
Sources
*
*
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*
*
*
*
*
*
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*
*
* Text also available online at [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/7689?docPos1 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Woodward, Llewellyn. (1962) The Age of Reform, 1815-1870 (Oxford University Press, 1938; 2nd ed. 1962) [https://archive.org/details/ageofreform181510000wood online].
Further reading
* Braun, Thom. Disraeli the Novelist (Routledge, 2016).
* Bright, J. Franck. A History of England. Period 4: Growth of Democracy: Victoria 1837–1880 (1893)[https://books.google.com/books?id=9CJAAQAAMAAJ online] 608pp; highly detailed political narrative
* Cesarani, David. Disraeli: The Novel Politician (Yale UP, 2016).
* Clausson, Nils. "Benjamin Disraeli, Sybil, or The Two." in Handbook of the English Novel, 1830–1900 ed. by Martin Middeke and Monika Pietrzak-Franger (2020) pp 189–204. [https://www.degruyter.com/view/title/498030 online]
* Davis, Richard W. "Disraeli, the Rothschilds, and anti-Semitism." Jewish History (1996): 9-19 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/20101265 online].
*
*
*
* Kalmar, Ivan Davidson. "Benjamin Disraeli, romantic orientalist." Comparative studies in society and history 47.2 (2005): 348–371. [https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/bitstream/1807/35322/1/disraeli.pdf online]
*
*
* Malchow, Howard LeRoy. Agitators and Promoters in the Age of Gladstone and Disraeli: A Biographical Dictionary of the Leaders of British Pressure Groups founded between 1865 and 1886 (2 vol 1983), includes thousands of activists.
*
* (translated by Hamish Miles)
* Miller, Henry. "Disraeli, Gladstone and the personification of party, 1868–80." in Miller, Politics personified (Manchester University Press, 2016).
* Monypenny, William Flavelle and George Earle Buckle, The Life of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield (2 vol. London: John Murray, 1929); contains vol 1–4 and vol 5–6 of the original edition Life of Benjamin Disraeli volume 1 1804–1837, Volume 2 1837–1846, Volume 3 1846–1855, Volume 4 1855–1868, Volume 5 1868–1876, Volume 6 1876–1881. Vol 1 to 6 are available free from Google books: [https://books.google.com/books?idfUkn3ZSDenAC&pgPR3 vol 1]; [https://books.google.com/books?idA0zGy8IjL-4C vol 2]; [https://books.google.com/books?idincNAAAAIAAJ vol 3]; [https://books.google.com/books?idRJANAAAAIAAJ vol 4]; [https://books.google.com/books?idvdJarJdAJ7QC vol 5]; and [https://books.google.com/books?id=1t7Jr8apQt8C vol 6]
*
* Napton, Dani. "Historical Romance and the Mythology of Charles I in D'Israeli, Scott and Disraeli." English Studies 99.2 (2018): 148–165.
* Nicolay, Claire. "The anxiety of 'Mosaic' influence: Thackeray, Disraeli, and Anglo-Jewish assimilation in the 1840s." Nineteenth-Century Contexts 25.2 (2003): 119–145.
* looks at close links between his fiction and his politics.
* Parry, J. P. "Disraeli, the East and religion: Tancred in context." English Historical Review 132.556 (2017): 570–604.
* Saab, Ann Pottinger. "Disraeli, Judaism, and the Eastern Question." International History Review 10.4 (1988): 559–578.
* Schwarz, Daniel R. "" Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin": Jewish Perspectives in Disraeli's Fiction." Jewish History (1996): 37-55. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/20101267 online]
*
* Seton-Watson, R.W. Britain in Europe, 1789–1914 (1938); comprehensive history [https://archive.org/download/in.ernet.dli.2015.226175/2015.226175.Britain-In.pdf online]
* Shannon, Richard. The crisis of imperialism, 1865–1915 (1976), pp. 101–141.
* Spevack, Marvin. "In the Shadow of the Son: Isaac D'Israeli and Benjamin Disraeli." Jewish Culture and History 8.2 (2006): 73–92.
*
Primary sources
* Letters of Benjamin Disraeli, 10 vols., edited by Michael W. Pharand, et al. (1982 to 2014), ending in 1868. [https://www.amazon.com/s?kdisraeli+letters&istripbooks online]
*
* Hicks, Geoff, et al. eds. Documents on Conservative Foreign Policy, 1852-1878 (2013), 550 documents [https://www.amazon.com/Documents-Conservative-Foreign-Policy-1852-1878/dp/1107035929/ excerpt]
* Partridge, Michael, and Richard Gaunt. Lives of Victorian Political Figures Part 1: Palmerston, Disraeli and Gladstone (4 vol. Pickering & Chatto. 2006) reprints 32 original pamphlets on Disraeli.
* Temperley, Harold and L.M. Penson, eds. Foundations of British Foreign Policy: From Pitt (1792) to Salisbury (1902) (1938), primary sources [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.2629 online]
*
Historiography
* Diniejko, Andrzej. "Benjamin Disraeli and the Jewish Question in Victorian England", The Victorian Web (2020) [https://victorianweb.org/authors/disraeli/judaism.html online]
* Parry, Jonathan P. "Disraeli and England", Historical Journal (2000): 699-728 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3020975 online].
* Quinault, Roland. "Gladstone and Disraeli: A Reappraisal of their Relationship", History 91.304 (2006): 557–576.
* St. John, Ian. The Historiography of Gladstone and Disraeli (Anthem Press, 2016) 402 pp. [https://books.google.com/books?idybo1DgAAQBAJ&pgPP1 excerpt]
External links
*
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050203033206/http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/005/198cdapm.asp Disraeli as the inventor of modern conservatism] at The Weekly Standard
* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-19817520 John Prescott interview with Andrew Neill.]
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/the_westminster_hour/7971143.stm BBC Radio 4 series The Prime Ministers]
* [http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/projects/disraeli/disraeli.html Bodleian Library Disraeli bicentenary exhibition, 2004]
* [http://www.nybooks.com/articles/22118 What Disraeli Can Teach Us] by Geoffrey Wheatcroft from The New York Review of Books
* , the holdings in numerous British archives
* Electronic editions*
*
*
*
}}
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3876 | Binomial distribution | <!-- EDITORS! Please see Wikipedia:WikiProject Probability#Standards for a discussion of standards used for probability distribution articles such as this one. -->
{{Probability distribution
| name = Binomial distribution
| type = mass
| pdf_image | cdf_image
| notation = <math>B(n,p)</math>
| parameters <math>n \in \{0, 1, 2, \ldots\}</math> – number of trials<br /><math>p \in [0,1]</math> – success probability for each trial<br /><math>q 1 - p</math>
| support = <math>k \in \{0, 1, \ldots, n\}</math> – number of successes
| pdf = <math>\binom{n}{k} p^k q^{n-k}</math>
| cdf = <math>I_q(n - \lfloor k \rfloor, 1 + \lfloor k \rfloor)</math> (the regularized incomplete beta function)
| mean = <math>np</math>
| median = <math>\lfloor np \rfloor</math> or <math>\lceil np \rceil</math>
| mode = <math>\lfloor (n + 1)p \rfloor</math> or <math>\lceil (n + 1)p \rceil - 1</math>
| variance <math>npq np(1-p)</math>
| skewness = <math>\frac{q-p}{\sqrt{npq}}</math>
| kurtosis = <math>\frac{1-6pq}{npq}</math>
| entropy = <math>\frac{1}{2} \log_2 (2\pi enpq) + O \left( \frac{1}{n} \right)</math><br /> in shannons. For nats, use the natural log in the log.
| mgf = <math>(q + pe^t)^n</math>
| char = <math>(q + pe^{it})^n</math>
| pgf <math>G(z) [q + pz]^n</math>
| fisher <math> g_n(p) \frac{n}{pq} </math><br />(for fixed <math>n</math>)
}}
<br /><br />The probability that a ball in a Galton box with 8 layers ( 8}}) ends up in the central bin ( 4}}) is .]]
In probability theory and statistics, the binomial distribution with parameters and is the discrete probability distribution of the number of successes in a sequence of independent experiments, each asking a yes–no question, and each with its own Boolean-valued outcome: success (with probability ) or failure (with probability 1 − p}}). A single success/failure experiment is also called a Bernoulli trial or Bernoulli experiment, and a sequence of outcomes is called a Bernoulli process; for a single trial, i.e., 1}}, the binomial distribution is a Bernoulli distribution. The binomial distribution is the basis for the binomial test of statistical significance.
The binomial distribution is frequently used to model the number of successes in a sample of size drawn with replacement from a population of size . If the sampling is carried out without replacement, the draws are not independent and so the resulting distribution is a hypergeometric distribution, not a binomial one. However, for much larger than , the binomial distribution remains a good approximation, and is widely used.
Definitions
Probability mass function
If the random variable follows the binomial distribution with parameters {{math|n ∈ <math>\mathbb{N}</math>}} and }}, we write . The probability of getting exactly successes in independent Bernoulli trials (with the same rate ) is given by the probability mass function:
: <math>f(k,n,p) \Pr(X k) = \binom{n}{k}p^k(1-p)^{n-k}</math>
for 0, 1, 2, ..., n}}, where
: <math>\binom{n}{k} =\frac{n!}{k!(n-k)!}</math>
is the binomial coefficient. The formula can be understood as follows: q}} is the probability of obtaining the sequence of independent Bernoulli trials in which trials are "successes" and the remaining trials result in "failure". Since the trials are independent with probabilities remaining constant between them, any sequence of trials with successes (and failures) has the same probability of being achieved (regardless of positions of successes within the sequence). There are <math display"inline">\binom{n}{k}</math> such sequences, since the binomial coefficient <math display"inline">\binom{n}{k}</math> counts the number of ways to choose the positions of the successes among the trials. The binomial distribution is concerned with the probability of obtaining any of these sequences, meaning the probability of obtaining one of them ( q}}) must be added <math display"inline">\binom{n}{k}</math> times, hence <math display"inline">\Pr(X k) \binom{n}{k} p^k (1-p)^{n-k}</math>.
In creating reference tables for binomial distribution probability, usually, the table is filled in up to values. This is because for , the probability can be calculated by its complement as
: <math>f(k,n,p)=f(n-k,n,1-p). </math>
Looking at the expression as a function of , there is a value that maximizes it. This value can be found by calculating
: <math> \frac{f(k+1,n,p)}{f(k,n,p)}=\frac{(n-k)p}{(k+1)(1-p)} </math>
and comparing it to 1. There is always an integer that satisfies
: <math>(n+1)p-1 \leq M < (n+1)p.</math>
is monotone increasing for and monotone decreasing for , with the exception of the case where is an integer. In this case, there are two values for which is maximal: and . is the most probable outcome (that is, the most likely, although this can still be unlikely overall) of the Bernoulli trials and is called the mode.
Equivalently, . Taking the floor function, we obtain floor(np)}}. 0}}, which must be checked separately.}}
Example
Suppose a biased coin comes up heads with probability 0.3 when tossed. The probability of seeing exactly 4 heads in 6 tosses is
: <math>f(4,6,0.3) \binom{6}{4}0.3^4 (1-0.3)^{6-4} 0.059535.</math>
Cumulative distribution function
The cumulative distribution function can be expressed as:
: <math>F(k;n,p) \Pr(X \le k) \sum_{i=0}^{\lfloor k \rfloor} {n\choose i}p^i(1-p)^{n-i},</math>
where <math>\lfloor k\rfloor</math> is the "floor" under , i.e. the greatest integer less than or equal to .
It can also be represented in terms of the regularized incomplete beta function, as follows:
: <math>\begin{align}
F(k;n,p) & = \Pr(X \le k) \\
&= I_{1-p}(n-k, k+1) \\
& = (n-k) {n \choose k} \int_0^{1-p} t^{n-k-1} (1-t)^k \, dt ,
\end{align}</math>
which is equivalent to the cumulative distribution functions of the beta distribution and of the -distribution:
: <math>F(k;n,p) F_{\text{beta-distribution}}\left(x1-p;\alphan-k,\betak+1\right)</math>
: <math>F(k;n,p) F_{F\text{-distribution}}\left(x\frac{1-p}{p}\frac{k+1}{n-k};d_12(n-k),d_22(k+1)\right).</math>
Some closed-form bounds for the cumulative distribution function are given below.
Properties
Expected value and variance
If , that is, is a binomially distributed random variable, being the total number of experiments and p the probability of each experiment yielding a successful result, then the expected value of is:
: <math> \operatorname{E}[X] = np.</math>
This follows from the linearity of the expected value along with the fact that is the sum of identical Bernoulli random variables, each with expected value . In other words, if <math>X_1, \ldots, X_n</math> are identical (and independent) Bernoulli random variables with parameter , then and
: <math>\operatorname{E}[X] \operatorname{E}[X_1 + \cdots + X_n] \operatorname{E}[X_1] + \cdots + \operatorname{E}[X_n] p + \cdots + p np.</math>
The variance is:
: <math> \operatorname{Var}(X) npq np(1 - p).</math>
This similarly follows from the fact that the variance of a sum of independent random variables is the sum of the variances.
Higher moments
<!-- Please stop changing the equation \mu_1 = 0, it is correct. The first central moment is not the mean. -->
The first 6 central moments, defined as <math> \mu _{c}=\operatorname {E} \left[(X-\operatorname {E} [X])^{c}\right] </math>, are given by
: <math>\begin{align}
\mu_1 &= 0, \\
\mu_2 &= np(1-p),\\
\mu_3 &= np(1-p)(1-2p),\\
\mu_4 &= np(1-p)(1+(3n-6)p(1-p)),\\
\mu_5 &= np(1-p)(1-2p)(1+(10n-12)p(1-p)),\\
\mu_6 &= np(1-p)(1-30p(1-p)(1-4p(1-p))+5np(1-p)(5-26p(1-p))+15n^2 p^2 (1-p)^2).
\end{align}</math>
The non-central moments satisfy
: <math>\begin{align}
\operatorname {E}[X] &= np, \\
\operatorname {E}[X^2] &= np(1-p)+n^2p^2,
\end{align}</math>
and in general
: <math>
\operatorname {E}[X^c] \sum_{k0}^c \left\{ {c \atop k} \right\} n^{\underline{k}} p^k,
</math>
where <math>\textstyle \left\{{c\atop k}\right\}</math> are the Stirling numbers of the second kind, and <math>n^{\underline{k}} = n(n-1)\cdots(n-k+1)</math> is the <math>k</math>th falling power of <math>n</math>.
A simple bound
follows by bounding the Binomial moments via the higher Poisson moments:
: <math>
\operatorname {E}[X^c] \le
\left(\frac{c}{\ln(c/(np)+1)}\right)^c \le (np)^c \exp\left(\frac{c^2}{2np}\right).
</math>
This shows that if <math>cO(\sqrt{np})</math>, then <math>\operatorname {E}[X^c]</math> is at most a constant factor away from <math>\operatorname {E}[X]^c</math> Mode
Usually the mode of a binomial distribution is equal to <math>\lfloor (n+1)p\rfloor</math>, where <math>\lfloor\cdot\rfloor</math> is the floor function. However, when is an integer and is neither 0 nor 1, then the distribution has two modes: and . When is equal to 0 or 1, the mode will be 0 and correspondingly. These cases can be summarized as follows:
: <math>\text{mode} =
\begin{cases}
\lfloor (n+1)\,p\rfloor & \text{if }(n+1)p\text{ is 0 or a noninteger}, \\
(n+1)\,p\ \text{ and }\ (n+1)\,p - 1 &\text{if }(n+1)p\in\{1,\dots,n\}, \\
n & \text{if }(n+1)p = n + 1.
\end{cases}</math>
Proof: Let
: <math>f(k)=\binom nk p^k q^{n-k}.</math>
For <math>p0</math> only <math>f(0)</math> has a nonzero value with <math>f(0)1</math>. For <math>p1</math> we find <math>f(n)1</math> and <math>f(k)0</math> for <math>k\neq n</math>. This proves that the mode is 0 for <math>p0</math> and <math>n</math> for <math>p=1</math>.
Let <math>0 < p < 1</math>. We find
:<math>\frac{f(k+1)}{f(k)} = \frac{(n-k)p}{(k+1)(1-p)}</math>.
From this follows
: <math>\begin{align}
k > (n+1)p-1 \Rightarrow f(k+1) < f(k) \\
k (n+1)p-1 \Rightarrow f(k+1) f(k) \\
k < (n+1)p-1 \Rightarrow f(k+1) > f(k)
\end{align}</math>
So when <math>(n+1)p-1</math> is an integer, then <math>(n+1)p-1</math> and <math>(n+1)p</math> is a mode. In the case that <math>(n+1)p-1\notin \Z</math>, then only <math>\lfloor (n+1)p-1\rfloor+1\lfloor (n+1)p\rfloor</math> is a mode. Median
In general, there is no single formula to find the median for a binomial distribution, and it may even be non-unique. However, several special results have been established:
* If is an integer, then the mean, median, and mode coincide and equal .
* Any median must lie within the interval <math>\lfloor np \rfloor\leq m \leq \lceil np \rceil</math>.
* A median cannot lie too far away from the mean:<math>|m-np|\leq \min\{{\ln2}, \max\{p,1-p\}\}</math> .
* The median is unique and equal to when ≤ min}} (except for the case when and is odd).
* When <math>p\frac{1}{2} </math> and is odd, any number in the interval <math> \frac{1}{2} \bigl(n-1\bigr)\leq m \leq \frac{1}{2} \bigl(n+1\bigr)</math> is a median of the binomial distribution. If <math>p \frac{1}{2} </math> and is even, then <math>m\frac{n}{2} </math> is the unique median. Tail bounds For , upper bounds can be derived for the lower tail of the cumulative distribution function <math>F(k;n,p) \Pr(X \le k)</math>, the probability that there are at most successes. Since <math>\Pr(X \ge k) = F(n-k;n,1-p) </math>, these bounds can also be seen as bounds for the upper tail of the cumulative distribution function for .
Hoeffding's inequality yields the simple bound
: <math> F(k;n,p) \leq \exp\left(-2 n\left(p-\frac{k}{n}\right)^2\right), \!</math>
which is however not very tight. In particular, for , we have that (for fixed , with ), but Hoeffding's bound evaluates to a positive constant.
A sharper bound can be obtained from the Chernoff bound:
: <math> F(k;n,p) \leq \exp\left(-nD\left(\frac{k}{n}\parallel p\right)\right) </math>
where is the relative entropy (or Kullback-Leibler divergence) between an -coin and a -coin (i.e. between the and distribution):
: <math> D(a\parallel p)=(a)\ln\frac{a}{p}+(1-a)\ln\frac{1-a}{1-p}. \!</math>
Asymptotically, this bound is reasonably tight; see
: <math> F(k;n,p) \geq \frac{1}{\sqrt{8n\tfrac{k}{n}(1-\tfrac{k}{n})}} \exp\left(-nD\left(\frac{k}{n}\parallel p\right)\right),</math>
which implies the simpler but looser bound
: <math> F(k;n,p) \geq \frac1{\sqrt{2n}} \exp\left(-nD\left(\frac{k}{n}\parallel p\right)\right).</math>
For and for even , it is possible to make the denominator constant:
: <math> F(k;n,\tfrac{1}{2}) \geq \frac{1}{15} \exp\left(- 16n \left(\frac{1}{2} -\frac{k}{n}\right)^2\right). \!</math>
Statistical inference
Estimation of parameters
When is known, the parameter can be estimated using the proportion of successes:
: <math> \widehat{p} = \frac{x}{n}.</math>
This estimator is found using maximum likelihood estimator and also the method of moments. This estimator is unbiased and uniformly with minimum variance, proven using Lehmann–Scheffé theorem, since it is based on a minimal sufficient and complete statistic (i.e.: ). It is also consistent both in probability and in MSE. This statistic is asymptotically normal thanks to the central limit theorem, because it is the same as taking the mean over Bernoulli samples. It has a variance of <math> var(\widehat{p}) = \frac{p(1-p)}{n}</math>, a property which is used in various ways, such as in Wald's confidence intervals.
A closed form Bayes estimator for also exists when using the Beta distribution as a conjugate prior distribution. When using a general <math>\operatorname{Beta}(\alpha, \beta)</math> as a prior, the posterior mean estimator is:
: <math> \widehat{p}_b = \frac{x+\alpha}{n+\alpha+\beta}.</math>
The Bayes estimator is asymptotically efficient and as the sample size approaches infinity (), it approaches the MLE solution. The Bayes estimator is biased (how much depends on the priors), admissible and consistent in probability. Using the Bayesian estimator with the Beta distribution can be used with Thompson sampling.
For the special case of using the standard uniform distribution as a non-informative prior, <math>\operatorname{Beta}(\alpha1, \beta1) = U(0,1)</math>, the posterior mean estimator becomes:
:<math> \widehat{p}_b = \frac{x+1}{n+2}.</math>
(A posterior mode should just lead to the standard estimator.) This method is called the rule of succession, which was introduced in the 18th century by Pierre-Simon Laplace.
When relying on Jeffreys prior, the prior is <math>\operatorname{Beta}(\alpha\frac{1}{2}, \beta\frac{1}{2})</math>, which leads to the estimator:
: <math> \widehat{p}_{Jeffreys} = \frac{x+\frac{1}{2}}{n+1}.</math>
When estimating with very rare events and a small (e.g.: if ), then using the standard estimator leads to <math> \widehat{p} 0,</math> which sometimes is unrealistic and undesirable. In such cases there are various alternative estimators. One way is to use the Bayes estimator <math> \widehat{p}_b</math>, leading to:
: <math> \widehat{p}_b = \frac{1}{n+2}.</math>
Another method is to use the upper bound of the confidence interval obtained using the rule of three:
: <math> \widehat{p}_{\text{rule of 3}} \frac{3}{n}.</math> Confidence intervals for the parameter p
Even for quite large values of n, the actual distribution of the mean is significantly nonnormal. Because of this problem several methods to estimate confidence intervals have been proposed.
In the equations for confidence intervals below, the variables have the following meaning:
* n<sub>1</sub> is the number of successes out of n, the total number of trials
* <math> \widehat{p\,} = \frac{n_1}{n}</math> is the proportion of successes
* <math>z</math> is the <math>1 - \tfrac{1}{2}\alpha</math> quantile of a standard normal distribution (i.e., probit) corresponding to the target error rate <math>\alpha</math>. For example, for a 95% confidence level the error <math>\alpha</math> 0.05, so <math>1 - \tfrac{1}{2}\alpha</math> 0.975 and <math>z</math> 1.96. Wald method
: <math> \widehat{p\,} \pm z \sqrt{ \frac{ \widehat{p\,} ( 1 -\widehat{p\,} )}{ n } } .</math>
A continuity correction of may be added. Agresti–Coull method
: <math> \tilde{p} \pm z \sqrt{ \frac{ \tilde{p} ( 1 - \tilde{p} )}{ n + z^2 } }</math>
Here the estimate of is modified to
: <math> \tilde{p}= \frac{ n_1 + \frac{1}{2} z^2}{ n + z^2 } </math>
This method works well for and . See here for <math>n\leq 10</math>. For use the Wilson (score) method below. Arcsine method
: <math>\sin^2 \left(\arcsin \left(\sqrt{\widehat{p\,}}\right) \pm \frac{z}{2\sqrt{n}} \right).</math>
Wilson (score) method
The notation in the formula below differs from the previous formulas in two respects:
* Firstly, has a slightly different interpretation in the formula below: it has its ordinary meaning of 'the th quantile of the standard normal distribution', rather than being a shorthand for 'the th quantile'.
* Secondly, this formula does not use a plus-minus to define the two bounds. Instead, one may use <math>z z_{\alpha / 2}</math> to get the lower bound, or use <math>z z_{1 - \alpha/2}</math> to get the upper bound. For example: for a 95% confidence level the error <math>\alpha</math> 0.05, so one gets the lower bound by using <math>z z_{\alpha/2} z_{0.025} - 1.96</math>, and one gets the upper bound by using <math>z z_{1 - \alpha/2} z_{0.975} = 1.96</math>.
: <math>\frac{
\widehat{p\,} + \frac{z^2}{2n} + z
\sqrt{
\frac{\widehat{p\,}(1 - \widehat{p\,})}{n} +
\frac{z^2}{4 n^2}
}
}{
1 + \frac{z^2}{n}
}</math>
Comparison
The so-called "exact" (Clopper–Pearson) method is the most conservative.
: <math>\begin{align}
\operatorname P(Zk) & \sum_{i=0}^k\left[\binom{n}i p^i (1-p)^{n-i}\right]\left[\binom{m}{k-i} p^{k-i} (1-p)^{m-k+i}\right]\\
&= \binom{n+m}k p^k (1-p)^{n+m-k}
\end{align}</math>
A Binomial distributed random variable can be considered as the sum of Bernoulli distributed random variables. So the sum of two Binomial distributed random variables and is equivalent to the sum of Bernoulli distributed random variables, which means . This can also be proven directly using the addition rule.
However, if and do not have the same probability , then the variance of the sum will be smaller than the variance of a binomial variable distributed as )}}.
Poisson binomial distribution
The binomial distribution is a special case of the Poisson binomial distribution, which is the distribution of a sum of independent non-identical Bernoulli trials .
Ratio of two binomial distributions
This result was first derived by Katz and coauthors in 1978.
Let and be independent. Let .
Then log(T) is approximately normally distributed with mean log(p<sub>1</sub>/p<sub>2</sub>) and variance .
Conditional binomials
If X ~ B(n, p) and Y | X ~ B(X, q) (the conditional distribution of Y, given X), then Y is a simple binomial random variable with distribution Y ~ B(n, pq).
For example, imagine throwing n balls to a basket U<sub>X</sub> and taking the balls that hit and throwing them to another basket U<sub>Y</sub>. If p is the probability to hit U<sub>X</sub> then X ~ B(n, p) is the number of balls that hit U<sub>X</sub>. If q is the probability to hit U<sub>Y</sub> then the number of balls that hit U<sub>Y</sub> is Y ~ B(X, q) and therefore Y ~ B(n, pq).
Since <math> X \sim B(n, p) </math> and <math> Y \sim B(X, q) </math>, by the law of total probability,
: <math>\begin{align}
\Pr[Y m] & \sum_{k m}^{n} \Pr[Y m \mid X k] \Pr[X k] \\[2pt]
&\sum_{km}^n \binom{n}{k} \binom{k}{m} p^k q^m (1-p)^{n-k} (1-q)^{k-m}
\end{align}</math>
Since <math>\tbinom{n}{k} \tbinom{k}{m} = \tbinom{n}{m} \tbinom{n-m}{k-m},</math> the equation above can be expressed as
: <math> \Pr[Y m] \sum_{k=m}^{n} \binom{n}{m} \binom{n-m}{k-m} p^k q^m (1-p)^{n-k} (1-q)^{k-m} </math>
Factoring <math> p^k = p^m p^{k-m} </math> and pulling all the terms that don't depend on <math> k </math> out of the sum now yields
: <math>\begin{align}
\Pr[Y m] & \binom{n}{m} p^m q^m \left( \sum_{k=m}^n \binom{n-m}{k-m} p^{k-m} (1-p)^{n-k} (1-q)^{k-m} \right) \\[2pt]
&\binom{n}{m} (pq)^m \left( \sum_{km}^n \binom{n-m}{k-m} \left(p(1-q)\right)^{k-m} (1-p)^{n-k} \right)
\end{align}</math>
After substituting <math> i = k - m </math> in the expression above, we get
: <math> \Pr[Y m] \binom{n}{m} (pq)^m \left( \sum_{i=0}^{n-m} \binom{n-m}{i} (p - pq)^i (1-p)^{n-m - i} \right) </math>
Notice that the sum (in the parentheses) above equals <math> (p - pq + 1 - p)^{n-m} </math> by the binomial theorem. Substituting this in finally yields
: <math>\begin{align}
\Pr[Ym] & \binom{n}{m} (pq)^m (p - pq + 1 - p)^{n-m}\\[4pt]
&= \binom{n}{m} (pq)^m (1-pq)^{n-m}
\end{align}</math>
and thus <math> Y \sim B(n, pq) </math> as desired.
Bernoulli distribution
The Bernoulli distribution is a special case of the binomial distribution, where . Symbolically, has the same meaning as . Conversely, any binomial distribution, , is the distribution of the sum of independent Bernoulli trials, , each with the same probability .
Normal approximation
and normal probability density function approximation for and ]]
If is large enough, then the skew of the distribution is not too great. In this case a reasonable approximation to is given by the normal distribution
: <math> \mathcal{N}(np,\,np(1-p)),</math>
and this basic approximation can be improved in a simple way by using a suitable continuity correction.
The basic approximation generally improves as increases (at least 20) and is better when is not near to 0 or 1. Various rules of thumb may be used to decide whether is large enough, and is far enough from the extremes of zero or one:
* One rule or equal to 5. However, the specific number varies from source to source, and depends on how good an approximation one wants. In particular, if one uses 9 instead of 5, the rule implies the results stated in the previous paragraphs.
Assume that both values <math>np</math> and <math>n(1-p)</math> are greater than 9. Since <math>0< p<1</math>, we easily have that
: <math>np\geq9>9(1-p)\quad\text{and}\quad n(1-p)\geq9>9p.</math>
We only have to divide now by the respective factors <math>p</math> and <math>1-p</math>, to deduce the alternative form of the 3-standard-deviation rule:
: <math>n>9 \left(\frac{1-p}p\right) \quad\text{and}\quad n>9 \left(\frac{p}{1-p}\right).</math>
The following is an example of applying a continuity correction. Suppose one wishes to calculate for a binomial random variable . If has a distribution given by the normal approximation, then is approximated by . The addition of 0.5 is the continuity correction; the uncorrected normal approximation gives considerably less accurate results.
This approximation, known as de Moivre–Laplace theorem, is a huge time-saver when undertaking calculations by hand (exact calculations with large are very onerous); historically, it was the first use of the normal distribution, introduced in Abraham de Moivre's book The Doctrine of Chances in 1738. Nowadays, it can be seen as a consequence of the central limit theorem since is a sum of independent, identically distributed Bernoulli variables with parameter . This fact is the basis of a hypothesis test, a "proportion z-test", for the value of using , the sample proportion and estimator of , in a common test statistic.
For example, suppose one randomly samples people out of a large population and ask them whether they agree with a certain statement. The proportion of people who agree will of course depend on the sample. If groups of n people were sampled repeatedly and truly randomly, the proportions would follow an approximate normal distribution with mean equal to the true proportion p of agreement in the population and with standard deviation
: <math>\sigma \sqrt{\frac{p(1-p)}{n}}</math> Poisson approximation The binomial distribution converges towards the Poisson distribution as the number of trials goes to infinity while the product converges to a finite limit. Therefore, the Poisson distribution with parameter can be used as an approximation to of the binomial distribution if is sufficiently large and is sufficiently small. According to rules of thumb, this approximation is good if and such that , or if and such that , or if and .
Concerning the accuracy of Poisson approximation, see Novak, ch. 4, and references therein.
Limiting distributions
* Poisson limit theorem: As approaches and approaches 0 with the product held fixed, the distribution approaches the Poisson distribution with expected value .
: <math>P(p;\alpha,\beta) = \frac{p^{\alpha-1}(1-p)^{\beta-1}}{\operatorname{Beta}(\alpha,\beta)}.</math>
Given a uniform prior, the posterior distribution for the probability of success given independent events with observed successes is a beta distribution.
Computational methods
Random number generation
Methods for random number generation where the marginal distribution is a binomial distribution are well-established.
One way to generate random variates samples from a binomial distribution is to use an inversion algorithm. To do so, one must calculate the probability that for all values from through . (These probabilities should sum to a value close to one, in order to encompass the entire sample space.) Then by using a pseudorandom number generator to generate samples uniformly between 0 and 1, one can transform the calculated samples into discrete numbers by using the probabilities calculated in the first step.
History
This distribution was derived by Jacob Bernoulli. He considered the case where where is the probability of success and and are positive integers. Blaise Pascal had earlier considered the case where , tabulating the corresponding binomial coefficients in what is now recognized as Pascal's triangle. See also
* Logistic regression
* Multinomial distribution
* Negative binomial distribution
* Beta-binomial distribution
* Binomial measure, an example of a multifractal measure.
* Statistical mechanics
* Piling-up lemma, the resulting probability when XOR-ing independent Boolean variables
References
Further reading *
* External links
* Interactive graphic: [http://www.math.wm.edu/~leemis/chart/UDR/UDR.html Univariate Distribution Relationships]
* [http://www.fxsolver.com/browse/formulas/Binomial+distribution Binomial distribution formula calculator]
* Difference of two binomial variables: [https://math.stackexchange.com/q/1065487 X-Y] or [https://math.stackexchange.com/q/562119 |X-Y|]
* [http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Prob+x+%3E+19+if+x+is+binomial+with+n+%3D+36++and+p+%3D+.6 Querying the binomial probability distribution in WolframAlpha]
* Confidence (credible) intervals for binomial probability, p: [https://causascientia.org/math_stat/ProportionCI.html online calculator] available at [https://causascientia.org causaScientia.org]
Category:Discrete distributions
Category:Factorial and binomial topics
Category:Conjugate prior distributions
Category:Exponential family distributions | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binomial_distribution | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.626197 |
3878 | Biostatistics | Biostatistics (also known as biometry) is a branch of statistics that applies statistical methods to a wide range of topics in biology. It encompasses the design of biological experiments, the collection and analysis of data from those experiments and the interpretation of the results.
History
Biostatistics and genetics
Biostatistical modeling forms an important part of numerous modern biological theories. Genetics studies, since its beginning, used statistical concepts to understand observed experimental results. Some genetics scientists even contributed with statistical advances with the development of methods and tools. Gregor Mendel started the genetics studies investigating genetics segregation patterns in families of peas and used statistics to explain the collected data. In the early 1900s, after the rediscovery of Mendel's Mendelian inheritance work, there were gaps in understanding between genetics and evolutionary Darwinism. Francis Galton tried to expand Mendel's discoveries with human data and proposed a different model with fractions of the heredity coming from each ancestral composing an infinite series. He called this the theory of "Law of Ancestral Heredity". His ideas were strongly disagreed by William Bateson, who followed Mendel's conclusions, that genetic inheritance were exclusively from the parents, half from each of them. This led to a vigorous debate between the biometricians, who supported Galton's ideas, as Raphael Weldon, Arthur Dukinfield Darbishire and Karl Pearson, and Mendelians, who supported Bateson's (and Mendel's) ideas, such as Charles Davenport and Wilhelm Johannsen. Later, biometricians could not reproduce Galton conclusions in different experiments, and Mendel's ideas prevailed. By the 1930s, models built on statistical reasoning had helped to resolve these differences and to produce the neo-Darwinian modern evolutionary synthesis.
Solving these differences also allowed to define the concept of population genetics and brought together genetics and evolution. The three leading figures in the establishment of population genetics and this synthesis all relied on statistics and developed its use in biology.
* Ronald Fisher worked alongside statistician Betty Allan developing several basic statistical methods in support of his work studying the crop experiments at Rothamsted Research, published in Fisher's books Statistical Methods for Research Workers (1925) and The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection (1930), as well as Allan's scientific papers. Fisher went on to give many contributions to genetics and statistics. Some of them include the ANOVA, p-value concepts, Fisher's exact test and Fisher's equation for population dynamics. He is credited for the sentence "Natural selection is a mechanism for generating an exceedingly high degree of improbability".
* Sewall G. Wright developed F-statistics and methods of computing them and defined inbreeding coefficient.
* J. B. S. Haldane's book, The Causes of Evolution, reestablished natural selection as the premier mechanism of evolution by explaining it in terms of the mathematical consequences of Mendelian genetics. He also developed the theory of primordial soup.
These and other biostatisticians, mathematical biologists, and statistically inclined geneticists helped bring together evolutionary biology and genetics into a consistent, coherent whole that could begin to be quantitatively modeled.
In parallel to this overall development, the pioneering work of D'Arcy Thompson in On Growth and Form also helped to add quantitative discipline to biological study.
Despite the fundamental importance and frequent necessity of statistical reasoning, there may nonetheless have been a tendency among biologists to distrust or deprecate results which are not qualitatively apparent. One anecdote describes Thomas Hunt Morgan banning the Friden calculator from his department at Caltech, saying "Well, I am like a guy who is prospecting for gold along the banks of the Sacramento River in 1849. With a little intelligence, I can reach down and pick up big nuggets of gold. And as long as I can do that, I'm not going to let any people in my department waste scarce resources in placer mining." Research planning Any research in life sciences is proposed to answer a scientific question we might have. To answer this question with a high certainty, we need accurate results. The correct definition of the main hypothesis and the research plan will reduce errors while taking a decision in understanding a phenomenon. The research plan might include the research question, the hypothesis to be tested, the experimental design, data collection methods, data analysis perspectives and costs involved. It is essential to carry the study based on the three basic principles of experimental statistics: randomization, replication, and local control. Research question The research question will define the objective of a study. The research will be headed by the question, so it needs to be concise, at the same time it is focused on interesting and novel topics that may improve science and knowledge and that field. To define the way to ask the scientific question, an exhaustive literature review might be necessary. So the research can be useful to add value to the scientific community.
Hypothesis definition
Once the aim of the study is defined, the possible answers to the research question can be proposed, transforming this question into a hypothesis. The main propose is called null hypothesis (H<sub>0</sub>) and is usually based on a permanent knowledge about the topic or an obvious occurrence of the phenomena, sustained by a deep literature review. We can say it is the standard expected answer for the data under the situation in test. In general, H<sub>O</sub> assumes no association between treatments. On the other hand, the alternative hypothesis is the denial of H<sub>O</sub>. It assumes some degree of association between the treatment and the outcome. Although, the hypothesis is sustained by question research and its expected and unexpected answers. The sample size is determined by several things, since the scope of the research to the resources available. In clinical research, the trial type, as inferiority, equivalence, and superiority is a key in determining sample size. Data collection
Data collection methods must be considered in research planning, because it highly influences the sample size and experimental design.
Data collection varies according to type of data. For qualitative data, collection can be done with structured questionnaires or by observation, considering presence or intensity of disease, using score criterion to categorize levels of occurrence. For quantitative data, collection is done by measuring numerical information using instruments.
In agriculture and biology studies, yield data and its components can be obtained by metric measures. However, pest and disease injuries in plats are obtained by observation, considering score scales for levels of damage. Especially, in genetic studies, modern methods for data collection in field and laboratory should be considered, as high-throughput platforms for phenotyping and genotyping. These tools allow bigger experiments, while turn possible evaluate many plots in lower time than a human-based only method for data collection.
Finally, all data collected of interest must be stored in an organized data frame for further analysis.
Analysis and data interpretation
Descriptive tools
Data can be represented through tables or graphical representation, such as line charts, bar charts, histograms, scatter plot. Also, measures of central tendency and variability can be very useful to describe an overview of the data. Follow some examples:
Frequency tables
One type of table is the frequency table, which consists of data arranged in rows and columns, where the frequency is the number of occurrences or repetitions of data. Frequency can be:
Absolute: represents the number of times that a determined value appear;
<math display"block">N f_1 + f_2 + f_3 + ... + f_n</math>
Relative: obtained by the division of the absolute frequency by the total number;
<math display"block">n_i \frac{f_i}{N}</math>
In the next example, we have the number of genes in ten operons of the same organism.
: }}
{| class="wikitable"
|+
!Genes number
!Absolute frequency
!Relative frequency
|-
|1
|0
|0
|-
|2
|1
|0.1
|-
|3
|6
|0.6
|-
|4
|2
|0.2
|-
|5
|1
|0.1
|}
Line graph
for the December months from 2010 to 2016; Figure C: Example of Box Plot: number of glycines in the proteome of eight different organisms (A-H); Figure D: Example of a scatter plot.]]
Line graphs represent the variation of a value over another metric, such as time. In general, values are represented in the vertical axis, while the time variation is represented in the horizontal axis. Bar chart A bar chart is a graph that shows categorical data as bars presenting heights (vertical bar) or widths (horizontal bar) proportional to represent values. Bar charts provide an image that could also be represented in a tabular format. Scatter plot A scatter plot is a mathematical diagram that uses Cartesian coordinates to display values of a dataset. A scatter plot shows the data as a set of points, each one presenting the value of one variable determining the position on the horizontal axis and another variable on the vertical axis. They are also called scatter graph, scatter chart, scattergram, or scatter diagram.
Mean
The arithmetic mean is the sum of a collection of values (<math>{x_1+x_2+x_3+\cdots +x_n}</math>) divided by the number of items of this collection (<math>{n}</math>).
: <math>\bar{x} \frac{1}{n}\left (\sum_{i1}^n{x_i}\right ) \frac{x_1+x_2+\cdots +x_n}{n}</math> Median
The median is the value in the middle of a dataset.
Mode
The mode is the value of a set of data that appears most often.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ |Comparison among mean, median and mode<br />
Values = { 2,3,3,3,3,3,4,4,11 }
!Type
!Example
!Result
|-
| align="center" |Mean
| align="center" | ( 2 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 4 + 4 + 11 ) / 9
| align="center" |4
|-
| align="center" |Median
| align="center" |2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 4, 4, 11
| align="center" |3
|-
| align="center" |Mode
| align="center" |2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 4, 4, 11
| align="center" |3
|}
Box plot
Box plot is a method for graphically depicting groups of numerical data. The maximum and minimum values are represented by the lines, and the interquartile range (IQR) represent 25–75% of the data. Outliers may be plotted as circles.
Correlation coefficients
Although correlations between two different kinds of data could be inferred by graphs, such as scatter plot, it is necessary validate this though numerical information. For this reason, correlation coefficients are required. They provide a numerical value that reflects the strength of an association. about an unknown population, by estimation and/or hypothesis testing. In other words, it is desirable to obtain parameters to describe the population of interest, but since the data is limited, it is necessary to make use of a representative sample in order to estimate them. With that, it is possible to test previously defined hypotheses and apply the conclusions to the entire population. The standard error of the mean is a measure of variability that is crucial to do inferences.
Multiple testing
In multiple tests of the same hypothesis, the probability of the occurrence of false positives (familywise error rate) increase and a strategy is needed to account for this occurrence. This is commonly achieved by using a more stringent threshold to reject null hypotheses. The Bonferroni correction defines an acceptable global significance level, denoted by α* and each test is individually compared with a value of α α*/m. This ensures that the familywise error rate in all m tests, is less than or equal to α*. When m is large, the Bonferroni correction may be overly conservative. An alternative to the Bonferroni correction is to control the false discovery rate (FDR). The FDR controls the expected proportion of the rejected null hypotheses (the so-called discoveries) that are false (incorrect rejections). This procedure ensures that, for independent tests, the false discovery rate is at most q*. Thus, the FDR is less conservative than the Bonferroni correction and have more power, at the cost of more false positives. Mis-specification and robustness checks The main hypothesis being tested (e.g., no association between treatments and outcomes) is often accompanied by other technical assumptions (e.g., about the form of the probability distribution of the outcomes) that are also part of the null hypothesis. When the technical assumptions are violated in practice, then the null may be frequently rejected even if the main hypothesis is true. Such rejections are said to be due to model mis-specification. Verifying whether the outcome of a statistical test does not change when the technical assumptions are slightly altered (so-called robustness checks) is the main way of combating mis-specification. Model selection criteria Model criteria selection will select or model that more approximate true model. The Akaike's Information Criterion (AIC) and The Bayesian Information Criterion (BIC) are examples of asymptotically efficient criteria. Developments and big data
Recent developments have made a large impact on biostatistics. Two important changes have been the ability to collect data on a high-throughput scale, and the ability to perform much more complex analysis using computational techniques. This comes from the development in areas as sequencing technologies, Bioinformatics and Machine learning (Machine learning in bioinformatics).
Use in high-throughput data
New biomedical technologies like microarrays, next-generation sequencers (for genomics) and mass spectrometry (for proteomics) generate enormous amounts of data, allowing many tests to be performed simultaneously. Careful analysis with biostatistical methods is required to separate the signal from the noise. For example, a microarray could be used to measure many thousands of genes simultaneously, determining which of them have different expression in diseased cells compared to normal cells. However, only a fraction of genes will be differentially expressed.
Multicollinearity often occurs in high-throughput biostatistical settings. Due to high intercorrelation between the predictors (such as gene expression levels), the information of one predictor might be contained in another one. It could be that only 5% of the predictors are responsible for 90% of the variability of the response. In such a case, one could apply the biostatistical technique of dimension reduction (for example via principal component analysis). Classical statistical techniques like linear or logistic regression and linear discriminant analysis do not work well for high dimensional data (i.e. when the number of observations n is smaller than the number of features or predictors p: n < p). As a matter of fact, one can get quite high R<sup>2</sup>-values despite very low predictive power of the statistical model. These classical statistical techniques (esp. least squares linear regression) were developed for low dimensional data (i.e. where the number of observations n is much larger than the number of predictors p: n >> p). In cases of high dimensionality, one should always consider an independent validation test set and the corresponding residual sum of squares (RSS) and R<sup>2</sup> of the validation test set, not those of the training set.
Often, it is useful to pool information from multiple predictors together. For example, Gene Set Enrichment Analysis (GSEA) considers the perturbation of whole (functionally related) gene sets rather than of single genes. These gene sets might be known biochemical pathways or otherwise functionally related genes. The advantage of this approach is that it is more robust: It is more likely that a single gene is found to be falsely perturbed than it is that a whole pathway is falsely perturbed. Furthermore, one can integrate the accumulated knowledge about biochemical pathways (like the JAK-STAT signaling pathway) using this approach. Bioinformatics advances in databases, data mining, and biological interpretation The development of biological databases enables storage and management of biological data with the possibility of ensuring access for users around the world. They are useful for researchers depositing data, retrieve information and files (raw or processed) originated from other experiments or indexing scientific articles, as PubMed. Another possibility is search for the desired term (a gene, a protein, a disease, an organism, and so on) and check all results related to this search. There are databases dedicated to SNPs (dbSNP), the knowledge on genes characterization and their pathways (KEGG) and the description of gene function classifying it by cellular component, molecular function and biological process (Gene Ontology). In addition to databases that contain specific molecular information, there are others that are ample in the sense that they store information about an organism or group of organisms. As an example of a database directed towards just one organism, but that contains much data about it, is the Arabidopsis thaliana genetic and molecular database – TAIR. Phytozome, in turn, stores the assemblies and annotation files of dozen of plant genomes, also containing visualization and analysis tools. Moreover, there is an interconnection between some databases in the information exchange/sharing and a major initiative was the International Nucleotide Sequence Database Collaboration (INSDC) which relates data from DDBJ, EMBL-EBI, and NCBI.
Nowadays, increase in size and complexity of molecular datasets leads to use of powerful statistical methods provided by computer science algorithms which are developed by machine learning area. Therefore, data mining and machine learning allow detection of patterns in data with a complex structure, as biological ones, by using methods of supervised and unsupervised learning, regression, detection of clusters and association rule mining, among others.
Quantitative genetics
The study of population genetics and statistical genetics in order to link variation in genotype with a variation in phenotype. In other words, it is desirable to discover the genetic basis of a measurable trait, a quantitative trait, that is under polygenic control. A genome region that is responsible for a continuous trait is called a quantitative trait locus (QTL). The study of QTLs become feasible by using molecular markers and measuring traits in populations, but their mapping needs the obtaining of a population from an experimental crossing, like an F2 or recombinant inbred strains/lines (RILs). To scan for QTLs regions in a genome, a gene map based on linkage have to be built. Some of the best-known QTL mapping algorithms are Interval Mapping, Composite Interval Mapping, and Multiple Interval Mapping.
However, QTL mapping resolution is impaired by the amount of recombination assayed, a problem for species in which it is difficult to obtain large offspring. Furthermore, allele diversity is restricted to individuals originated from contrasting parents, which limit studies of allele diversity when we have a panel of individuals representing a natural population. For this reason, the genome-wide association study was proposed in order to identify QTLs based on linkage disequilibrium, that is the non-random association between traits and molecular markers. It was leveraged by the development of high-throughput SNP genotyping.
In animal and plant breeding, the use of markers in selection aiming for breeding, mainly the molecular ones, collaborated to the development of marker-assisted selection. While QTL mapping is limited due resolution, GWAS does not have enough power when rare variants of small effect that are also influenced by environment. So, the concept of Genomic Selection (GS) arises in order to use all molecular markers in the selection and allow the prediction of the performance of candidates in this selection. The proposal is to genotype and phenotype a training population, develop a model that can obtain the genomic estimated breeding values (GEBVs) of individuals belonging to a genotype and but not phenotype population, called testing population. This kind of study could also include a validation population, thinking in the concept of cross-validation, in which the real phenotype results measured in this population are compared with the phenotype results based on the prediction, what used to check the accuracy of the model.
As a summary, some points about the application of quantitative genetics are:
* This has been used in agriculture to improve crops (Plant breeding) and livestock (Animal breeding).
* In biomedical research, this work can assist in finding candidates gene alleles that can cause or influence predisposition to diseases in human genetics
Expression data
Studies for differential expression of genes from RNA-Seq data, as for RT-qPCR and microarrays, demands comparison of conditions. The goal is to identify genes which have a significant change in abundance between different conditions. Then, experiments are designed appropriately, with replicates for each condition/treatment, randomization and blocking, when necessary. In RNA-Seq, the quantification of expression uses the information of mapped reads that are summarized in some genetic unit, as exons that are part of a gene sequence. As microarray results can be approximated by a normal distribution, RNA-Seq counts data are better explained by other distributions. The first used distribution was the Poisson one, but it underestimate the sample error, leading to false positives. Currently, biological variation is considered by methods that estimate a dispersion parameter of a negative binomial distribution. Generalized linear models are used to perform the tests for statistical significance and as the number of genes is high, multiple tests correction have to be considered. Some examples of other analysis on genomics data comes from microarray or proteomics experiments. Often concerning diseases or disease stages.
Other studies
* Ecology, ecological forecasting
* Biological sequence analysis
* Systems biology for gene network inference or pathways analysis.
* Clinical research and pharmaceutical development
* Population dynamics, especially in regards to fisheries science.
* Phylogenetics and evolution
* Pharmacodynamics
* Pharmacokinetics
* Neuroimaging
Tools
There are a lot of tools that can be used to do statistical analysis in biological data. Most of them are useful in other areas of knowledge, covering a large number of applications (alphabetical). Here are brief descriptions of some of them:
* ASReml: Another software developed by VSNi that can be used also in R environment as a package. It is developed to estimate variance components under a general linear mixed model using restricted maximum likelihood (REML). Models with fixed effects and random effects and nested or crossed ones are allowed. Gives the possibility to investigate different variance-covariance matrix structures.
* CycDesigN: A computer package developed by VSNi
* Orange: A programming interface for high-level data processing, data mining and data visualization. Include tools for gene expression and genomics. In addition to its functions to read data tables, take descriptive statistics, develop and evaluate models, its repository contains packages developed by researchers around the world. This allows the development of functions written to deal with the statistical analysis of data that comes from specific applications. In the case of Bioinformatics, for example, there are packages located in the main repository (CRAN) and in others, as Bioconductor. It is also possible to use packages under development that are shared in hosting-services as GitHub.
* SAS: A data analysis software widely used, going through universities, services and industry. Developed by a company with the same name (SAS Institute), it uses SAS language for programming.
* PLA 3.0: Is a biostatistical analysis software for regulated environments (e.g. drug testing) which supports Quantitative Response Assays (Parallel-Line, Parallel-Logistics, Slope-Ratio) and Dichotomous Assays (Quantal Response, Binary Assays). It also supports weighting methods for combination calculations and the automatic data aggregation of independent assay data.
* Weka: A Java software for machine learning and data mining, including tools and methods for visualization, clustering, regression, association rule, and classification. There are tools for cross-validation, bootstrapping and a module of algorithm comparison. Weka also can be run in other programming languages as Perl or R.
* International Journal of Biostatistics
* Journal of Epidemiology and Biostatistics
* Biostatistics and Public Health
* Biometrics
* Biometrika
* Biometrical Journal
* Communications in Biometry and Crop Science
* Statistical Applications in Genetics and Molecular Biology
* Statistical Methods in Medical Research
* Pharmaceutical Statistics
* Statistics in Medicine
See also
* Bioinformatics
* Epidemiological method
* Epidemiology
* Group size measures
* Health indicator
* Mathematical and theoretical biology
References
External links
*
* [https://www.biometricsociety.org/ The International Biometric Society]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080827161431/http://www.biostatsresearch.com/repository/ The Collection of Biostatistics Research Archive]
* [http://www.medpagetoday.com/lib/content/Medpage-Guide-to-Biostatistics.pdf Guide to Biostatistics (MedPageToday.com)]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20150402180351/http://www.biostat.katerynakon.in.ua/en/ Biomedical Statistics]
Category:Bioinformatics | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biostatistics | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.678217 |
3912 | List of major biblical figures | The Bible is a collection of canonical sacred texts of Judaism and Christianity. Different religious groups include different books within their canons, in different orders, and sometimes divide or combine books, or incorporate additional material into canonical books. Christian Bibles range from the sixty-six books of the Protestant canon to the eighty-one books of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church canon.
Hebrew Bible
*Tubal-cain
Prophets
*Samuel
*Enoch
Kings
*David
*Solomon
Priests
* Aaron
* Eleazar
* Eli
* Phinehas
Tribes of Israel
According to the Book of Genesis, the Israelites were descendants of the sons of Jacob, who was renamed Israel after wrestling with an angel. His twelve male children become the ancestors of the Twelve Tribes of Israel.
* Asher
* Benjamin
* Dan
* Gad
* Issachar
* Joseph, which was split into two tribes descended from his sons:
** Tribe of Ephraim
** Tribe of Manasseh
* Judah
* Levi
* Naphtali
* Reuben
* Simeon
* Zebulun
Deuterocanon
Maccabees
*Eleazar Avaran
*John Gaddi
*John Hyrcanus
*Jonathan Apphus
*Judas Maccabeus
*Mattathias
*Simon Thassi
Greek rulers
*Alexander the Great
*Antiochus III the Great
*Antiochus IV Epiphanes
*Philip II of Macedon
Persian rulers
*Astyages
*Darius III
Others
*Baruch
*Tobit
*Judith
*Susanna
New Testament
Jesus and his relatives
* Jesus Christ
* Mary, mother of Jesus
* Joseph
* Brothers of Jesus
** James (often identified with James, son of Alphaeus)
** Joseph (Joses)
** Judas (Jude) (often identified with Thaddeus)
** Simon
* Mary of Clopas
* Cleopas (often identified with Alphaeus and Clopas)
Apostles of Jesus
The Thirteen:
* Peter (a.k.a. Simon or Cephas)
* Andrew (Simon Peter's brother)
* James, son of Zebedee
* John, son of Zebedee
* Philip
* Bartholomew also known as "Nathanael"
* Thomas also known as "Doubting Thomas"
* Matthew also known as "Levi"
* James, son of Alphaeus
* Judas, son of James (a.k.a. Thaddeus or Lebbaeus)
* Simon the Zealot
* Judas Iscariot (the traitor)
* Matthias
Others:
* Paul
* Barnabas
* Mary Magdalene (the one who discovered Jesus' empty tomb)
Priests
* Caiaphas, high priest
* Annas, first high priest of Roman Judea
* Zechariah, father of John the Baptist
Prophets
* Agabus
* Anna
* Simeon
* John the Baptist
Other believers
* Apollos
* Aquila
* Dionysius the Areopagite
* Epaphras, fellow prisoner of Paul, fellow worker
* John Mark (often identified with Mark)
* Joseph of Arimathea
* Lazarus
* Luke
* Mark
* Martha
* Mary Magdalene
* Mary, sister of Martha
* Nicodemus
* Onesimus
* Philemon
* Priscilla
* Silas
* Sopater
* Stephen, first martyr
* Timothy
* Titus
Secular rulers
Herod}}
* Herod Agrippa I, called "King Herod" or "Herod" in Acts 12
* Felix governor of Judea who was present at the trial of Paul, and his wife Drusilla in Acts 24:24
* Herod Agrippa II, king over several territories, before whom Paul made his defense in Acts 26.
* Herod Antipas, called "Herod the Tetrarch" or "Herod" in the Gospels and in Acts 4:27
* Herodias
* Herod the Great
* Philip the Tetrarch
* Pontius Pilate
* Salome, the daughter of Herodias
* Quirinius
Roman Emperors
* Augustus
* Tiberius
* Claudius
See also
* List of biblical names
* List of burial places of biblical figures
* List of Jewish biblical figures
* List of minor biblical figures, A–K
* List of minor biblical figures, L–Z
* List of minor New Testament figures
References
<references/>
*major | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_major_biblical_figures | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.689333 |
3914 | British & Irish Lions | Rugby Football Union<br /> Irish Rugby Football Union<br /> Scottish Rugby Union<br /> Welsh Rugby Union
| coach = Andy Farrell (2025)
| captain = Alun Wyn Jones (2021)
| caps = Willie John McBride (17)
| top scorer Gavin Hastings (69)}}
| most tries Tony O'Reilly (6) For the 2005 tour to New Zealand, the Lions management commissioned a song, "The Power of Four", although it was met with little support among Lions fans at the matches and has not been used since.Colours and stripFor more than half a century, the Lions have worn a red jersey that sports the amalgamated crests of the four unions. Prior to 1950 the strip went through a number of significantly different formats.
Unsanctioned tours
In 1888, the promoter of the first expedition to Australia and New Zealand, Arthur Shrewsbury, demanded "something that would be good material and yet take them by storm out here". The result was a jersey in thick red, white and blue hoops, worn above white shorts and dark socks. The tours to South Africa in 1891 and 1896 retained the red, white and blue theme but this time as red and white hooped jerseys and dark blue shorts and socks. The 1899 trip to Australia saw a reversion to red, white and blue jerseys, but with the blue used in thick hoops and the red and white in thin bands. The shorts remained blue, as did the socks although a white flash was added to the latter. The one-off test in 1999 between England and Australia that was played to commemorate Australia's first test against Reverend Matthew Mullineux's British side saw England wear an updated version of this jersey. In 1903, the South Africa tour followed on from the 1896 tour, with red and white hooped jerseys. The slight differences were that the red hoops were slightly thicker than the white (the opposite was true in 1896), and the white flash on the socks introduced in 1899 was partially retained. The Australia tour of 1904 saw exactly the same kit as in 1899. In 1908, with the Scottish and Irish unions not taking part, the Anglo-Welsh side sported red jerseys with a thick white band on tour to Australia and New Zealand. The only additions to the strip since 1950 began appearing in 1993, with the addition of kit suppliers logos in prominent positions. Umbro had in 1989 asked for "maximum brand exposure whenever possible" but this did not affect the kit's appearance. Since then, Nike, Adidas and Canterbury have had more overt branding on the shirts, with sponsors Scottish Provident (1997), NTL (2001), Zurich (2005), HSBC (2009 and 2013), Standard Life Investments (2017) and Vodafone (2021).
Jersey evolution
The Lions did not return to South Africa until 1997, after the Apartheid era. A Lions team was selected in April 1986 for the International Rugby Board centenary match against 'The Rest'. The team was organised by the Four Home Unions Committee and the players were given the status of official British Lions.
The Lions tour to Australia in 1989 was a shorter affair, being only 12 matches in total. The tour was very successful for the Lions, who won all eight non-test matches and won the test series against Australia, two to one.
1990–1999
The tour to New Zealand in 1993 was the last of the amateur era. The Lions won six and lost four non-test matches, and lost the test series 2–1. The tour to South Africa in 1997 was a success for the Lions, who completed the tour with only two losses, and won the test series 2–1.
2000–2009
In 2001, the ten-game tour to Australia saw the Wallabies win the test series 2–1. This series saw the first award of the Tom Richards Trophy. In the Lions' 2005 tour to New Zealand, coached by Clive Woodward, the Lions won seven games against provincial teams, were defeated by the New Zealand Maori team, and suffered heavy defeats in all three tests.
In 2009, the Lions toured South Africa. There they faced the World Cup winners South Africa, with Ian McGeechan leading a coaching team including Warren Gatland, Shaun Edwards and Rob Howley. The Lions were captained by Irish lock Paul O'Connell. The initial Lions selection consisted of fourteen Irish players, thirteen Welsh, eight English and two Scots in the 37-man squad. In the first Test on 20 June, they lost 26–21, and lost the series in the second 28–25 in a tightly fought game at Loftus Versfeld on 27 June. The Lions won the third Test 28–9 at Ellis Park, and the series finished 2–1 to South Africa.
2010–2019
During June 2013 the British & Irish Lions toured Australia. Former Scotland and Lions full-back Andy Irvine was appointed as tour manager in 2010. Wales head coach Warren Gatland was the Lions' head coach, and their tour captain was Sam Warburton. The tour started in Hong Kong with a match against the Barbarians before moving on to Australia for the main tour featuring six provincial matches and three tests. The Lions won all but one non-test matches, losing to the Brumbies 14–12 on 18 June. The first test was followed shortly after this, which saw the Lions go 1-up over Australia winning 23–21. Australia did have a chance to take the win in the final moments of the game, but a missed penalty by Kurtley Beale saw the Lions take the win. The Wallabies drew the series in the second test winning 16–15, though the Lions had a chance to steal the win had it not been because of a missed penalty by Leigh Halfpenny. With tour captain Warburton out of the final test due to injury, Alun Wyn Jones took over the captaincy in the final test in Sydney. The final test was won by the Lions in what was a record win, winning 41–16 to earn their first series win since 1997 and their first over Australia since 1989.
Following his winning tour of Australia in 2013, Warren Gatland was reappointed as Lions Head Coach for the tour to New Zealand in June and July 2017. In April 2016, it was announced that the side would again be captained again by Sam Warburton. The touring schedule included 10 games: an opening game against the Provincial Barbarians, challenge matches against all five of New Zealand's Super Rugby sides, a match against the Māori All Blacks and three tests against . The Lions defeated the Provincial Barbarians in the first game of the tour, before being beaten by the Blues three days later. The team recovered to beat the Crusaders but this was followed up with another midweek loss, this time against the Highlanders. The Lions then faced the Māori All Blacks, winning comfortably to restore optimism and followed up with their first midweek victory of the tour against the Chiefs. On 24 June, the Lions, captained by Peter O'Mahony, faced New Zealand in Eden Park in the first Test and were beaten 30–15. This was followed by the final midweek game of the tour, a draw against the Hurricanes. For the second Test, Gatland recalled Warburton to the starting team as captain. In Wellington Regional Stadium, the Lions beat a 14-man New Zealand side 24–21 after Sonny Bill Williams was red-carded at the 24-minute mark after a shoulder charge on Anthony Watson. This tied the series going into the final game, ending the side's 47-game winning run at home. In the final test at Eden Park the following week, the teams were tied at 15 points apiece with 78 minutes gone. Romain Poite signaled a penalty to New Zealand for an offside infringement after Ken Owens received the ball in front of his teammate Liam Williams, giving New Zealand the opportunity to kick for goal and potentially win the series. Poite, however, decided to downgrade the penalty to a free-kick after discussing with assistant referee Jérôme Garcès and Lions captain Sam Warburton. The match finished as a draw and the series was tied.
2020–present
Warren Gatland was Lions head coach again for the tour to South Africa in 2021. In December 2019, the Lions' Test venues were announced, but the tour was significantly disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, and all the games were played behind closed doors. South Africa won the test series by two games to one. In the deciding third test, Morne Steyn again kicked a late penalty to win the series. In 2024, it was announced that Andy Farrell would succeed Gatland as the Lions head coach. A women's Lions team was established in 2024, with their inaugural tour to New Zealand to take place in 2027.Overall test match record
.
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
! width=155px| Team
! width=45px| Played
! width=45px| Won
! width=45px| Lost
! width=45px| Drawn
! width=45px| For
! width=45px| Against
! width=45px|
! width=45px|
|-
| style="text-align:left" | ANZAC XV
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 19
| align=center| 15
| align=center| +4
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 7
| align=center| 6
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 236
| align=center| 31
| align=center| +205
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 23
| align=center| 17
| align=center| 6
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 414
| align=center| 248
| align=center| +166
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 19
| align=center| 8
| align=center| +11
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 2
| align=center| 2
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 89
| align=center| 6
| align=center| +83
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" | East Africa
| align=center| 2
| align=center| 2
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 89
| align=center| 12
| align=center| +77
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 21
| align=center| 25
| align=center| –4
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 29
| align=center| 27
| align=center| +2
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 28
| align=center| 10
| align=center| +18
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 41
| align=center| 7
| align=center| 30
| align=center| 4
| align=center| 399
| align=center| 700
| align=center| –301
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" | Rest of Europe XV
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 43
| align=center| 18
| align=center| +25
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" | Rhodesia/Southern Rhodesia}}
| align=center| 9
| align=center| 9
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 265
| align=center| 83
| align=center| +182
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 49
| align=center| 18
| align=center| 25
| align=center| 6
| align=center| 554
| align=center| 636
| align=center| –82
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" | South West Africa
| align=center| 4
| align=center| 4
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 69
| align=center| 22
| align=center| +47
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" | The Rest
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 7
| align=center| 15
| align=center| –8
| align=center|
|-
|- class="sortbottom"
! Total
! 144
! 70
! 63
! 11
! 2,281
! 1,856
! +425
!
|}
Overall test series results
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
! width=155px| Team
! width=45px| Tours
! width=45px| Won
! width=45px| Lost
! width=45px| Drawn
! width=45px|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 3
| align=center| 3
| align=center| 0
| align=center| 0
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 9
| align=center| 7
| align=center| 2
| align=center| 0
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 12
| align=center| 1
| align=center| 10
| align=center| 1
| align=center|
|-
| style="text-align:left" |
| align=center| 14
| align=center| 4
| align=center| 9
| align=center| 1
| align=center|
|- class="sortbottom"
! Total
! 38
! 15
! 21
! 2
!
|}
Tours
Format
The Lions now regularly tour three Southern Hemisphere countries; Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. They also toured Argentina three times before the Second World War. Since 1989 tours have been held every four years. The most recent tour was to South Africa in 2021.
In a break with tradition, the 2005 tour of New Zealand was preceded by a "home" fixture against Argentina at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff on 23 May 2005. It finished in a 25–25 draw. A similar fixture was held against Japan before the 2021 tour of South Africa at Murrayfield, with the Lions winning 28–10.
On tour, games take place against local provinces, clubs or representative sides as well as test matches against the host's national team.
The Lions and their predecessor teams have also played games against other nearby countries on tour. For example, they played Rhodesia in 1910, 1924, 1938, 1955, 1962, 1968 and 1974 during their tours to South Africa. They were also beaten by Fiji on their 1977 tour to New Zealand. In addition, they visited pre-independence Namibia (then South West Africa), in 1955, 1962, 1968 and 1974.
There have also been games in other countries on the way home. These include games in in 1959 and 1966, East Africa (then mostly Kenya, and held in Nairobi), and an unofficial game against Ceylon (future Sri Lanka) in 1950.
{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Year
!To
!Captain
!Head coach
!Top scorer in Tests
!Test series result
!Tests record
|-
|1888
|New Zealand<br />and Australia
| Robert Seddon<br /> Andrew Stoddart
| Alfred Shaw<br /> Arthur Shrewsbury
|colspan="3"|No Test matches played
|-
|1891
|South Africa
| Bill Maclagan
| Edwin Ash
| Arthur Rotherham, 4
|Won
|
|-
|1896
|South Africa
| Johnny Hammond<br />Thomas Crean
| Roger Walker
| J. F. Byrne, 12
|Won
|
|-
|1899
|Australia
| Matthew Mullineux<br /> Frank Stout
| Matthew Mullineux
| Charlie Adamson, 17
|Won
|
|-
|1903
|South Africa
| Mark Morrison
| Johnny Hammond
| John Gillespie, 4
|Lost
|
|-
|1904
|Australia<br /> and New Zealand
| David Bedell-Sivright<br />Teddy Morgan
| Arthur O'Brien
| Percy Bush, 20
|Won<br />Lost
| (Australia)<br /> (New Zealand)
|-
|1908
|New Zealand<br />and Australia
| Arthur Harding
| George Harnett
| Reggie Gibbs, 3<br /> Jack Jones, 3
|Lost
| (NZ)<br />No tests against Australia
|-
|1910
|South Africa
| Tommy Smyth<br /> Jack Jones
| William Cail<br />Walter E. Rees
| Jack Spoors, 9
|Lost
|
|-
|1910
|Argentina
| John Raphael
| R.V. Stanley
| Harold Monks, 10<br /><small>(no test caps awarded)</small>
|Won
|
|-
|1924
|South Africa
| Ronald Cove-Smith
| Harry Packer
| Tom Voyce, 6
|Lost
|
|-
|1927
|Argentina
| David MacMyn
| James Baxter
| Ernie Hammett, 40<br /><small>(no test caps awarded)</small>
|Won
|
|-
|1930
|New Zealand<br />and Australia
| Doug Prentice<br /> Carl Aarvold
| James Baxter
| Carl Aarvold, 9
|Lost<br />Lost
| (New Zealand)<br /> (Australia)
|-
|1936
|Argentina
| Bernard Gadney
| Doug Prentice
| John Brett, 7<br /><small>(no test caps awarded)</small>
|Won
|
|-
|1938
|South Africa
| Sam Walker
| Major B.C. Hartley
| Vivian Jenkins, 9
|Lost
|
|-
|1950
|New Zealand<br />and Australia
| Karl Mullen<br />Bleddyn Williams
| Leslie B. Osborne
| Lewis Jones, 26
|Lost<br />Won
| (NZ)<br /> (Australia)
|-
|1955
|South Africa
| Robin Thompson<br />Cliff Morgan
| Jack Siggins
| Jeff Butterfield, 12
|Tied
|
|-
|1959
|Australia<br />and New Zealand
| Ronnie Dawson
| O. B. Glasgow
| David Hewitt, 16
|Won<br />Lost
| (Australia)<br /> (New Zealand)
|-
|1962
|South Africa
| Arthur Smith<br />Dickie Jeeps
| Harry McKibbin
| John Willcox, 5
|Lost
|
|-
|1966
|Australia<br />and New Zealand
| David Watkins <br /> Mike Campbell-Lamerton
| John Robins
| Stewart Wilson, 30
|Won<br />Lost
| (Australia)<br /> (New Zealand)
|-
|1968
|South Africa
| Tom Kiernan
| Ronnie Dawson
| Tom Kiernan, 35
|Lost
|
|-
|1971
|New Zealand
| John Dawes
| Carwyn James
| Barry John, 30
|Won
|
|-
|1974
|South Africa
| Willie John McBride
| Syd Millar
| Phil Bennett, 26
|Won
|
|-
|1977
|New Zealand
| Phil Bennett
| John Dawes
| Phil Bennett, 18
|Lost
|
|-
|1980
|South Africa
| Bill Beaumont
| Noel Murphy
| Tony Ward, 18
|Lost
|
|-
|1983
|New Zealand
| Ciaran Fitzgerald
| Jim Telfer
| Ollie Campbell, 15
|Lost
|
|-
|1989
|Australia
| Finlay Calder
| Ian McGeechan
| Gavin Hastings, 28
|Won
|
|-
|1993
|New Zealand
| Gavin Hastings
| Ian McGeechan
| Gavin Hastings, 38
|Lost
|
|-
|1997
|South Africa
| Martin Johnson
| Ian McGeechan
| Neil Jenkins, 41
|Won
|
|-
|2001
|Australia
| Martin Johnson
| Graham Henry
| Jonny Wilkinson, 36
|Lost
|
|-
|2005
|New Zealand
| Brian O'Driscoll<br /> Gareth Thomas
| Clive Woodward
| Stephen Jones, 14
|Lost
|
|-
|2009
|South Africa
| Paul O'Connell
| Ian McGeechan
| Stephen Jones, 39
|Lost
|
|-
|2013
|Australia
| Sam Warburton<br /> Alun Wyn Jones
| Warren Gatland
| Leigh Halfpenny, 49
|Won
|
|-
|2017
|New Zealand
| Sam Warburton<br /> Peter O'Mahony
| Warren Gatland
| Owen Farrell, 31
|Tied
|
|-
|2021
|South Africa
| Alun Wyn Jones <br />
| Warren Gatland
| Dan Biggar, 23
|Lost
|
|-
|2025
|Australia
|
| Andy Farrell
|
|
|
|-
|2029
|New Zealand
|
|
|
|
|
|}
Other matches
Lions non-tour and home matches
The Lions have played a number of other matches against international opposition. With the exception of the matches against Argentina in 2005 and Japan in 2021, which were preparation matches for Lions tours, these matches have been one-offs to mark special occasions.
The Lions played an unofficial international match in 1955 at Cardiff Arms Park against a Welsh XV to mark the 75th anniversary of the Welsh Rugby Union. The Lions won 20–17 but did not include all the big names of the 1955 tour, such as Tony O'Reilly, Jeff Butterfield, Phil Davies, Dickie Jeeps, Bryn Meredith and Jim Greenwood.
In 1977, the Lions played their first official home game, against the Barbarians as a charity fund-raiser held as part of the Queen's silver jubilee celebrations. The Barbarians line-up featured JPR Williams, Gerald Davies, Gareth Edwards, Jean-Pierre Rives and Jean-Claude Skrela. The Lions included 13 of the team who played in the fourth test against New Zealand three weeks before and won 23–14.
In 1986, a match was organised against The Rest as a warm-up to the 1986 South Africa tour, and as a celebration to mark the International Rugby Board's centenary. The Lions lost 15–7 and the planned tour was subsequently cancelled.
In 1989, the Lions played against France in Paris. The game formed part of the celebrations of the bi-centennial of the French Revolution. The Lions, captained by Rob Andrew, won 29–27.
In 1990, a Four Home Unions team played against the Rest of Europe in a match to raise money for the rebuilding of Romania following the overthrow of Nicolae Ceaușescu in December 1989. The team used the Lions' logo, while the Rest of Europe played under the symbol of the Romanian Rugby Federation.
Player records
:Players in bold are still active at international level.
:Only matches against full international sides are listed.
Most caps
Updated 7 August 2021<ref name="auto" />
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
!width=40px|Rank
!width=150px|Name
!width=100px|Tours
!width=50px|Caps
!width=50px|Position
|-
|1
|align="left"| Willie John McBride
|1962–1974
|17
|Lock
|-
|2
|align="left"| Dickie Jeeps
|1955–1962
|13
|Scrum-half
|-
|rowspan="3"|3
|align="left"| Mike Gibson
|1966–1971
|12
|Centre
|-
|align="left"| Alun Wyn Jones
|2009–2021
|12
|Lock
|-
|align="left"| Graham Price
|1977–1983
|12
|Prop
|-
|rowspan="3"|6
|align="left"| Tony O'Reilly
|1955–1959
|10
|Wing
|-
|align="left"| R. H. Williams
|1955–1959
|10
|Lock
|-
|align="left"| Gareth Edwards
|1968–1974
|10
|Scrum-half
|-
|rowspan="2"|9
|align="left"| Syd Millar
|1955–1959
|9
|Prop
|-
|align="left"| Mako Vunipola
|2013–2021
|9
|Prop
|}
Most points
<!----------------------------- READ THIS NOTICE FIRST BEFORE EDITING ----------------------------------
– Active players are in bold even if they are not active with their national team any more.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------>
Updated 31 July 2021<ref name="auto" />
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
!width=40px|Rank
!width=150px"|Name
!width=100px"|Career
!width=50px|Points
!width=50px|Caps
!width=100px|Position
|-
|1
|align="left"| Gavin Hastings
|1986–1993
|69
|7
|Full-back
|-
|2
|align="left"| Jonny Wilkinson
|2001–2005
|67
|6
|Fly-half
|-
|3
|align="left"| Stephen Jones
|2005–2009
|53
|6
|Fly-half
|-
|4
|align="left"| Leigh Halfpenny
|2013–2017
|49
|4
|Full-back
|-
|5
|align="left"| Phil Bennett
|1974–1977
|44
|8
|Fly-half
|-
|6
|align="left"| Neil Jenkins
|1997–2001
|41
|4
|Fly-half
|-
|7
|align="left"| Tom Kiernan
|1962–1968
|35
|5
|Full-back
|-
|8
|align="left"| Owen Farrell
|2013–2021
|34
|6
|Fly-half/centre
|-
|rowspan="2"|9
|align="left"| Stewart Wilson
|1966
|30
|5
|Full-back
|-
|align="left"| Barry John
|1968–1971
|30
|5
|Fly-half
|}
Most tries
<!----------------------------- READ THIS NOTICE FIRST BEFORE EDITING ----------------------------------
– Active players are in bold even if they are not active with their national team any more.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------>
Updated 31 July 2021<ref name="auto" />
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align:center"
|-
!width=40px|Rank
!width=150px|Name
!width=100px|Career
!width=50px|Tries
!width=50px|Caps
!width=50px|Position
|-
|1
|align="left"| Tony O'Reilly
|1955–1959
|6
|10
|Wing
|-
|2
|align="left"| J. J. Williams
|1974–1977
|5
|7
|Wing
|-
|rowspan="2"|3
|align="left"| Willie Llewellyn
|1904
|4
|4
|Wing
|-
|align="left"| Malcolm Price
|1959
|4
|6
|Centre
|-
|rowspan="6"|4
|align="left"| Alf Bucher
|1899
|3
|3
|Wing
|-
|align="left"| Jack Spoors
|1910
|3
|3
|Full-back
|-
|align="left"| Carl Aarvold
|1930
|3
|5
|Centre
|-
|align="left"| Jeff Butterfield
|1955
|3
|4
|Centre
|-
|align="left"| Ken Jones
|1962–1966
|3
|6
|Centre
|-
|align="left"| Gerald Davies
|1968–1971
|3
|5
|Wing
|}
See also
*List of British & Irish Lions test matches
*Rugby union and apartheid
*Rugby union in the British Isles
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
External links
*
Category:International rugby union teams
Category:Multinational rugby union teams
Category:1888 establishments in the United Kingdom | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_&_Irish_Lions | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.751624 |
3916 | Bass guitar | Bass Guitar (magazine)}}
The bass guitar, electric bass () is the lowest-pitched member of the guitar family. It is similar in appearance and construction to an electric but with a longer neck and scale length. The electric bass guitar most commonly has four strings, though five- and six-stringed models are also built. Since the mid-1950s, the bass guitar has replaced the double bass in popular music due to its lighter weight, smaller size, most models' inclusion of frets for easier intonation, and electromagnetic pickups for amplification.
The bass guitar is usually tuned the same as the double bass, corresponding to pitches one octave lower than the four lowest-pitched strings of a guitar (typically E, A, D, and G). It is played with the fingers and thumb or with a pick.
Because the electric bass guitar is acoustically a quiet instrument, it requires external amplification, generally via electromagnetic or piezo-electric pickups. It can also be used with direct input boxes, audio interfaces, mixing consoles, computers, or bass-effects processors which offer headphone jacks.
Terminology
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians refers to this instrument as an "Electric bass guitar, usually with four heavy strings tuned E<sub>1</sub>'–A<sub>1</sub>'–D<sub>2</sub>–G<sub>2</sub>." It also defines bass as "Bass (iv). A contraction of Double bass or Electric bass guitar." ''Mottola's Cyclopedic Dictionary of Lutherie Terms'' begins its definition of the instrument as "A bass guitar that produces sound primarily with the aid of electronic devices." According to some authors the proper term is "electric bass". Common names for the instrument are "bass guitar", "electric bass guitar", and "electric bass" and some authors claim that they are historically accurate. A bass guitar whose neck lacks frets is termed a fretless bass. Scale
The scale of a bass is defined as the length of the vibrating strings between the nut and the bridge saddles. On a modern 4-string bass guitar, 30" (76 cm) or less is considered short scale, 32" (81 cm) medium scale, 34" (86 cm) standard scale and 35" (89 cm) long scale. Pickup
Bass pickups are attached to the body of the guitar and located beneath the strings. They are responsible for converting the vibrations of the strings into analogous electrical voltage sent as input to an instrument amplifier. Strings
Bass guitar strings are composed of a core and winding. The core is a wire which runs through the center of the string and is made of steel, nickel, or an alloy. The winding is a smaller gauge wire wrapped around the core. Bass guitar strings vary by the material and cross-sectional shape of the winding.
Common string variants include roundwound, flatwound, halfwound (groundwound), coated, tapewound and taperwound strings. Roundwound and flatwound strings feature windings with circular and rounded-square cross-sections, respectively, with half-round strings being a hybrid between the two. Coated strings have their surface coated with a synthetic layer while tapewound strings feature a metal core with a plastic winding. Taperwound strings have a tapered end where the exposed core sits on the bridge saddle without windings. The choice of winding has considerable impact on the sound of the instrument, with certain winding styles often being preferred for certain musical genres. History 1930s
, inventor of the modern bass guitar, outside his music store in Seattle, Washington]]
In the 1930s, musician and inventor Paul Tutmarc of Seattle, Washington, developed the first electric bass guitar in its modern form, a fretted instrument designed to be played horizontally. The 1935 sales catalog for Tutmarc's company Audiovox featured the "Model 736 Bass Fiddle", a solid body electric bass guitar with four strings, a scale length, and a single pickup. Around 100 were made during this period.
Audiovox also sold their "Model 236" bass amplifier. 1950s
]]
In the 1950s, Leo Fender and George Fullerton developed the first mass-produced electric bass guitar. The Fender Electric Instrument Manufacturing Company began producing the Precision Bass, or P-Bass, in October 1951. The design featured a simple uncontoured "slab" body design (with no edge contours) and a single coil pickup, both features similar to a Telecaster. By 1957, the Precision Bass began to resemble the Fender Stratocaster with the body edges beveled for comfort and the pickup changed to a separate halves split coil design.
The Fender Bass was a revolutionary instrument for working musicians. In comparison to the upright bass, the bass guitar could be easily transported. When amplified, the bass guitar was also much less prone than acoustic basses to audio feedback. The addition of frets enabled bassists to play in tune more easily than on upright basses, and allowed guitarists to more easily play the instrument.
In 1953, Monk Montgomery became the first bassist to tour with the Fender bass, in Lionel Hampton's postwar big band. Montgomery was also possibly the first to record with the electric bass, on July 2, 1953, with the Art Farmer Septet. Roy Johnson (with Lionel Hampton), and Shifty Henry (with Louis Jordan and His Tympany Five), were other early Fender bass pioneers. Bill Black, who played with Elvis Presley and James Jamerson switched from upright bass to the Fender Precision Bass around 1957. The bass guitar was intended to appeal to guitarists as well as upright bass players, and many early pioneers of the instrument, such as Joe Osborn, and Paul McCartney were originally guitarists.
Also in 1953, Gibson released the first short-scale violin-shaped electric bass, the EB-1, with an extendable end pin so a bassist could play it upright or horizontally. In 1958, Gibson released the maple arched-top EB-2 described in the Gibson catalog as a "hollow-body electric bass that features a Bass/Baritone pushbutton for two different tonal characteristics". In 1959, these were followed by the more conventional-looking EB-0 Bass. The EB-0 was very similar to a Gibson SG in appearance (although the earliest examples have a slab-sided body shape closer to that of the double-cutaway Les Paul Special). The Fender and Gibson versions used bolt-on and set necks.
Several other companies also began manufacturing bass guitars during the 1950s. Kay Musical Instrument Company began production of the K162 in 1952. Also in 1956, at the German trade fair "Musikmesse Frankfurt", the distinctive Höfner 500/1 viola-shaped bass first appeared, constructed using violin techniques by Walter Höfner, a second-generation violin luthier. Due to its use by Paul McCartney, it became known as the "Beatle bass". In 1957, Rickenbacker introduced the model 4000, the first bass to feature a neck-through-body design in which the neck is part of the body wood. The Burns London Supersound was introduced in 1958.
1960s
]]
With the explosion in popularity of rock music in the 1960s, many more manufacturers began making electric basses, including Yamaha, Teisco and Guyatone. Introduced in 1960, the Fender Jazz Bass, initially known as the "Deluxe Bass", used a body design known as an offset waist which was first seen on the Jazzmaster guitar in an effort to improve comfort while playing seated. The Jazz bass, or J-Bass, features two single-coil pickups.
Providing a more "Gibson-scale" instrument, rather than the Jazz and Precision, Fender produced the Mustang Bass, a scale-length instrument. The Fender VI, a 6-string bass, was tuned one octave lower than standard guitar tuning. It was released in 1961, and was briefly favored by Jack Bruce of Cream.
Gibson introduced its short-scale EB-3 in 1961, also used by Bruce. The EB-3 had a "mini-humbucker" at the bridge position. Gibson basses tended to be instruments with a shorter 30.5" scale length than the Precision. Gibson did not produce a -scale bass until 1963 with the release of the Thunderbird.
The first commercial fretless bass guitar was the Ampeg AUB-1, introduced in 1966. In the late 1960s, eight-string basses, with four octave paired courses (similar to a 12 string guitar), were introduced, such as the Hagström H8. 1970s In 1972, Alembic established what became known as "boutique" or "high-end" electric bass guitars. These expensive, custom-tailored instruments, as used by Phil Lesh, Jack Casady, and Stanley Clarke, featured unique designs, premium hand-finished wood bodies, and innovative construction techniques such as multi-laminate neck-through-body construction and graphite necks. Alembic also pioneered the use of onboard electronics for pre-amplification and equalization.
Active electronics increase the output of the instrument, and allow more options for controlling tonal flexibility, giving the player the ability to amplify as well as to attenuate certain frequency ranges while improving the overall frequency response (including more low-register and high-register sounds). 1976 saw the UK company Wal begin production of their own range of active basses. In 1974 Music Man Instruments, founded by Tom Walker, Forrest White and Leo Fender, introduced the StingRay, the first widely produced bass with active (powered) electronics built into the instrument. Basses with active electronics can include a preamplifier and knobs for boosting and cutting the low and high frequencies.
In the mid-1970s, five-string basses, with a very low "B" string, were introduced. In 1975, bassist Anthony Jackson commissioned luthier Carl Thompson to build a six-string bass tuned (low to high) B0, E1, A1, D2, G2, C3, adding a low B string and a high C string. See also
* Acoustic bass guitar
* Fretless bass
* Bass guitar tuning
* Bass instrument amplification
* Extended-range bass
* Bass effects
* Pickups
* List of bass guitar manufacturers
* List of bass guitarists
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Category:American inventions
Category:American musical instruments
Category:Amplified instruments
Category:Bass guitars
Category:Bass (sound)
Category:Blues instruments
Category:Contrabass instruments
Category:Electric bass guitars
Category:Folk music instruments
Category:Guitars
Category:Jazz instruments
Category:Rhythm section
Category:Rock music instruments
Category:String instruments
Category:Electric musical instruments | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bass_guitar | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.766484 |
3921 | Basketball | . Springfield, Massachusetts, U.S.
| registered | region Worldwide
| contact = Limited
| team = 5 per side:<br>point guard<br>shooting guard<br>small forward<br>power forward<br>center
| mgender = Yes, separate competitions
| type = Indoor/Outdoor
| category = Team sport, ball sport
| venue = Indoor court (mainly) or outdoor court (Streetball)
| glossary = Glossary of basketball
| ball = Basketball
| olympic = Yes, demonstrated in the 1904 and 1924 Summer Olympics<br>Part of the Summer Olympic program since 1936
| paralympic = Yes
}}
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's hoop (a basket in diameter mounted high to a backboard at each end of the court), while preventing the opposing team from shooting through their own hoop. A field goal is worth two points, unless made from behind the three-point line, when it is worth three. After a foul, timed play stops and the player fouled or designated to shoot a technical foul is given one, two or three one-point free throws. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins, but if regulation play expires with the score tied, an additional period of play (overtime) is mandated.
Players advance the ball by bouncing it while walking or running (dribbling) or by passing it to a teammate, both of which require considerable skill. On offense, players may use a variety of shotsthe layup, the jump shot, or a dunk; on defense, they may steal the ball from a dribbler, intercept passes, or block shots; either offense or defense may collect a rebound, that is, a missed shot that bounces from rim or backboard. It is a violation to lift or drag one's pivot foot without dribbling the ball, to carry it, or to hold the ball with both hands then resume dribbling.
The five players on each side fall into five playing positions. The tallest player is usually the center, the second-tallest and strongest is the power forward, a slightly shorter but more agile player is the small forward, and the shortest players or the best ball handlers are the shooting guard and the point guard, who implement the coach's game plan by managing the execution of offensive and defensive plays (player positioning). Informally, players may play three-on-three, two-on-two, and one-on-one.
Invented in 1891 by Canadian-American gym teacher James Naismith in Springfield, Massachusetts, in the United States, basketball has evolved to become one of the world's most popular and widely viewed sports. The National Basketball Association (NBA) is the most significant professional basketball league in the world in terms of popularity, salaries, talent, and level of competition (drawing most of its talent from U.S. college basketball). Outside North America, the top clubs from national leagues qualify to continental championships such as the EuroLeague and the Basketball Champions League Americas. The FIBA Basketball World Cup and Men's Olympic Basketball Tournament are the major international events of the sport and attract top national teams from around the world. Each continent hosts regional competitions for national teams, like EuroBasket and FIBA AmeriCup.
The FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup and women's Olympic basketball tournament feature top national teams from continental championships. The main North American league is the WNBA (NCAA Women's Division I Basketball Championship is also popular), whereas the strongest European clubs participate in the EuroLeague Women.
History
Early history
A game similar to basketball is mentioned in a 1591 book published in Frankfurt am Main that reports on the lifestyles and customs of coastal North American residents, (German; translates as Truthful Depictions of the Savages: "Among other things, a game of skill is described in which balls must be thrown against a target woven from twigs, mounted high on a pole. There's a small reward for the player if the target is being hit."
Creation
]]
In December 1891, James Naismith, a Canadian-American professor of physical education and instructor at the International Young Men's Christian Association Training School (now Springfield College) in Springfield, Massachusetts, was trying to keep his gym class active on a rainy day. He sought a vigorous indoor game to keep his students occupied and at proper levels of fitness during the long New England winters. After rejecting other ideas as either too rough or poorly suited to walled-in gymnasiums, he invented a new game in which players would pass a ball to teammates and try to score points by tossing the ball into a basket mounted on a wall.
]]
Naismith wrote the basic rules and nailed a peach basket onto an elevated track. Naismith initially set up the peach basket with its bottom intact, which meant that the ball had to be retrieved manually after each "basket" or point scored. This quickly proved tedious, so Naismith removed the bottom of the basket to allow the balls to be poked out with a long dowel after each scored basket.
Shortly after, Senda Berenson, instructor of physical culture at the nearby Smith College, went to Naismith to learn more about the game.
Basketball was originally played with a soccer ball. These round balls from "association football" were made, at the time, with a set of laces to close off the hole needed for inserting the inflatable bladder after the other sewn-together segments of the ball's cover had been flipped outside-in. These laces could cause bounce passes and dribbling to be unpredictable. Eventually a lace-free ball construction method was invented, and this change to the game was endorsed by Naismith (whereas in American football, the lace construction proved to be advantageous for gripping and remains to this day). The first balls made specifically for basketball were brown, and it was only in the late 1950s that Tony Hinkle, searching for a ball that would be more visible to players and spectators alike, introduced the orange ball that is now in common use. Dribbling was not part of the original game except for the "bounce pass" to teammates. Passing the ball was the primary means of ball movement. Dribbling was eventually introduced but limited by the asymmetric shape of early balls. Dribbling was common by 1896, with a rule against the double dribble by 1898.
The peach baskets were used until 1906 when they were finally replaced by metal hoops with backboards. A further change was soon made, so the ball merely passed through. Whenever a person got the ball in the basket, their team would gain a point. Whichever team got the most points won the game. The baskets were originally nailed to the mezzanine balcony of the playing court, but this proved impractical when spectators in the balcony began to interfere with shots. The backboard was introduced to prevent this interference; it had the additional effect of allowing rebound shots. Naismith's handwritten diaries, discovered by his granddaughter in early 2006, indicate that he was nervous about the new game he had invented, which incorporated rules from a children's game called duck on a rock, as many had failed before it.
Frank Mahan, one of the players from the original first game, approached Naismith after the Christmas break, in early 1892, asking him what he intended to call his new game. Naismith replied that he had not thought of it because he had been focused on just getting the game started. Mahan suggested that it be called "Naismith ball", at which he laughed, saying that a name like that would kill any game. Mahan then said, "Why not call it basketball?" Naismith replied, "We have a basket and a ball, and it seems to me that would be a good name for it." The first official game was played in the YMCA gymnasium in Albany, New York, on January 20, 1892, with nine players. The game ended at 1–0; the shot was made from , on a court just half the size of a present-day Streetball or National Basketball Association (NBA) court.
At the time, soccer was being played with 10 to a team (which was increased to 11). When winter weather got too icy to play soccer, teams were taken indoors, and it was convenient to have them split in half and play basketball with five on each side. By 1897–98, teams of five became standard.
College basketball
Basketball's early adherents were dispatched to YMCAs throughout the United States, and it quickly spread through the United States and Canada. By 1895, it was well established at several women's high schools. While YMCA was responsible for initially developing and spreading the game, within a decade it discouraged the new sport, as rough play and rowdy crowds began to detract from YMCA's primary mission. However, other amateur sports clubs, colleges, and professional clubs quickly filled the void. In the years before World War I, the Amateur Athletic Union and the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States (forerunner of the NCAA) vied for control over the rules for the game. The first pro league, the National Basketball League, was formed in 1898 to protect players from exploitation and to promote a less rough game. This league only lasted five years.
James Naismith was instrumental in establishing college basketball. His colleague C. O. Beamis fielded the first college basketball team just a year after the Springfield YMCA game at the suburban Pittsburgh Geneva College. Naismith himself later coached at the University of Kansas for six years, before handing the reins to renowned coach Forrest "Phog" Allen. Naismith's disciple Amos Alonzo Stagg brought basketball to the University of Chicago, while Adolph Rupp, a student of Naismith's at Kansas, enjoyed great success as coach at the University of Kentucky. On February 9, 1895, the first intercollegiate 5-on-5 game was played at Hamline University between Hamline and the School of Agriculture, which was affiliated with the University of Minnesota. The School of Agriculture won in a 9–3 game.
In 1901, colleges, including the University of Chicago, Columbia University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, the University of Minnesota, the U.S. Naval Academy, the University of Colorado and Yale University began sponsoring men's games. In 1905, frequent injuries on the football field prompted President Theodore Roosevelt to suggest that colleges form a governing body, resulting in the creation of the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States (IAAUS). In 1910, that body changed its name to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). The first Canadian interuniversity basketball game was played at YMCA in Kingston, Ontario on February 6, 1904, when McGill UniversityNaismith's alma matervisited Queen's University. McGill won 9–7 in overtime; the score was 7–7 at the end of regulation play, and a ten-minute overtime period settled the outcome. A good turnout of spectators watched the game.
The first men's national championship tournament, the National Association of Intercollegiate Basketball tournament, which still exists as the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) tournament, was organized in 1937. The first national championship for NCAA teams, the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) in New York, was organized in 1938; the NCAA national tournament began one year later. College basketball was rocked by gambling scandals from 1948 to 1951, when dozens of players from top teams were implicated in game-fixing and point shaving. Partially spurred by an association with cheating, the NIT lost support to the NCAA tournament.
High school basketball
and Powell High School girls teams, Wyoming, March 1944]]
Before widespread school district consolidation, most American high schools were far smaller than their present-day counterparts. During the first decades of the 20th century, basketball quickly became the ideal interscholastic sport due to its modest equipment and personnel requirements. In the days before widespread television coverage of professional and college sports, the popularity of high school basketball was unrivaled in many parts of America. Perhaps the most legendary of high school teams was Indiana's Franklin Wonder Five, which took the nation by storm during the 1920s, dominating Indiana basketball and earning national recognition.
Today virtually every high school in the United States fields a basketball team in varsity competition. Basketball's popularity remains high, both in rural areas where they carry the identification of the entire community, as well as at some larger schools known for their basketball teams where many players go on to participate at higher levels of competition after graduation. In the 2016–17 season, 980,673 boys and girls represented their schools in interscholastic basketball competition, according to the National Federation of State High School Associations. The states of Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky are particularly well known for their residents' devotion to high school basketball, commonly called Hoosier Hysteria in Indiana; the critically acclaimed film Hoosiers shows high school basketball's depth of meaning to these communities.
Girls Junior Basketball team, 1915–1916]]There is currently no tournament to determine a national high school champion. The most serious effort was the National Interscholastic Basketball Tournament at the University of Chicago from 1917 to 1930. The event was organized by Amos Alonzo Stagg and sent invitations to state champion teams. The tournament started out as a mostly Midwest affair but grew. In 1929 it had 29 state champions. Faced with opposition from the National Federation of State High School Associations and North Central Association of Colleges and Schools that bore a threat of the schools losing their accreditation the last tournament was in 1930. The organizations said they were concerned that the tournament was being used to recruit professional players from the prep ranks. The tournament did not invite minority schools or private/parochial schools.
The National Catholic Interscholastic Basketball Tournament ran from 1924 to 1941 at Loyola University. The National Catholic Invitational Basketball Tournament from 1954 to 1978 played at a series of venues, including Catholic University, Georgetown and George Mason. The National Interscholastic Basketball Tournament for Black High Schools was held from 1929 to 1942 at Hampton Institute. The National Invitational Interscholastic Basketball Tournament was held from 1941 to 1967 starting out at Tuskegee Institute. Following a pause during World War II it resumed at Tennessee State College in Nashville. The basis for the champion dwindled after 1954 when Brown v. Board of Education began an integration of schools. The last tournaments were held at Alabama State College from 1964 to 1967.Professional basketball
'' magazine promoting an exhibition in Harlem, March 1922. Drawing by Hugo Gellert]]
Teams abounded throughout the 1920s. There were hundreds of men's professional basketball teams in towns and cities all over the United States, and little organization of the professional game. Players jumped from team to team and teams played in armories and smoky dance halls. Leagues came and went. Barnstorming squads such as the Original Celtics and two all-African American teams, the New York Renaissance Five ("Rens") and the (still existing) Harlem Globetrotters played up to two hundred games a year on their national tours.
In 1946, the Basketball Association of America (BAA) was formed. The first game was played in Toronto, Ontario, Canada between the Toronto Huskies and New York Knickerbockers on November 1, 1946. Three seasons later, in 1949, the BAA merged with the National Basketball League (NBL) to form the National Basketball Association (NBA). By the 1950s, basketball had become a major college sport, thus paving the way for a growth of interest in professional basketball. In 1959, a basketball hall of fame was founded in Springfield, Massachusetts, site of the first game. Its rosters include the names of great players, coaches, referees and people who have contributed significantly to the development of the game. The hall of fame has people who have accomplished many goals in their career in basketball. An upstart organization, the American Basketball Association, emerged in 1967 and briefly threatened the NBA's dominance until the ABA-NBA merger in 1976. Today the NBA is the top professional basketball league in the world in terms of popularity, salaries, talent, and level of competition.
(#1) drives to the basket around Maya Moore (#23) in the Minnesota Lynx vs Chicago Sky game]]
The NBA has featured many famous players, including George Mikan, the first dominating "big man"; ball-handling wizard Bob Cousy and defensive genius Bill Russell of the Boston Celtics; charismatic center Wilt Chamberlain, who originally played for the barnstorming Harlem Globetrotters; all-around stars Oscar Robertson and Jerry West; more recent big men Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Shaquille O'Neal, Hakeem Olajuwon and Karl Malone; playmakers John Stockton, Isiah Thomas and Steve Nash; crowd-pleasing forwards Julius Erving and Charles Barkley; European stars Dirk Nowitzki, Pau Gasol and Tony Parker; Latin American stars Manu Ginobili, more recent superstars, Allen Iverson, Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Giannis Antetokounmpo, etc.; and the three players who many credit with ushering the professional game to its highest level of popularity during the 1980s and 1990s: Larry Bird, Earvin "Magic" Johnson, and Michael Jordan.
In 2001, the NBA formed a developmental league, the National Basketball Development League (later known as the NBA D-League and then the NBA G League after a branding deal with Gatorade). As of the 2023–24 season, the G League has 31 teams.
International basketball
]]
FIBA (International Basketball Federation) was formed in 1932 by eight founding nations: Argentina, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Portugal, Romania and Switzerland. At this time, the organization only oversaw amateur players. Its acronym, derived from the French Fédération Internationale de Basket-ball Amateur, was thus "FIBA". Men's basketball was first included at the Berlin 1936 Summer Olympics, although a demonstration tournament was held in 1904. The United States defeated Canada in the first final, played outdoors. This competition has usually been dominated by the United States, whose team has won all but three titles. The first of these came in a controversial final game in Munich in 1972 against the Soviet Union, in which the ending of the game was replayed three times until the Soviet Union finally came out on top. In 1950 the first FIBA World Championship for men, now known as the FIBA Basketball World Cup, was held in Argentina. Three years later, the first FIBA World Championship for women, now known as the FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup, was held in Chile. Women's basketball was added to the Olympics in 1976, which were held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada with teams such as the Soviet Union, Brazil and Australia rivaling the American squads.
In 1989, FIBA allowed professional NBA players to participate in the Olympics for the first time. Prior to the 1992 Summer Olympics, only European and South American teams were allowed to field professionals in the Olympics. The United States' dominance continued with the introduction of the original Dream Team. In the 2004 Athens Olympics, the United States suffered its first Olympic loss while using professional players, falling to Puerto Rico (in a 19-point loss) and Lithuania in group games, and being eliminated in the semifinals by Argentina. It eventually won the bronze medal defeating Lithuania, finishing behind Argentina and Italy. The Redeem Team, won gold at the 2008 Olympics, and the B-Team, won gold at the 2010 FIBA World Championship in Turkey despite featuring no players from the 2008 squad. The United States continued its dominance as they won gold at the 2012 Olympics, 2014 FIBA World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.
game in Moscow in 2018]]
Worldwide, basketball tournaments are held for boys and girls of all age levels. The global popularity of the sport is reflected in the nationalities represented in the NBA. Players from all six inhabited continents currently play in the NBA. Top international players began coming into the NBA in the mid-1990s, including Croatians Dražen Petrović and Toni Kukoč, Serbian Vlade Divac, Lithuanians Arvydas Sabonis and Šarūnas Marčiulionis, Dutchman Rik Smits and German Detlef Schrempf.
In the Philippines, the Philippine Basketball Association's first game was played on April 9, 1975, at the Araneta Coliseum in Cubao, Quezon City, Philippines. It was founded as a "rebellion" of several teams from the now-defunct Manila Industrial and Commercial Athletic Association, which was tightly controlled by the Basketball Association of the Philippines (now defunct), the then-FIBA recognized national association. Nine teams from the MICAA participated in the league's first season that opened on April 9, 1975. The NBL is Australia's pre-eminent men's professional basketball league. The league commenced in 1979, playing a winter season (April–September) and did so until the completion of the 20th season in 1998. The 1998–99 season, which commenced only months later, was the first season after the shift to the current summer season format (October–April). This shift was an attempt to avoid competing directly against Australia's various football codes. It features 8 teams from around Australia and one in New Zealand. A few players including Luc Longley, Andrew Gaze, Shane Heal, Chris Anstey and Andrew Bogut made it big internationally, becoming poster figures for the sport in Australia. The Women's National Basketball League began in 1981.
Women's basketball
on winning the 2006 FIBA World Championship for Women]]
Women began to play basketball in the fall of 1892 at Smith College through Senda Berenson, substitute director of the newly opened gymnasium and physical education teacher, after having modified the rules for women. Shortly after Berenson was hired at Smith, she visited Naismith to learn more about the game. Fascinated by the new sport and the values it could teach, she instantly introduced the game as a class exercise and soon after teams were organized. The first women's collegiate basketball game was played on March 21, 1893, when her Smith freshmen and sophomores played against one another. The first official women's interinstitutional game was played later that year between the University of California and the Miss Head's School. In 1899, a committee was established at the Conference of Physical Training in Springfield to draw up general rules for women's basketball. These rules, designed by Berenson, were published in 1899. These rules called for six to nine players per team and 11 officials. The International Women's Sports Federation (1924) included a women's basketball competition. 37 women's high school varsity basketball or state tournaments were held by 1925. And in 1926, the Amateur Athletic Union backed the first national women's basketball championship, complete with men's rules. The Grads also shone on several exhibition trips to Europe, and won four consecutive exhibition Olympics tournaments, in 1924, 1928, 1932, and 1936; however, women's basketball was not an official Olympic sport until 1976. The Grads' players were unpaid, and had to remain single. The Grads' style focused on team play, without overly emphasizing skills of individual players. The first women's AAU All-America team was chosen in 1929.
Rules and regulations
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Measurements and time limits discussed in this section often vary among tournaments and organizations; international and NBA rules are used in this section.
The object of the game is to outscore one's opponents by throwing the ball through the opponents' basket from above while preventing the opponents from doing so on their own. An attempt to score in this way is called a shot. A successful shot is worth two points, or three points if it is taken from beyond the three-point arc from the basket in international games and in NBA games. A one-point shot can be earned when shooting from the foul line after a foul is made. After a team has scored from a field goal or free throw, play is resumed with a throw-in awarded to the non-scoring team taken from a point beyond the endline of the court where the points were scored.
Playing regulations
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Games are played in four quarters of 10 (FIBA) or 12 minutes (NBA). College men's games use two 20-minute halves, college women's games use 10-minute quarters, and most United States high school varsity games use 8-minute quarters; however, this varies from state to state. 15 minutes are allowed for a half-time break under FIBA, NBA, and NCAA rules and 10 minutes in United States high schools. except for high school, which is four minutes in length. Substitutions are unlimited but can only be done when play is stopped. Teams also have a coach, who oversees the development and strategies of the team, and other team personnel such as assistant coaches, managers, statisticians, doctors and trainers.
For both men's and women's teams, a standard uniform consists of a pair of shorts and a jersey with a clearly visible number, unique within the team, printed on both the front and back. Players wear high-top sneakers that provide extra ankle support. Typically, team names, players' names and, outside of North America, sponsors are printed on the uniforms.
A limited number of time-outs, clock stoppages requested by a coach (or sometimes mandated in the NBA) for a short meeting with the players, are allowed. They generally last no longer than one minute (100 seconds in the NBA) unless, for televised games, a commercial break is needed.
The game is controlled by the officials consisting of the referee (referred to as crew chief in the NBA), one or two umpires (referred to as referees in the NBA) and the table officials. For college, the NBA, and many high schools, there are a total of three referees on the court. The table officials are responsible for keeping track of each team's scoring, timekeeping, individual and team fouls, player substitutions, team possession arrow, and the shot clock.
Equipment
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The only essential equipment in a basketball game is the ball and the court: a flat, rectangular surface with baskets at opposite ends. Competitive levels require the use of more equipment such as clocks, score sheets, scoreboards, alternating possession arrows, and whistle-operated stop-clock systems.
A regulation basketball court in international games is long and wide. In the NBA and NCAA the court is . The name and logo of the home team is usually painted on or around the center circle.
The basket is a steel rim diameter with an attached net affixed to a backboard that measures and one basket is at each end of the court. The white outlined box on the backboard is high and wide. At almost all levels of competition, the top of the rim is exactly above the court and inside the baseline. While variation is possible in the dimensions of the court and backboard, it is considered important for the basket to be of the correct height – a rim that is off by just a few inches can have an adverse effect on shooting. The net must "check the ball momentarily as it passes through the basket" to aid the visual confirmation that the ball went through. The act of checking the ball has the further advantage of slowing down the ball so the rebound does not go as far.
The size of the basketball is also regulated. For men, the official ball is in circumference (size 7, or a "295 ball") and weighs . If women are playing, the official basketball size is in circumference (size 6, or a "285 ball") with a weight of . In 3x3, a formalized version of the halfcourt 3-on-3 game, a dedicated ball with the circumference of a size 6 ball but the weight of a size 7 ball is used in all competitions (men's, women's, and mixed teams).
Violations
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The ball may be advanced toward the basket by being shot, passed between players, thrown, tapped, rolled or dribbled (bouncing the ball while running).
The ball must stay within the court; the last team to touch the ball before it travels out of bounds forfeits possession. The ball is out of bounds if it touches a boundary line, or touches any player or object that is out of bounds.
There are limits placed on the steps a player may take without dribbling, which commonly results in an infraction known as traveling. Nor may a player stop their dribble and then resume dribbling. A dribble that touches both hands is considered stopping the dribble, giving this infraction the name double dribble. Within a dribble, the player cannot carry the ball by placing their hand on the bottom of the ball; doing so is known as carrying the ball. A team, once having established ball control in the front half of their court, may not return the ball to the backcourt and be the first to touch it. A violation of these rules results in loss of possession.
The ball may not be kicked, nor be struck with the fist. For the offense, a violation of these rules results in loss of possession; for the defense, most leagues reset the shot clock and the offensive team is given possession of the ball out of bounds.
There are limits imposed on the time taken before progressing the ball past halfway (8 seconds in FIBA and the NBA; 10 seconds in NCAA and high school for both sexes), before attempting a shot (24 seconds in FIBA, the NBA, and U Sports (Canadian universities) play for both sexes, and 30 seconds in NCAA play for both sexes), holding the ball while closely guarded (5 seconds), and remaining in the restricted area known as the free-throw lane, (or the "key") (3 seconds). These rules are designed to promote more offense.
There are also limits on how players may block an opponent's field goal attempt or help a teammate's field goal attempt. Goaltending is a defender's touching of a ball that is on a downward flight toward the basket, while the related violation of basket interference is the touching of a ball that is on the rim or above the basket, or by a player reaching through the basket from below. Goaltending and basket interference committed by a defender result in awarding the basket to the offense, while basket interference committed by an offensive player results in cancelling the basket if one is scored. The defense gains possession in all cases of goaltending or basket interference.
Fouls
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An attempt to unfairly disadvantage an opponent through certain types of physical contact is illegal and is called a personal foul. These are most commonly committed by defensive players; however, they can be committed by offensive players as well. Players who are fouled either receive the ball to pass inbounds again, or receive one or more free throws if they are fouled in the act of shooting, depending on whether the shot was successful. One point is awarded for making a free throw, which is attempted from a line from the basket.
The referee is responsible for judging whether contact is illegal, sometimes resulting in controversy. The calling of fouls can vary between games, leagues and referees.
There is a second category of fouls called technical fouls, which may be charged for various rules violations including failure to properly record a player in the scorebook, or for unsportsmanlike conduct. These infractions result in one or two free throws, which may be taken by any of the five players on the court at the time. Repeated incidents can result in disqualification. A blatant foul involving physical contact that is either excessive or unnecessary is called an intentional foul (flagrant foul in the NBA). In FIBA and NCAA women's basketball, a foul resulting in ejection is called a disqualifying foul, while in leagues other than the NBA, such a foul is referred to as flagrant.
If a team exceeds a certain limit of team fouls in a given period (quarter or half) – four for NBA, NCAA women's, and international games – the opposing team is awarded one or two free throws on all subsequent non-shooting fouls for that period, the number depending on the league. In the US college men's game and high school games for both sexes, if a team reaches 7 fouls in a half, the opposing team is awarded one free throw, along with a second shot if the first is made. This is called shooting "one-and-one". If a team exceeds 10 fouls in the half, the opposing team is awarded two free throws on all subsequent fouls for the half.
When a team shoots foul shots, the opponents may not interfere with the shooter, nor may they try to regain possession until the last or potentially last free throw is in the air.
After a team has committed a specified number of fouls, the other team is said to be "in the bonus". On scoreboards, this is usually signified with an indicator light reading "Bonus" or "Penalty" with an illuminated directional arrow or dot indicating that team is to receive free throws when fouled by the opposing team. (Some scoreboards also indicate the number of fouls committed.)
If a team misses the first shot of a two-shot situation, the opposing team must wait for the completion of the second shot before attempting to reclaim possession of the ball and continuing play.
If a player is fouled while attempting a shot and the shot is unsuccessful, the player is awarded a number of free throws equal to the value of the attempted shot. A player fouled while attempting a regular two-point shot thus receives two shots, and a player fouled while attempting a three-point shot receives three shots.
If a player is fouled while attempting a shot and the shot is successful, typically the player will be awarded one additional free throw for one point. In combination with a regular shot, this is called a "three-point play" or "four-point play" (or more colloquially, an "and one") because of the basket made at the time of the foul (2 or 3 points) and the additional free throw (1 point).
Common techniques and practices
Positions
Although the rules do not specify any positions whatsoever, they have evolved as part of basketball. During the early years of basketball's evolution, two guards, two forwards, and one center were used. In more recent times specific positions evolved, but the current trend, advocated by many top coaches including Mike Krzyzewski, is towards positionless basketball, where big players are free to shoot from outside and dribble if their skill allows it. Popular descriptions of positions include:
Point guard (often called the "1") : usually the fastest player on the team, organizes the team's offense by controlling the ball and making sure that it gets to the right player at the right time.
Shooting guard (the "2") : creates a high volume of shots on offense, mainly long-ranged; and guards the opponent's best perimeter player on defense.
Small forward (the "3") : often primarily responsible for scoring points via cuts to the basket and dribble penetration; on defense seeks rebounds and steals, but sometimes plays more actively.
Power forward (the "4"): plays offensively often with their back to the basket; on defense, plays under the basket (in a zone defense) or against the opposing power forward (in man-to-man defense).
Center (the "5"): uses height and size to score (on offense), to protect the basket closely (on defense), or to rebound.
The above descriptions are flexible. For most teams today, the shooting guard and small forward have very similar responsibilities and are often called the wings, as do the power forward and center, who are often called post players. While most teams describe two players as guards, two as forwards, and one as a center, on some occasions teams choose to call them by different designations.
Strategy
There are two main defensive strategies: zone defense and man-to-man defense. In a zone defense, each player is assigned to guard a specific area of the court. Zone defenses often allow the defense to double team the ball, a manoeuver known as a trap. In a man-to-man defense, each defensive player guards a specific opponent.
Offensive plays are more varied, normally involving planned passes and movement by players without the ball. A quick movement by an offensive player without the ball to gain an advantageous position is known as a cut. A legal attempt by an offensive player to stop an opponent from guarding a teammate, by standing in the defender's way such that the teammate cuts next to him, is a screen or pick. The two plays are combined in the pick and roll, in which a player sets a pick and then "rolls" away from the pick towards the basket. Screens and cuts are very important in offensive plays; these allow the quick passes and teamwork, which can lead to a successful basket. Teams almost always have several offensive plays planned to ensure their movement is not predictable. On court, the point guard is usually responsible for indicating which play will occur.
Shooting
Shooting is the act of attempting to score points by throwing the ball through the basket, methods varying with players and situations.
Typically, a player faces the basket with both feet facing the basket. A player will rest the ball on the fingertips of the dominant hand (the shooting arm) slightly above the head, with the other hand supporting the side of the ball. The ball is usually shot by jumping (though not always) and extending the shooting arm. The shooting arm, fully extended with the wrist fully bent, is held stationary for a moment following the release of the ball, known as a follow-through. Players often try to put a steady backspin on the ball to absorb its impact with the rim. The ideal trajectory of the shot is somewhat controversial, but generally a proper arc is recommended. Players may shoot directly into the basket or may use the backboard to redirect the ball into the basket.
The two most common shots that use the above described setup are the set shot and the jump shot. Both are preceded by a crouching action which preloads the muscles and increases the power of the shot. In a set shot, the shooter straightens up and throws from a standing position with neither foot leaving the floor; this is typically used for free throws. For a jump shot, the throw is taken in mid-air with the ball being released near the top of the jump. This provides much greater power and range, and it also allows the player to elevate over the defender. Failure to release the ball before the feet return to the floor is considered a traveling violation.
Another common shot is called the layup. This shot requires the player to be in motion toward the basket, and to "lay" the ball "up" and into the basket, typically off the backboard (the backboard-free, underhand version is called a finger roll). The most crowd-pleasing and typically highest-percentage accuracy shot is the slam dunk, in which the player jumps very high and throws the ball downward, through the basket while touching it.
Another shot that is less common than the layup, is the "circus shot". The circus shot is a low-percentage shot that is flipped, heaved, scooped, or flung toward the hoop while the shooter is off-balance, airborne, falling down or facing away from the basket. A back-shot is a shot taken when the player is facing away from the basket, and may be shot with the dominant hand, or both; but there is a very low chance that the shot will be successful.
A shot that misses both the rim and the backboard completely is referred to as an air ball. A particularly bad shot, or one that only hits the backboard, is jocularly called a brick. The hang time is the length of time a player stays in the air after jumping, either to make a slam dunk, layup or jump shot.
Rebounding
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The objective of rebounding is to successfully gain possession of the basketball after a missed field goal or free throw, as it rebounds from the hoop or backboard. This plays a major role in the game, as most possessions end when a team misses a shot. There are two categories of rebounds: offensive rebounds, in which the ball is recovered by the offensive side and does not change possession, and defensive rebounds, in which the defending team gains possession of the loose ball. The majority of rebounds are defensive, as the team on defense tends to be in better position to recover missed shots; for example, about 75% of rebounds in the NBA are defensive.Passing<!-- Image with unknown copyright status removed: shown here with the Utah Jazz, left, passes to a teammate. ]] -->
A pass is a method of moving the ball between players. Most passes are accompanied by a step forward to increase power and are followed through with the hands to ensure accuracy.
A staple pass is the chest pass. The ball is passed directly from the passer's chest to the receiver's chest. A proper chest pass involves an outward snap of the thumbs to add velocity and leaves the defence little time to react.
Another type of pass is the bounce pass. Here, the passer bounces the ball crisply about two-thirds of the way from his own chest to the receiver. The ball strikes the court and bounces up toward the receiver. The bounce pass takes longer to complete than the chest pass, but it is also harder for the opposing team to intercept (kicking the ball deliberately is a violation). Thus, players often use the bounce pass in crowded moments, or to pass around a defender.
The overhead pass is used to pass the ball over a defender. The ball is released while over the passer's head.
The outlet pass occurs after a team gets a defensive rebound. The next pass after the rebound is the outlet pass.
The crucial aspect of any good pass is it being difficult to intercept. Good passers can pass the ball with great accuracy and they know exactly where each of their other teammates prefers to receive the ball. A special way of doing this is passing the ball without looking at the receiving teammate. This is called a no-look pass.
Another advanced style of passing is the behind-the-back pass, which, as the description implies, involves throwing the ball behind the passer's back to a teammate. Although some players can perform such a pass effectively, many coaches discourage no-look or behind-the-back passes, believing them to be difficult to control and more likely to result in turnovers or violations.
Dribbling
Dribbling is the act of bouncing the ball continuously with one hand and is a requirement for a player to take steps with the ball. To dribble, a player pushes the ball down towards the ground with the fingertips rather than patting it; this ensures greater control.
When dribbling past an opponent, the dribbler should dribble with the hand farthest from the opponent, making it more difficult for the defensive player to get to the ball. It is therefore important for a player to be able to dribble competently with both hands.
Good dribblers (or "ball handlers") tend to keep their dribbling hand low to the ground, reducing the distance of travel of the ball from the floor to the hand, making it more difficult for the defender to "steal" the ball. Good ball handlers frequently dribble behind their backs, between their legs, and switch directions suddenly, making a less predictable dribbling pattern that is more difficult to defend against. This is called a crossover, which is the most effective way to move past defenders while dribbling.
A skilled player can dribble without watching the ball, using the dribbling motion or peripheral vision to keep track of the ball's location. By not having to focus on the ball, a player can look for teammates or scoring opportunities, as well as avoid the danger of having someone steal the ball away from him/her.
Blocking
A block is performed when, after a shot is attempted, a defender succeeds in altering the shot by touching the ball. In almost all variants of play, it is illegal to touch the ball after it is in the downward path of its arc; this is known as goaltending. It is also illegal under NBA and Men's NCAA basketball to block a shot after it has touched the backboard, or when any part of the ball is directly above the rim. Under international rules it is illegal to block a shot that is in the downward path of its arc or one that has touched the backboard until the ball has hit the rim. After the ball hits the rim, it is again legal to touch it even though it is no longer considered as a block performed.
To block a shot, a player has to be able to reach a point higher than where the shot is released. Thus, height can be an advantage in blocking. Players who are taller and playing the power forward or center positions generally record more blocks than players who are shorter and playing the guard positions. However, with good timing and a sufficiently high vertical leap, even shorter players can be effective shot blockers.
Height
, a Finnish-American former professional center, is tall. Many professional centers' heights exceed .]]
At the professional level, most male players are above and most women above . Guards, for whom physical coordination and ball-handling skills are crucial, tend to be the smallest players. Almost all forwards in the top men's pro leagues are or taller. Most centers are over tall. According to a survey given to all NBA teams, the average height of all NBA players is just under , with the average weight being close to . The tallest players ever in the NBA were Manute Bol and Gheorghe Mureșan, who were both tall. At , Margo Dydek was the tallest player in the history of the WNBA.
The shortest player ever to play in the NBA is Muggsy Bogues at . Other average-height or relatively short players have thrived at the pro level, including Anthony "Spud" Webb, who was tall, but had a vertical leap, giving him significant height when jumping, and Temeka Johnson, who won the WNBA Rookie of the Year Award and a championship with the Phoenix Mercury while standing only . While shorter players are often at a disadvantage in certain aspects of the game, their ability to navigate quickly through crowded areas of the court and steal the ball by reaching low are strengths.
Players regularly inflate their height in high school or college. Many prospects exaggerate their height while in high school or college to make themselves more appealing to coaches and scouts, who prefer taller players. Charles Barkley stated; "I've been measured at 6–5, 6-. But I started in college at 6–6." Sam Smith, a former writer from the Chicago Tribune, said: "We sort of know the heights, because after camp, the sheet comes out. But you use that height, and the player gets mad. And then you hear from his agent. Or you file your story with the right height, and the copy desk changes it because they have the 'official' N.B.A. media guide, which is wrong. So you sort of go along with the joke."
Since the 2019–20 NBA season heights of NBA players are recorded definitively by measuring players with their shoes off.Variations and similar games
Variations of basketball are activities based on the game of basketball, using common basketball skills and equipment (primarily the ball and basket). Some variations only have superficial rule changes, while others are distinct games with varying degrees of influence from basketball. Other variations include children's games, contests or activities meant to help players reinforce skills.
An earlier version of basketball, played primarily by women and girls, was six-on-six basketball. Horseball is a game played on horseback where a ball is handled and points are scored by shooting it through a high net (approximately 1.5m×1.5m). The sport is like a combination of polo, rugby, and basketball. There is even a form played on donkeys known as Donkey basketball, which has attracted criticism from animal rights groups.
Half-court
Perhaps the single most common variation of basketball is the half-court game, played in informal settings without referees or strict rules. Only one basket is used, and the ball must be "taken back" or "cleared" – passed or dribbled outside the three-point line each time possession of the ball changes from one team to the other. Half-court games require less cardiovascular stamina, since players need not run back and forth a full court. Half-court raises the number of players that can use a court or, conversely, can be played if there is an insufficient number to form full 5-on-5 teams.
Half-court basketball is usually played 1-on-1, 2-on-2 or 3-on-3. The last of these variations is gradually gaining official recognition as 3x3, originally known as FIBA 33. It was first tested at the 2007 Asian Indoor Games in Macau and the first official tournaments were held at the 2009 Asian Youth Games and the 2010 Youth Olympics, both in Singapore. The first FIBA 3x3 Youth World Championships were held in Rimini, Italy in 2011, with the first FIBA 3x3 World Championships for senior teams following a year later in Athens. The sport is highly tipped to become an Olympic sport as early as 2016. In the summer of 2017, the BIG3 basketball league, a professional 3x3 half court basketball league that features former NBA players, began. The BIG3 features several rule variants including a four-point field goal. Other variations
Variations of basketball with their own page or subsection include:
* 21 (also known as American, cutthroat and roughhouse)
* 42
* Around the World
* Bounce
* Firing Squad
* Fives
* H-O-R-S-E
* Hotshot
* Knockout
* One-shot conquer
* Steal The Bacon
* Tip-it
* Tips
* "The One"
* Basketball War
* Water basketball
* Beach basketball
* Streetball
* One-on-one is a variation in which two players will use only a small section of the court (often no more than a half of a court) and compete to play the ball into a single hoop. Such games tend to emphasize individual dribbling and ball stealing skills over shooting and team play.
* Dunk Hoops is a variation played on basketball hoops with lowered (under basketball regulation 10 feet) rims. It originated when the popularity of the slam dunk grew and was developed to create better chances for dunks with lowered rims and using altered goaltending rules.
* Unicycle basketball is played using a regulation basketball on a regular basketball court with the same rules, for example, one must dribble the ball while riding. There are a number of rules that are particular to unicycle basketball as well, for example, a player must have at least one foot on a pedal when in-bounding the ball. Unicycle basketball is usually played using 24" or smaller unicycles, and using plastic pedals, both to preserve the court and the players' shins. Popular unicycle basketball games are organized in North America.
Spin-offs from basketball that are now separate sports include:
* Ringball, a traditional South African sport that stems from basketball, has been played since 1907. The sport is now promoted in South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho, India, and Mauritius to establish Ringball as an international sport.
* Korfball (Dutch: Korfbal, korf meaning 'basket') started in the Netherlands and is now played worldwide as a mixed-gender team ball game, similar to mixed netball and basketball.
* Netball is a limited-contact team sport in which two teams of seven try to score points against one another by placing a ball through a high hoop. Australia New Zealand champions (so called ANZ Championship) is very famous in Australia and New Zealand as the premier netball league. Formerly played exclusively by women, netball today features mixed-gender competitions.
* Slamball, invented by television writer Mason Gordon, is a full-contact sport featuring trampolines. The main difference from basketball is the court; below the padded rim and backboard are four trampolines set into the floor, which serve to propel players to great heights for slam dunks. The rules also permit some physical contact between the members of the four-player teams. Professional games of Slamball aired on Spike TV in 2002, and the sport has since expanded to China and other countries.
<gallery widths"200px" heights"160px">
File:Dan Hadani collection (990044347560205171).jpg|A basketball player in Israel, 1969
File:Girls play basketball in Dharmsala, India.jpg|Schoolgirls shooting hoops among the Himalayas in Dharamsala, India.
File:Sân trường THPT Phan Đình Phùng, Hà Nội.JPG|A basketball training course at the Phan Đình Phùng High School, Hanoi, Vietnam
File:MECVOLLEYBALL GROUND.JPG|A basketball court in Tamil Nadu, India
File:Kevyen liikenteen väylä Baana - G8537 - hkm.HKMS000005-km0000n5j4.jpg|A basketball court on Baana - Helsinki, Finland.
</gallery>
Social forms of basketball
Basketball as a social and communal sport features environments, rules and demographics different from those seen in professional and televised basketball.
Recreational basketball
Basketball is played widely as an extracurricular, intramural or amateur sport in schools and colleges. Notable institutions of recreational basketball include:
* Basketball schools and academies, where students are trained in developing basketball fundamentals, undergo fitness and endurance exercises and learn various basketball skills. Basketball students learn proper ways of passing, ball handling, dribbling, shooting from various distances, rebounding, offensive moves, defense, layups, screens, basketball rules and basketball ethics. Also popular are the basketball camps organized for various occasions, often to get prepared for basketball events, and basketball clinics for improving skills.
* College and university basketball played in educational institutions of higher learning. This includes National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) intercollegiate basketball.
Disabled basketball
* Deaf basketball: One of several deaf sports, deaf basketball relies on signing for communication. Any deaf sporting event that happens, its purpose is to serve as a catalyst for the socialization of a low-incidence and geographically dispersed population.
* Wheelchair basketball: A sport based on basketball but designed for disabled people in wheelchairs and considered one of the major disabled sports practiced. There is a functional classification system that is used to help determine if the wheelchair basketball player classification system reflects the existing differences in the performance of elite female players. This system gives an analysis of the players' functional resources through field-testing and game observation. During this system's process, players are assigned a score of 1 to 4.5.
Other forms
* Biddy basketball played by minors, sometimes in formal tournaments, around the globe.
* Midnight basketball, an initiative to curb inner-city crime in the United States and elsewhere by engaging youth in urban areas with sports as an alternative to drugs and crime.
* Rezball, short for reservation ball, is the avid Native American following of basketball, particularly a style of play particular to Native American teams of some areas.
Fantasy basketball
Fantasy basketball was popularized during the 1990s by ESPN Fantasy Sports, NBA.com, and Yahoo! Fantasy Sports. On the model of fantasy baseball and football, players create fictional teams, select professional basketball players to "play" on these teams through a mock draft or trades, then calculate points based on the players' real-world performance.
Basics of Fantasy Basketball
# League Setup:
#* You can join public leagues or create private leagues with friends.
#* Popular platforms include ESPN, Yahoo Sports, Sleeper, and Fantrax.
# Draft:
#* A draft (snake or auction) is held at the beginning of the season.
#* Participants select NBA players to form their teams.
# Scoring Formats:
#* Points League: Players earn points based on specific stats (e.g., 2 points per rebound, 1.5 points per assist).
#* Categories League: Teams compete in specific categories (e.g., best in assists, steals).
#* Rotisserie (Roto): Teams rank in each category, and rankings are combined to determine the overall score.
# Roster Management:
#* Teams set lineups daily or weekly, determining which players' stats will count.
#* You can trade players, pick up free agents, or drop underperforming players.
# Playoffs:
#* At the end of the regular NBA season, fantasy leagues often have playoffs to determine the champion.
See also
* Basketball moves
* Basketball National League
* Continental Basketball Association
* Glossary of basketball terms
* Index of basketball-related articles
* List of basketball films
* List of basketball leagues
* Timeline of women's basketball
* ULEB, Union des Ligues Européennes de Basket, in English Union of European Leagues of Basketball
References
Citations
General references
*
*
*
*
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
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Historical
* [http://www.hoophall.com/ Basketball Hall of Fame – Springfield, MA]
* [http://naismithbasketballfoundation.com/ National Basketball Foundation]runs the Naismith Museum in Ontario
* [http://www.virtualmuseum.ca/sgc-cms/histoires_de_chez_nous-community_memories/pm_v2.php?idstory_line&lgEnglish&fl0&ex00000534&sl4146&pos1 Hometown Sports Heroes]
Organizations
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100626134909/http://www.olympic.org/uk/sports/programme/index_uk.asp?SportCode=BK Basketball at the Olympic Games]
* [https://www.fiba.basketball International Basketball Federation]
* [http://www.nba.com/ National Basketball Association]
* [http://www.wnba.com/ Women's National Basketball Association]
* [http://www.cbahoopsonline.com/ Continental Basketball Association (oldest professional basketball league in the world)]
* [http://www.nwba.org/ National Wheelchair Basketball Association]
Other sources
* [https://www.britannica.com/sports/basketball "Basketball"]. Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
* [http://www.eurobasket.com/ Eurobasket website]
* [https://www.basketball-reference.com/ Basketball-Reference.com: Basketball Statistics, Analysis and History]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100902041518/http://www.ontarioplaques.com/Plaques_JKL/Plaque_Lanark03.html Ontario's Historical Plaques – Dr. James Naismith (1861–1939)]
}}
Category:Articles containing video clips
Category:Ball games
Category:Games and sports introduced in 1891
Category:Sports originating in the United States
Category:Summer Olympic sports
Category:Team sports | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basketball | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.809461 |
3926 | Blowfish (disambiguation) | Blowfish are species of fish in the family Tetraodontidae.
Blowfish may also refer to:
Porcupinefish, belonging to the family Diodontidae
Blowfish (cipher), an encryption algorithm
Blowfish (company), an American erotic goods supplier
The Blowfish, a satirical newspaper at Brandeis University
Lexington County Blowfish, a baseball team
Vice President Blowfish, a character in the animated series Adventure Time episode "President Porpoise Is Missing!"
See also
Hootie & the Blowfish, an American rock band | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowfish_(disambiguation) | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.817522 |
3928 | Ball | A ball is a round object (usually spherical, but can sometimes be ovoid) with several uses. It is used in ball games, where the play of the game follows the state of the ball as it is hit, kicked or thrown by players. Balls can also be used for simpler activities, such as catch or juggling. Balls made from hard-wearing materials are used in engineering applications to provide very low friction bearings, known as ball bearings. Black-powder weapons use stone and metal balls as projectiles.
Although many types of balls are today made from rubber, this form was unknown outside the Americas until after the voyages of Columbus. The Spanish were the first Europeans to see the bouncing rubber balls (although solid and not inflated) which were employed most notably in the Mesoamerican ballgame. Balls used in various sports in other parts of the world prior to Columbus were made from other materials such as animal bladders or skins, stuffed with various materials.
As balls are one of the most familiar spherical objects to humans, the word "ball" may refer to or describe spherical or near-spherical objects.
"Ball" is used metaphorically sometimes to denote something spherical or spheroid, e.g., armadillos and human beings curl up into a ball, making a fist into a ball.
Etymology
The first known use of the word ball in English in the sense of a globular body that is played with was in 1205 in ''Layamon's Brut, or Chronicle of Britain in the phrase, "" ("Some of them drove balls far across the fields.") The word came from the Middle English bal (inflected as ball-e, -es), in turn from Old Norse böllr (pronounced ; compare Old Swedish baller, and Swedish boll) from Proto-Germanic ballu-z (whence probably Middle High German bal, ball-es, Middle Dutch bal), a cognate with Old High German ballo, pallo, Middle High German balle from Proto-Germanic *ballon (weak masculine), and Old High German ballâ, pallâ, Middle High German balle, Proto-Germanic *ballôn (weak feminine). No Old English representative of any of these is known. (The answering forms in Old English would have been beallu, -a, -e—compare bealluc, ballock.) If ball- was native in Germanic, it may have been a cognate with the Latin foll-is in sense of a "thing blown up or inflated." In the later Middle English spelling balle the word coincided graphically with the French balle "ball" and "bale" which has hence been erroneously assumed to be its source. French balle (but not boule) is assumed to be of Germanic origin, itself, however. In Ancient Greek the word πάλλα (palla) for "ball" is attested besides the word σφαίρα (sfaíra), sphere.History
balls (), 12th-13th century.]]
Some form of game with a ball is found portrayed on Egyptian monuments. In Homer, Nausicaa was playing at ball with her maidens when Odysseus first saw her in the land of the Phaeacians (Od. vi. 100). And Halios and Laodamas performed before Alcinous and Odysseus with ball play, accompanied with dancing (Od. viii. 370).
Ancient Greeks
Among the ancient Greeks, games with balls (σφαῖραι) were regarded as a useful subsidiary to the more violent athletic exercises, as a means of keeping the body supple, and rendering it graceful, but were generally left to boys and girls. Of regular rules for the playing of ball games, little trace remains, if there were any such. The names in Greek for various forms, which have come down to us in such works as the Ὀνομαστικόν of Julius Pollux, imply little or nothing of such; thus, ἀπόρραξις (aporraxis) only means the putting of the ball on the ground with the open hand, οὐρανία (ourania), the flinging of the ball in the air to be caught by two or more players; φαινίνδα (phaininda'') would seem to be a game of catch played by two or more, where feinting is used as a test of quickness and skill. Pollux (i. x. 104) mentions a game called episkyros (ἐπίσκυρος), which has often been looked on as the origin of football. It seems to have been played by two sides, arranged in lines; how far there was any form of "goal" seems uncertain. It was impossible to produce a ball that was perfectly spherical; children usually made their own balls by inflating pig's bladders and heating them in the ashes of a fire to make them rounder,
Ancient Romans
Among the Romans, ball games were looked upon as an adjunct to the bath, and were graduated to the age and health of the bathers, and usually a place (sphaeristerium) was set apart for them in the baths (thermae). There appear to have been three types or sizes of ball, the pila, or small ball, used in catching games, the paganica, a heavy ball stuffed with feathers, and the follis, a leather ball filled with air, the largest of the three. This was struck from player to player, who wore a kind of gauntlet on the arm. There was a game known as trigon, played by three players standing in the form of a triangle, and played with the follis, and also one known as harpastum, which seems to imply a "scrimmage" among several players for the ball. These games are known to us through the Romans, though the names are Greek. Depressurized balls lack bounce and are often termed "dead". In extreme cases, a dead ball becomes flaccid. If the ball is pressured on use, there are generally rules about how the ball is pressurized before the match, and when (or whether) the ball can be repressurized or replaced.
Due to the ideal gas law, ball pressure is a function of temperature, generally tracking ambient conditions. Softer balls that are struck hard (especially squash balls) increase in temperature due to inelastic collision.
In outdoor sports, wet balls play differently than dry balls. In indoor sports, balls may become damp due to hand sweat. Any form of humidity or dampness will affect a ball's surface friction, which will alter a player's ability to impart spin on the ball. The action required to apply spin to a ball is governed by the physics of angular momentum. Spinning balls travelling through air (technically a fluid) will experience the Magnus effect, which can produce lateral deflections in addition to the normal up-down curvature induced by a combination of wind resistance and gravity.
<gallery>
File:Green Rubber Band Ball.jpg|Rubber band ball
File:Black Super Ball.jpg|Super Ball
File:A cherry utility ball in a field (cropped).jpg|Utility ball
File:Sponge Ball.jpg|Sponge ball
</gallery>
Specifications
{| class="wikitable sticky-header"
|+
!Sport
!Regulated by
!Shape
!Circumferency
!Diameter
!Weight
!Pressure
!Bounce
!Material
!Image
|-
|Basketball
|FIBA
|Sphere
|75-77 centimeters
| -
|580-620 grams
|
|1.035-1.085 meters dropped from height of 1.8 meters
|leather, artificial/composite/synthetic leather
|
|-
|Bowling
|IBF
|Sphere
|
|
|
| -
|
|non-metallic
|
|-
|Cycle ball
|UCI
|Sphere
| -
|17-18 centimeters
|500-600 grams
| -
|
|textile (case)
|
|-
|Goalball
|IBSA
|Sphere
|75.5-78.5 centimeters
|24-25 centimeters
|1200-1300 grams
|
|
|Natural rubber with internal bells
|
|-
|Golf
|IGF
|Sphere
| -
|
|
| -
|
|elastomeric material
|
|-
|Sepaktakraw
|ISTAF
|Sphere
|41-43 centimeters
| -
|170-180 grams
| -
|
|woven synthetic fiber
|
|-
|Gaelic games
|GAA
|Sphere
| -
|0.69-0.72 centimeters
|110-116 grams
| -
|
|leather (case)
|
|-
|Tchoukball
|FITB
|Sphere
|58-60 centimeters
| -
|425-475 grams
|
|
|
|
|-
|Waterpolo and Canoe Polo
|World Aquatics
|Sphere
|68-71 centimeters
| -
|400-450 grams
|
|
|
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Bat and ball sports
|-
|Baseball
| rowspan="3" |WBSC
| rowspan="3" |Sphere
|
| -
|
| -
|
|
* cork or rubber (core)
* yarn
* white horsehide or cowhide (case)
|
|-
|Softball
|
| -
|
| -
|0.47 e
|
* long fiber kapok, mixture of cork and rubber or polyurethane mixture (core)
* twisted yarn and covered with latex or rubber cement
* horsehide or cowhide (case)
|
|-
|Baseball5
|20.84 centimeters
|6.64 centimeters
|84,8 grams
| (to press the ball into the center of inside by 30%)
|76 centimeters (from 150 centimeters in height, drop to marble floor)
|natural rubber
|
|-
|Pêl-Fas
|IBB
|Sphere
|
| -
|
|
|
|
|
|-
|Pesäpallo
|Finnish Pesäpallo Association
|Sphere
|
| -
|
|
|
|
|
|-
|Cricket
|ICC
|Sphere
|
| -
|
| -
|
|
|
|-
|Oină
|Romanian Oină Federation
|Sphere
|24 centimeters
|8 centimeters
|140 grams
|
|
|
* livestock hair
* leather (case)
|
|-
|Schlagball
|
|Sphere
|19-21 centimeters
| -
|70-85 grams
| -
|
|red leather covered
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Boules
|-
|Boccia
|BISFed
|Sphere
|26.2-27.8 cm
| -
|263-287 grames
| -
|
|vinyl, polyurethane fabric, leather, synthetic leather, suede
|
|-
|Bocce volo (bowl)
| rowspan="6" |WPBF
| rowspan="6" |Sphere
| rowspan="2" | -
|8.9-11.1 centimeters
|900-1200 grams
| rowspan="2" | -
|
|metal or synthetic
|
|-
|Bocce volo (jack)
|3.5-3.7 centimeters
|23-27 grams
|
|wood
|
|-
|Petanque (boule)
| rowspan="2" | -
|7.05-8 centimeters
|650-800 grams
| rowspan="2" | -
|
|metal
| rowspan="2" |
|-
|Petanque (jack)
|2.9-3.1 centimeters
|10-18 grams
|
|wood or synthetic
|-
|Raffa (bowl)
| rowspan="2" | -
|10.55-10.75 centimeters
|895-925 grams
| rowspan="2" | -
|
| rowspan="2" |synthetic
|
|-
|Raffa (pallino)
|3.9-4.1 centimeters
|83-97 grams
|
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Cue sports
|-
|Carom
| rowspan="3" |WCBS
| rowspan="3" |Sphere
| -
|6.1-6.15
centimeters
|205-220 grams
| -
|
|
|
|-
|Pool
| -
|
|
| -
|
|cast phenolic resin plastic
|
|-
|Snooker
| -
|5.2-5.3 centimeters
| -
| -
|
|
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Football codes
|-
|American
|IFAF
| rowspan"2" |Lemon
| (longitudinal) ×
(transversal)
| (longitudinal)
| rowspan="2" |
| rowspan="2" |
|
|urethane (bladder), case (leather)
|
|-
|Canadian
|Football Canada
| (longitudinal)
(transversal)
| (longitudinal)
(transversal)
|
|
|
|-
|Soccer
| rowspan="3" |FIFA
| rowspan="3" |Sphere
|
| -
|
|
| -
| -
|
|-
|Beach soccer
|68-70 centimeters
| -
| rowspan="2" |400-440 grams
|
| -
| -
|
|-
|Futsal
|62-64 centimeters
| -
|
|50-65 centimeters on the first rebound when dropped from a height of 2 meters
| -
|
|-
|Australian rules
|AFL Commission
|Prolate spheroid
|72 – 73 cm (elliptic) ×
54.5 -55.5 cm (circular)
| -
| -
|69 kilopascals
|
| -
|
|-
|Gaelic and International rules
|GAA
|Sphere
|68-70 centimeters
| -
|480-500 grams
|
|0.5222-0.576 e when dropped from 1.8 meters
| -
|
|-
|Rugby league
|IRL
| rowspan="2" |Prolate spheroid
|
|
|
|
|
|leather
|
|-
|Rugby union
|World Rugby
|74 - 77 centimeters (elliptic) ×
58 - 62 centimeters (circular)
|28-30 centimeters (longitudinal)
|410 - 460 grams
|
|
|leather or synthetic material
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Handball
|-
|Indoor (with resine)
| rowspan="3" |IHF
| rowspan="3" |Sphere
|58-60 centimeters
| -
|425-475 grams
|
|
| rowspan="2" |leather or synthetic
| rowspan="2" |
|-
|Indoor (without resine)
|55.5-57.5 centimeters
| -
|400-425 grams
|
|
|-
|Beach
|54-56 centimeters
| -
|350-370 grams
|
|
|rubber
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Hockey
|-
|Bandy and Rink bandy
|FIB
|Sphere
| -
|6.1-6.5 centimeters
|60-65 grams
| -
|15-30 centimeters on ice dropped from height of 1.5 meters
| -
|
|-
|Field and indoor
| rowspan="2" |FIH
| rowspan="2" |Sphere
|22.4-23.5 centimeters
| -
|156-163 grams
| -
|
| -
|
|-
|Beach
|45 centimeters
| -
|140-250 grams
| -
|
| -
|
|-
|Roller
|World Skate
|Sphere
| -
|7.2 centimeters
|145-155 grams
| -
|
|pressed rubber/plastic
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Lacrosse
|-
|Field and Box
| rowspan="3" |World Lacrosse
| rowspan="3" |Sphere
|
| -
|
| -
| on wooden floor from height of
|rubber
|
|-
|Sixes
|19.7-20.3 centimeters
| -
| -
| -
|
| rowspan="2" |elastomeric
|
|-
|Women
|20-20.3 centimeters
| -
|142-149 grams
| -
|1.1-1.3 meters on wooden floor dropped from height of 1.8 meters
|
|-
|Intercrosse
|
|Sphere
|23-25 centimeters
| -
|80-100 grams
| -
|
|rubber
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Polo
|-
|Polo
| rowspan="2" |FIP
| rowspan="2" |Sphere
| -
|
|
| -
|
|
|
|-
|Snow
|
| -
|
|
|
|
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Racquet sports
|-
|Squash
|WSF
|Sphere
| -
|3.95-4.05 centimeters
|23-25 grams
|
|
| -
|
|-
|Table tennis
|ITTF
|Sphere
| -
|4 centimeters
|2.7 grams
| -
|
|plastic
|
|-
|Tennis
|ITF
|Sphere
| -
|
|
|
|
|
|
|-
| colspan="10" |Volleyball
|-
|Volleyball
| rowspan="2" |FIVB
| rowspan="2" |Sphere
|65-67 centimeters
| -
| rowspan="2" |260 - 280 grams
|
|
| rowspan="2" |rubber (bladder), leather or synthetic leather (case)
|
|-
|Beach and Snow
|66-68 centimeters
| -
|17.1-22.1 kilopascals
|
|
|}
See also
* Ball (mathematics)
* Buckminster Fullerene "Bucky balls"
* Dryer ball, used in a tumbling dryer
* Football (ball)
* Hockey puck, can also spin, bounce, and roll
* Kickball
* Marbles
* Penny floater
* Prisoner Ball
* Shuttlecock
* Super Ball
References
External links
*
Category:Spheres | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ball | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.867556 |
3931 | Binary relation | In mathematics, a binary relation associates elements of one set called the domain with elements of another set called the codomain. Precisely, a binary relation over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> is a set of ordered pairs <math>(x, y)</math> where <math>x</math> is in <math>X</math> and <math>y</math> is in <math>Y</math>. It encodes the common concept of relation: an element <math>x</math> is related to an element <math>y</math>, if and only if the pair <math>(x, y)</math> belongs to the set of ordered pairs that defines the binary relation.
An example of a binary relation is the "divides" relation over the set of prime numbers <math>\mathbb{P}</math> and the set of integers <math>\mathbb{Z}</math>, in which each prime <math>p</math> is related to each integer <math>z</math> that is a multiple of <math>p</math>, but not to an integer that is not a multiple of <math>p</math>. In this relation, for instance, the prime number <math>2</math> is related to numbers such as <math>-4</math>, <math>0</math>, <math>6</math>, <math>10</math>, but not to <math>1</math> or <math>9</math>, just as the prime number <math>3</math> is related to <math>0</math>, <math>6</math>, and <math>9</math>, but not to <math>4</math> or <math>13</math>.
Binary relations, and especially homogeneous relations, are used in many branches of mathematics to model a wide variety of concepts. These include, among others:
* the "is greater than", "is equal to", and "divides" relations in arithmetic;
* the "is congruent to" relation in geometry;
* the "is adjacent to" relation in graph theory;
* the "is orthogonal to" relation in linear algebra.
A function may be defined as a binary relation that meets additional constraints. Binary relations are also heavily used in computer science.
A binary relation over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> is an element of the power set of <math>X \times Y.</math> Since the latter set is ordered by inclusion (<math>\subseteq</math>), each relation has a place in the lattice of subsets of <math>X \times Y.</math> A binary relation is called a homogeneous relation when <math>X Y</math>. A binary relation is also called a heterogeneous relation when it is not necessary that <math>X Y</math>.
Since relations are sets, they can be manipulated using set operations, including union, intersection, and complementation, and satisfying the laws of an algebra of sets. Beyond that, operations like the converse of a relation and the composition of relations are available, satisfying the laws of a calculus of relations, for which there are textbooks by Ernst Schröder, Clarence Lewis, and Gunther Schmidt. A deeper analysis of relations involves decomposing them into subsets called concepts, and placing them in a complete lattice.
In some systems of axiomatic set theory, relations are extended to classes, which are generalizations of sets. This extension is needed for, among other things, modeling the concepts of "is an element of" or "is a subset of" in set theory, without running into logical inconsistencies such as Russell's paradox.
A binary relation is the most studied special case <math>n 2</math> of an <math>n</math>-ary relation over sets <math>X_1, \dots, X_n</math>, which is a subset of the Cartesian product <math>X_1 \times \cdots \times X_n.</math> The set <math>X</math> is called the |groupnote}} The or
When <math>X Y,</math> a binary relation is called a (or ). To emphasize the fact that <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are allowed to be different, a binary relation is also called a heterogeneous relation. The prefix hetero is from the Greek ἕτερος (heteros, "other, another, different").
A heterogeneous relation has been called a rectangular relation,
The terms correspondence, dyadic relation<!---Dyadic relation---> and two-place relation<!---Two-place relation---> are synonyms for binary relation, though some authors use the term "binary relation" for any subset of a Cartesian product <math>X \times Y</math> without reference to <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>, and reserve the term "correspondence" for a binary relation with reference to <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>.
In a binary relation, the order of the elements is important; if <math>x \neq y</math> then <math>yRx</math> can be true or false independently of <math>xRy</math>. For example, <math>3</math> divides <math>9</math>, but <math>9</math> does not divide <math>3</math>.
Operations
Union
<!---This definition should appear before the closure defs, which refer to it:--->
If <math>R</math> and <math>S</math> are binary relations over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> then <math>R \cup S = \{ (x, y) \mid xRy \text{ or } xSy \}</math> is the of <math>R</math> and <math>S</math> over <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>.
The identity element is the empty relation. For example, <math>\leq</math> is the union of < and , and <math>\geq</math> is the union of > and.
Intersection
If <math>R</math> and <math>S</math> are binary relations over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> then <math>R \cap S = \{ (x, y) \mid xRy \text{ and } xSy \}</math> is the of <math>R</math> and <math>S</math> over <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>.
The identity element is the universal relation. For example, the relation "is divisible by 6" is the intersection of the relations "is divisible by 3" and "is divisible by 2".
Composition
If <math>R</math> is a binary relation over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>, and <math>S</math> is a binary relation over sets <math>Y</math> and <math>Z</math> then <math>S \circ R = \{ (x, z) \mid \text{ there exists } y \in Y \text{ such that } xRy \text{ and } ySz \}</math> (also denoted by <math>R; S</math>) is the of <math>R</math> and <math>S</math> over <math>X</math> and <math>Z</math>.
The identity element is the identity relation. The order of <math>R</math> and <math>S</math> in the notation <math>S \circ R,</math> used here agrees with the standard notational order for composition of functions. For example, the composition (is parent of)<math>\circ</math>(is mother of) yields (is maternal grandparent of), while the composition (is mother of)<math>\circ</math>(is parent of) yields (is grandmother of). For the former case, if <math>x</math> is the parent of <math>y</math> and <math>y</math> is the mother of <math>z</math>, then <math>x</math> is the maternal grandparent of <math>z</math>.
Converse
If <math>R</math> is a binary relation over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> then <math>R^\textsf{T} = \{ (y, x) \mid xRy \}</math> is the , also called , of <math>R</math> over <math>Y</math> and <math>X</math>.
For example, <math></math> is the converse of itself, as is <math>\neq</math>, and <math><</math> and <math>></math> are each other's converse, as are <math>\leq</math> and <math>\geq.</math> A binary relation is equal to its converse if and only if it is symmetric. Complement
If <math>R</math> is a binary relation over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> then <math>\bar{R} = \{ (x, y) \mid \neg xRy \}</math> (also denoted by <math>\neg R</math>) is the of <math>R</math> over <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>.
For example, <math>=</math> and <math>\neq</math> are each other's complement, as are <math>\subseteq</math> and <math>\not \subseteq</math>, <math>\supseteq</math> and <math>\not \supseteq</math>, <math>\in</math> and <math>\not \in</math>, and for total orders also <math><</math> and <math>\geq</math>, and <math>></math> and <math>\leq</math>.
The complement of the converse relation <math>R^\textsf{T}</math> is the converse of the complement: <math>\overline{R^\mathsf{T}} = \bar{R}^\mathsf{T}.</math>
If <math>X = Y,</math> the complement has the following properties:
* If a relation is symmetric, then so is the complement.
* The complement of a reflexive relation is irreflexive—and vice versa.
* The complement of a strict weak order is a total preorder—and vice versa.
Restriction
If <math>R</math> is a binary homogeneous relation over a set <math>X</math> and <math>S</math> is a subset of <math>X</math> then <math>R_{\vert S} = \{ (x, y) \mid xRy \text{ and } x \in S \text{ and } y \in S \}</math> is the }} of <math>R</math> to <math>S</math> over <math>X</math>.
If <math>R</math> is a binary relation over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> and if <math>S</math> is a subset of <math>X</math> then <math>R_{\vert S} \{ (x, y) \mid xRy \text{ and } x \in S \}</math> is the }} of <math>R</math> to <math>S</math> over <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>.
If a relation is reflexive, irreflexive, symmetric, antisymmetric, asymmetric, transitive, total, trichotomous, a partial order, total order, strict weak order, total preorder (weak order), or an equivalence relation, then so too are its restrictions.
However, the transitive closure of a restriction is a subset of the restriction of the transitive closure, i.e., in general not equal. For example, restricting the relation "<math>x</math> is parent of <math>y</math>" to females yields the relation "<math>x</math> is mother of the woman <math>y</math>"; its transitive closure does not relate a woman with her paternal grandmother. On the other hand, the transitive closure of "is parent of" is "is ancestor of"; its restriction to females does relate a woman with her paternal grandmother.
Also, the various concepts of completeness (not to be confused with being "total") do not carry over to restrictions. For example, over the real numbers a property of the relation <math>\leq</math> is that every non-empty subset <math>S \subseteq \R</math> with an upper bound in <math>\R</math> has a least upper bound (also called supremum) in <math>\R.</math> However, for the rational numbers this supremum is not necessarily rational, so the same property does not hold on the restriction of the relation <math>\leq</math> to the rational numbers.
<!---This definition is needed by the closure defs, too, but maybe should better given in an earlier section(?):--->
A binary relation <math>R</math> over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> is said to be }} a relation <math>S</math> over <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math>, written <math>R \subseteq S,</math> if <math>R</math> is a subset of <math>S</math>, that is, for all <math>x \in X</math> and <math>y \in Y,</math> if <math>xRy</math>, then <math>xSy</math>. If <math>R</math> is contained in <math>S</math> and <math>S</math> is contained in <math>R</math>, then <math>R</math> and <math>S</math> are called written <math>R S</math>. If <math>R</math> is contained in <math>S</math> but <math>S</math> is not contained in <math>R</math>, then <math>R</math> is said to be }} than <math>S</math>, written <math>R \subsetneq S.</math> For example, on the rational numbers, the relation <math>></math> is smaller than <math>\geq</math>, and equal to the composition <math>> \circ ></math>. Matrix representation Binary relations over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> can be represented algebraically by logical matrices indexed by <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> with entries in the Boolean semiring (addition corresponds to OR and multiplication to AND) where matrix addition corresponds to union of relations, matrix multiplication corresponds to composition of relations (of a relation over <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> and a relation over <math>Y</math> and <math>Z</math>), the Hadamard product corresponds to intersection of relations, the zero matrix corresponds to the empty relation, and the matrix of ones corresponds to the universal relation. Homogeneous relations (when <math>X Y</math>) form a matrix semiring (indeed, a matrix semialgebra over the Boolean semiring) where the identity matrix corresponds to the identity relation. Examples {| class"wikitable" style="float: right; margin-left:1em; text-align:center;"
|+ 2nd example relation
!
! scope="col" | ball
! scope="col" | car
! scope="col" | doll
! scope="col" | cup
|-
! scope="row" | John
| + || − || − || −
|-
! scope="row" | Mary
| − || − || + || −
|-
! scope="row" | Venus
| − || + || − || −
|}
{| class"wikitable" style"float: right; margin-left:1em; text-align:center;"
|+ 1st example relation
!
! scope="col" | ball
! scope="col" | car
! scope="col" | doll
! scope="col" | cup
|-
! scope="row" | John
| + || − || − || −
|-
! scope="row" | Mary
| − || − || + || −
|-
! scope="row" | Ian
| − || − || − || −
|-
! scope="row" | Venus
| − || + || − || −
|}
{{olist
|1The following example shows that the choice of codomain is important. Suppose there are four objects <math>A \{ \text{ball, car, doll, cup} \}</math> and four people <math>B \{ \text{John, Mary, Ian, Venus} \}.</math> A possible relation on <math>A</math> and <math>B</math> is the relation "is owned by", given by <math>R \{ (\text{ball, John}), (\text{doll, Mary}), (\text{car, Venus}) \}.</math> That is, John owns the ball, Mary owns the doll, and Venus owns the car. Nobody owns the cup and Ian owns nothing; see the 1st example. As a set, <math>R</math> does not involve Ian, and therefore <math>R</math> could have been viewed as a subset of <math>A \times \{ \text{John, Mary, Venus} \},</math> i.e. a relation over <math>A</math> and <math>\{ \text{John, Mary, Venus} \};</math> see the 2nd example. But in that second example, <math>R</math> contains no information about the ownership by Ian.
While the 2nd example relation is surjective (see below), the 1st is not.
"wikitable" style"float: right; margin-left:1em; text-align:center;"
|+Ocean borders continent
!
! scope"col" | NA
! scope"col" | SA
! scope"col" | AF
! scope"col" | EU
! scope"col" | AS
! scope"col" | AU
! scope"col" | AA
|-
! scope"row" | Indian
|0||0||1||0||1||1||1
|-
! scope"row" | Arctic
|1||0||0||1||1||0||0
|-
! scope"row" | Atlantic
|1||1||1||1||0||0||1
|-
! scope"row" | Pacific
|1||1||0||0||1||1||1
|}
}}
|2Let <math>A \{\text{Indian}, \text{Arctic}, \text{Atlantic}, \text{Pacific}\}</math>, the oceans of the globe, and <math>B = \{\text{NA}, \text{SA}, \text{AF}, \text{EU}, \text{AS}, \text{AU}, \text{AA}\}</math>, the continents. Let <math>aRb</math> represent that ocean <math>a</math> borders continent <math>b</math>. Then the logical matrix for this relation is:
:<math>R = \begin{pmatrix} 0 & 0 & 1 & 0 & 1 & 1 & 1 \\ 1 & 0 & 0 & 1 & 1 & 0 & 0 \\ 1 & 1 & 1 & 1 & 0 & 0 & 1 \\ 1 & 1 & 0 & 0 & 1 & 1 & 1 \end{pmatrix} .</math>
The connectivity of the planet Earth can be viewed through <math>R R^\mathsf{T}</math> and <math>R^\mathsf{T} R</math>, the former being a <math>4 \times 4</math> relation on <math>A</math>, which is the universal relation (<math>A \times A</math> or a logical matrix of all ones). This universal relation reflects the fact that every ocean is separated from the others by at most one continent. On the other hand, <math>R^\mathsf{T} R</math> is a relation on <math>B \times B</math> which fails to be universal because at least two oceans must be traversed to voyage from Europe to Australia.
|3= Visualization of relations leans on graph theory: For relations on a set (homogeneous relations), a directed graph illustrates a relation and a graph a symmetric relation. For heterogeneous relations a hypergraph has edges possibly with more than two nodes, and can be illustrated by a bipartite graph.
Just as the clique is integral to relations on a set, so bicliques are used to describe heterogeneous relations; indeed, they are the "concepts" that generate a lattice associated with a relation.
|4= Hyperbolic orthogonality: Time and space are different categories, and temporal properties are separate from spatial properties. The idea of is simple in absolute time and space since each time <math>t</math> determines a simultaneous hyperplane in that cosmology. Hermann Minkowski changed that when he articulated the notion of , which exists when spatial events are "normal" to a time characterized by a velocity. He used an indefinite inner product, and specified that a time vector is normal to a space vector when that product is zero. The indefinite inner product in a composition algebra is given by
:<math>\langle x, z\rangle = x \bar{z} + \bar{x}z\;</math> where the overbar denotes conjugation.
As a relation between some temporal events and some spatial events, hyperbolic orthogonality (as found in split-complex numbers) is a heterogeneous relation.
|5= A geometric configuration can be considered a relation between its points and its lines. The relation is expressed as incidence. Finite and infinite projective and affine planes are included. Jakob Steiner pioneered the cataloguing of configurations with the Steiner systems <math>\operatorname S(t, k, n)</math> which have an n-element set <math>\operatorname S</math> and a set of k-element subsets called blocks, such that a subset with <math>t</math> elements lies in just one block. These incidence structures have been generalized with block designs. The incidence matrix used in these geometrical contexts corresponds to the logical matrix used generally with binary relations.
: An incidence structure is a triple <math>\mathbf D (V, \mathbf B, I)</math> where <math>V</math> and <math>\mathbf B</math> are any two disjoint sets and <math>I</math> is a binary relation between <math>V</math> and <math>\mathbf B</math>, i.e. <math>I \subseteq V \times \mathbf B.</math> The elements of <math>V</math> will be called , those of <math>\mathbf B</math> , and those of <math>I</math> .
}}
Types of binary relations
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s: one-to-one (in green), one-to-many (in blue), many-to-one (in red), many-to-many (in black).]]
Some important types of binary relations <math>R</math> over sets <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are listed below.
Uniqueness properties:
* Injective<!---Injective relation---> (also called left-unique<!---Left-unique relation--->): for all <math>x, y \in X</math> and all <math>z \in Y,</math> if <math>xRz</math> and <math>yRz</math> then <math>x y</math>. In other words, every element of the codomain has at most one preimage element. For such a relation, <math>Y</math> is called a primary key of <math>R</math>. (also called right-unique<!---Right-unique relation--->): for all <math>x \in X</math> and all <math>y, z \in Y,</math> if <math>xRy</math> and <math>xRz</math> then <math>y z</math>. In other words, every element of the domain has at most one image element. Such a binary relation is called a or . For such a relation, <math>\{ X \}</math> is called of <math>R</math>. However, <math><</math> is a total relation over the positive integers, the rational numbers and the real numbers. Every reflexive relation is total: for a given <math>x</math>, choose <math>y x</math>.
* Surjective<!---Surjective relation---> The usual ordering < over the class of ordinal numbers is a set-like relation, while its inverse > is not. Sets versus classes Certain mathematical "relations", such as "equal to", "subset of", and "member of", cannot be understood to be binary relations as defined above, because their domains and codomains cannot be taken to be sets in the usual systems of axiomatic set theory. For example, to model the general concept of "equality" as a binary relation <math></math>, take the domain and codomain to be the "class of all sets", which is not a set in the usual set theory.
In most mathematical contexts, references to the relations of equality, membership and subset are harmless because they can be understood implicitly to be restricted to some set in the context. The usual work-around to this problem is to select a "large enough" set <math>A</math>, that contains all the objects of interest, and work with the restriction <math>_A</math> instead of <math></math>. Similarly, the "subset of" relation <math>\subseteq</math> needs to be restricted to have domain and codomain <math>P(A)</math> (the power set of a specific set <math>A</math>): the resulting set relation can be denoted by <math>\subseteq_A.</math> Also, the "member of" relation needs to be restricted to have domain <math>A</math> and codomain <math>P(A)</math> to obtain a binary relation <math>\in_A</math> that is a set. Bertrand Russell has shown that assuming <math>\in</math> to be defined over all sets leads to a contradiction in naive set theory, see ''Russell's paradox.
Another solution to this problem is to use a set theory with proper classes, such as NBG or Morse–Kelley set theory, and allow the domain and codomain (and so the graph) to be proper classes: in such a theory, equality, membership, and subset are binary relations without special comment. (A minor modification needs to be made to the concept of the ordered triple <math>(X, Y, G)</math>, as normally a proper class cannot be a member of an ordered tuple; or of course one can identify the binary relation with its graph in this context.) With this definition one can for instance define a binary relation over every set and its power set. Homogeneous relation
A homogeneous relation<!---keep boldface: Homogeneous relation redirects to here---> over a set <math>X</math> is a binary relation over <math>X</math> and itself, i.e. it is a subset of the Cartesian product <math>X \times X.</math> It is also simply called a (binary) relation over <math>X</math>.
A homogeneous relation <math>R</math> over a set <math>X</math> may be identified with a directed simple graph permitting loops, where <math>X</math> is the vertex set and <math>R</math> is the edge set (there is an edge from a vertex <math>x</math> to a vertex <math>y</math> if and only if <math>xRy</math>).
The set of all homogeneous relations <math>\mathcal{B}(X)</math> over a set <math>X</math> is the power set <math>2^{X \times X}</math> which is a Boolean algebra augmented with the involution of mapping of a relation to its converse relation. Considering composition of relations as a binary operation on <math>\mathcal{B}(X)</math>, it forms a semigroup with involution.
Some important properties that a homogeneous relation <math>R</math> over a set <math>X</math> may have are:
* : for all <math>x \in X,</math> <math>xRx</math>. For example, <math>\geq</math> is a reflexive relation but > is not.
* : for all <math>x \in X,</math> not <math>xRx</math>. For example, <math>></math> is an irreflexive relation, but <math>\geq</math> is not.
* : for all <math>x, y \in X,</math> if <math>xRy</math> then <math>yRx</math>. For example, "is a blood relative of" is a symmetric relation.
* : for all <math>x, y \in X,</math> if <math>xRy</math> and <math>yRx</math> then <math>x y.</math> For example, <math>\geq</math> is an antisymmetric relation.
* : for all <math>x, y \in X,</math> if <math>xRy</math> then not <math>yRx</math>. A relation is asymmetric if and only if it is both antisymmetric and irreflexive. For example, > is an asymmetric relation, but <math>\geq</math> is not.
* : for all <math>x, y, z \in X,</math> if <math>xRy</math> and <math>yRz</math> then <math>xRz</math>. A transitive relation is irreflexive if and only if it is asymmetric. For example, "is ancestor of" is a transitive relation, while "is parent of" is not.
* : for all <math>x, y \in X,</math> if <math>x \neq y</math> then <math>xRy</math> or <math>yRx</math>.
* : for all <math>x, y \in X,</math> <math>xRy</math> or <math>yRx</math>.
* : for all <math>x, y \in X,</math> if <math>xRy ,</math> then some <math>z \in X</math> exists such that <math>xRz</math> and <math>zRy</math>.
A is a relation that is reflexive, antisymmetric, and transitive. A is a relation that is irreflexive, asymmetric, and transitive. A is a relation that is reflexive, antisymmetric, transitive and connected. A is a relation that is irreflexive, asymmetric, transitive and connected.
An is a relation that is reflexive, symmetric, and transitive.
For example, "<math>x</math> divides <math>y</math>" is a partial, but not a total order on natural numbers <math>\N,</math> "<math>x < y</math>" is a strict total order on <math>\N,</math> and "<math>x</math> is parallel to <math>y</math>" is an equivalence relation on the set of all lines in the Euclidean plane.
All operations defined in section also apply to homogeneous relations.
Beyond that, a homogeneous relation over a set <math>X</math> may be subjected to closure operations like:
; : the smallest reflexive relation over <math>X</math> containing <math>R</math>,
; : the smallest transitive relation over <math>X</math> containing <math>R</math>,
; : the smallest equivalence relation over <math>X</math> containing <math>R</math>.
Calculus of relations
Developments in algebraic logic have facilitated usage of binary relations. The calculus of relations includes the algebra of sets, extended by composition of relations and the use of converse relations. The inclusion <math>R \subseteq S,</math> meaning that <math>aRb</math> implies <math>aSb</math>, sets the scene in a lattice of relations. But since <math>P \subseteq Q \equiv (P \cap \bar{Q} \varnothing ) \equiv (P \cap Q P),</math> the inclusion symbol is superfluous. Nevertheless, composition of relations and manipulation of the operators according to Schröder rules, provides a calculus to work in the power set of <math>A \times B.</math>
In contrast to homogeneous relations, the composition of relations operation is only a partial function. The necessity of matching target to source of composed relations has led to the suggestion that the study of heterogeneous relations is a chapter of category theory as in the category of sets, except that the morphisms of this category are relations. The of the category Rel are sets, and the relation-morphisms compose as required in a category.
Induced concept lattice
Binary relations have been described through their induced concept lattices:
A concept <math>C \subset R</math> satisfies two properties:
* The logical matrix of <math>C</math> is the outer product of logical vectors <math>C_{i j} u_i v_j , \quad u, v</math> logical vectors.
* <math>C</math> is maximal, not contained in any other outer product. Thus <math>C</math> is described as a non-enlargeable rectangle.
For a given relation <math>R \subseteq X \times Y,</math> the set of concepts, enlarged by their joins and meets, forms an "induced lattice of concepts", with inclusion <math>\sqsubseteq</math> forming a preorder.
The MacNeille completion theorem (1937) (that any partial order may be embedded in a complete lattice) is cited in a 2013 survey article "Decomposition of relations on concept lattices". The decomposition is
: <math>R = f E g^\textsf{T}</math>, where <math>f</math> and <math>g</math> are functions, called or left-total, functional relations in this context. The "induced concept lattice is isomorphic to the cut completion of the partial order <math>E</math> that belongs to the minimal decomposition <math>(f, g, E)</math> of the relation <math>R</math>."
Particular cases are considered below: <math>E</math> total order corresponds to Ferrers type, and <math>E</math> identity corresponds to difunctional, a generalization of equivalence relation on a set.
Relations may be ranked by the Schein rank which counts the number of concepts necessary to cover a relation. Structural analysis of relations with concepts provides an approach for data mining. Particular relations
* Proposition: If <math>R</math> is a surjective relation and <math>R^\mathsf{T}</math> is its transpose, then <math>I \subseteq R^\textsf{T} R</math> where <math>I</math> is the <math>m \times m</math> identity relation.
* Proposition: If <math>R</math> is a serial relation, then <math>I \subseteq R R^\textsf{T}</math> where <math>I</math> is the <math>n \times n</math> identity relation.
Difunctional
The idea of a difunctional relation is to partition objects by distinguishing attributes, as a generalization of the concept of an equivalence relation. One way this can be done is with an intervening set <math>Z \{ x, y, z, \ldots \}</math> of indicators. The partitioning relation <math>R F G^\textsf{T}</math> is a composition of relations using relations <math>F \subseteq A \times Z \text{ and } G \subseteq B \times Z.</math> Jacques Riguet named these relations difunctional since the composition <math>F G^\mathsf{T}</math> involves functional relations, commonly called partial functions.
In 1950 Riguet showed that such relations satisfy the inclusion:
: <math display=block>R R^\textsf{T} R \subseteq R</math>
In automata theory, the term rectangular relation has also been used to denote a difunctional relation. This terminology recalls the fact that, when represented as a logical matrix, the columns and rows of a difunctional relation can be arranged as a block matrix with rectangular blocks of ones on the (asymmetric) main diagonal. More formally, a relation <math>R</math> on <math>X \times Y</math> is difunctional if and only if it can be written as the union of Cartesian products <math>A_i \times B_i</math>, where the <math>A_i</math> are a partition of a subset of <math>X</math> and the <math>B_i</math> likewise a partition of a subset of <math>Y</math>.
Using the notation <math>\{y \mid xRy\} xR</math>, a difunctional relation can also be characterized as a relation <math>R</math> such that wherever <math>x_1 R</math> and <math>x_2 R</math> have a non-empty intersection, then these two sets coincide; formally <math>x_1 \cap x_2 \neq \varnothing</math> implies <math>x_1 R x_2 R.</math>
In 1997 researchers found "utility of binary decomposition based on difunctional dependencies in database management." Furthermore, difunctional relations are fundamental in the study of bisimulations.
In the context of homogeneous relations, a partial equivalence relation is difunctional.
Ferrers type
A strict order on a set is a homogeneous relation arising in order theory.
In 1951 Jacques Riguet adopted the ordering of an integer partition, called a Ferrers diagram, to extend ordering to binary relations in general.
The corresponding logical matrix of a general binary relation has rows which finish with a sequence of ones. Thus the dots of a Ferrer's diagram are changed to ones and aligned on the right in the matrix.
An algebraic statement required for a Ferrers type relation R is
<math display="block">R \bar{R}^\textsf{T} R \subseteq R.</math>
If any one of the relations <math>R, \bar{R}, R^\textsf{T}</math> is of Ferrers type, then all of them are.
Contact
Suppose <math>B</math> is the power set of <math>A</math>, the set of all subsets of <math>A</math>. Then a relation <math>g</math> is a contact relation if it satisfies three properties:
# <math>\text{for all } x \in A, Y = \{ x \} \text{ implies } xgY.</math>
# <math>Y \subseteq Z \text{ and } xgY \text{ implies } xgZ.</math>
# <math>\text{for all } y \in Y, ygZ \text{ and } xgY \text{ implies } xgZ.</math>
The set membership relation, <math>\epsilon </math> "is an element of", satisfies these properties so <math>\epsilon</math> is a contact relation. The notion of a general contact relation was introduced by Georg Aumann in 1970.
In terms of the calculus of relations, sufficient conditions for a contact relation include
<math display="block">C^\textsf{T} \bar{C} \subseteq \ni \bar{C} \equiv C \overline{\ni \bar{C}} \subseteq C,</math>
where <math>\ni</math> is the converse of set membership (<math>\in</math>). In terms of converse and complements, <math>R \backslash R \equiv \overline{R^\textsf{T} \bar{R}}.</math> Forming the diagonal of <math>R^\textsf{T} \bar{R}</math>, the corresponding row of <math>R^{\textsf{T}}</math> and column of <math>\bar{R}</math> will be of opposite logical values, so the diagonal is all zeros. Then
: <math>R^\textsf{T} \bar{R} \subseteq \bar{I} \implies I \subseteq \overline{R^\textsf{T} \bar{R}} = R \backslash R</math>, so that <math>R \backslash R</math> is a reflexive relation.
To show transitivity, one requires that <math>(R\backslash R)(R\backslash R) \subseteq R \backslash R.</math> Recall that <math>X = R \backslash R</math> is the largest relation such that <math>R X \subseteq R.</math> Then
: <math>R(R\backslash R) \subseteq R</math>
: <math>R(R\backslash R) (R\backslash R )\subseteq R</math> (repeat)
: <math>\equiv R^\textsf{T} \bar{R} \subseteq \overline{(R \backslash R)(R \backslash R)}</math> (Schröder's rule)
: <math>\equiv (R \backslash R)(R \backslash R) \subseteq \overline{R^\textsf{T} \bar{R}}</math> (complementation)
: <math>\equiv (R \backslash R)(R \backslash R) \subseteq R \backslash R.</math> (definition)
The inclusion relation Ω on the power set of <math>U</math> can be obtained in this way from the membership relation <math>\in</math> on subsets of <math>U</math>:
: <math>\Omega \overline{\ni \bar{\in}} \in \backslash \in .</math>
Mathematical heaps
Given two sets <math>A</math> and <math>B</math>, the set of binary relations between them <math>\mathcal{B}(A,B)</math> can be equipped with a ternary operation <math>[a, b, c] a b^\textsf{T} c</math> where <math>b^\mathsf{T}</math> denotes the converse relation of <math>b</math>. In 1953 Viktor Wagner used properties of this ternary operation to define semiheaps, heaps, and generalized heaps. The contrast of heterogeneous and homogeneous relations is highlighted by these definitions:
See also
* Abstract rewriting system
* Additive relation, a many-valued homomorphism between modules
* Allegory (category theory)
* Category of relations, a category having sets as objects and binary relations as morphisms
* Confluence (term rewriting), discusses several unusual but fundamental properties of binary relations
* Correspondence (algebraic geometry), a binary relation defined by algebraic equations
* Hasse diagram, a graphic means to display an order relation
* Incidence structure, a heterogeneous relation between set of points and lines
* Logic of relatives, a theory of relations by Charles Sanders Peirce
* Order theory, investigates properties of order relations
Notes
References Bibliography *
* |date2012|chapterChapter 3: Heterogeneous relations|publisherSpringer Science & Business Media|isbn978-3-642-77968-8|authorlink1Gunther Schmidt}}
* Ernst Schröder (1895) [https://archive.org/details/vorlesungenberd03mlgoog Algebra der Logik, Band III], via Internet Archive
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External links
*
Category:Binary relations | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_relation | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.914127 |
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Braille dashboard in elevator]]
Braille ( , ) is a tactile writing system used by people who are visually impaired. It can be read either on embossed paper or by using refreshable braille displays that connect to computers and smartphone devices. Braille can be written using a slate and stylus, a braille writer, an electronic braille notetaker or with the use of a computer connected to a braille embosser. For blind readers, braille is an independent writing system, rather than a code of printed orthography. The second revision, published in 1837, was the first binary form of writing developed in the modern era.
Braille characters are formed using a combination of six raised dots arranged in a 3 × 2 matrix, called the braille cell. The number and arrangement of these dots distinguishes one character from another. Since the various braille alphabets originated as transcription codes for printed writing, the mappings (sets of character designations) vary from language to language, and even within one; in English braille there are three levels: uncontracteda letter-by-letter transcription used for basic literacy; contractedan addition of abbreviations and contractions used as a space-saving mechanism; and grade 3 various non-standardized personal stenographies that are less commonly used.
In addition to braille text (letters, punctuation, contractions), it is also possible to create embossed illustrations and graphs, with the lines either solid or made of series of dots, arrows, and bullets that are larger than braille dots. A full braille cell includes six raised dots arranged in two columns, each column having three dots. The dot positions are identified by numbers from one to six. Dot configurations can be used to represent a letter, digit, punctuation mark, or even a word.
History
for "first", can be read]]
Braille was based on a tactile code, now known as night writing, developed by Charles Barbier. (The name "night writing" was later given to it when it was considered as a means for soldiers to communicate silently at night and without a light source, but Barbier's writings do not use this term and suggest that it was originally designed as a simpler form of writing and for the visually impaired.) In Barbier's system, sets of 12 embossed dots were used to encode 36 different sounds. Braille identified three major defects of the code: first, the symbols represented phonetic sounds and not letters of the alphabetthus the code was unable to render the orthography of the words. Second, the 12-dot symbols could not easily fit beneath the pad of the reading finger. This required the reading finger to move in order to perceive the whole symbol, which slowed the reading process. (This was because Barbier's system was based only on the number of dots in each of two 6-dot columns, not the pattern of the dots.) Third, the code did not include symbols for numerals or punctuation. Braille's solution was to use 6-dot cells and to assign a specific pattern to each letter of the alphabet. Braille also developed symbols for representing numerals and punctuation.
At first, braille was a one-to-one transliteration of the French alphabet, but soon various abbreviations (contractions) and even logograms were developed, creating a system much more like shorthand.
In English, some variations in the braille codes have traditionally existed among English-speaking countries. In 1991, work to standardize the braille codes used in the English-speaking world began. Unified English Braille (UEB) has been adopted in all seven member countries of the International Council on English Braille (ICEB) as well as Nigeria. Derivation Braille is derived from the Latin alphabet, albeit indirectly. In Braille's original system, the dot patterns were assigned to letters according to their position within the alphabetic order of the French alphabet of the time, with accented letters and w sorted at the end.
Unlike print, which consists of mostly arbitrary symbols, the braille alphabet follows a logical sequence. The first ten letters of the alphabet, a–j, use the upper four dot positions: (black dots in the table below). These stand for the ten digits 1–9 and 0 in an alphabetic numeral system similar to Greek numerals (as well as derivations of it, including Hebrew numerals, Cyrillic numerals, Abjad numerals, also Hebrew gematria and Greek isopsephy).
Though the dots are assigned in no obvious order, the cells with the fewest dots are assigned to the first three letters (and lowest digits), abc 123 (), and to the three vowels in this part of the alphabet, aei (), whereas the even digits 4, 6, 8, 0 () are right angles.
The next ten letters, k–t, are identical to a–j respectively, apart from the addition of a dot at position 3 (red dots in the bottom left corners of the cells in the table below): :
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The next ten letters (the next "decade") are the same again, but with dots also at both position 3 and position 6 (green dots in the bottom rows of the cells in the table above). Here w was left out as it was not part of the official French alphabet in Braille's time; the French order of the decade was u v x y z ç é à è ù ().
The next ten letters, ending in w, are the same again, except that for this series position 6 (purple dot in the bottom right corner of the cell in the table above) is used without a dot at position 3. In French braille these are the letters â ê î ô û ë ï ü œ w (). W had been tacked onto the end of 39 letters of the French alphabet to accommodate English.
The a–j series shifted down by one dot space () is used for punctuation. Letters a and c , which only use dots in the top row, were shifted two places for the apostrophe and hyphen: . (These are also the decade diacritics, on the left in the table below, of the second and third decade.)
In addition, there are ten patterns that are based on the first two letters () with their dots shifted to the right; these were assigned to non-French letters (ì ä ò ), or serve non-letter functions: (superscript; in English the accent mark), (currency prefix), (capital, in English the decimal point), (number sign), (emphasis mark), (symbol prefix).
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The first four decades are similar in that the numeric sequence is extended by adding the decade dots, whereas in the fifth decade it is extended by shifting it downward.
Originally there had been nine decades. The fifth through ninth used dashes as well as dots, but they proved to be impractical to distinguish by touch under normal conditions and were soon abandoned. From the beginning, these additional decades could be substituted with what we now know as the number sign () applied to the earlier decades, though that only caught on for the digits (the old 5th decade being replaced by applied to the 1st decade). The dash occupying the top row of the original sixth decade was simply omitted, producing the modern fifth decade. (See 1829 braille.)
Assignment
Historically, there have been three principles in assigning the values of a linear script (print) to Braille: Using Louis Braille's original French letter values; reassigning the braille letters according to the sort order of the print alphabet being transcribed; and reassigning the letters to improve the efficiency of writing in braille.
Under international consensus, most braille alphabets follow the French sorting order for the 26 letters of the basic Latin alphabet, and there have been attempts at unifying the letters beyond these 26 (see international braille), though differences remain, for example, in German Braille. This unification avoids the chaos of each nation reordering the braille code to match the sorting order of its print alphabet, as happened in Algerian Braille, where braille codes were numerically reassigned to match the order of the Arabic alphabet and bear little relation to the values used in other countries (compare modern Arabic Braille, which uses the French sorting order), and as happened in an early American version of English Braille, where the letters w, x, y, z were reassigned to match English alphabetical order. A convention sometimes seen for letters beyond the basic 26 is to exploit the physical symmetry of braille patterns iconically, for example, by assigning a reversed n to ñ or an inverted s to sh. (See Hungarian Braille and Bharati Braille, which do this to some extent.)
A third principle was to assign braille codes according to frequency, with the simplest patterns (quickest ones to write with a stylus) assigned to the most frequent letters of the alphabet. Such frequency-based alphabets were used in Germany and the United States in the 19th century (see American Braille), but with the invention of the braille typewriter their advantage disappeared, and none are attested in modern use they had the disadvantage that the resulting small number of dots in a text interfered with following the alignment of the letters, and consequently made texts more difficult to read than Braille's more arbitrary letter assignment. Finally, there are braille scripts that do not order the codes numerically at all, such as Japanese Braille and Korean Braille, which are based on more abstract principles of syllable composition.
Texts are sometimes written in a script of eight dots per cell rather than six, enabling them to encode a greater number of symbols. (See Gardner–Salinas braille codes.) Luxembourgish Braille has adopted eight-dot cells for general use; for example, accented letters take the unaccented versions plus dot 8.
Form
Braille was the first writing system with binary encoding. The system as devised by Braille consists of two parts:
# Character encoding that mapped characters of the French alphabet to tuples of six bits (the dots).
# The physical representation of those six-bit characters with raised dots in a braille cell.
Within an individual cell, the dot positions are arranged in two columns of three positions. A raised dot can appear in any of the six positions, producing 64 (2<sup>6</sup>) possible patterns, including one in which there are no raised dots. For reference purposes, a pattern is commonly described by listing the positions where dots are raised, the positions being universally numbered, from top to bottom, as 1 to 3 on the left and 4 to 6 on the right. For example, dot pattern 1-3-4 describes a cell with three dots raised, at the top and bottom in the left column and at the top of the right column: that is, the letter m. The lines of horizontal braille text are separated by a space, much like visible printed text, so that the dots of one line can be differentiated from the braille text above and below. Different assignments of braille codes (or code pages) are used to map the character sets of different printed scripts to the six-bit cells. Braille assignments have also been created for mathematical and musical notation. However, because the six-dot braille cell allows only 64 (2<sup>6</sup>) patterns, including space, the characters of a braille script commonly have multiple values, depending on their context. That is, character mapping between print and braille is not one-to-one. For example, the character corresponds in print to both the letter d and the digit 4.
In addition to simple encoding, many braille alphabets use contractions to reduce the size of braille texts and to increase reading speed. (See Contracted braille.)
Writing braille
Braille may be produced by hand using a slate and stylus in which each dot is created from the back of the page, writing in mirror image, or it may be produced on a braille typewriter or Perkins Brailler, or an electronic Brailler or braille notetaker. Braille users with access to smartphones may also activate the on-screen braille input keyboard, to type braille symbols on to their device by placing their fingers on to the screen according to the dot configuration of the symbols they wish to form. These symbols are automatically translated into print on the screen. The different tools that exist for writing braille allow the braille user to select the method that is best for a given task. For example, the slate and stylus is a portable writing tool, much like the pen and paper for the sighted. Errors can be erased using a braille eraser or can be overwritten with all six dots (). Interpoint refers to braille printing that is offset, so that the paper can be embossed on both sides, with the dots on one side appearing between the divots that form the dots on the other.
Using a computer or other electronic device, Braille may be produced with a braille embosser (printer) or a refreshable braille display (screen).
Eight-dot braille
Braille has been extended to an 8-dot code, particularly for use with braille embossers and refreshable braille displays. In 8-dot braille the additional dots are added at the bottom of the cell, giving a matrix 4 dots high by 2 dots wide. The additional dots are given the numbers 7 (for the lower-left dot) and 8 (for the lower-right dot). Eight-dot braille has the advantages that the casing of each letter is coded in the cell and that every printable ASCII character can be encoded in a single cell. All 256 (2<sup>8</sup>) possible combinations of 8 dots are encoded by the Unicode standard. Braille with six dots is frequently stored as Braille ASCII.
Letters
The first 25 braille letters, up through the first half of the 3rd decade, transcribe a–z (skipping w). In English Braille, the rest of that decade is rounded out with the ligatures and, for, of, the, and with. Omitting dot 3 from these forms the 4th decade, the ligatures ch, gh, sh, th, wh, ed, er, ou, ow and the letter w.
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(See English Braille.)
Formatting
Various formatting marks affect the values of the letters that follow them. They have no direct equivalent in print. The most important in English Braille are:
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That is, is read as capital 'A', and as the digit '1'.
Punctuation
Basic punctuation marks in English Braille include:
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is both the question mark and the opening quotation mark. Its reading depends on whether it occurs before a word or after.
is used for both opening and closing parentheses. Its placement relative to spaces and other characters determines its interpretation.
Punctuation varies from language to language. For example, French Braille uses for its question mark and swaps the quotation marks and parentheses (to and ); it uses () for both the period and the decimal point, and the English decimal point () to mark capitalization. Contractions
Braille contractions are words and affixes that are shortened so that they take up fewer cells. In English Braille, for example, the word afternoon is written with just three letters, , much like stenoscript. There are also several abbreviation marks that create what are effectively logograms.
The Stainsby Brailler, developed by Henry Stainsby in 1903, is a mechanical writer with a sliding carriage that moves over an aluminium plate as it embosses Braille characters. An improved version was introduced around 1933.
In 1951 David Abraham, a woodworking teacher at the Perkins School for the Blind, produced a more advanced Braille typewriter, the Perkins Brailler.
In 1991 Ernest Bate developed the Mountbatten Brailler, an electronic machine used to type braille on braille paper, giving it a number of additional features such as word processing, audio feedback and embossing. This version was improved in 2008 with a quiet writer that had an erase key.
In 2011 David S. Morgan produced the first SMART Brailler machine, with added text to speech function and allowed digital capture of data entered.
Braille reading
Braille is traditionally read in hardcopy form, such as with paper books written in braille, documents produced in paper braille (such as restaurant menus), and braille labels or public signage. It can also be read on a refreshable braille display either as a stand-alone electronic device or connected to a computer or smartphone. Refreshable braille displays convert what is visually shown on a computer or smartphone screen into braille through a series of pins that rise and fall to form braille symbols. Currently more than 1% of all printed books have been translated into hardcopy braille.
The fastest braille readers apply a light touch and read braille with two hands, although reading braille with one hand is also possible. Although the finger can read only one braille character at a time, the brain chunks braille at a higher level, processing words a digraph, root or suffix at a time. The processing largely takes place in the visual cortex. Literacy
Children who are blind miss out on fundamental parts of early and advanced education if not provided with the necessary tools, such as access to educational materials in braille. Children who are blind or visually impaired can begin learning foundational braille skills from a very young age to become fluent braille readers as they get older. Sighted children are naturally exposed to written language on signs, on TV and in the books they see. Blind children require the same early exposure to literacy, through access to braille rich environments and opportunities to explore the world around them. Print-braille books, for example, present text in both print and braille and can be read by sighted parents to blind children (and vice versa), allowing blind children to develop an early love for reading even before formal reading instruction begins.
Adults who experience sight loss later in life or who did not have the opportunity to learn it when they were younger can also learn braille. In most cases, adults who learn braille were already literate in print before vision loss and so instruction focuses more on developing the tactile and motor skills needed to read braille.
While different countries publish statistics on how many readers in a given organization request braille, these numbers only provide a partial picture of braille literacy statistics. For example, this data does not survey the entire population of braille readers or always include readers who are no longer in the school system (adults) or readers who request electronic braille materials. Therefore, there are currently no reliable statistics on braille literacy rates, as described in a publication in the Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness. Regardless of the precise percentage of braille readers, there is consensus that braille should be provided to all those who benefit from it.
Numerous factors influence access to braille literacy, including school budget constraints, technology advancements such as screen-reader software, access to qualified instruction, and different philosophical views over how blind children should be educated.
In the US, a key turning point for braille literacy was the passage of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, an act of Congress that moved thousands of children from specialized schools for the blind into mainstream public schools. Because only a small percentage of public schools could afford to train and hire braille-qualified teachers, braille literacy has declined since the law took effect.
Early Braille education is crucial to literacy for a blind or low-vision child. A study conducted in the state of Washington found that people who learned braille at an early age did just as well as, if not better than, their sighted peers in several areas, including vocabulary and comprehension. In the preliminary adult study, while evaluating the correlation between adult literacy skills and employment, it was found that 44% of the participants who had learned to read in braille were unemployed, compared to the 77% unemployment rate of those who had learned to read using print. Currently, among the estimated 85,000 blind adults in the United States, 90% of those who are braille-literate are employed. Among adults who do not know braille, only 33% are employed.
Braille transcription
and corresponding Mandarin text. Three Braille cells are needed to transcribe most Mandarin characters.]]
Although it is possible to transcribe print by simply substituting the equivalent braille character for its printed equivalent, in English such a character-by-character transcription (known as uncontracted braille) is typically used by beginners or those who only engage in short reading tasks (such as reading household labels).
Braille characters are much larger than their printed equivalents, and the standard page has room for only 25 lines of 43 characters. To reduce space and increase reading speed, most braille alphabets and orthographies use ligatures, abbreviations, and contractions. Virtually all English braille books in hardcopy (paper) format are transcribed in contracted braille: The Library of Congress's Instruction Manual for Braille Transcribing runs to over 300 pages, and braille transcribers must pass certification tests.
Uncontracted braille was previously known as grade 1 braille, and contracted braille was previously known as grade 2 braille. Uncontracted braille is a direct transliteration of print words (one-to-one correspondence); hence, the word "about" would contain all the same letters in uncontracted braille as it does in inkprint. Contracted braille includes short forms to save space; hence, for example, the letters "ab" when standing alone represent the word "about" in English contracted braille. In English, some braille users only learn uncontracted braille, particularly if braille is being used for shorter reading tasks such as reading household labels. However, those who plan to use braille for educational and employment purposes and longer reading texts often go on to contracted braille.
The system of contractions in English Braille begins with a set of 23 words contracted to single characters. Thus the word but is contracted to the single letter b, can to c, do to d, and so on. Even this simple rule creates issues requiring special cases; for example, d is, specifically, an abbreviation of the verb do; the noun do representing the note of the musical scale is a different word and must be spelled out.
Portions of words may be contracted, and many rules govern this process. For example, the character with dots 2-3-5 (the letter "f" lowered in the Braille cell) stands for "ff" when used in the middle of a word. At the beginning of a word, this same character stands for the word "to"; the character is written in braille with no space following it. (This contraction was removed in the Unified English Braille Code.) At the end of a word, the same character represents an exclamation point.
Some contractions are more similar than their print equivalents. For example, the contraction , meaning "letter", differs from , meaning "little", only by one dot in the second letter: little, letter. This causes greater confusion between the braille spellings of these words and can hinder the learning process of contracted braille.
The contraction rules take into account the linguistic structure of the word; thus, contractions are generally not to be used when their use would alter the usual braille form of a base word to which a prefix or suffix has been added. Some portions of the transcription rules are not fully codified and rely on the judgment of the transcriber. Thus, when the contraction rules permit the same word in more than one way, preference is given to "the contraction that more nearly approximates correct pronunciation".
"Grade 3 braille" is a variety of non-standardized systems that include many additional shorthand-like contractions. They are not used for publication, but by individuals for their personal convenience. Braille translation software When people produce braille, this is called braille transcription. When computer software produces braille, this is called a braille translator. Braille translation software exists to handle almost all of the common languages of the world, and many technical areas, such as mathematics (mathematical notation), for example WIMATS, music (musical notation), and tactile graphics. Braille reading techniques
Since Braille is one of the few writing systems where tactile perception is used, as opposed to visual perception, a braille reader must develop new skills. One skill important for Braille readers is the ability to create smooth and even pressures when running one's fingers along the words. There are many different styles and techniques used for the understanding and development of braille, even though a study by B. F. Holland suggests that there is no specific technique that is superior to any other.
Another study by Lowenfield & Abel shows that braille can be read "the fastest and best... by students who read using the index fingers of both hands". Another important reading skill emphasized in this study is to finish reading the end of a line with the right hand and to find the beginning of the next line with the left hand simultaneously.
International uniformity
in Rapperswil, Switzerland]]
When Braille was first adapted to languages other than French, many schemes were adopted, including mapping the native alphabet to the alphabetical order of French – e.g. in English W, which was not in the French alphabet at the time, is mapped to braille X, X to Y, Y to Z, and Z to the first French-accented letter – or completely rearranging the alphabet such that common letters are represented by the simplest braille patterns. Consequently, mutual intelligibility was greatly hindered by this state of affairs. In 1878, the International Congress on Work for the Blind, held in Paris, proposed an international braille standard, where braille codes for different languages and scripts would be based, not on the order of a particular alphabet, but on phonetic correspondence and transliteration to Latin.
This unified braille has been applied to the languages of India and Africa, Arabic, Vietnamese, Hebrew, Russian, and Armenian, as well as nearly all Latin-script languages. In Greek, for example, γ (g) is written as Latin g, despite the fact that it has the alphabetic position of c; Hebrew ב (b), the second letter of the alphabet and cognate with the Latin letter b, is sometimes pronounced /b/ and sometimes /v/, and is written b or v accordingly; Russian ц (ts) is written as c, which is the usual letter for /ts/ in those Slavic languages that use the Latin alphabet; and Arabic ف (f) is written as f, despite being historically p and occurring in that part of the Arabic alphabet (between historic o and q).
Other braille conventions
Other systems for assigning values to braille patterns are also followed beside the simple mapping of the alphabetical order onto the original French order. Some braille alphabets start with unified braille, and then diverge significantly based on the phonology of the target languages, while others diverge even further.
In the various Chinese systems, traditional braille values are used for initial consonants and the simple vowels. In both Mandarin and Cantonese Braille, however, characters have different readings depending on whether they are placed in syllable-initial (onset) or syllable-final (rime) position. For instance, the cell for Latin k, , represents Cantonese k (g in Yale and other modern romanizations) when initial, but aak when final, while Latin j, , represents Cantonese initial j but final oei.
Novel systems of braille mapping include Korean, which adopts separate syllable-initial and syllable-final forms for its consonants, explicitly grouping braille cells into syllabic groups in the same way as hangul. Japanese, meanwhile, combines independent vowel dot patterns and modifier consonant dot patterns into a single braille cell – an abugida representation of each Japanese mora.
Uses
wine, with braille on the label]]
Braille is read by people who are blind, deafblind or who have low vision, and by both those born with a visual impairment and those who experience sight loss later in life. Braille may also be used by print impaired people, who although may be fully sighted, due to a physical disability are unable to read print. Even individuals with low vision will find that they benefit from braille, depending on level of vision or context (for example, when lighting or colour contrast is poor). Braille is used for both short and long reading tasks. Examples of short reading tasks include braille labels for identifying household items (or cards in a wallet), reading elevator buttons, accessing phone numbers, recipes, grocery lists and other personal notes. Examples of longer reading tasks include using braille to access educational materials, novels and magazines. People with access to a refreshable braille display can also use braille for reading email and ebooks, browsing the internet and accessing other electronic documents. It is also possible to adapt or purchase playing cards and board games in braille.
In India there are instances where the parliament acts have been published in braille, such as The Right to Information Act''. Sylheti Braille is used in Northeast India.
In Canada, passenger safety information in braille and tactile seat row markers are required aboard planes, trains, large ferries, and interprovincial busses pursuant to the Canadian Transportation Agency's regulations.
In the United States, the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 requires various building signage to be in braille.
In the United Kingdom, medicines are required to have the name of the medicine in Braille on the labeling. Currency
The current series of Canadian banknotes has a tactile feature consisting of raised dots that indicate the denomination, allowing bills to be easily identified by blind or low vision people. It does not use standard braille numbers to identify the value. Instead, the number of full braille cells, which can be simply counted by both braille readers and non-braille readers alike, is an indicator of the value of the bill.
Mexican bank notes, Australian bank notes, Indian rupee notes, Israeli new shekel notes and Russian ruble notes also have special raised symbols to make them identifiable by persons who are blind or have low vision.
Euro coins were designed in cooperation with organisations representing blind people, and as a result they incorporate many features allowing them to be distinguished by touch alone. In addition, their visual appearance is designed to make them easy to tell apart for persons who cannot read the inscriptions on the coins. "A good design for the blind and partially sighted is a good design for everybody" was the principle behind the cooperation of the European Central Bank and the European Blind Union during the design phase of the first series Euro banknotes in the 1990s.
Australia introduced the tactile feature onto their five-dollar banknote in 2016.
In the United Kingdom, the front of the £10 polymer note (the side with raised print), has two clusters of raised dots in the top left hand corner, and the £20 note has three. This tactile feature helps blind and partially sighted people identify the value of the note.
In 2003 the US Mint introduced the commemorative Alabama State Quarter, which recognized State Daughter Helen Keller on the Obverse, including the name Helen Keller in both English script and Braille inscription. This appears to be the first known use of Braille on US Coin Currency, though not standard on all coins of this type. Unicode
The Braille set was added to the Unicode Standard in version 3.0 (1999).
Most braille embossers and refreshable braille displays do not use the Unicode code points, but instead reuse the 8-bit code points that are assigned to standard ASCII for braille ASCII. (Thus, for simple material, the same bitstream may be interpreted equally as visual letter forms for sighted readers or their exact semantic equivalent in tactile patterns for blind readers. However some codes have quite different tactile versus visual interpretations and most are not even defined in Braille ASCII.)
Some embossers have proprietary control codes for 8-dot braille or for full graphics mode, where dots may be placed anywhere on the page without leaving any space between braille cells so that continuous lines can be drawn in diagrams, but these are rarely used and are not standard.
The Unicode standard encodes 6-dot and 8-dot braille glyphs according to their binary appearance, rather than following their assigned numeric order. Dot 1 corresponds to the least significant bit of the low byte of the Unicode scalar value, and dot 8 to the high bit of that byte.
The Unicode block for braille is U+2800 ... U+28FF. The mapping of patterns to characters etc. is language dependent: even for English for example, see American Braille and English Braille.
Observation
Every year on 4 January, World Braille Day is observed internationally to commemorate the birth of Louis Braille and to recognize his efforts. Although the event is not considered a public holiday, it has been recognized by the United Nations as an official day of celebration since 2019.
Braille devices
There is a variety of contemporary electronic devices that serve the needs of blind people that operate in Braille, such as refreshable braille displays and Braille e-books that use different technologies for transmitting graphic information of different types (pictures, maps, graphs, texts, etc.).
See also
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* ("the Braille man of India")
* List of binary codes
* List of international common standards
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Notes
References
External links
* [https://www.avh.asso.fr/fr/lassociation L'association Valentin Haüy] (in French)
** [https://www.avh.asso.fr/sites/default/files/booklet_avh_final.docx Acting for the autonomy of blind and partially sighted persons (Corporate brochure)] (Microsoft Word file, in English)
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENxk8U1nA1g Braille Part 1 Text To Speech For The Visually Impaired] YouTube
* [https://www.sense.org.uk/get-support/information-and-advice/communication/braille/ Braille information and advice] – Sense UK
* [https://omniglot.com/writing/braille.htm Braille at Omniglot]
Category:1824 introductions
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Category:Writing systems introduced in the 19th century | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braille | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.947839 |
3936 | Bastille Day | )<br />The Fourteenth of July<br />()
| significance Commemorates the Storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, and commonly, as () in French, though la fête nationale is also used in the press.
French National Day is the anniversary of the Storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, a major event of the French Revolution, as well as the that celebrated the unity of the French people on 14 July 1790. Celebrations are held throughout France. One that has been reported as "the oldest and largest military parade in Europe" is held on 14 July on the Champs-Élysées in Paris in front of the President of France, along with other French officials and foreign guests.
History
In 1789, tensions rose in France between reformist and conservative factions as the country struggled to resolve an economic crisis. In May, the Estates General legislative assembly was revived, but members of the Third Estate broke ranks, declaring themselves to be the National Assembly of the country, and on 20 June, vowed to write a constitution for the kingdom.
On 11 July, Jacques Necker, the finance minister of Louis XVI, who was sympathetic to the Third Estate, was dismissed by the King, provoking an angry reaction among Parisians. Crowds formed, fearful of an attack by the royal army or by foreign regiments of mercenaries in the King's service and seeking to arm themselves. Early on 14 July, a crowd besieged the Hôtel des Invalides for firearms, muskets, and cannons stored in its cellars. That same day, another crowd stormed the Bastille, a fortress-prison in Paris that had historically held people jailed on the basis of lettres de cachet (literally "signet letters"), arbitrary royal indictments that could not be appealed and did not indicate the reason for the imprisonment, and was believed to hold a cache of ammunition and gunpowder. As it happened, at the time of the attack, the Bastille held only seven inmates, none of great political significance.
The crowd was eventually reinforced by the mutinous Régiment des Gardes Françaises ("Regiment of French Guards"), whose usual role was to protect public buildings. They proved a fair match for the fort's defenders, and Governor de Launay, the commander of the Bastille, capitulated and opened the gates to avoid a mutual massacre. According to the official documents, about 200 attackers and just one defender died before the capitulation. However, possibly because of a misunderstanding, fighting resumed. In this second round of fighting, de Launay and seven other defenders were killed, as was Jacques de Flesselles, the prévôt des marchands ("provost of the merchants"), the elected head of the city's guilds, who under the French monarchy had the responsibilities of a present-day mayor.
Shortly after the storming of the Bastille, late in the evening of 4 August, after a very stormy session of the Assemblée constituante, feudalism was abolished. On 26 August, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (Déclaration des Droits de l'Homme et du Citoyen) was proclaimed.
Fête de la Fédération''
]]
As early as 1789, the year of the storming of the Bastille, preliminary designs for a national festival were underway. These designs were intended to strengthen the country's national identity through the celebration of the events of 14 July 1789. One of the first designs was proposed by Clément Gonchon, a French textile worker, who presented his design for a festival celebrating the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille to the French city administration and the public on 9 December 1789. There were other proposals and unofficial celebrations of 14 July 1789, but the official festival sponsored by the National Assembly was called the Fête de la Fédération.
The Fête de la Fédération on 14 July 1790 was a celebration of the unity of the French nation during the French Revolution. The aim of this celebration, one year after the Storming of the Bastille, was to symbolize peace. The event took place on the Champ de Mars, which was located far outside of Paris at the time. The work needed to transform the Champ de Mars into a suitable location for the celebration was not on schedule to be completed in time. On the day recalled as the Journée des brouettes ("The Day of the Wheelbarrow"), thousands of Parisian citizens gathered together to finish the construction needed for the celebration.
The day of the festival, the National Guard assembled and proceeded along the boulevard du Temple in the pouring rain, and were met by an estimated 260,000 Parisian citizens at the Champ de Mars. A mass was celebrated by Talleyrand, bishop of Autun. The popular General Lafayette, as captain of the National Guard of Paris and a confidant of the king, took his oath to the constitution, followed by King Louis XVI. After the end of the official celebration, the day ended in a huge four-day popular feast, and people celebrated with fireworks, as well as fine wine and running nude through the streets in order to display their freedom.Origin of the current celebration
, Rue Montorgueil, Paris, Festival of 30 June 1878]]
On 30 June 1878, a feast was officially arranged in Paris to honour the French Republic (the event was commemorated in a painting by Claude Monet). On 14 July 1879, there was another feast, with a semi-official aspect. The day's events included a reception in the Chamber of Deputies, organised and presided over by Léon Gambetta (a military reviewer at Longchamp), and a Republican Feast in the Pré Catelan. All throughout France, Le Figaro wrote, "people feasted much to honour the storming of the Bastille".
In 1880, the government of the Third Republic wanted to revive the 14 July festival. The campaign for the reinstatement of the festival was sponsored by the notable politician Léon Gambetta and scholar Henri Baudrillant. On 21 May 1880, Benjamin Raspail proposed a law, signed by sixty-four members of government, to have "the Republic adopt 14 July as the day of an annual national festival". There were many disputes over which date to be remembered as the national holiday, including 4 August (the commemoration of the end of the feudal system), 5 May (when the Estates-General first assembled), 27 July (the fall of Robespierre), and 21 January (the date of Louis XVI's execution). The government decided that the date of the holiday would be 14 July, but that was still somewhat problematic. The events of 14 July 1789 were illegal under the previous government, which contradicted the Third Republic's need to establish legal legitimacy. French politicians also did not want the sole foundation of their national holiday to be rooted in a day of bloodshed and class-hatred as the day of storming the Bastille was. Instead, they based the establishment of the holiday as both the celebration of the Fête de la Fédération, a festival celebrating the anniversary of the Republic of France on 14 July 1789, and the storming of the Bastille. The Assembly voted in favor of the proposal on 21 May, and 8 June. The law was approved on 27 and 29 June. The celebration was made official on 6 July 1880.
In the debate leading up to the adoption of the holiday, Senator Henri Martin, who wrote the National Day law,}}
Bastille Day military parade
The Bastille Day military parade is the French military parade that has been held in the morning, every year in Paris, since 1880. While previously held elsewhere within or near the capital city, since 1918 it has been held on the Champs-Élysées, with the participation of the Allies as represented in the Versailles Peace Conference, and with the exception of the period of German occupation from 1940 to 1944 (when the ceremony took place in London under the command of General Charles de Gaulle); and 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic forced its cancellation. The parade passes down the Champs-Élysées from the Arc de Triomphe to the Place de la Concorde, where the President of the French Republic, his government and foreign ambassadors to France stand. This is a popular event in France, broadcast on French TV, and is the oldest and largest regular military parade in Europe.
<gallery>
File:Bastille Day Parade 170714-D-PB383-005 (35087624434).jpg|Allied forces participate in the military parade
File:Fly over Bastille Day 2017.jpg|The Patrouille de France with nine Alpha Jets over the Champs-Élysées in Paris in 2017, during the Bastille Day military parade
File:French Republican Guard Bastille Day 2007 n1.jpg|Horseman of the Republican Guard during the 2007 military parade on the Champs-Élysées
File:Dominique Vallet-IMG 5734.JPG|Surgeon general inspector Dominique Vallet, head of the Laveran military medical school, at the ceremonies for Bastille Day in Marseille, 2012
</gallery>
Bastille Day celebrations in other countries
Belgium
Liège celebrates Bastille Day each year since the end of the First World War, as Liège was decorated by the Légion d'Honneur for its unexpected resistance during the Battle of Liège. The city also hosts a fireworks show outside of Congress Hall. Specifically in Liège, celebrations of Bastille Day have been known to be bigger than the celebrations of the Belgian National holiday. Around 35,000 people gather to celebrate Bastille Day. There is a traditional festival dance of the French consul that draws large crowds, and many unofficial events over the city celebrate the relationship between France and the city of Liège.
Canada
Vancouver, British Columbia holds a celebration featuring exhibits, food and entertainment. The Toronto Bastille Day festival is also celebrated in Toronto, Ontario. The festival is organized by the French-Canadian community in Toronto and sponsored by the Consulate General of France. The celebration includes music, performances, sport competitions, and a French Market. At the end of the festival, there is also a traditional French bal populaire.
Czech Republic
Since 2008, Prague has hosted a French market "" ("Fourteenth of July Market") offering traditional French food and wine as well as music. The market takes place on Kampa Island, it is usually between 11 and 14 July. It acts as an event that marks the relinquish of the EU presidency from France to the Czech Republic. Traditional selections of French produce, including cheese, wine, meat, bread and pastries, are provided by the market. Throughout the event, live music is played in the evenings, with lanterns lighting up the square at night. Denmark The amusement park Tivoli celebrates Bastille Day., Hungary]]
Hungary
Budapest's two-day celebration is sponsored by the Institut de France. The festival is hosted along the Danube River, with streets filled with music and dancing. There are also local markets dedicated to French foods and wine, mixed with some traditional Hungarian specialties. At the end of the celebration, a fireworks show is held on the river banks.
India
Bastille Day is celebrated with great festivity in Pondicherry, a former French colony.
Ireland
The Embassy of France in Ireland organizes several events around Dublin, Cork and Limerick for Bastille Day; including evenings of French music and tasting of French food. Many members of the French community in Ireland take part in the festivities. Events in Dublin include live entertainment, speciality menus on French cuisine, and screenings of popular French films.
New Zealand
The Auckland suburb of Remuera hosts an annual French-themed Bastille Day street festival. Visitors enjoy mimes, dancers, music, as well as French foods and drinks. The budding relationship between the two countries, with the establishment of a Maori garden in France and exchange of their analyses of cave art, resulted in the creation of an official reception at the Residence of France. There is also an event in Wellington for the French community held at the Residence of France. has been celebrated since 1993. (Franschhoek, or 'French Corner,' is situated in the Western Cape.) As South Africa's gourmet capital, French food, wine and other entertainment is provided throughout the festival. The French Consulate in South Africa also celebrates their national holiday with a party for the French community.
French Polynesia
Following colonial rule, France annexed a large portion of what is now French Polynesia. Under French rule, Tahitians were permitted to participate in sport, singing, and dancing competitions one day a year: Bastille Day. The single day of celebration evolved into the major Heiva i Tahiti festival in Papeete Tahiti, where traditional events such as canoe races, tattooing, and fire walks are held. The singing and dancing competitions continue with music composed with traditional instruments such as the nasal flute and ukulele. Live entertainment is performed at Canary Wharf, with weeklong performances of French theatre at the Lion and Unicorn Theatre in Kentish Town. Restaurants feature cabarets and special menus across the city, and other celebrations include garden parties and sports tournaments. There is also a large event at the Bankside and Borough Market, where there is live music, street performers, and traditional French games played.
;Northeastern States
Baltimore, Maryland, has a large Bastille Day celebration each year at Petit Louis in the Roland Park area of Baltimore. Boston has a celebration annually, hosted by the French Cultural Center for 40 years. The street festival occurs in Boston's Back Bay neighborhood, near the Cultural Center's headquarters. The celebration includes francophone musical performers, dancing, and French cuisine. New York City has numerous Bastille Day celebrations each July, including Bastille Day on 60th Street hosted by the French Institute Alliance Française between Fifth and Lexington Avenues on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, Bastille Day on Smith Street in Brooklyn, and Bastille Day in Tribeca. There is also the annual Bastille Day Ball, taking place since 1924.) In Newport, Rhode Island, the annual Bastille Day celebration is organized by the local chapter of the Alliance Française. It takes place at King Park in Newport at the monument memorializing the accomplishments of the General Comte de Rochambeau whose 6,000 to 7,000 French forces landed in Newport on 11 July 1780. Their assistance in the defeat of the English in the War of Independence is well documented and is proof of the special relationship between France and the United States. In Washington D.C., food, music, and auction events are sponsored by the Embassy of France. There is also a French Festival within the city, where families can meet period entertainment groups set during the time of the French Revolution. Restaurants host parties serving traditional French food. Miami's celebration is organized by "French & Famous" in partnership with the French American Chamber of Commerce, the Union des Français de l'Etranger and many French brands. The event gathers over 1,000 attendees to celebrate "La Fête Nationale". The location and theme change every year. In 2017, the theme was "Guinguette Party" and attracted 1,200 francophiles at The River Yacht Club. New Orleans, Louisiana, has multiple celebrations, the largest in the historic French Quarter. In Austin, Texas, the Alliance Française d’Austin usually conducts a family-friendly Bastille Day party at the French Legation, the home of the French representative to the Republic of Texas from 1841 to 1845.
; Midwestern States
Chicago, Illinois, has hosted a variety of Bastille Day celebrations in a number of locations in the city, including Navy Pier and Oz Park. The recent incarnations have been sponsored in part by the Chicago branch of the French-American Chamber of Commerce and by the French Consulate-General in Chicago. Milwaukee's four-day street festival begins with a "Storming of the Bastille" with a 43-foot replica of the Eiffel Tower. Minneapolis, Minnesota, has a celebration with wine, French food, pastries, a flea market, circus performers and bands. Also in the Twin Cities area, the local chapter of the Alliance Française has hosted an annual event for years at varying locations with a competition for the "Best Baguette of the Twin Cities." Montgomery, Ohio, has a celebration with wine, beer, local restaurants' fare, pastries, games and bands. St. Louis, Missouri, has annual festivals in the Soulard neighborhood, the former French village of Carondelet, Missouri, and in the Benton Park neighborhood. The Chatillon-DeMenil Mansion in the Benton Park neighborhood, holds an annual Bastille Day festival with reenactments of the beheading of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, traditional dancing, and artillery demonstrations. Carondelet also began hosting an annual saloon crawl to celebrate Bastille Day in 2017. The Soulard neighborhood in St. Louis, Missouri celebrates its unique French heritage with special events including a parade, which honors the peasants who rejected the monarchy. The parade includes a 'gathering of the mob,' a walking and golf cart parade, and a mock beheading of the King and Queen.
; Western States
Portland, Oregon, has celebrated Bastille Day with crowds up to 8,000, in public festivals at various public parks, since 2001. The event is coordinated by the Alliance Française of Portland. Seattle's Bastille Day celebration, held at the Seattle Center, involves performances, picnics, wine and shopping. Sacramento, California, conducts annual "waiter races" in the midtown restaurant and shopping district, with a street festival.
One-time celebrations
* 1979: A concert with Jean-Michel Jarre on the Place de la Concorde in Paris was the first concert to have one million attendees.
* 1989: France celebrated the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution, notably with a monumental show on the Champs-Élysées in Paris, directed by French designer Jean-Paul Goude. President François Mitterrand acted as a host for invited world leaders.
* 1990: A concert with Jarre was held at La Défense near Paris.
* 1994: The military parade was opened by Eurocorps, a newly created European army unit including German soldiers. This was the first time German troops paraded in France since 1944, as a symbol of Franco-German reconciliation.
* 1995: A concert with Jarre was held at the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
* 1998: Two days after the French football team became World Cup champions, huge celebrations took place nationwide.
* 2004: To commemorate the centenary of the Entente Cordiale, the British led the military parade with the Red Arrows flying overhead.
* 2007: To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome, the military parade was led by troops from the 26 other EU member states, all marching at the French time.
* 2014: To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War, representatives of 80 countries who fought during this conflict were invited to the ceremony. The military parade was opened by 76 flags representing each of these countries.
* 2017: To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the United States of America's entry into the First World War, president of France Emmanuel Macron invited U.S. president Donald Trump to celebrate a centuries-long transatlantic tie between the two countries. Trump was reported to have admired the display, and pushed for the United States to "top it" with a proposed military parade on 10 November 2018 (the eve of the Armistice Day centenary).
Incidents during Bastille Day
* In 2002, Maxime Brunerie attempted to shoot French President Jacques Chirac during the Champs-Élysées parade.
* In 2009, Paris youths set fire to more than 300 cars on Bastille Day.
* In 2016, Tunisian terrorist Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel drove a truck into crowds during celebrations in the city of Nice. 86 people were killed and 434 injured along the Promenade des Anglais, before the attacker was killed in a shootout with police.
See also
* "Bastille Day", a song by Canadian progressive rock band Rush
*Bastille Day (1933 film), a French romantic comedy by René Clair
*Bastille Day (2016 film), a film starring Idris Elba
*Triplets of Bellville (2003 film), an animated film written and directed by Sylvain Chomet
*Bastille, a British alternative rock band named after the birthday of their frontman
* Bastille Day event
* Opération 14 juillet
* Place de la Bastille
* Public holidays in France
* Other national holidays in July:
** Canada Day in Canada
** Independence Day/Fourth of July in the United States
** Battle of the Boyne in Northern Ireland
** Belgian National Day
References
External links
*
*
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130329041343/http://www.france.fr/en/celebrations-and-festivals/bastille-day-%E2%80%93-14th-july 14 July] – Official French website (in English)
*
Category:Culture of the French Revolution
Category:July observances
Category:Parades in France
Day
Category:National days
Category:Culture of France
Category:Recurring events established in 1880
Category:1880 establishments in France
Category:Public holidays in France
Category:Summer events in France | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastille_Day | 2025-04-05T18:26:37.997518 |
3940 | Blowfish (cipher) | <!-- This article is the top result for "blowfish" on Google, so we need a link to the disambiguation page. -->
| publish date 1993
| derived from | derived to Twofish
| key size = 32–448 bits
| block size = 64 bits
| structure = Feistel network
| rounds = 16
| cryptanalysis Four rounds of Blowfish are susceptible to a second-order differential attack (Rijmen, 1997); for a class of weak keys, 14 rounds of Blowfish can be distinguished from a pseudorandom permutation (Vaudenay, 1996).
}}
Blowfish is a symmetric-key block cipher, designed in 1993 by Bruce Schneier and included in many cipher suites and encryption products. Blowfish provides a good encryption rate in software, and no effective cryptanalysis of it has been found to date for smaller files. It is recommended Blowfish should not be used to encrypt files larger than 4GB in size, Twofish should be used instead. It is a 16-round Feistel cipher and uses large key-dependent S-boxes. In structure it resembles CAST-128, which uses fixed S-boxes.
The adjacent diagram shows Blowfish's encryption routine. Each line represents 32 bits. There are five subkey-arrays: one 18-entry P-array (denoted as K in the diagram, to avoid confusion with the Plaintext) and four 256-entry S-boxes (S0, S1, S2 and S3).
Every round r consists of 4 actions:
{| class="wikitable"
|Action 1
|XOR the left half (L) of the data with the r th P-array entry
|-
|Action 2
|Use the XORed data as input for Blowfish's F-function
|-
|Action 3
|XOR the F-function's output with the right half (R) of the data
|-
|Action 4
|Swap L and R
|}
The F-function splits the 32-bit input into four 8-bit quarters and uses the quarters as input to the S-boxes. The S-boxes accept 8-bit input and produce 32-bit output. The outputs are added modulo 2<sup>32</sup> and XORed to produce the final 32-bit output (see image in the upper right corner).
After the 16th round, undo the last swap, and XOR L with K18 and R with K17 (output whitening).
Decryption is exactly the same as encryption, except that P1, P2, ..., P18 are used in the reverse order. This is not so obvious because xor is commutative and associative. A common misconception is to use inverse order of encryption as decryption algorithm (i.e. first XORing P17 and P18 to the ciphertext block, then using the P-entries in reverse order).
Blowfish's key schedule starts by initializing the P-array and S-boxes with values derived from the hexadecimal digits of pi, which contain no obvious pattern (see nothing up my sleeve number). The secret key is then, byte by byte, cycling the key if necessary, XORed with all the P-entries in order. A 64-bit all-zero block is then encrypted with the algorithm as it stands. The resultant ciphertext replaces P<sub>1</sub> and P<sub>2</sub>. The same ciphertext is then encrypted again with the new subkeys, and the new ciphertext replaces P<sub>3</sub> and P<sub>4</sub>. This continues, replacing the entire P-array and all the S-box entries. In all, the Blowfish encryption algorithm will run 521 times to generate all the subkeys about 4 KB of data is processed.
Because the P-array is 576 bits long, and the key bytes are XORed through all these 576 bits during the initialization, many implementations support key sizes up to 576 bits. The reason for that is a discrepancy between the original Blowfish description, which uses 448-bit keys, and its reference implementation, which uses 576-bit keys. The test vectors for verifying third-party implementations were also produced with 576-bit keys. When asked which Blowfish version is the correct one, Bruce Schneier answered: "The test vectors should be used to determine the one true Blowfish".
Another opinion is that the 448 bits limit is present to ensure that every bit of every subkey depends on every bit of the key,Weakness and successors
Blowfish's use of a 64-bit block size (as opposed to e.g. AES's 128-bit block size) makes it vulnerable to birthday attacks, particularly in contexts like HTTPS. In 2016, the SWEET32 attack demonstrated how to leverage birthday attacks to perform plaintext recovery (i.e. decrypting ciphertext) against ciphers with a 64-bit block size. The GnuPG project recommends that Blowfish not be used to encrypt files larger than 4 GB due to its small block size.
A reduced-round variant of Blowfish is known to be susceptible to known-plaintext attacks on reflectively weak keys. Blowfish implementations use 16 rounds of encryption, and are not susceptible to this attack.
Bruce Schneier has recommended migrating to his Blowfish successor, Twofish.
Blowfish2 was released in 2005, developed by Alexander Pukall. It has exactly the same design but has twice as many S tables and uses 64-bit integers instead of 32-bit integers. It no longer works on 64-bit blocks but on 128-bit blocks like AES. Blowfish2 is used for example, in FreePascal.See also
* Twofish
* Threefish
* MacGuffin
References
External links
*
*
*
Category:Feistel ciphers
Category:Free ciphers
Category:Articles with example pseudocode | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowfish_(cipher) | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.007386 |
3942 | Bijection | In mathematics, a bijection, bijective function, or one-to-one correspondence is a function between two sets such that each element of the second set (the codomain) is the image of exactly one element of the first set (the domain). Equivalently, a bijection is a relation between two sets such that each element of either set is paired with exactly one element of the other set.
A function is bijective if and only if it is invertible; that is, a function <math>f:X\to Y</math> is bijective if and only if there is a function <math>g:Y\to X,</math> the inverse of , such that each of the two ways for composing the two functions produces an identity function: <math>g(f(x)) x</math> for each <math>x</math> in <math>X</math> and <math>f(g(y)) y</math> for each <math>y</math> in <math>Y.</math>
For example, the multiplication by two defines a bijection from the integers to the even numbers, which has the division by two as its inverse function.
A function is bijective if and only if it is both injective (or one-to-one)—meaning that each element in the codomain is mapped from at most one element of the domain—and surjective (or onto)—meaning that each element of the codomain is mapped from at least one element of the domain. The term one-to-one correspondence must not be confused with one-to-one function, which means injective but not necessarily surjective.
The elementary operation of counting establishes a bijection from some finite set to the first natural numbers , up to the number of elements in the counted set. It results that two finite sets have the same number of elements if and only if there exists a bijection between them. More generally, two sets are said to have the same cardinal number if there exists a bijection between them.
A bijective function from a set to itself is also called a permutation, and the set of all permutations of a set forms its symmetric group.
Some bijections with further properties have received specific names, which include automorphisms, isomorphisms, homeomorphisms, diffeomorphisms, permutation groups, and most geometric transformations. Galois correspondences are bijections between sets of mathematical objects of apparently very different nature.
Definition
For a binary relation pairing elements of set X with elements of set Y to be a bijection, four properties must hold:
# each element of X must be paired with at least one element of Y,
# no element of X may be paired with more than one element of Y,
# each element of Y must be paired with at least one element of X, and
# no element of Y may be paired with more than one element of X.
Satisfying properties (1) and (2) means that a pairing is a function with domain X. It is more common to see properties (1) and (2) written as a single statement: Every element of X is paired with exactly one element of Y. Functions which satisfy property (3) are said to be "onto Y " and are called surjections (or surjective functions). Functions which satisfy property (4) are said to be "one-to-one functions" and are called injections (or injective functions). With this terminology, a bijection is a function which is both a surjection and an injection, or using other words, a bijection is a function which is both "one-to-one" and "onto".Examples Batting line-up of a baseball or cricket teamConsider the batting line-up of a baseball or cricket team (or any list of all the players of any sports team where every player holds a specific spot in a line-up). The set X will be the players on the team (of size nine in the case of baseball) and the set Y will be the positions in the batting order (1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.) The "pairing" is given by which player is in what position in this order. Property (1) is satisfied since each player is somewhere in the list. Property (2) is satisfied since no player bats in two (or more) positions in the order. Property (3) says that for each position in the order, there is some player batting in that position and property (4) states that two or more players are never batting in the same position in the list. Seats and students of a classroom
In a classroom there are a certain number of seats. A group of students enter the room and the instructor asks them to be seated. After a quick look around the room, the instructor declares that there is a bijection between the set of students and the set of seats, where each student is paired with the seat they are sitting in. What the instructor observed in order to reach this conclusion was that:
# Every student was in a seat (there was no one standing),
# No student was in more than one seat,
# Every seat had someone sitting there (there were no empty seats), and
# No seat had more than one student in it.
The instructor was able to conclude that there were just as many seats as there were students, without having to count either set.
More mathematical examples
s to the integers, which maps 2n to −n and 2n − 1 to n, for n ≥ 0.]]
* For any set X, the identity function 1<sub>X</sub>: X → X, 1<sub>X</sub>(x) = x is bijective.
* The function f: R → R, f(x) 2x + 1 is bijective, since for each y there is a unique x (y − 1)/2 such that f(x) y. More generally, any linear function over the reals, f: R → R, f(x) ax + b (where a is non-zero) is a bijection. Each real number y is obtained from (or paired with) the real number x = (y − b)/a.
* The function f: R → (−π/2, π/2), given by f(x) arctan(x) is bijective, since each real number x is paired with exactly one angle y in the interval (−π/2, π/2) so that tan(y) x (that is, y = arctan(x)). If the codomain (−π/2, π/2) was made larger to include an integer multiple of π/2, then this function would no longer be onto (surjective), since there is no real number which could be paired with the multiple of π/2 by this arctan function.
* The exponential function, g: R → R, g(x) e<sup>x</sup>, is not bijective: for instance, there is no x in R such that g(x) −1, showing that g is not onto (surjective). However, if the codomain is restricted to the positive real numbers <math>\R^+ \equiv \left(0, \infty\right)</math>, then g would be bijective; its inverse (see below) is the natural logarithm function ln.
* The function h: R → R<sup>+</sup>, h(x) x<sup>2</sup> is not bijective: for instance, h(−1) h(1) = 1, showing that h is not one-to-one (injective). However, if the domain is restricted to <math>\R^+_0 \equiv \left[0, \infty\right)</math>, then h would be bijective; its inverse is the positive square root function.
*By Schröder–Bernstein theorem, given any two sets X and Y, and two injective functions f: X → Y and g: Y → X, there exists a bijective function h: X → Y.
Inverses
A bijection f with domain X (indicated by f: X → Y in functional notation) also defines a converse relation starting in Y and going to X (by turning the arrows around). The process of "turning the arrows around" for an arbitrary function does not, in general, yield a function, but properties (3) and (4) of a bijection say that this inverse relation is a function with domain Y. Moreover, properties (1) and (2) then say that this inverse function is a surjection and an injection, that is, the inverse function exists and is also a bijection. Functions that have inverse functions are said to be invertible. A function is invertible if and only if it is a bijection.
Stated in concise mathematical notation, a function f: X → Y is bijective if and only if it satisfies the condition
:for every y in Y there is a unique x in X with y = f(x).
Continuing with the baseball batting line-up example, the function that is being defined takes as input the name of one of the players and outputs the position of that player in the batting order. Since this function is a bijection, it has an inverse function which takes as input a position in the batting order and outputs the player who will be batting in that position.
Composition
The composition <math>g \,\circ\, f</math> of two bijections f: X → Y and g: Y → Z is a bijection, whose inverse is given by <math>g \,\circ\, f</math> is <math>(g \,\circ\, f)^{-1} \;=\; (f^{-1}) \,\circ\, (g^{-1})</math>.
Conversely, if the composition <math>g \, \circ\, f</math> of two functions is bijective, it only follows that f is injective and g is surjective.
Cardinality
If X and Y are finite sets, then there exists a bijection between the two sets X and Y if and only if X and Y have the same number of elements. Indeed, in axiomatic set theory, this is taken as the definition of "same number of elements" (equinumerosity), and generalising this definition to infinite sets leads to the concept of cardinal number, a way to distinguish the various sizes of infinite sets.
Properties
* A function f: R → R is bijective if and only if its graph meets every horizontal and vertical line exactly once.
* If X is a set, then the bijective functions from X to itself, together with the operation of functional composition (∘), form a group, the symmetric group of X, which is denoted variously by S(X), S<sub>X</sub>, or X! (X factorial).
* Bijections preserve cardinalities of sets: for a subset A of the domain with cardinality |A| and subset B of the codomain with cardinality |B|, one has the following equalities:
*:|f(A)| |A| and |f<sup>−1</sup>(B)| |B|.
*If X and Y are finite sets with the same cardinality, and f: X → Y, then the following are equivalent:
*# f is a bijection.
*# f is a surjection.
*# f is an injection.
*For a finite set S, there is a bijection between the set of possible total orderings of the elements and the set of bijections from S to S. That is to say, the number of permutations of elements of S is the same as the number of total orderings of that set—namely, n!.
Category theory
Bijections are precisely the isomorphisms in the category Set of sets and set functions. However, the bijections are not always the isomorphisms for more complex categories. For example, in the category Grp of groups, the morphisms must be homomorphisms since they must preserve the group structure, so the isomorphisms are group isomorphisms which are bijective homomorphisms.
Generalization to partial functions
The notion of one-to-one correspondence generalizes to partial functions, where they are called partial bijections, although partial bijections are only required to be injective. The reason for this relaxation is that a (proper) partial function is already undefined for a portion of its domain; thus there is no compelling reason to constrain its inverse to be a total function, i.e. defined everywhere on its domain. The set of all partial bijections on a given base set is called the symmetric inverse semigroup.
Another way of defining the same notion is to say that a partial bijection from A to B is any relation
R (which turns out to be a partial function) with the property that R is the graph of a bijection f:A′→B′, where A′ is a subset of A and B′ is a subset of B.
When the partial bijection is on the same set, it is sometimes called a one-to-one partial transformation. An example is the Möbius transformation simply defined on the complex plane, rather than its completion to the extended complex plane.
Gallery
See also
* Ax–Grothendieck theorem
* Bijection, injection and surjection
* Bijective numeration
* Bijective proof
* Category theory
* Multivalued function
Notes
References
This topic is a basic concept in set theory and can be found in any text which includes an introduction to set theory. Almost all texts that deal with an introduction to writing proofs will include a section on set theory, so the topic may be found in any of these:
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* External links
*
*
* [http://jeff560.tripod.com/i.html Earliest Uses of Some of the Words of Mathematics: entry on Injection, Surjection and Bijection has the history of Injection and related terms.]
Category:Functions and mappings
Category:Basic concepts in set theory
Category:Mathematical relations
Category:Types of functions | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bijection | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.022655 |
3943 | Binary function | In mathematics, a binary function (also called bivariate function, or function of two variables) is a function that takes two inputs.
Precisely stated, a function f is binary if there exists sets X, Y, Z such that
\,f \colon X \times Y \rightarrow Z
where X \times Y is the Cartesian product of X and Y.
Alternative definitions
Set-theoretically, a binary function can be represented as a subset of the Cartesian product X \times Y \times Z, where (x,y,z) belongs to the subset if and only if f(x,y) = z.
Conversely, a subset R defines a binary function if and only if for any x \in X and y \in Y, there exists a unique z \in Z such that (x,y,z) belongs to R.
f(x,y) is then defined to be this z.
Alternatively, a binary function may be interpreted as simply a function from X \times Y to Z.
Even when thought of this way, however, one generally writes f(x,y) instead of f((x,y)).
(That is, the same pair of parentheses is used to indicate both function application and the formation of an ordered pair.)
Examples
Division of whole numbers can be thought of as a function. If \Z is the set of integers, \N^+ is the set of natural numbers (except for zero), and \Q is the set of rational numbers, then division is a binary function f:\Z \times \N^+ \to \Q.
In a vector space V over a field F, scalar multiplication is a binary function. A scalar a ∈ F is combined with a vector v ∈ V to produce a new vector av ∈ V.
Another example is that of inner products, or more generally functions of the form (x,y)\mapsto x^\mathrm{T}My, where , are real-valued vectors of appropriate size and is a matrix. If is a positive definite matrix, this yields an inner product.
Functions of two real variables
Functions whose domain is a subset of \mathbb{R}^2 are often also called functions of two variables even if their domain does not form a rectangle and thus the cartesian product of two sets.
Restrictions to ordinary functions
In turn, one can also derive ordinary functions of one variable from a binary function.
Given any element x \in X, there is a function f^x, or f(x,\cdot), from Y to Z, given by f^x(y) = f(x,y).
Similarly, given any element y \in Y, there is a function f_y, or f(\cdot,y), from X to Z, given by f_y(x) = f(x,y). In computer science, this identification between a function from X \times Y to Z and a function from X to Z^Y, where Z^Y is the set of all functions from Y to Z, is called currying.
Generalisations
The various concepts relating to functions can also be generalised to binary functions.
For example, the division example above is surjective (or onto) because every rational number may be expressed as a quotient of an integer and a natural number.
This example is injective in each input separately, because the functions f x and f y are always injective.
However, it's not injective in both variables simultaneously, because (for example) f (2,4) = f (1,2).
One can also consider partial binary functions, which may be defined only for certain values of the inputs.
For example, the division example above may also be interpreted as a partial binary function from Z and N to Q, where N is the set of all natural numbers, including zero.
But this function is undefined when the second input is zero.
A binary operation is a binary function where the sets X, Y, and Z are all equal; binary operations are often used to define algebraic structures.
In linear algebra, a bilinear transformation is a binary function where the sets X, Y, and Z are all vector spaces and the derived functions f x and fy are all linear transformations.
A bilinear transformation, like any binary function, can be interpreted as a function from X × Y to Z, but this function in general won't be linear.
However, the bilinear transformation can also be interpreted as a single linear transformation from the tensor product X \otimes Y to Z.
Generalisations to ternary and other functions
The concept of binary function generalises to ternary (or 3-ary) function, quaternary (or 4-ary) function, or more generally to n-ary function for any natural number n.
A 0-ary function to Z is simply given by an element of Z.
One can also define an A-ary function where A is any set; there is one input for each element of A.
Category theory
In category theory, n-ary functions generalise to n-ary morphisms in a multicategory.
The interpretation of an n-ary morphism as an ordinary morphisms whose domain is some sort of product of the domains of the original n-ary morphism will work in a monoidal category.
The construction of the derived morphisms of one variable will work in a closed monoidal category.
The category of sets is closed monoidal, but so is the category of vector spaces, giving the notion of bilinear transformation above.
See also
Arity
Unary operation
Unary function
Binary operation
Iterated binary operation
Ternary operation
References
Category:Types of functions
Category:2 (number) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_function | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.031381 |
3947 | Blue Velvet (film) | | music = Angelo Badalamenti
| cinematography = Frederick Elmes
| editing = Duwayne Dunham
| distributor = De Laurentiis Entertainment Group
| released =
| runtime 120 minutes
| country = United States
| budget $6 million
| gross $8.6 million (North America)
}}
Blue Velvet is a 1986 American neo-noir mystery thriller film written and directed by David Lynch. Blending psychological horror with film noir, the film stars Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, and Laura Dern, and is named after the 1951 song of the same name. The film follows a college student who returns to his hometown and discovers a severed human ear in a field, which leads him to uncover a criminal conspiracy involving a troubled nightclub singer.
The screenplay of Blue Velvet had been passed around multiple times in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with several major studios declining it due to its strong sexual and violent content. After the failure of his 1984 film Dune, Lynch made attempts at developing a more "personal story", somewhat characteristic of the surrealist style displayed in his first film Eraserhead (1977). The independent studio De Laurentiis Entertainment Group, owned at the time by Italian film producer Dino De Laurentiis, agreed to finance and produce the film.
Blue Velvet initially received a divided critical response, with many stating that its explicit content served little artistic purpose. Nevertheless, the film earned Lynch his second nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director, and received the year's Best Film and Best Director prizes from the National Society of Film Critics. It came to achieve cult status. As an example of a director casting against the norm, it was credited for revitalizing Hopper's career and for providing Rossellini with a dramatic outlet beyond her previous work as a fashion model and a cosmetics spokeswoman. In the years since, the film has been re-evaluated, and it is now widely regarded as one of Lynch's major works and one of the greatest films of the 1980s. Publications including Sight & Sound, Time, Entertainment Weekly and BBC Magazine have ranked it among the greatest American films of all time. In 2008, it was chosen by the American Film Institute as one of the ten greatest American mystery films.
Plot
<!-- Per WP:FILMPLOT, plot summaries for feature films should be between 400 to 700 words only. -->
College student Jeffrey Beaumont returns to his suburban hometown of Lumberton, North Carolina, after his father, Tom, has a near-fatal attack from a medical condition. Walking home from the hospital, Jeffrey cuts through a vacant lot and discovers a severed human ear, which he takes to police detective John Williams. Williams's daughter Sandy tells Jeffrey that the ear somehow relates to a lounge singer named Dorothy Vallens. Intrigued, Jeffrey enters her apartment by posing as an exterminator. While there, he steals a spare key while she is distracted by a man in a distinctive yellow sport coat, whom Jeffrey nicknames the "Yellow Man".
Jeffrey and Sandy attend Dorothy's nightclub act, in which she sings "Blue Velvet", and leave early so Jeffrey can break into her apartment. Dorothy returns home and undresses; she finds Jeffrey hiding in a closet and forces him to strip at knifepoint, but he retreats to the closet when Frank Booth, a psychopathic gangster and drug lord, arrives and interrupts their encounter. Frank beats and rapes Dorothy while inhaling gas from a canister, alternating between fits of sobbing and violent rage. After Frank leaves, Jeffrey sneaks away and seeks comfort from Sandy.
Surmising that Frank has abducted Dorothy's husband Don, and son Donnie, to force her into sexual slavery, Jeffrey suspects that Frank cut off Don's ear to intimidate her into submission. While continuing to see Sandy, Jeffrey enters into a sadomasochistic relationship with Dorothy, in which she encourages him to hit her. Jeffrey sees Frank attending Dorothy's show and later observes him selling drugs and meeting with the Yellow Man. Jeffrey then sees the Yellow Man meeting with a "well-dressed man".
When Frank catches Jeffrey leaving Dorothy's apartment, he abducts them and takes them to the lair of Ben, a criminal associate holding Don and Donnie hostage. Frank permits Dorothy to see her family and forces Jeffrey to watch Ben perform an impromptu lip-sync of Roy Orbison's "In Dreams", which moves Frank to tears. Afterwards, he and his gang take Jeffrey and Dorothy on a high-speed joyride to a sawmill yard, where he again attempts to sexually abuse Dorothy. When Jeffrey intervenes and punches him in the face, an enraged Frank and his gang pull him out of the car. Replaying the tape of "In Dreams", Frank smears lipstick on his face and violently kisses Jeffrey. Frank then has Jeffrey restrained and beats him unconscious, while Dorothy pleads for Frank to stop. Jeffrey awakens the next morning, bruised and bloodied.
While visiting the police station, Jeffrey discovers that the Yellow Man is Detective Williams's partner Tom Gordon, who has been murdering Frank's rival drug dealers and stealing confiscated narcotics from the evidence room for Frank to sell. After Jeffrey and Sandy declare their love for each other at a party, they are pursued by a car which they assume belongs to Frank; as they arrive at Jeffrey's home, Sandy realizes the driver is her ex-boyfriend, Mike. After Mike threatens to beat Jeffrey for stealing his girlfriend, Dorothy appears on Jeffrey's porch naked, beaten, and confused. Mike backs down as Jeffrey and Sandy whisk Dorothy to Sandy's house to summon medical attention.
When Dorothy calls Jeffrey "my secret lover", a distraught Sandy slaps him for cheating on her. Jeffrey asks Sandy to tell her father everything, and Detective Williams then leads a police raid on Frank's headquarters, killing Frank's men. Jeffrey returns alone to Dorothy's apartment, where he discovers Don dead and Gordon mortally wounded. As Jeffrey leaves the apartment, the "Well-Dressed Man" arrives, sees Jeffrey in the stairs, and chases him back inside. Jeffrey uses Gordon's walkie-talkie to say he is in the bedroom before hiding in the closet. The "Well-Dressed Man" arrives at the apartment and Jeffrey observes he is actually Frank in disguise. Jeffrey kills Frank with Gordon's gun when Frank opens the closet door. Moments later, Sandy and Detective Williams arrive.
Some time later, Jeffrey and Sandy have continued their relationship, Tom Beaumont has recovered, and Dorothy has been reunited with her son.
Cast
Production
Origin
The film's story originated from three ideas that crystallized in the filmmaker's mind over a period of time starting as early as 1973.
The second idea was an image of a severed, human ear lying in a field. "I don't know why it had to be an ear. Except it needed to be an opening of a part of the body, a hole into something else ... The ear sits on the head and goes right into the mind so it felt perfect," Lynch remarked in a 1986 interview to The New York Times.
The third idea was Bobby Vinton's rendition of "Blue Velvet" and "the mood that came with that song a mood, a time, and things that were of that time."
The scene in which Dorothy appears naked outside was inspired by a real-life experience Lynch had during childhood when he and his brother saw a naked woman walking down a neighborhood street at night. The experience was so traumatic to the young Lynch that it made him cry, and he had never forgotten it.
After completing The Elephant Man (1980), Lynch met producer Richard Roth over coffee. Roth had read and enjoyed Lynch's Ronnie Rocket script, but did not think it was something he wanted to produce. He asked Lynch if the filmmaker had any other scripts, but the director only had ideas. "I told him I had always wanted to sneak into a girl's room to watch her into the night and that, maybe, at one point or another, I would see something that would be the clue to a murder mystery. Roth loved the idea and asked me to write a treatment. I went home and thought of the ear in the field." Production was announced in August 1984. Rossellini had gained some exposure before the film for her Lancôme ads in the early 1980s and for being the daughter of actress Ingrid Bergman and director Roberto Rossellini. After completion of the film, during test screenings, ICM Partners—the agency representing Rossellini—immediately dropped her as a client. Furthermore, the nuns at the school in Rome that Rossellini attended in her youth called to say they were praying for her.
Kyle MacLachlan had played the central role in Lynch's critical and commercial failure Dune (1984), a science fiction epic based on the novel of the same name. MacLachlan later became a recurring collaborator with Lynch, who remarked: "Kyle plays innocents who are interested in the mysteries of life. He's the person you trust enough to go into a strange world with." Val Kilmer was offered a role in the film, but he turned it down as felt it was too "graphic" for him, a decision he later regretted. Dourif and Stockwell also rejoined Lynch from Dune.
Dennis Hopper was the best-known actor in the film, having directed and starred in Easy Rider (1969). Hopper—said to be Lynch's third choice (Michael Ironside has stated that Frank was written with him in mind)—accepted the role, reportedly having exclaimed, "I've got to play Frank! I am Frank!"
Laura Dern, then 18 years old, was cast as Sandy after several already-successful actresses turned the role down, one among those being Molly Ringwald.ShootingPrincipal photography of Blue Velvet began in August 1985 and completed in November. The film was shot at EUE/Screen Gems studio in Wilmington, North Carolina, which also provided the exterior scenes of Lumberton. The scene with a raped and battered Dorothy proved to be particularly challenging. Several townspeople arrived to watch the filming with picnic baskets and rugs, against the wishes of Rossellini and Lynch. However, they continued filming as normal, and when Lynch yelled cut, the townspeople left. As a result, police told Lynch they were no longer permitted to shoot in any public areas of Wilmington.
The Carolina Apartments in downtown Wilmington served as Dorothy's apartment building, with the adjacent Kenan fountain featured prominently in many shots. The building is also the birth place and death place of noted artist Claude Howell. The apartment building stands today, and the Kenan fountain was refurbished in 2020 after sustaining heavy damage during Hurricane Florence.
Editing
Lynch's original rough cut ran for approximately four hours. He also made cuts at the request of the MPAA. For example, when Frank slaps Dorothy after the first rape scene, the audience was supposed to see Frank actually hitting her. Instead, the film cuts away to Jeffrey in the closet, wincing at what he has just seen. This cut was made to satisfy the MPAA's concerns about violence, though Lynch thought that the change made the scene more disturbing.
In 2011, Lynch announced that footage from the deleted scenes, long thought lost, had been discovered. The material was subsequently included on the Blu-ray Disc release of the film. Among the deleted footage was Megan Mullally as Jeffrey's college sweetheart Louise Wertham, whose entire role was cut from the theatrical release. The final cut of the film runs at just over two hours.
Interpretations
is a strong symbolic aspect of the film, illustrated in this second shot which is lit from above before fading out, representing a return to normality.]]
Despite Blue Velvets initial appearance as a mystery, the film operates on a number of thematic levels. The film owes a large debt to 1950s film noir, containing and exploring such conventions as the femme fatale (Dorothy Vallens), a seemingly unstoppable villain (Frank Booth) and the questionable moral outlook of the hero (Jeffrey Beaumont), as well as its unusual use of shadowy, sometimes dark cinematography. Blue Velvet establishes Lynch's famous "askew vision" and introduces several common elements of his work, some of which would later become his trademarks, including distorted characters, a polarized world and debilitating damage to the skull or brain. Perhaps the most significant Lynchian trademark in the film is the unearthing of a dark underbelly in a seemingly idealized small town; Jeffrey even proclaims in the film that he is "seeing something that was always hidden". Lynch's characterization of films, symbols and motifs have become well known and his particular style, characterised largely in Blue Velvet for the first time, has been written about extensively using descriptions like "dreamlike", "ultraweird", "dark", and "oddball". Red curtains also appear in key scenes, specifically in Dorothy's apartment and at the night club where she sings, which have since become a Lynch trademark. The film has been compared to Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) because of its stark treatment of evil and mental illness. The premise of both films is curiosity, leading to an investigation that draws the lead characters into a hidden, voyeuristic underworld of crime.
The film's thematic framework harks back to Edgar Allan Poe, Henry James and early gothic fiction, as well as films such as Shadow of a Doubt (1943) and The Night of the Hunter (1955) and the entire notion of film noir. Lynch has called it a "film about things that are hidden - within a small city and within people." Michael Atkinson claims that the resulting violence in the film can be read as symbolic of domestic violence within real families. He reads Jeffrey as an innocent youth who is both horrified by the violence inflicted by Frank and tempted by it as the means of possessing Dorothy for himself. Atkinson takes a Freudian approach to the film, considering it to be an expression of the traumatised innocence which characterises Lynch's work.
Soundtrack
The Blue Velvet soundtrack was supervised by Angelo Badalamenti (who makes a brief cameo appearance as the pianist at the Slow Club where Dorothy performs). The soundtrack makes heavy usage of vintage pop songs, such as Bobby Vinton's "Blue Velvet" and Roy Orbison's "In Dreams", juxtaposed with an orchestral score. During filming, Lynch placed speakers on set and in streets and played Shostakovich to set the mood he wanted to convey. The score alludes to Shostakovich's 15th Symphony, which Lynch had been listening to regularly while writing the screenplay. Lynch had originally opted to use "Song to the Siren" by This Mortal Coil during the scene in which Sandy and Jeffrey share a dance; however, he could not obtain the rights for the song at the time. He would go on to use this song in Lost Highway eleven years later.
Entertainment Weekly ranked Blue Velvet soundtrack on its list of the 100 Greatest Film Soundtracks, at the 100th position. Critic John Alexander wrote, "the haunting soundtrack accompanies the title credits, then weaves through the narrative, accentuating the noir mood of the film." Lynch worked with music composer Angelo Badalamenti for the first time in this film and asked him to write a score that had to be "like Shostakovich, be very Russian, but make it the most beautiful thing but make it dark and a little bit scary." Badalamenti's success with Blue Velvet would lead him to contribute to all of Lynch's future full-length films until Inland Empire as well as the cult television program Twin Peaks. Also included in the sound team was long-time Lynch collaborator Alan Splet, a sound editor and designer who had won an Academy Award for his work on The Black Stallion (1979) and been nominated for Never Cry Wolf (1983).
Reception
Box office
Blue Velvet premiered in competition at the Montreal World Film Festival in August 1986, and at the Toronto Festival of Festivals on September 12, 1986, and a few days later in the United States. It debuted commercially in both countries on September 19, 1986, in 98 theatres across the United States. In its opening weekend, the film grossed a total of $789,409. It eventually expanded to another 15 theatres, and in the US and Canada grossed a total of $8,551,228. Blue Velvet was met with uproar during its audience reception, with lines formed around city blocks in New York City and Los Angeles. There were reports of mass walkouts and refund demands during its opening week. At a Chicago screening, a man fainted and had to have his pacemaker checked. Upon completion, he returned to the cinema to see the ending. At a Los Angeles cinema, two strangers became engaged in a heated disagreement, but decided to resolve the disagreement to return to the theatre.
Sheila Benson of the Los Angeles Times called the film "the most brilliantly disturbing film ever to have its roots in small-town American life," describing it as "shocking, visionary, rapturously controlled". Film critic Gene Siskel included Blue Velvet on his list of the best films of 1986, at the fifth spot. Peter Travers, film critic for Rolling Stone, named it the best film of the 1980s and referred to it as an "American masterpiece".
in 1990]]
On the other hand, Paul Attanasio of The Washington Post said "the film showcases a visual stylist utterly in command of his talents" and that Angelo Badalamenti "contributes an extraordinary score, slipping seamlessly from slinky jazz to violin figures to the romantic sweep of a classic Hollywood score," but stated that Lynch "isn't interested in communicating, he's interested in parading his personality. The movie doesn't progress or deepen, it just gets weirder, and to no good end." A general criticism from US critics was Blue Velvets approach to sexuality and violence. They asserted that this detracted from the film's seriousness as a work of art, and some condemned the film as pornographic. One of its detractors, Roger Ebert, stated that the large amount of "jokey small-town satire" in the film made it impossible to take its themes seriously. Ebert praised Rossellini's performance as "convincing and courageous" but criticized how she was depicted in the film, even accusing David Lynch of misogyny: "degraded, slapped around, humiliated and undressed in front of the camera. And when you ask an actress to endure those experiences, you should keep your side of the bargain by putting her in an important film."
The film is now widely considered a masterpiece and holds an approval score of 91% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 138 reviews, with an average rating of 8.2/10. The website's critical consensus states: "If audiences walk away from this subversive, surreal shocker not fully understanding the story, they might also walk away with a deeper perception of the potential of film storytelling." The film also has a score of 75 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 15 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Looking back in his Guardian/Observer review, critic Philip French wrote, "The film is wearing well and has attained a classic status without becoming respectable or losing its sense of danger."
Mark Kermode walked out on the film and gave the film a poor review upon its release, but revised his view of the film over time. In 2016, he remarked, "as a film critic, it taught me that when a film really gets under your skin and really provokes a visceral reaction, you have to be very careful about assessing it ... I didn't walk out on Blue Velvet because it was a bad film. I walked out on it because it was a really good film. The point was at the time I wasn't good enough for it."Accolades
David Lynch was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director and the Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay for his work on the film. Dennis Hopper was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture for his performance, while Isabella Rossellini won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead for her performance. Lynch won Best Director and Hopper won Best Supporting Actor at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association awards in 1987. That same year, the film received four National Society of Film Critics awards: Best Film, Best Director (Lynch), Best Cinematography (Frederick Elmes), and Best Supporting Actor (Hopper).
Home media
Blue Velvet was released on VHS and LaserDisc by Karl-Lorimar Home Video in 1987 and re-issued by Warner Home Video in 1991. After that, it was released on DVD in 2000 and 2002 by MGM Home Entertainment. The film made its Blu-ray debut on November 8, 2011, with a special 25th-anniversary edition featuring never-before-seen deleted scenes. On May 28, 2019, the film was re-released on Blu-ray by the Criterion Collection, featuring a 4K digital restoration, the original stereo soundtrack and other special features, including a behind-the-scenes documentary titled Blue Velvet Revisited''. Criterion later released the film as a 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray/Blu-Ray combo pack on June 25, 2024.Legacy various "all-time greatest films" rankings, the American Film Institute has awarded the film three honors in its lists: 96th on 100 Years ... 100 Thrills in 2001, selecting cinema's most thrilling moments and ranked Frank Booth 36th of the 50 greatest villains in 100 Years ... 100 Heroes and Villains in 2003. In June 2008, the AFI revealed its "ten Top Ten"—the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres—after polling over 1,500 people from the creative community. Blue Velvet was acknowledged as the eighth best film in the mystery genre. Premiere magazine listed Frank Booth, played by Dennis Hopper, as the 54th on its list of 'The 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time', calling him one of "the most monstrously funny creations in cinema history". The film was ranked 84th on Bravo Television's four-hour program 100 Scariest Movie Moments (2004). It is frequently sampled musically and an array of bands and solo artists have taken their names and inspiration from the film. In August 2012, Sight & Sound unveiled their latest list of the 250 greatest films of all time, with Blue Velvet ranking at 69th.
Blue Velvet was also nominated for the following AFI lists:
* AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies
* AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains
** Frank Booth – ranked 36th-greatest film villain
* AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs:
** "In Dreams" - nominated
* AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition)
Inspired by the film, pop singer Lana Del Rey recorded a cover version of "Blue Velvet" in 2012. Used to endorse clothing line H&M, a music video accompanied the track and aired as a television commercial. Set in post-war America, the video drew influence from Lynch and Blue Velvet. In the video, Del Rey plays the role of Dorothy Vallens, performing a private concert similar to the scene where Ben (Dean Stockwell) pantomimes "In Dreams" for Frank Booth. Del Rey's version, however, has her lip-syncing "Blue Velvet" when a little person dressed as Frank Sinatra approaches and unplugs a hidden Victrola, revealing Del Rey as a fraud.
See also
*List of cult films
References
Further reading
* Atkinson, Michael (1997). Blue Velvet. Long Island, New York.: British Film Institute. .
* Drazin, Charles (2001). Blue Velvet: Bloomsbury Pocket Movie Guide 3. Britain. Bloomsbury Publishing. .
* Lynch, David and Rodley, Chris (2005). Lynch on Lynch. Faber and Faber: New York. .
External links
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*
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Category:English-language independent films
Category:English-language crime thriller films
Category:English-language mystery thriller films | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Velvet_(film) | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.063981 |
3948 | Binary operation | thumb|A binary operation \circ is a rule for combining the arguments x and y to produce x\circ y
In mathematics, a binary operation or dyadic operation is a rule for combining two elements (called operands) to produce another element. More formally, a binary operation is an operation of arity two.
More specifically, a binary operation on a set is a binary function whose two domains and the codomain are the same set. Examples include the familiar arithmetic operations like addition, subtraction, multiplication, set operations like union, complement, cartesian product, intersection. Other examples are readily found in different areas of mathematics, such as vector addition, matrix multiplication, and conjugation in groups.
A binary function that involves several sets is sometimes also called a binary operation. For example, scalar multiplication of vector spaces takes a scalar and a vector to produce a vector, and scalar product takes two vectors to produce a scalar.
Binary operations are the keystone of most structures that are studied in algebra, in particular in semigroups, monoids, groups, rings, fields, and vector spaces.
Terminology
More precisely, a binary operation on a set S is a mapping of the elements of the Cartesian product S \times S to S:
\,f \colon S \times S \rightarrow S.
The closure property of a binary operation expresses the existence of a result for the operation given any pair of operands.
If f is not a function but a partial function, then f is called a partial binary operation. For instance, division of real numbers is a partial binary operation, because one can not divide by zero: \frac{a}{0} is undefined for every real number a. In both model theory and classical universal algebra, binary operations are required to be defined on all elements of S \times S. However, partial algebras generalize universal algebras to allow partial operations.
Sometimes, especially in computer science, the term binary operation is used for any binary function.
Properties and examples
Typical examples of binary operations are the addition (+) and multiplication (\times) of numbers and matrices as well as composition of functions on a single set.
For instance,
On the set of real numbers \mathbb R, f(a,b)=a+b is a binary operation since the sum of two real numbers is a real number.
On the set of natural numbers \mathbb N, f(a,b)=a+b is a binary operation since the sum of two natural numbers is a natural number. This is a different binary operation than the previous one since the sets are different.
On the set M(2,\mathbb R) of 2 \times 2 matrices with real entries, f(A,B)=A+B is a binary operation since the sum of two such matrices is a 2 \times 2 matrix.
On the set M(2,\mathbb R) of 2 \times 2 matrices with real entries, f(A,B)=AB is a binary operation since the product of two such matrices is a 2 \times 2 matrix.
For a given set C, let S be the set of all functions h \colon C \rightarrow C. Define f \colon S \times S \rightarrow S by f(h_1,h_2)(c)(h_1 \circ h_2)(c)h_1(h_2(c)) for all c \in C, the composition of the two functions h_1 and h_2 in S. Then f is a binary operation since the composition of the two functions is again a function on the set C (that is, a member of S).
Many binary operations of interest in both algebra and formal logic are commutative, satisfying f(a,b)f(b,a) for all elements a and b in S, or associative, satisfying f(f(a,b),c)f(a,f(b,c)) for all a, b, and c in S. Many also have identity elements and inverse elements.
The first three examples above are commutative and all of the above examples are associative.
On the set of real numbers \mathbb R, subtraction, that is, f(a,b)a-b, is a binary operation which is not commutative since, in general, a-b \neq b-a. It is also not associative, since, in general, a-(b-c) \neq (a-b)-c; for instance, 1-(2-3)2 but (1-2)-3=-4.
On the set of natural numbers \mathbb N, the binary operation exponentiation, f(a,b)a^b, is not commutative since, a^b \neq b^a (cf. Equation xy yx), and is also not associative since f(f(a,b),c) \neq f(a,f(b,c)). For instance, with a2, b3, and c2, f(2^3,2)f(8,2)8^264, but f(2,3^2)f(2,9)2^9512. By changing the set \mathbb N to the set of integers \mathbb Z, this binary operation becomes a partial binary operation since it is now undefined when a0 and b is any negative integer. For either set, this operation has a right identity (which is 1) since f(a,1)=a for all a in the set, which is not an identity (two sided identity) since f(1,b) \neq b in general.
Division (\div), a partial binary operation on the set of real or rational numbers, is not commutative or associative. Tetration (\uparrow\uparrow), as a binary operation on the natural numbers, is not commutative or associative and has no identity element.
Notation
Binary operations are often written using infix notation such as a \ast b, a+b, a \cdot b or (by juxtaposition with no symbol) ab rather than by functional notation of the form f(a, b). Powers are usually also written without operator, but with the second argument as superscript.
Binary operations are sometimes written using prefix or (more frequently) postfix notation, both of which dispense with parentheses. They are also called, respectively, Polish notation \ast a b and reverse Polish notation a b \ast.
Binary operations as ternary relations
A binary operation f on a set S may be viewed as a ternary relation on S, that is, the set of triples (a, b, f(a,b)) in S \times S \times S for all a and b in S.
Other binary operations
For example, scalar multiplication in linear algebra. Here K is a field and S is a vector space over that field.
Also the dot product of two vectors maps S \times S to K, where K is a field and S is a vector space over K. It depends on authors whether it is considered as a binary operation.
See also
:Category:Properties of binary operations
Notes
References
External links | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_operation | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.078227 |
3950 | Bagpipes | Bagpipes are a woodwind instrument using enclosed reeds fed from a constant reservoir of air in the form of a bag. The Great Highland bagpipes are well known, but people have played bagpipes for centuries throughout large parts of Europe, Northern Africa, Western Asia, around the Persian Gulf and northern parts of South Asia.
The term bagpipe is equally correct in the singular or the plural, though pipers usually refer to the bagpipes as "the pipes", "a set of pipes" or "a stand of pipes".
Construction
thumb|right|A detail from the Cantigas de Santa Maria showing bagpipes with one chanter and a parallel drone (Spain, 13th century).
thumb|On this Bulgarian gaida, the chanter is the short gray pipe at the top, while the drone is the long three-section pipe.
thumb|right|A detail from a painting by Hieronymus Bosch showing two bagpipers (15th century).
A set of bagpipes minimally consists of an air supply, a bag, a chanter, and usually at least one drone. Many bagpipes have more than one drone (and, sometimes, more than one chanter) in various combinations, held in place in stocks—sockets that fasten the various pipes to the bag.
Air supply
The most common method of supplying air to the bag is through blowing into a blowpipe or blowstick. In some pipes the player must cover the tip of the blowpipe with the tongue while inhaling, in order to prevent unwanted deflation of the bag, but most blowpipes have a non-return valve that eliminates this need. In recent times, there are many instruments that assist in creating a clean air flow to the pipes and assist the collection of condensation.
The use of a bellows to supply air is an innovation dating from the 16th or 17th century. In these pipes, sometimes called "cauld wind pipes", air is not heated or moistened by the player's breathing, so bellows-driven bagpipes can use more refined or delicate reeds. Such pipes include the Irish uilleann pipes; the border or Lowland pipes, Scottish smallpipes, Northumbrian smallpipes and pastoral pipes in Britain; the musette de cour, the musette bechonnet and the cabrette in France; and the , koziol bialy, and koziol czarny in Poland.
Bag
The bag is an airtight reservoir that holds air and regulates its flow via arm pressure, allowing the player to maintain continuous, even sound. The player keeps the bag inflated by blowing air into it through a blowpipe or by pumping air into it with a bellows. Materials used for bags vary widely, but the most common are the skins of local animals such as goats, dogs, sheep, and cows. More recently, bags made of synthetic materials including Gore-Tex have become much more common. Some synthetic bags have zips that allow the player to fit a more effective moisture trap to the inside of the bag. However, synthetic bags still carry a risk of colonisation by fungal spores, and the associated danger of lung infection if they are not kept clean, even if they otherwise require less cleaning than do bags made from natural substances.
Bags cut from larger materials are usually saddle-stitched with an extra strip folded over the seam and stitched (for skin bags) or glued (for synthetic bags) to reduce leaks. Holes are then cut to accommodate the stocks. In the case of bags made from largely intact animal skins, the stocks are typically tied into the points where the limbs and the head joined the body of the whole animal, a construction technique common in Central Europe. Different regions have different ways of treating the hide. The simplest methods involve just the use of salt, while more complex treatments involve milk, flour, and the removal of fur. The hide is normally turned inside out so that the fur is on the inside of the bag, as this helps to reduce the effect of moisture buildup within the bag.
Chanter
thumb|A Great Highland bagpipe practice chanter
The chanter is the melody pipe, played with two hands. All bagpipes have at least one chanter; some pipes have two chanters, particularly those in North Africa, in the Balkans, and in Southwest Asia. A chanter can be bored internally so that the inside walls are parallel (or "cylindrical") for its full length, or it can be bored in a conical shape. Popular woods include boxwood, cornel, plum or other fruit wood.
The chanter is usually open-ended, so there is no easy way for the player to stop the pipe from sounding. Thus most bagpipes share a constant legato sound with no rests in the music. Primarily because of this inability to stop playing, technical movements are made to break up notes and to create the illusion of articulation and accents. Because of their importance, these embellishments (or "ornaments") are often highly technical systems specific to each bagpipe, and take many years of study to master. A few bagpipes (such as the musette de cour, the uilleann pipes, the Northumbrian smallpipes, the piva and the left chanter of the surdelina) have closed ends or stop the end on the player's leg, so that when the player "closes" (covers all the holes), the chanter becomes silent.
A practice chanter is a chanter without bag or drones and has a much quieter reed, allowing a player to practice the instrument quietly and with no variables other than playing the chanter.
The term chanter is derived from the Latin cantare, or "to sing", much like the modern French verb meaning "to sing", chanter.
A distinctive feature of the gaida's chanter (which it shares with a number of other Eastern European bagpipes) is the "flea-hole" (also known as a mumbler or voicer, marmorka) which is covered by the index finger of the left hand. The flea-hole is smaller than the rest and usually consists of a small tube that is made out of metal or a chicken or duck feather. Uncovering the flea-hole raises any note played by a half step, and it is used in creating the musical ornamentation that gives Balkan music its unique character.
Some types of gaida can have a double bored chanter, such as the Serbian three-voiced gajde. It has eight fingerholes: the top four are covered by the thumb and the first three fingers of the left hand, then the four fingers of the right hand cover the remaining four holes.
Chanter reed
The note from the chanter is produced by a reed installed at its top. The reed may be a single (a reed with one vibrating tongue) or double reed (of two pieces that vibrate against each other). Double reeds are used with both conical- and parallel-bored chanters while single reeds are generally (although not exclusively) limited to parallel-bored chanters. In general, double-reed chanters are found in pipes of Western Europe while single-reed chanters appear in most other regions.
They are made from reed (arundo donax or Phragmites), bamboo, or elder. A more modern variant for the reed is a combination of a cotton phenolic (Hgw2082) material from which the body of the reed is made and a clarinet reed cut to size in order to fit the body. These type of reeds produce a louder sound and are not so sensitive to humidity and temperature changes.
Drone
Most bagpipes have at least one drone, a pipe that generally is not fingered but rather produces a constant harmonizing note throughout play (usually the tonic note of the chanter). Exceptions are generally those pipes that have a double-chanter instead. A drone is most commonly a cylindrically bored tube with a single reed, although drones with double reeds exist. The drone is generally designed in two or more parts with a sliding joint so that the pitch of the drone can be adjusted.
Depending on the type of pipes, the drones may lie over the shoulder, across the arm opposite the bag, or may run parallel to the chanter. Some drones have a tuning screw, which effectively alters the length of the drone by opening a hole, allowing the drone to be tuned to two or more distinct pitches. The tuning screw may also shut off the drone altogether. In most types of pipes with one drone, it is pitched two octaves below the tonic of the chanter. Additional drones often add the octave below and then a drone consonant with the fifth of the chanter.
History
Possible ancient origins
The evidence for bagpipes prior to the 13th century AD is still uncertain, but several textual and visual clues have been suggested. The Oxford History of Music posits that a sculpture of bagpipes has been found on a Hittite slab at Euyuk in Anatolia, dated to 1000 BC. Another interpretation of this sculpture suggests that it instead depicts a pan flute played along with a friction drum.
Several authors identify the ancient Greek (ἀσκός askos – wine-skin, αὐλός aulos – reed pipe) with the bagpipe. In the 2nd century AD, Suetonius described the Roman emperor Nero as a player of the tibia utricularis. Dio Chrysostom wrote in the 1st century of a contemporary sovereign (possibly Nero) who could play a pipe (tibia, Roman reedpipes similar to Greek and Etruscan instruments) with his mouth as well as by tucking a bladder beneath his armpit. Vereno suggests that such instruments, rather than being seen as an independent class, were understood as variants on mouth-blown instruments that used a bag as an alternative blowing aid and that it was not until drones were added in the European Medieval era that bagpipes were seen as a distinct class.
Spread and development in Europe
thumb|left|Medieval bagpiper at the Cistercian monastery of Santes Creus, Catalonia, Spain
right|thumb|Image of Irelande, Military use of the bagpipe dated 1581
In the early part of the second millennium, representation of bagpipes began to appear with frequency in Western European art and iconography. The Cantigas de Santa Maria, written in Galician-Portuguese and compiled in Castile in the mid-13th century, depicts several types of bagpipes. Several illustrations of bagpipes also appear in the Chronique dite de Baudoin d’Avesnes, a 13th-century manuscript of northern French origin. Although evidence of bagpipes in the British Isles prior to the 14th century is contested, they are explicitly mentioned in The Canterbury Tales (written around 1380):
Bagpipes were also frequent subjects for carvers of wooden choir stalls in the late 15th and early 16th century throughout Europe, sometimes with animal musicians.
Actual specimens of bagpipes from before the 18th century are extremely rare; however, a substantial number of paintings, carvings, engravings, and manuscript illuminations survive. These artefacts are clear evidence that bagpipes varied widely throughout Europe, and even within individual regions. Many examples of early folk bagpipes in continental Europe can be found in the paintings of Brueghel, Teniers, Jordaens, and Durer.
The earliest known artefact identified as a part of a bagpipe is a chanter found in 1985 at Rostock, Germany, that has been dated to the late 14th century or the first quarter of the 15th century.
thumb|right|De doedelzakspeler ("Bagpipe Player"), Hendrick ter Brugghen, 1624
The first clear reference to the use of the Scottish Highland bagpipes is from a French history that mentions their use at the Battle of Pinkie in 1547. George Buchanan (1506–82) claimed that bagpipes had replaced the trumpet on the battlefield. This period saw the creation of the ceòl mór (great music) of the bagpipe, which reflected its martial origins, with battle tunes, marches, gatherings, salutes and laments. The Highlands of the early 17th century saw the development of piping families including the MacCrimmonds, MacArthurs, MacGregors, and the Mackays of Gairloch.
The earliest Irish mention of the bagpipe is in 1206, approximately thirty years after the Anglo-Norman invasion; another mention attributes their use to Irish troops in Henry VIII's siege of Boulogne. Illustrations in the 1581 book The Image of Irelande by John Derricke clearly depict a bagpiper. Derricke's illustrations are considered to be reasonably faithful depictions of the attire and equipment of the English and Irish population of the 16th century.
The "Battell" sequence from My Ladye Nevells Booke (1591) by William Byrd, which probably alludes to the Irish wars of 1578, contains a piece entitled The bagpipe: & the drone. In 1760, the first serious study of the Scottish Highland bagpipe and its music was attempted in Joseph MacDonald's Compleat Theory. A manuscript from the 1730s by a William Dixon of Northumberland contains music that fits the border pipes, a nine-note bellows-blown bagpipe with a chanter similar to that of the modern Great Highland bagpipe. However, the music in Dixon's manuscript varied greatly from modern Highland bagpipe tunes, consisting mostly of extended variation sets of common dance tunes. Some of the tunes in the Dixon manuscript correspond to those found in the early 19th century manuscript sources of Northumbrian smallpipe tunes, notably the rare book of 50 tunes, many with variations, by John Peacock.
thumb|right|Happy Brothers by Uroš Predić (1887)
As Western classical music developed, both in terms of musical sophistication and instrumental technology, bagpipes in many regions fell out of favour because of their limited range and function. This triggered a long, slow decline that continued, in most cases, into the 20th century.
Extensive and documented collections of traditional bagpipes may be found at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the International Bagpipe Museum in Gijón, Spain, the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, England and the Morpeth Chantry Bagpipe Museum in Northumberland, and the Musical Instrument Museum in Phoenix, Arizona.
thumb|left|International Bagpipe Festival, Strakonice, 2018
The is held every two years in Strakonice, Czech Republic.
Recent history
thumb|right| A Canadian soldier plays the bagpipes during the war in Afghanistan. Bagpipes are frequently used during funerals and memorials, especially among fire department, military and police forces in the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Commonwealth realms, and the U.S.
During the 19th and 20th centuries, as a result of the participation of Scottish regiments in British colonial expansion, the bagpipes became well known worldwide. This surge in the bagpipes' popularity was boosted by large numbers of British Armed Forces pipers which served in World War I and World War II. This coincided with a decline in the popularity of many traditional forms of bagpipe throughout Europe, which began to be displaced by instruments from the classical tradition and later by gramophone and radio.
As pipers were easily identifiable, combat losses were high, estimated at one thousand in World War I. A front line role was prohibited following high losses in the Second Battle of El Alamein in 1943, though a few later instances occurred.
In the United Kingdom and Commonwealth Nations such as Canada, New Zealand and Australia, the Great Highland bagpipe is commonly used in the military and is often played during formal ceremonies. Foreign militaries patterned after the British army have also adopted the Highland bagpipe, including those of Uganda, Sudan, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Jordan, and Oman. Many police and fire services in Scotland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, and the United States have also adopted the tradition of fielding pipe bands.
thumb|right|A bagpiper busking with the Great Highland bagpipe on the street in Edinburgh, Scotland
In recent years, often driven by revivals of native folk music and dance, many types of bagpipes have enjoyed a resurgence in popularity and, in many cases, instruments that had fallen into obscurity have become extremely popular. In Brittany, the Great Highland bagpipe and concept of the pipe band were appropriated to create a Breton interpretation known as the bagad. The pipe-band idiom has also been adopted and applied to the Galician gaita as well. Bagpipes have often been used in various films depicting moments from Scottish and Irish history; the film Braveheart and the theatrical show Riverdance have served to make the uilleann pipes more commonly known.
Bagpipes are sometimes played at formal events at Commonwealth universities, particularly in Canada. Because of Scottish influences on the sport of curling, bagpipes are also the official instrument of the World Curling Federation and are commonly played during a ceremonial procession of teams before major curling championships.
Bagpipe making was once a craft that produced instruments in many distinctive, local and traditional styles. Today, the world's largest producer of the instrument is Pakistan, where the industry was worth $6.8 million in 2010. In the late 20th century, various models of electronic bagpipes were invented. The first custom-built MIDI bagpipes were developed by the Asturian piper known as Hevia (José Ángel Hevia Velasco).thumb|Bagpipes players from The City Of Auckland Pipe Band.
Astronaut Kjell N. Lindgren is thought to be the first person to play the bagpipes in outer space, having played "Amazing Grace" in tribute to late research scientist Victor Hurst aboard the International Space Station in November 2015.
Traditionally, one of the purposes of the bagpipe was to provide music for dancing. This has declined with the growth of dance bands, recordings, and the decline of traditional dance. In turn, this has led to many types of pipes developing a performance-led tradition, and indeed much modern music based on the dance music tradition played on bagpipes is suitable for use as dance music.
Modern usage
Types of bagpipes
Numerous types of bagpipes today are widely spread across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa as well as through much of the former British Empire. The name bagpipe has almost become synonymous with its best-known form, the Great Highland bagpipe, overshadowing the great number and variety of traditional forms of bagpipe. Despite the decline of these other types of pipes over the last few centuries, in recent years many of these pipes have seen a resurgence or revival as musicians have sought them out; for example, the Irish piping tradition, which by the mid 20th century had declined to a handful of master players is today alive, well, and flourishing, a situation similar to that of the Asturian gaita, the Galician gaita, the Portuguese gaita transmontana, the Aragonese gaita de boto, Northumbrian smallpipes, the Breton biniou, the Balkan gaida, the Romanian cimpoi, the Black Sea tulum, the Scottish smallpipes and pastoral pipes, as well as other varieties. Bulgaria has the Kaba gaida, a large bagpipe of the Rhodope mountains with a hexagonal and rounded drone, often described as a deep-sounding gaida and the Dzhura gaida with a straight conical drone and of a higher pitch. The Macedonian gaida is structurally between a kaba and dzhura gaida and described as a medium pitched gaida.
In Southeastern Europe and Eastern Europe bagpipes known as gaida include: the , , (), () () or (), (), , also and .
In Tunisia, it is known by the name "mezwed". It is used in the Tunisian pop music genre, also called mezwed, that is named after the instrument.
Image gallery
thumb|Tunisian Mizwad
File:Mmexport1647183006419.jpg|Piper in Petrash, Jordan
File:BulgarianKabaGaidaPlayer.jpg|Bulgarian Kaba gaida player.
File:Bag piper, Padre, Currie Hall, Royal Military College of Canada, fall 2011.jpg|The Scottish Great Highland bagpipe played at a Canadian military function.
File:Baghet suonatore.jpg|A musician with a Northern Italian Baghèt wearing traditional dress.
File:A modern model of Baghèt.png|Modern Baghèt (made 2000 by Valter Biella) in G.
File:Zampogna.jpg|Central and southern Italian zampogna.
File:Tulumcu.jpg|Laz man from Turkey playing a tulum.
File:Cillian Vallely on Uilleann Pipes.jpg|Cillian Vallely playing Irish Uilleann pipes.
File:Tickell 2004.jpg|Kathryn Tickell playing Northumbrian smallpipes.
File:Gaida.jpg|Man from Skopje, North Macedonia playing the Gaida.
File:Seivane1.jpg|Galician gaita.
File:Sruti upanga.jpg|Sruti upanga, a Southern Indian bagpipe.
File:Duda Bagpipe 001.jpg|Hungarian duda.
File:Serbian bagpiper.jpg|Serbian piper.
File:DudyWielkopolskie.jpg|Polish pipers.
File:Bagad.JPG|Bagad of Lann Bihoué from the French Navy.
File:Ollegallmo.jpg|Swedish säckpipa.
File:Pastoral pipes removable foot joint.JPG|Pastoral pipes with removable footjoint and bellows.
File:Street-piper.jpg|Street piper from Sofia, Bulgaria.
File:Torupillimängija.jpg|Estonian torupill player.
File:Lithuanian bagpipes.png|Lithuanian piper.
File:Modern huemmelchen.jpg|Modern German huemmelchen.
File:Baltarusių dūdmaišis Lietuvos nacionaliniame muziejuje (LNM).jpg|Belarusian bagpipes in Lithuanian museum.
File:Bagad Brest.jpg|A bagad in Brest, France
File:Al son de la gaita.jpg|Gaita asturiana.
File:Pibecwd.jpg|Welsh bagpipes (double-reed type).
File:Gaiteroscantabria.jpg|Cantabrian pipe band.
File:Bagpipe player damascus.jpg|Syrian piper in Damascus, Syria.
File:Tsambouna.jpg|Various forms of the Tsampouna, found in the Greek islands.
File:Селянін грае на дудзе.jpg|Belarusian piper.
File:A żaqq (bagpipe), made from calf pelt, cane, and animal horn.jpg|Maltese Żaqq.
File:Bagpipe player Dam.jpg|Piper playing by the Royal Palace of Amsterdam.
File:Cimpoi.png|Romanian cimpoi player.
File:Ľubomír Párička gra na dudach.webm|Ľubomír Párička playing bagpipes, Slovak Republic.
File:Associação Gaita-de-Fole.jpg|Portuguese pipers
File:نی انبان ساخته شده در آبپخش.jpg|Bagpipes made in Ab Pakhsh, Iran.
File:شکل قرار گرغتن نی های نی انبان ساخته شده در آبپخش.jpg|Chanter of bagpipes from Ab Pakhsh
File:Sac_de_gemecs.png|Sac de gemecs, from Catalonia
File:Xeremies_de_Mallorca.jpg|Xeremies, from Majorca
File:Greek Gaida Player.jpg|Greek shepherd playing gaida
File:BASA-2072K-1-361-19-Gaida, Bulgaria.JPG|Bulgarian gaida player, a pre-1945 photo. Central State Archive, Sofia
Usage in non-traditional music
thumb|right|Celtic rock band Enter the Haggis featuring Highland bagpipes
Since the 1960s, bagpipes have also made appearances in other forms of music, including rock, metal, jazz, hip-hop, punk, and classical music, for example with Paul McCartney's "Mull of Kintyre", AC/DC's "It's a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll)", and Peter Maxwell Davies's composition An Orkney Wedding, with Sunrise.
thumb|right|Bagpiper from German band Saltatio Mortis.
Publications
Periodicals
Periodicals covering specific types of bagpipes are addressed in the article for that bagpipe
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Books
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, 147 pp. with plates.
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See also
List of bagpipes
List of bagpipers
List of pipe makers
List of pipe bands
Glossary of bagpipe terms
Practice chanter
Glen (music company)
References
Bibliography
Lommel, Arle. "The Hungarian Duda and Contra-Chanter Bagpipes of the Carpathian Basin." The Galpin Society Journal (2008): 305–321.
External links
Bagpipe iconography – Paintings and images of the pipes.
Musiconis Database of Medieval Musical Iconography: Bagpipe.
A demonstration of rare instruments including bagpipes (archived 12 November 2009)
The Concise History of the Bagpipe by Frank J. Timoney
The Bagpipe Society, dedicated to promoting the study, playing, and making of bagpipes and pipes from around the world
Bagpipes from polish collections (Polish folk musical instruments)
Bagpipes (local polish name "Koza") played by Jan Karpiel-Bułecka (English subtitles)
Official site of Baghet (bagpipe from North Italy) players. (archived 9 July 2017)
Celtic Music : Scottish Military Bagpipes.
The presence of the gaida in Greece
Category:Articles containing video clips | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagpipes | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.120716 |
3952 | Bedrock Records | Bedrock Records is an English record label for trance, progressive house and techno started by John Digweed. Its name comes from a long running and successful club night held in Hastings and also at Heaven nightclub, London – both also called Bedrock. Bedrock Records has released many singles from artists such as Astro & Glyde, Brancaccio & Aisher, Steve Lawler, Shmuel Flash, Steve Porter, Sahar Z, Guy J, Henry Saiz, Stelios Vassiloudis, Electric Rescue, The Japanese Popstars and Jerry Bonham. Bedrock is also the name that Digweed and Muir use as their production moniker.
Bedrock has had different imprints: Bedrock Breaks, B_Rock and Black (Bedrock). Currently it has Bedrock Digital and one called Lost & Found belonging to Guy J.
The first Bedrock album compiled and mixed by John Digweed was released in 1999, containing several tracks signed to the Bedrock label.
In 2018, Digweed marked the 20th anniversary of the label with the release of Bedrock XX.
See also
List of electronic music record labels
References
External links
Official site
Category:Record labels established in 1999
Category:1999 establishments in the United Kingdom
Category:British record labels
Category:Trance record labels
Category:House music record labels
Category:Techno record labels | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedrock_Records | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.124386 |
3954 | Biochemistry | Biochemistry (journal)|and|Biological Chemistry (journal)Biological Chemistry (journal)}}
Biochemistry (book)}}
Biochemistry, or biological chemistry, is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology, and metabolism. Over the last decades of the 20th century, biochemistry has become successful at explaining living processes through these three disciplines. Almost all areas of the life sciences are being uncovered and developed through biochemical methodology and research. Biochemistry focuses on understanding the chemical basis that allows biological molecules to give rise to the processes that occur within living cells and between cells, in turn relating greatly to the understanding of tissues and organs as well as organism structure and function. Biochemistry is closely related to molecular biology, the study of the molecular mechanisms of biological phenomena.
Much of biochemistry deals with the structures, functions, and interactions of biological macromolecules such as proteins, nucleic acids, carbohydrates, and lipids. They provide the structure of cells and perform many of the functions associated with life. The chemistry of the cell also depends upon the reactions of small molecules and ions. These can be inorganic (for example, water and metal ions) or organic (for example, the amino acids, which are used to synthesize proteins). The mechanisms used by cells to harness energy from their environment via chemical reactions are known as metabolism. The findings of biochemistry are applied primarily in medicine, nutrition, and agriculture. In medicine, biochemists investigate the causes and cures of diseases. Nutrition studies how to maintain health and wellness and also the effects of nutritional deficiencies. In agriculture, biochemists investigate soil and fertilizers with the goal of improving crop cultivation, crop storage, and pest control. In recent decades, biochemical principles and methods have been combined with problem-solving approaches from engineering to manipulate living systems in order to produce useful tools for research, industrial processes, and diagnosis and control of diseasethe discipline of biotechnology.History
and Carl Cori jointly won the Nobel Prize in 1947 for their discovery of the Cori cycle at RPMI.]]
At its most comprehensive definition, biochemistry can be seen as a study of the components and composition of living things and how they come together to become life. In this sense, the history of biochemistry may therefore go back as far as the ancient Greeks. However, biochemistry as a specific scientific discipline began sometime in the 19th century, or a little earlier, depending on which aspect of biochemistry is being focused on. Some argued that the beginning of biochemistry may have been the discovery of the first enzyme, diastase (now called amylase), in 1833 by Anselme Payen, while others considered Eduard Buchner's first demonstration of a complex biochemical process alcoholic fermentation in cell-free extracts in 1897 to be the birth of biochemistry. Some might also point as its beginning to the influential 1842 work by Justus von Liebig, Animal chemistry, or, Organic chemistry in its applications to physiology and pathology, which presented a chemical theory of metabolism, Many other pioneers in the field who helped to uncover the layers of complexity of biochemistry have been proclaimed founders of modern biochemistry. Emil Fischer, who studied the chemistry of proteins, and F. Gowland Hopkins, who studied enzymes and the dynamic nature of biochemistry, represent two examples of early biochemists.
The term "biochemistry" was first used when Vinzenz Kletzinsky (1826–1882) had his "Compendium der Biochemie" printed in Vienna in 1858; it derived from a combination of biology and chemistry. In 1877, Felix Hoppe-Seyler used the term ( in German) as a synonym for physiological chemistry in the foreword to the first issue of Zeitschrift für Physiologische Chemie (Journal of Physiological Chemistry) where he argued for the setting up of institutes dedicated to this field of study. The German chemist Carl Neuberg however is often cited to have coined the word in 1903, while some credited it to Franz Hofmeister.
(1992), pp. 1161–1173.</ref>]]
It was once generally believed that life and its materials had some essential property or substance (often referred to as the "vital principle") distinct from any found in non-living matter, and it was thought that only living beings could produce the molecules of life. In 1828, Friedrich Wöhler published a paper on his serendipitous urea synthesis from potassium cyanate and ammonium sulfate; some regarded that as a direct overthrow of vitalism and the establishment of organic chemistry. However, the Wöhler synthesis has sparked controversy as some reject the death of vitalism at his hands. Since then, biochemistry has advanced, especially since the mid-20th century, with the development of new techniques such as chromatography, X-ray diffraction, dual polarisation interferometry, NMR spectroscopy, radioisotopic labeling, electron microscopy and molecular dynamics simulations. These techniques allowed for the discovery and detailed analysis of many molecules and metabolic pathways of the cell, such as glycolysis and the Krebs cycle (citric acid cycle), and led to an understanding of biochemistry on a molecular level.
Another significant historic event in biochemistry is the discovery of the gene, and its role in the transfer of information in the cell. In the 1950s, James D. Watson, Francis Crick, Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins were instrumental in solving DNA structure and suggesting its relationship with the genetic transfer of information. In 1958, George Beadle and Edward Tatum received the Nobel Prize for work in fungi showing that one gene produces one enzyme. In 1988, Colin Pitchfork was the first person convicted of murder with DNA evidence, which led to the growth of forensic science. More recently, Andrew Z. Fire and Craig C. Mello received the 2006 Nobel Prize for discovering the role of RNA interference (RNAi) in the silencing of gene expression. Starting materials: the chemical elements of life
Around two dozen chemical elements are essential to various kinds of biological life. Most rare elements on Earth are not needed by life (exceptions being selenium and iodine), while a few common ones (aluminum and titanium) are not used. Most organisms share element needs, but there are a few differences between plants and animals. For example, ocean algae use bromine, but land plants and animals do not seem to need any. All animals require sodium, but is not an essential element for plants. Plants need boron and silicon, but animals may not (or may need ultra-small amounts).
Just six elements—carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, calcium and phosphorus—make up almost 99% of the mass of living cells, including those in the human body (see composition of the human body for a complete list). In addition to the six major elements that compose most of the human body, humans require smaller amounts of possibly 18 more.
Biomolecules
The 4 main classes of molecules in biochemistry (often called biomolecules) are carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, and nucleic acids. Many biological molecules are polymers: in this terminology, monomers are relatively small macromolecules that are linked together to create large macromolecules known as polymers. When monomers are linked together to synthesize a biological polymer, they undergo a process called dehydration synthesis. Different macromolecules can assemble in larger complexes, often needed for biological activity.Carbohydrates
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Two of the main functions of carbohydrates are energy storage and providing structure. One of the common sugars known as glucose is a carbohydrate, but not all carbohydrates are sugars. There are more carbohydrates on Earth than any other known type of biomolecule; they are used to store energy and genetic information, as well as play important roles in cell to cell interactions and communications.
The simplest type of carbohydrate is a monosaccharide, which among other properties contains carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, mostly in a ratio of 1:2:1 (generalized formula C<sub>n</sub>H<sub>2n</sub>O<sub>n</sub>, where n is at least 3). Glucose (C<sub>6</sub>H<sub>12</sub>O<sub>6</sub>) is one of the most important carbohydrates; others include fructose (C<sub>6</sub>H<sub>12</sub>O<sub>6</sub>), the sugar commonly associated with the sweet taste of fruits, and deoxyribose (C<sub>5</sub>H<sub>10</sub>O<sub>4</sub>), a component of DNA. A monosaccharide can switch between acyclic (open-chain) form and a cyclic form. The open-chain form can be turned into a ring of carbon atoms bridged by an oxygen atom created from the carbonyl group of one end and the hydroxyl group of another. The cyclic molecule has a hemiacetal or hemiketal group, depending on whether the linear form was an aldose or a ketose.
In these cyclic forms, the ring usually has 5 or 6 atoms. These forms are called furanoses and pyranoses, respectively—by analogy with furan and pyran, the simplest compounds with the same carbon-oxygen ring (although they lack the carbon-carbon double bonds of these two molecules). For example, the aldohexose glucose may form a hemiacetal linkage between the hydroxyl on carbon 1 and the oxygen on carbon 4, yielding a molecule with a 5-membered ring, called glucofuranose. The same reaction can take place between carbons 1 and 5 to form a molecule with a 6-membered ring, called glucopyranose. Cyclic forms with a 7-atom ring called heptoses are rare.
Two monosaccharides can be joined by a glycosidic or ester bond into a disaccharide through a dehydration reaction during which a molecule of water is released. The reverse reaction in which the glycosidic bond of a disaccharide is broken into two monosaccharides is termed hydrolysis. The best-known disaccharide is sucrose or ordinary sugar, which consists of a glucose molecule and a fructose molecule joined. Another important disaccharide is lactose found in milk, consisting of a glucose molecule and a galactose molecule. Lactose may be hydrolysed by lactase, and deficiency in this enzyme results in lactose intolerance.
When a few (around three to six) monosaccharides are joined, it is called an oligosaccharide (oligo- meaning "few"). These molecules tend to be used as markers and signals, as well as having some other uses. Many monosaccharides joined form a polysaccharide. They can be joined in one long linear chain, or they may be branched. Two of the most common polysaccharides are cellulose and glycogen, both consisting of repeating glucose monomers. Cellulose is an important structural component of plant's cell walls and glycogen is used as a form of energy storage in animals.
Sugar can be characterized by having reducing or non-reducing ends. A reducing end of a carbohydrate is a carbon atom that can be in equilibrium with the open-chain aldehyde (aldose) or keto form (ketose). If the joining of monomers takes place at such a carbon atom, the free hydroxy group of the pyranose or furanose form is exchanged with an OH-side-chain of another sugar, yielding a full acetal. This prevents opening of the chain to the aldehyde or keto form and renders the modified residue non-reducing. Lactose contains a reducing end at its glucose moiety, whereas the galactose moiety forms a full acetal with the C4-OH group of glucose. Saccharose does not have a reducing end because of full acetal formation between the aldehyde carbon of glucose (C1) and the keto carbon of fructose (C2).
Lipids
and oleic acid. The middle structure is a triglyceride composed of oleoyl, stearoyl, and palmitoyl chains attached to a glycerol backbone. At the bottom is the common phospholipid, phosphatidylcholine.]]
Lipids comprise a diverse range of molecules and to some extent is a catchall for relatively water-insoluble or nonpolar compounds of biological origin, including waxes, fatty acids, fatty-acid derived phospholipids, sphingolipids, glycolipids, and terpenoids (e.g., retinoids and steroids). Some lipids are linear, open-chain aliphatic molecules, while others have ring structures. Some are aromatic (with a cyclic [ring] and planar [flat] structure) while others are not. Some are flexible, while others are rigid.
Lipids are usually made from one molecule of glycerol combined with other molecules. In triglycerides, the main group of bulk lipids, there is one molecule of glycerol and three fatty acids. Fatty acids are considered the monomer in that case, and may be saturated (no double bonds in the carbon chain) or unsaturated (one or more double bonds in the carbon chain).
Most lipids have some polar character and are largely nonpolar. In general, the bulk of their structure is nonpolar or hydrophobic ("water-fearing"), meaning that it does not interact well with polar solvents like water. Another part of their structure is polar or hydrophilic ("water-loving") and will tend to associate with polar solvents like water. This makes them amphiphilic molecules (having both hydrophobic and hydrophilic portions). In the case of cholesterol, the polar group is a mere –OH (hydroxyl or alcohol).
In the case of phospholipids, the polar groups are considerably larger and more polar, as described below.
Lipids are an integral part of our daily diet. Most oils and milk products that we use for cooking and eating like butter, cheese, ghee etc. are composed of fats. Vegetable oils are rich in various polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA). Lipid-containing foods undergo digestion within the body and are broken into fatty acids and glycerol, the final degradation products of fats and lipids. Lipids, especially phospholipids, are also used in various pharmaceutical products, either as co-solubilizers (e.g. in parenteral infusions) or else as drug carrier components (e.g. in a liposome or transfersome).
Proteins
group on the left and the carboxyl group on the right]]
Proteins are very large molecules—macro-biopolymers—made from monomers called amino acids. An amino acid consists of an alpha carbon atom attached to an amino group, –NH<sub>2</sub>, a carboxylic acid group, –COOH (although these exist as –NH<sub>3</sub><sup>+</sup> and –COO<sup>−</sup> under physiologic conditions), a simple hydrogen atom, and a side chain commonly denoted as "–R". The side chain "R" is different for each amino acid of which there are 20 standard ones. It is this "R" group that makes each amino acid different, and the properties of the side chains greatly influence the overall three-dimensional conformation of a protein. Some amino acids have functions by themselves or in a modified form; for instance, glutamate functions as an important neurotransmitter. Amino acids can be joined via a peptide bond. In this dehydration synthesis, a water molecule is removed and the peptide bond connects the nitrogen of one amino acid's amino group to the carbon of the other's carboxylic acid group. The resulting molecule is called a dipeptide, and short stretches of amino acids (usually, fewer than thirty) are called peptides or polypeptides. Longer stretches merit the title proteins. As an example, the important blood serum protein albumin contains 585 amino acid residues.
. The red and blue ribbons represent the protein globin; the green structures are the heme groups.]]
Proteins can have structural and/or functional roles. For instance, movements of the proteins actin and myosin ultimately are responsible for the contraction of skeletal muscle. One property many proteins have is that they specifically bind to a certain molecule or class of molecules—they may be extremely selective in what they bind. Antibodies are an example of proteins that attach to one specific type of molecule. Antibodies are composed of heavy and light chains. Two heavy chains would be linked to two light chains through disulfide linkages between their amino acids. Antibodies are specific through variation based on differences in the N-terminal domain.
The enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), which uses antibodies, is one of the most sensitive tests modern medicine uses to detect various biomolecules. Probably the most important proteins, however, are the enzymes. Virtually every reaction in a living cell requires an enzyme to lower the activation energy of the reaction. These molecules recognize specific reactant molecules called substrates; they then catalyze the reaction between them. By lowering the activation energy, the enzyme speeds up that reaction by a rate of 10<sup>11</sup> or more; a reaction that would normally take over 3,000 years to complete spontaneously might take less than a second with an enzyme. The enzyme itself is not used up in the process and is free to catalyze the same reaction with a new set of substrates. Using various modifiers, the activity of the enzyme can be regulated, enabling control of the biochemistry of the cell as a whole.
The structure of proteins is traditionally described in a hierarchy of four levels. The primary structure of a protein consists of its linear sequence of amino acids; for instance, "alanine-glycine-tryptophan-serine-glutamate-asparagine-glycine-lysine-...". Secondary structure is concerned with local morphology (morphology being the study of structure). Some combinations of amino acids will tend to curl up in a coil called an α-helix or into a sheet called a β-sheet; some α-helixes can be seen in the hemoglobin schematic above. Tertiary structure is the entire three-dimensional shape of the protein. This shape is determined by the sequence of amino acids. In fact, a single change can change the entire structure. The alpha chain of hemoglobin contains 146 amino acid residues; substitution of the glutamate residue at position 6 with a valine residue changes the behavior of hemoglobin so much that it results in sickle-cell disease. Finally, quaternary structure is concerned with the structure of a protein with multiple peptide subunits, like hemoglobin with its four subunits. Not all proteins have more than one subunit.
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domains]]
Ingested proteins are usually broken up into single amino acids or dipeptides in the small intestine and then absorbed. They can then be joined to form new proteins. Intermediate products of glycolysis, the citric acid cycle, and the pentose phosphate pathway can be used to form all twenty amino acids, and most bacteria and plants possess all the necessary enzymes to synthesize them. Humans and other mammals, however, can synthesize only half of them. They cannot synthesize isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine. Because they must be ingested, these are the essential amino acids. Mammals do possess the enzymes to synthesize alanine, asparagine, aspartate, cysteine, glutamate, glutamine, glycine, proline, serine, and tyrosine, the nonessential amino acids. While they can synthesize arginine and histidine, they cannot produce it in sufficient amounts for young, growing animals, and so these are often considered essential amino acids.
If the amino group is removed from an amino acid, it leaves behind a carbon skeleton called an α-keto acid. Enzymes called transaminases can easily transfer the amino group from one amino acid (making it an α-keto acid) to another α-keto acid (making it an amino acid). This is important in the biosynthesis of amino acids, as for many of the pathways, intermediates from other biochemical pathways are converted to the α-keto acid skeleton, and then an amino group is added, often via transamination. The amino acids may then be linked together to form a protein.
A similar process is used to break down proteins. It is first hydrolyzed into its component amino acids. Free ammonia (NH3), existing as the ammonium ion (NH4+) in blood, is toxic to life forms. A suitable method for excreting it must therefore exist. Different tactics have evolved in different animals, depending on the animals' needs. Unicellular organisms release the ammonia into the environment. Likewise, bony fish can release ammonia into the water where it is quickly diluted. In general, mammals convert ammonia into urea, via the urea cycle.
In order to determine whether two proteins are related, or in other words to decide whether they are homologous or not, scientists use sequence-comparison methods. Methods like sequence alignments and structural alignments are powerful tools that help scientists identify homologies between related molecules. The relevance of finding homologies among proteins goes beyond forming an evolutionary pattern of protein families. By finding how similar two protein sequences are, we acquire knowledge about their structure and therefore their function.
Nucleic acids
(DNA); the picture shows the monomers being put together.]]
Nucleic acids, so-called because of their prevalence in cellular nuclei, is the generic name of the family of biopolymers. They are complex, high-molecular-weight biochemical macromolecules that can convey genetic information in all living cells and viruses.
s).]]
The most common nucleic acids are deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and ribonucleic acid (RNA). The phosphate group and the sugar of each nucleotide bond with each other to form the backbone of the nucleic acid, while the sequence of nitrogenous bases stores the information. The most common nitrogenous bases are adenine, cytosine, guanine, thymine, and uracil. The nitrogenous bases of each strand of a nucleic acid will form hydrogen bonds with certain other nitrogenous bases in a complementary strand of nucleic acid. Adenine binds with thymine and uracil, thymine binds only with adenine, and cytosine and guanine can bind only with one another. Adenine, thymine, and uracil contain two hydrogen bonds, while hydrogen bonds formed between cytosine and guanine are three.
Aside from the genetic material of the cell, nucleic acids often play a role as second messengers, as well as forming the base molecule for adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the primary energy-carrier molecule found in all living organisms. Also, the nitrogenous bases possible in the two nucleic acids are different: adenine, cytosine, and guanine occur in both RNA and DNA, while thymine occurs only in DNA and uracil occurs in RNA.
Metabolism
Carbohydrates as energy source
Glucose is an energy source in most life forms. For instance, polysaccharides are broken down into their monomers by enzymes (glycogen phosphorylase removes glucose residues from glycogen, a polysaccharide). Disaccharides like lactose or sucrose are cleaved into their two component monosaccharides.Glycolysis (anaerobic)
Glucose is mainly metabolized by a very important ten-step pathway called glycolysis, the net result of which is to break down one molecule of glucose into two molecules of pyruvate. This also produces a net two molecules of ATP, the energy currency of cells, along with two reducing equivalents of converting NAD<sup>+</sup> (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide: oxidized form) to NADH (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide: reduced form). This does not require oxygen; if no oxygen is available (or the cell cannot use oxygen), the NAD is restored by converting the pyruvate to lactate (lactic acid) (e.g. in humans) or to ethanol plus carbon dioxide (e.g. in yeast). Other monosaccharides like galactose and fructose can be converted into intermediates of the glycolytic pathway.
Aerobic
In aerobic cells with sufficient oxygen, as in most human cells, the pyruvate is further metabolized. It is irreversibly converted to acetyl-CoA, giving off one carbon atom as the waste product carbon dioxide, generating another reducing equivalent as NADH. The two molecules acetyl-CoA (from one molecule of glucose) then enter the citric acid cycle, producing two molecules of ATP, six more NADH molecules and two reduced (ubi)quinones (via FADH<sub>2</sub> as enzyme-bound cofactor), and releasing the remaining carbon atoms as carbon dioxide. The produced NADH and quinol molecules then feed into the enzyme complexes of the respiratory chain, an electron transport system transferring the electrons ultimately to oxygen and conserving the released energy in the form of a proton gradient over a membrane (inner mitochondrial membrane in eukaryotes). Thus, oxygen is reduced to water and the original electron acceptors NAD<sup>+</sup> and quinone are regenerated. This is why humans breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide. The energy released from transferring the electrons from high-energy states in NADH and quinol is conserved first as proton gradient and converted to ATP via ATP synthase. This generates an additional 28 molecules of ATP (24 from the 8 NADH + 4 from the 2 quinols), totaling to 32 molecules of ATP conserved per degraded glucose (two from glycolysis + two from the citrate cycle). It is clear that using oxygen to completely oxidize glucose provides an organism with far more energy than any oxygen-independent metabolic feature, and this is thought to be the reason why complex life appeared only after Earth's atmosphere accumulated large amounts of oxygen.
Gluconeogenesis
In vertebrates, vigorously contracting skeletal muscles (during weightlifting or sprinting, for example) do not receive enough oxygen to meet the energy demand, and so they shift to anaerobic metabolism, converting glucose to lactate.
The combination of glucose from noncarbohydrates origin, such as fat and proteins. This only happens when glycogen supplies in the liver are worn out. The pathway is a crucial reversal of glycolysis from pyruvate to glucose and can use many sources like amino acids, glycerol and Krebs Cycle. Large scale protein and fat catabolism usually occur when those suffer from starvation or certain endocrine disorders. The liver regenerates the glucose, using a process called gluconeogenesis. This process is not quite the opposite of glycolysis, and actually requires three times the amount of energy gained from glycolysis (six molecules of ATP are used, compared to the two gained in glycolysis). Analogous to the above reactions, the glucose produced can then undergo glycolysis in tissues that need energy, be stored as glycogen (or starch in plants), or be converted to other monosaccharides or joined into di- or oligosaccharides. The combined pathways of glycolysis during exercise, lactate's crossing via the bloodstream to the liver, subsequent gluconeogenesis and release of glucose into the bloodstream is called the Cori cycle.Relationship to other "molecular-scale" biological sciences
}}
, and molecular biology]]
Researchers in biochemistry use specific techniques native to biochemistry, but increasingly combine these with techniques and ideas developed in the fields of genetics, molecular biology, and biophysics. There is not a defined line between these disciplines. Biochemistry studies the chemistry required for biological activity of molecules, molecular biology studies their biological activity, genetics studies their heredity, which happens to be carried by their genome. This is shown in the following schematic that depicts one possible view of the relationships between the fields:
* Biochemistry is the study of the chemical substances and vital processes occurring in live organisms. Biochemists focus heavily on the role, function, and structure of biomolecules. The study of the chemistry behind biological processes and the synthesis of biologically active molecules are applications of biochemistry. Biochemistry studies life at the atomic and molecular level.
* Genetics is the study of the effect of genetic differences in organisms. This can often be inferred by the absence of a normal component (e.g. one gene). The study of "mutants" – organisms that lack one or more functional components with respect to the so-called "wild type" or normal phenotype. Genetic interactions (epistasis) can often confound simple interpretations of such "knockout" studies.
* Molecular biology is the study of molecular underpinnings of the biological phenomena, focusing on molecular synthesis, modification, mechanisms and interactions. The central dogma of molecular biology, where genetic material is transcribed into RNA and then translated into protein, despite being oversimplified, still provides a good starting point for understanding the field. This concept has been revised in light of emerging novel roles for RNA.
* Chemical biology seeks to develop new tools based on small molecules that allow minimal perturbation of biological systems while providing detailed information about their function. Further, chemical biology employs biological systems to create non-natural hybrids between biomolecules and synthetic devices (for example emptied viral capsids that can deliver gene therapy or drug molecules).
See also
Lists
* Important publications in biochemistry (chemistry)
* List of biochemistry topics
* List of biochemists
* List of biomolecules
See also
* Astrobiology
* Biochemistry (journal)
* Biological Chemistry (journal)
* Biophysics
* Chemical ecology
* Computational biomodeling
* Dedicated bio-based chemical
* EC number
* Hypothetical types of biochemistry
* International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
* Metabolome
* Metabolomics
* Molecular biology
* Molecular medicine
* Plant biochemistry
* Proteolysis
* Small molecule
* Structural biology
* TCA cycle
Notes
References
Cited literature
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Further reading
* Fruton, Joseph S. Proteins, Enzymes, Genes: The Interplay of Chemistry and Biology. Yale University Press: New Haven, 1999.
* Keith Roberts, Martin Raff, Bruce Alberts, Peter Walter, Julian Lewis and Alexander Johnson, Molecular Biology of the Cell
** 4th Edition, Routledge, March, 2002, hardcover, 1616 pp.
** 3rd Edition, Garland, 1994,
** 2nd Edition, Garland, 1989,
* Kohler, Robert. From Medical Chemistry to Biochemistry: The Making of a Biomedical Discipline. Cambridge University Press, 1982.
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External links
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* [http://biochemweb.fenteany.com/ The Virtual Library of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and Cell Biology]
* [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/bv.fcgi?callbv.View..ShowTOC&ridstryer.TOC&depth=2 Biochemistry, 5th ed.] Full text of Berg, Tymoczko, and Stryer, courtesy of NCBI.
* [http://www.systemsX.ch/ SystemsX.ch – The Swiss Initiative in Systems Biology]
* [http://biochem.science.oregonstate.edu/content/biochemistry-free-and-easy Full text of Biochemistry] by Kevin and Indira, an introductory biochemistry textbook.
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Category:Biotechnology
Category:Molecular biology | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biochemistry | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.155108 |
3956 | Badminton | Badminton is a racquet sport played using racquets to hit a shuttlecock across a net. Although it may be played with larger teams, the most common forms of the game are "singles" (with one player per side) and "doubles" (with two players per side). Badminton is often played as a casual outdoor activity in a yard or on a beach; professional games are played on a rectangular indoor court. Points are scored by striking the shuttlecock with the racquet and landing it within the other team's half of the court, within the set boundaries.
Each side may only strike the shuttlecock once before it passes over the net. Play ends once the shuttlecock has struck the floor or ground, or if a fault has been called by the umpire, service judge, or (in their absence) the opposing side.
The shuttlecock is a feathered or (in informal matches) plastic projectile that flies differently from the balls used in many other sports. In particular, the feathers create much higher drag, causing the shuttlecock to decelerate more rapidly. Shuttlecocks also have a high top speed compared to the balls in other racquet sports, making badminton the fastest racquet sport in the world. The flight of the shuttlecock gives the sport its distinctive nature, and in certain languages the sport is named by reference to this feature (e.g., German , literally feather-ball).
The game developed in British India from the earlier game of battledore and shuttlecock. European play came to be dominated by Denmark but the game has become very popular in Asia. In 1992, badminton debuted as a Summer Olympic sport with four events: men's singles, women's singles, men's doubles, and women's doubles; mixed doubles was added four years later. At high levels of play, the sport demands excellent fitness: players require aerobic stamina, agility, strength, speed, and precision. It is also a technical sport, requiring good motor coordination and the development of sophisticated racquet movements involving much greater flexibility in the wrist than some other racquet sports.
History
]]
by John Leech]]
Games employing shuttlecocks have been played for centuries across Eurasia, but the modern game of badminton developed in the mid-19th century among the expatriate officers of British India as a variant of the earlier game of battledore and shuttlecock. ("Battledore" was an older term for "racquet".) Its exact origin remains obscure. The name derives from the Duke of Beaufort's Badminton House in Gloucestershire, but why or when remains unclear. As early as 1860, a London toy dealer named Isaac Spratt published a booklet entitled Badminton Battledore – A New Game, but no copy is known to have survived. An 1863 article in The Cornhill Magazine describes badminton as "battledore and shuttlecock played with sides, across a string suspended some five feet from the ground".
The game originally developed in India among the British expatriates, where it was very popular by the 1870s. Ball badminton, a form of the game played with a wool ball instead of a shuttlecock, was being played in Thanjavur as early as the 1850s and was at first played interchangeably with badminton by the British, the woollen ball being preferred in windy or wet weather.
Early on, the game was also known as Poona or Poonah after the garrison town of Poona (Pune), where it was particularly popular and where the first rules for the game were drawn up in 1873. The BAE started the first badminton competition, the All England Open Badminton Championships for gentlemen's doubles, ladies' doubles, and mixed doubles, in 1899. Singles competitions were added in 1900 and an England–Ireland championship match appeared in 1904.
England, Scotland, Wales, Canada, Denmark, France, Ireland, the Netherlands, and New Zealand were the founding members of the International Badminton Federation in 1934, now known as the Badminton World Federation. India joined as an affiliate in 1936. The BWF now governs international badminton. Although initiated in England, competitive men's badminton has traditionally been dominated in Europe by Denmark. Worldwide, Asian nations have become dominant in international competition. China, Denmark, Indonesia, Malaysia, India, South Korea, Taiwan (playing as 'Chinese Taipei') and Japan are the nations which have consistently produced world-class players in the past few decades, with China being the greatest force in men's and women's competition recently. Great Britain, where the rules of the modern game were codified, is not among the top powers in the sport, but has had significant Olympic and World success in doubles play, especially mixed doubles.
The game has also become a popular backyard sport in the United States.
Rules
The following information is a simplified summary of badminton rules based on the BWF Statutes publication, Laws of Badminton.
Court
view]]
The court is rectangular and divided into halves by a net. Courts are usually marked for both singles and doubles play, although badminton rules permit a court to be marked for singles only. The move itself has been very controversial amongst several badminton players.
Lets
If a let is called, the rally is stopped and replayed with no change to the score. Lets may occur because of some unexpected disturbance such as a shuttlecock landing on a court (having been hit there by players playing in adjacent court) or in small halls the shuttle may touch an overhead rail which can be classed as a let.
If the receiver is not ready when the service is delivered, a let shall be called; yet, if the receiver attempts to return the shuttlecock, the receiver shall be judged to have been ready.
Equipment
s]]
Badminton rules restrict the design and size of racquets and shuttlecocks.
Racquets
Badminton racquets are lightweight, with top quality racquets weighing between not including grip or strings. They are composed of many different materials ranging from carbon fibre composite (graphite reinforced plastic) to solid steel, which may be augmented by a variety of materials. Carbon fibre has an excellent strength to weight ratio, is stiff, and gives excellent kinetic energy transfer. Before the adoption of carbon fibre composite, racquets were made of light metals such as aluminium. Earlier still, racquets were made of wood. Cheap racquets are still often made of metals such as steel, but wooden racquets are no longer manufactured for the ordinary market, because of their excessive mass and cost. Nowadays, nanomaterials such as carbon nanotubes and fullerenes are added to racquets giving them greater durability.
There is a wide variety of racquet designs, although the laws limit the racquet size and shape. Different racquets have playing characteristics that appeal to different players. The traditional oval head shape is still available, but an isometric head shape is increasingly common in new racquets.StringsBadminton strings for racquets are thin, high-performing strings with thicknesses ranging from about 0.62 to 0.73 mm. Thicker strings are more durable, but many players prefer the feel of thinner strings. String tension is normally in the range of 80 to 160 N (18 to 36 lbf). Recreational players generally string at lower tensions than professionals, typically between 80 and 110 N (18 and 25 lbf). Professionals string between about 110 and 160 N (25 and 36 lbf). Some string manufacturers measure the thickness of their strings under tension so they are actually thicker than specified when slack. Ashaway Micropower is actually 0.7mm but Yonex BG-66 is about 0.72mm.
It is often argued that high string tensions improve control, whereas low string tensions increase power. The arguments for this generally rely on crude mechanical reasoning, such as claiming that a lower tension string bed is more bouncy and therefore provides more power. This is, in fact, incorrect, for a higher string tension can cause the shuttle to slide off the racquet and hence make it harder to hit a shot accurately. An alternative view suggests that the optimum tension for power depends on the player:
Shoes
Badminton shoes are lightweight with soles of rubber or similar high-grip, non-marking materials, similar to tennis shoes.
Compared to running shoes, badminton shoes have little lateral support. High levels of lateral support are useful for activities where lateral motion is undesirable and unexpected. Badminton, however, requires powerful lateral movements. A highly built-up lateral support will not be able to protect the foot in badminton; instead, it will encourage catastrophic collapse at the point where the shoe's support fails, and the player's ankles are not ready for the sudden loading, which can cause sprains. For this reason, players should choose badminton shoes rather than general trainers or running shoes, because proper badminton shoes will have a very thin sole,Technique
smashing]]
Strokes
Badminton offers a wide variety of basic strokes, and players require a high level of skill to perform all of them effectively. All strokes can be played either forehand or backhand. A player's forehand side is the same side as their playing hand: for a right-handed player, the forehand side is their right side and the backhand side is their left side. Forehand strokes are hit with the front of the hand leading (like hitting with the palm), whereas backhand strokes are hit with the back of the hand leading (like hitting with the knuckles). Players frequently play certain strokes on the forehand side with a backhand hitting action, and vice versa.
In the forecourt and midcourt, most strokes can be played equally effectively on either the forehand or backhand side; but in the rear court, players will attempt to play as many strokes as possible on their forehands, often preferring to play a round-the-head forehand overhead (a forehand "on the backhand side") rather than attempt a backhand overhead. Playing a backhand overhead has two main disadvantages. First, the player must turn their back to their opponents, restricting their view of them and the court. Second, backhand overheads cannot be hit with as much power as forehands: the hitting action is limited by the shoulder joint, which permits a much greater range of movement for a forehand overhead than for a backhand. The backhand clear is considered by most players and coaches to be the most difficult basic stroke in the game, since the precise technique is needed in order to muster enough power for the shuttlecock to travel the full length of the court. For the same reason, backhand smashes tend to be weak.
Position of the shuttlecock and receiving player
prepares for a forehand serve]]
The choice of stroke depends on how near the shuttlecock is to the net, whether it is above net height, and where an opponent is currently positioned: players have much better attacking options if they can reach the shuttlecock well above net height, especially if it is also close to the net. In the forecourt, a high shuttlecock will be met with a net kill, hitting it steeply downwards and attempting to win the rally immediately. This is why it is best to drop the shuttlecock just over the net in this situation. In the midcourt, a high shuttlecock will usually be met with a powerful smash, also hitting downwards and hoping for an outright winner or a weak reply. Athletic jump smashes, where players jump upwards for a steeper smash angle, are a common and spectacular element of elite men's doubles play. In the rearcourt, players strive to hit the shuttlecock while it is still above them, rather than allowing it to drop lower. This overhead hitting allows them to play smashes, clears (hitting the shuttlecock high and to the back of the opponents' court), and drop shots (hitting the shuttlecock softly so that it falls sharply downwards into the opponents' forecourt). If the shuttlecock has dropped lower, then a smash is impossible and a full-length, high clear is difficult.
Vertical position of the shuttlecock
When the shuttlecock is well below net height, players have no choice but to hit upwards. Lifts, where the shuttlecock is hit upwards to the back of the opponents' court, can be played from all parts of the court. If a player does not lift, their only remaining option is to push the shuttlecock softly back to the net: in the forecourt, this is called a net shot; in the midcourt or rear court, it is often called a push or block.
When the shuttlecock is near to net height, players can hit drives, which travel flat and rapidly over the net into the opponents' rear midcourt and rear court. Pushes may also be hit flatter, placing the shuttlecock into the front midcourt. Drives and pushes may be played from the midcourt or forecourt, and are most often used in doubles: they are an attempt to regain the attack, rather than choosing to lift the shuttlecock and defend against smashes. After a successful drive or push, the opponents will often be forced to lift the shuttlecock.
Spin
Balls may be spun to alter their bounce (for example, topspin and backspin in tennis) or trajectory, and players may slice the ball (strike it with an angled racquet face) to produce such spin. The shuttlecock is not allowed to bounce, but slicing the shuttlecock does have applications in badminton. (See Basic strokes for an explanation of technical terms.)
* Slicing the shuttlecock from the side may cause it to travel in a different direction from the direction suggested by the player's racquet or body movement. This is used to deceive opponents.
* Slicing the shuttlecock from the side may cause it to follow a slightly curved path (as seen from above), and the deceleration imparted by the spin causes sliced strokes to slow down more suddenly towards the end of their flight path. This can be used to create drop shots and smashes that dip more steeply after they pass the net.
* When playing a net shot, slicing underneath the shuttlecock may cause it to turn over itself (tumble) several times as it passes the net. This is called a spinning net shot or tumbling net shot. The opponent will be unwilling to address the shuttlecock until it has corrected its orientation.
Due to the way that its feathers overlap, a shuttlecock also has a slight natural spin about its axis of rotational symmetry. The spin is in a counter-clockwise direction as seen from above when dropping a shuttlecock. This natural spin affects certain strokes: a tumbling net shot is more effective if the slicing action is from right to left, rather than from left to right.BiomechanicsBadminton biomechanics have not been the subject of extensive scientific study, but some studies confirm the minor role of the wrist in power generation and indicate that the major contributions to power come from internal and external rotations of the upper and lower arm. Recent guides to the sport thus emphasize forearm rotation rather than wrist movements.
The feathers impart substantial drag, causing the shuttlecock to decelerate greatly over distance. The shuttlecock is also extremely aerodynamically stable: regardless of initial orientation, it will turn to fly cork-first and remain in the cork-first orientation.
One consequence of the shuttlecock's drag is that it requires considerable power to hit it the full length of the court, which is not the case for most racquet sports. The drag also influences the flight path of a lifted (lobbed) shuttlecock: the parabola of its flight is heavily skewed so that it falls at a steeper angle than it rises. With very high serves, the shuttlecock may even fall vertically.
Other factors
and Ko Sung-hyun defend against a smash.]]
When defending against a smash, players have three basic options: lift, block, or drive. In singles, a block to the net is the most common reply. In doubles, a lift is the safest option but it usually allows the opponents to continue smashing; blocks and drives are counter-attacking strokes but may be intercepted by the smasher's partner. Many players use a backhand hitting action for returning smashes on both the forehand and backhand sides because backhands are more effective than forehands at covering smashes directed to the body. Hard shots directed towards the body are difficult to defend.
The service is restricted by the Laws and presents its own array of stroke choices. Unlike in tennis, the server's racquet must be pointing in a downward direction to deliver the serve so normally the shuttle must be hit upwards to pass over the net. The server can choose a low serve into the forecourt (like a push), or a lift to the back of the service court, or a flat drive serve. Lifted serves may be either high serves, where the shuttlecock is lifted so high that it falls almost vertically at the back of the court, or flick serves, where the shuttlecock is lifted to a lesser height but falls sooner.
Deception
showing a loose grip before smashing]]
Once players have mastered these basic strokes, they can hit the shuttlecock from and to any part of the court, powerfully and softly as required. Beyond the basics, however, badminton offers rich potential for advanced stroke skills that provide a competitive advantage. Because badminton players have to cover a short distance as quickly as possible, the purpose of many advanced strokes is to deceive the opponent, so that either they are tricked into believing that a different stroke is being played, or they are forced to delay their movement until they actually sees the shuttle's direction. "Deception" in badminton is often used in both of these senses. When a player is genuinely deceived, they will often lose the point immediately because they cannot change their direction quickly enough to reach the shuttlecock. Experienced players will be aware of the trick and cautious not to move too early, but the attempted deception is still useful because it forces the opponent to delay their movement slightly. Against weaker players whose intended strokes are obvious, an experienced player may move before the shuttlecock has been hit, anticipating the stroke to gain an advantage.
Slicing and using a shortened hitting action are the two main technical devices that facilitate deception. Slicing involves hitting the shuttlecock with an angled racquet face, causing it to travel in a different direction than suggested by the body or arm movement. Slicing also causes the shuttlecock to travel more slowly than the arm movement suggests. For example, a good crosscourt sliced drop shot will use a hitting action that suggests a straight clear or a smash, deceiving the opponent about both the power and direction of the shuttlecock. A more sophisticated slicing action involves brushing the strings around the shuttlecock during the hit, in order to make the shuttlecock spin. This can be used to improve the shuttle's trajectory, by making it dip more rapidly as it passes the net; for example, a sliced low serve can travel slightly faster than a normal low serve, yet land on the same spot. Spinning the shuttlecock is also used to create spinning net shots (also called tumbling net shots), in which the shuttlecock turns over itself several times (tumbles) before stabilizing; sometimes the shuttlecock remains inverted instead of tumbling. The main advantage of a spinning net shot is that the opponent will be unwilling to address the shuttlecock until it has stopped tumbling, since hitting the feathers will result in an unpredictable stroke. Spinning net shots are especially important for high-level singles players.
The lightness of modern racquets allows players to use a very short hitting action for many strokes, thereby maintaining the option to hit a powerful or a soft stroke until the last possible moment. For example, a singles player may hold their racquet ready for a net shot, but then flick the shuttlecock to the back instead with a shallow lift when they notice the opponent has moved before the actual shot was played. A shallow lift takes less time to reach the ground and as mentioned above a rally is over when the shuttlecock touches the ground. This makes the opponent's task of covering the whole court much more difficult than if the lift was hit higher and with a bigger, obvious swing. A short hitting action is not only useful for deception: it also allows the player to hit powerful strokes when they have no time for a big arm swing. A big arm swing is also usually not advised in badminton because bigger swings make it more difficult to recover for the next shot in fast exchanges. The use of grip tightening is crucial to these techniques, and is often described as finger power. Elite players develop finger power to the extent that they can hit some power strokes, such as net kills, with less than a racquet swing.
It is also possible to reverse this style of deception, by suggesting a powerful stroke before slowing down the hitting action to play a soft stroke. In general, this latter style of deception is more common in the rear court (for example, drop shots disguised as smashes), whereas the former style is more common in the forecourt and midcourt (for example, lifts disguised as net shots).
Deception is not limited to slicing and short hitting actions. Players may also use double motion, where they make an initial racquet movement in one direction before withdrawing the racquet to hit in another direction. Players will often do this to send opponents in the wrong direction. The racquet movement is typically used to suggest a straight angle but then play the stroke crosscourt, or vice versa. Triple motion is also possible, but this is very rare in actual play. An alternative to double motion is to use a racquet head fake, where the initial motion is continued but the racquet is turned during the hit. This produces a smaller change in direction but does not require as much time.
Injuries
In badminton, cramps, usually in the arms and legs, are very common. Elbow, and leg pain is also common due to fast movement. A notable incident in badminton is the death of Zhang Zhijie, who collapsed onto the court, and died of cardiac arrest.
Another notable incident is the major knee injury of Carolina Marin, in which she had landed on her already surgically repaired knee akwardly, breaking her right knee. She was leading 21-14, and in the second game, was forced to retire, 10-6.Strategy
To win in badminton, players need to employ a wide variety of strokes in the right situations. These range from powerful jumping smashes to delicate tumbling net returns. Often rallies finish with a smash, but setting up the smash requires subtler strokes. For example, a net shot can force the opponent to lift the shuttlecock, which gives an opportunity to smash. If the net shot is tight and tumbling, then the opponent's lift will not reach the back of the court, which makes the subsequent smash much harder to return.
Deception is also important, helping players gain time back, and tricking the opponent (if played properly). Expert players prepare for many different strokes that look identical and use slicing to deceive their opponents about the speed or direction of the stroke. If an opponent tries to anticipate the stroke, they may move in the wrong direction and may be unable to change their body momentum in time to reach the shuttlecock.
Singles
Since one person needs to cover the entire court, singles tactics are based on forcing the opponent to move as much as possible; this means that singles strokes are normally directed to the corners of the court. Players exploit the length of the court by combining lifts and clears with drop shots and net shots. Smashing tends to be less prominent in singles than in doubles because the smasher has no partner to follow up their effort and is thus vulnerable to a skillfully placed return. Moreover, frequent smashing can be exhausting in singles where the conservation of a player's energy is at a premium. However, players with strong smashes will sometimes use the shot to create openings, and players commonly smash weak returns to try to end rallies.
In singles, players will often start the rally with a forehand high serve or with a flick serve. Low serves are also used frequently, either forehand or backhand. Drive serves are rare.
At high levels of play, singles demand extraordinary fitness. Singles is a game of patient positional manoeuvring, unlike the all-out aggression of doubles.Doubles
and Jwala Gutta at 2010 BWF World Championships]]
Both pairs will try to gain and maintain the attack, smashing downwards when the opportunity arises. Whenever possible, a pair will adopt an ideal attacking formation with one player hitting down from the rear court, and their partner in the midcourt intercepting all smash returns except the lift. If the rear court attacker plays a drop shot, their partner will move into the forecourt to threaten the net reply. If a pair cannot hit downwards, they will use flat strokes in an attempt to gain the attack. If a pair is forced to lift or clear the shuttlecock, then they must defend: they will adopt a side-by-side position in the rear midcourt, to cover the full width of their court against the opponents' smashes. In doubles, players generally smash to the middle ground between two players in order to take advantage of confusion and clashes.
At high levels of play, the backhand serve has become popular to the extent that forehand serves have become fairly rare at a high level of play. The straight low serve is used most frequently, in an attempt to prevent the opponents gaining the attack immediately. Flick serves are used to prevent the opponent from anticipating the low serve and attacking it decisively.
At high levels of play, doubles rallies are extremely fast. Men's doubles are the most aggressive form of badminton, with a high proportion of powerful jump smashes and very quick reflex exchanges. Because of this, spectator interest is sometimes greater for men's doubles than for singles.
Mixed doubles
In mixed doubles, both pairs typically try to maintain an attacking formation with the woman at the front and the man at the back. This is because the male players are usually substantially stronger, and can, therefore, produce smashes that are more powerful. As a result, mixed doubles require greater tactical awareness and subtler positional play. Clever opponents will try to reverse the ideal position, by forcing the woman towards the back or the man towards the front. In order to protect against this danger, mixed players must be careful and systematic in their shot selection.
At high levels of play, the formations will generally be more flexible: the top women players are capable of playing powerfully from the back-court, and will happily do so if required. When the opportunity arises, however, the pair will switch back to the standard mixed attacking position, with the woman in front and men in the back.
Organization
Governing bodies
The Badminton World Federation (BWF) is the internationally recognized governing body of the sport responsible for the regulation of tournaments and approaching fair play. Five regional confederations are associated with the BWF, the rest are unaffiliated, or are minor in comparison.
* Asia: Badminton Asia Confederation (BAC)
* Africa: Badminton Confederation of Africa (BCA)
* Americas: Badminton Pan Am (North America and South America belong to the same confederation; BPA)
* Europe: Badminton Europe (BE)
* Oceania: Badminton Oceania (BO)
Unaffiliated:
* Canada: Badminton Canada
* America: USA Badminton
* Philippines: Philippine Badminton Association
* Japan: Nippon Badminton Association
* North Macedonia: North Macedonian Badminton Federation
* Spain: Spanish Badminton Federation
* North Korea (DPRK): Badminton Association of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
* South Korea: Badminton Korea Association
* Portugal: Federação Portuguesa de Badminton
Competitions
at the 2015 Finnish Open Badminton Championships in Vantaa, Finland]]
The BWF organizes several international competitions, including the Thomas Cup, the premier men's international team event first held in 1948–1949, and the Uber Cup, the women's equivalent first held in 1956–1957. The competitions now take place once every two years. More than 50 national teams compete in qualifying tournaments within continental confederations for a place in the finals. The final tournament involves 12 teams, following an increase from eight teams in 2004. It was further increased to 16 teams in 2012.
The Sudirman Cup, a gender-mixed international team event held once every two years, began in 1989. Teams are divided into seven levels based on the performance of each country. To win the tournament, a country must perform well across all five disciplines (men's doubles and singles, women's doubles and singles, and mixed doubles). Like association football (soccer), it features a promotion and relegation system at every level. However, the system was last used in 2009 and teams competing will now be grouped by world rankings.
Badminton was a demonstration event at the 1972 and 1988 Summer Olympics. It became an official Summer Olympic sport at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992 and its gold medals now generally rate as the sport's most coveted prizes for individual players.
In the BWF World Championships, first held in 1977, currently only the highest-ranked 64 players in the world, and a maximum of four from each country can participate in any category. Therefore, it's not an "open" format. In both the BWF World and the Olympic competitions restrictions on the number of participants from any one country have caused some controversy, because they result in excluding some world elite level players from the strongest badminton nations. The Thomas, Uber, and Sudirman Cups, the Olympics, and the BWF World (and World Junior Championships), are all categorized as level one tournaments.
At the start of 2007, the BWF introduced a new tournament structure for the highest level tournaments aside from those in level one: the BWF Super Series. This "level two" tournament series is a circuit for the world's elite players, staging twelve open tournaments around the world with 32 players (half the previous limit). The players collect points that determine whether they can play in Super Series Finals held at the year-end. Among the tournaments in this series is the venerable All-England Championships, first held in 1900, which was once considered the unofficial world championships of the sport.
Level three tournaments consist of Grand Prix Gold and Grand Prix event. Top players can collect the world ranking points and enable them to play in the BWF Super Series open tournaments. These include the regional competitions in Asia (Badminton Asia Championships) and Europe (European Badminton Championships), which produce the world's best players as well as the Pan America Badminton Championships.
The level four tournaments, known as International Challenge, International Series, and Future Series, encourage participation by junior players.
Comparison with tennis
Badminton is frequently compared to tennis due to several qualities. The following is a list of manifest differences:
* Scoring: In badminton, a match is played best of 2 of 3 games, with each game played up to 21 points. In tennis a match is played best of 3 or 5 sets, each set consisting of 6 games and each game ends when one player wins 4 points or wins two consecutive points at deuce points. If both teams are tied at "game point", they must play until one team achieves a two-point advantage. However, at 29all, whoever scores the golden point will win. In tennis, if the score is tied 66 in a set, a tiebreaker will be played, which ends once a player reaches at least 7 points and has a two-point advantage.
* In tennis, the ball may bounce once before the point ends; in badminton, the rally ends once the shuttlecock touches the floor.
* In tennis, the serve is dominant to the extent that the server is expected to win most of their service games (at advanced level & onwards); a break of service, where the server loses the game, is of major importance in a match. In badminton, a server has far less an advantage and is unlikely to score an ace (unreturnable serve).
* In tennis, the server has two chances to hit a serve into the service box; in badminton, the server is allowed only one attempt.
* A tennis court is approximately twice the length and width of a badminton court.
* Tennis racquets are about four times as heavy as badminton racquets, versus . Tennis balls are more than eleven times heavier than shuttlecocks, versus .
* The fastest recorded tennis stroke is Samuel Groth's serve, whereas the fastest badminton stroke during gameplay was Mads Pieler Kolding's recorded smash at a Badminton Premier League match.
Statistics such as the smash speed, above, prompt badminton enthusiasts to make other comparisons that are more contentious. For example, it is often claimed that badminton is the fastest racquet sport. Although badminton holds the record for the fastest initial speed of a racquet sports projectile, the shuttlecock decelerates substantially faster than other projectiles such as tennis balls. In turn, this qualification must be qualified by consideration of the distance over which the shuttlecock travels: a smashed shuttlecock travels a shorter distance than a tennis ball during a serve.
While fans of badminton and tennis often claim that their sport is the more physically demanding, such comparisons are difficult to make objectively because of the differing demands of the games. No formal study currently exists evaluating the physical condition of the players or demands during gameplay.
Badminton and tennis techniques differ substantially. The lightness of the shuttlecock and of badminton racquets allows badminton players to make use of the wrist and fingers much more than tennis players; in tennis, the wrist is normally held stable, and playing with a mobile wrist may lead to injury. For the same reasons, badminton players can generate power from a short racquet swing: for some strokes such as net kills, an elite player's swing may be less than . For strokes that require more power, a longer swing will typically be used, but the badminton racquet swing will rarely be as long as a typical tennis swing.See also
* Ball badminton
* Hanetsuki
* List of racquet sports
* Crossminton
Notes
ReferencesSources*
*
* |page=189 }}
* |date1991 |titleThe Olympics Factbook: A Spectator's Guide to the Winter and Summer Games |publisherVisible Ink Press |isbn=0-8103-9417-0 }}.
* .
*
*
* |page228 }}
* .
External links
<!-- Note to editors, unimportant external links will be deleted immediately -->
* [http://www.bwfbadminton.org/ Badminton World Federation]
** [https://www.worldbadminton.com/rules/ Laws of Badminton]
** [https://system.bwfbadminton.com/documents/folder_1_81/Regulations/Simplified-Rules/Simplified%20Rules%20of%20Badminton%20-%20Dec%202015.pdf Simplified Rules] (PDF)
* [https://www.badmintonasia.org/ Badminton Asia Confederation]
* [http://www.badmintonpanam.org/ Badminton Pan Am]
* [http://www.oceaniabadminton.org/ Badminton Oceania]
* [http://www.badmintoneurope.com/ Badminton Europe]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080410081244/http://www.badmintonafrica.org/ Badminton Confederation of Africa] (archived)
Category:Racket sports
Category:Summer Olympic sports
Category:Sports originating in England
Category:Sports originating in South Asia | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badminton | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.200630 |
3957 | Baroque | | caption = Top: Venus and Adonis by Peter Paul Rubens (1635–1640); centre: Ecstasy of Saint Teresa by Bernini (1651); bottom: the Palace of Versailles in France ( 1660–1715)
| yearsactive = 17th–18th centuries
|countries = Europe and the Americas
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The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from the early 17th century until the 1750s. It followed Renaissance art and Mannerism and preceded the Rococo (in the past often referred to as "late Baroque") and Neoclassical styles. It was encouraged by the Catholic Church as a means to counter the simplicity and austerity of Protestant architecture, art, and music, though Lutheran Baroque art developed in parts of Europe as well.
The Baroque style used contrast, movement, exuberant detail, deep color, grandeur, and surprise to achieve a sense of awe. The style began at the start of the 17th century in Rome, then spread rapidly to the rest of Italy, France, Spain, and Portugal, then to Austria, southern Germany, and Poland. By the 1730s, it had evolved into an even more flamboyant style, called rocaille or Rococo, which appeared in France and Central Europe until the mid to late 18th century. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires including the Iberian Peninsula it continued, together with new styles, until the first decade of the 19th century.
In the decorative arts, the style employs plentiful and intricate ornamentation. The departure from Renaissance classicism has its own ways in each country. But a general feature is that everywhere the starting point is the ornamental elements introduced by the Renaissance. The classical repertoire is crowded, dense, overlapping, loaded, in order to provoke shock effects. New motifs introduced by Baroque are: the cartouche, trophies and weapons, baskets of fruit or flowers, and others, made in marquetry, stucco, or carved.Origin of the word
, made of a baroque pearl (the torso) with enameled gold mounts set with rubies, probably , in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York City, New York).]]
The English word baroque comes directly from the French. Some scholars state that the French word originated from the Portuguese term 'a flawed pearl', pointing to the Latin 'wart', or to a word with the Romance suffix (common in pre-Roman Iberia). Other sources suggest a Medieval Latin term used in logic, , as the most likely source.
In the 16th century the Medieval Latin word moved beyond scholastic logic and came into use to characterise anything that seemed absurdly complex. The French philosopher (1533–1592) helped to give the term (spelled by him) the meaning 'bizarre, uselessly complicated'. Other early sources associate with magic, complexity, confusion, and excess. Later, the word appears in a 1694 edition of , which describes baroque as "only used for pearls that are imperfectly round." A 1728 Portuguese dictionary similarly describes as relating to a "coarse and uneven pearl".
An alternative derivation of the word baroque points to the name of the Italian painter Federico Barocci (1528–1612).
In the 18th century the term began to be used to describe music, and not in a flattering way. In an anonymous satirical review of the première of 's in October 1733, which was printed in the in May 1734, the critic wrote that the novelty in this opera was "", complaining that the music lacked coherent melody, was unsparing with dissonances, constantly changed key and meter, and speedily ran through every compositional device.
In 1762 recorded that the term could figuratively describe something "irregular, bizarre or unequal".
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who was a musician and composer as well as a philosopher, wrote in the in 1768: "Baroque music is that in which the harmony is confused, and loaded with modulations and dissonances. The singing is harsh and unnatural, the intonation difficult, and the movement limited. It appears that term comes from the word 'baroco' used by logicians."
In 1788 defined the term in the as "an architectural style that is highly adorned and tormented".
The French terms and appeared in in 1835. By the mid-19th century, art critics and historians had adopted the term baroque as a way to ridicule post-Renaissance art. This was the sense of the word as used in 1855 by the leading art historian Jacob Burckhardt, who wrote that baroque artists "despised and abused detail" because they lacked "respect for tradition".
In 1888 the art historian Heinrich Wölfflin published the first serious academic work on the style, Renaissance und Barock, which described the differences between the painting, sculpture, and architecture of the Renaissance and the Baroque.
Architecture: origins and characteristics
ceiling of the Church of the Gesù, Rome, by Giovanni Battista Gaulli, 1673–1678]]
The Baroque style of architecture was a result of doctrines adopted by the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent in 1545–1563, in response to the Protestant Reformation. The first phase of the Counter-Reformation had imposed a severe, academic style on religious architecture, which had appealed to intellectuals but not the mass of churchgoers. The Council of Trent decided instead to appeal to a more popular audience, and declared that the arts should communicate religious themes with direct and emotional involvement. Similarly, Lutheran Baroque art developed as a confessional marker of identity, in response to the Great Iconoclasm of Calvinists.
Baroque churches were designed with a large central space, where the worshippers could be close to the altar, with a dome or cupola high overhead, allowing light to illuminate the church below. The dome was one of the central symbolic features of Baroque architecture illustrating the union between the heavens and the earth. The inside of the cupola was lavishly decorated with paintings of angels and saints, and with stucco statuettes of angels, giving the impression to those below of looking up at heaven. Another feature of Baroque churches are the quadratura; trompe-l'œil paintings on the ceiling in stucco frames, either real or painted, crowded with paintings of saints and angels and connected by architectural details with the balustrades and consoles. Quadratura paintings of Atlantes below the cornices appear to be supporting the ceiling of the church. Unlike the painted ceilings of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel, which combined different scenes, each with its own perspective, to be looked at one at a time, the Baroque ceiling paintings were carefully created so the viewer on the floor of the church would see the entire ceiling in correct perspective, as if the figures were real.
The interiors of Baroque churches became more and more ornate in the High Baroque, and focused around the altar, usually placed under the dome. The most celebrated baroque decorative works of the High Baroque are the Chair of Saint Peter (1647–1653) and St. Peter's Baldachin (1623–1634), both by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. The Baldequin of St. Peter is an example of the balance of opposites in Baroque art; the gigantic proportions of the piece, with the apparent lightness of the canopy; and the contrast between the solid twisted columns, bronze, gold and marble of the piece with the flowing draperies of the angels on the canopy. The Dresden Frauenkirche serves as a prominent example of Lutheran Baroque art, which was completed in 1743 after being commissioned by the Lutheran city council of Dresden and was "compared by eighteenth-century observers to St Peter's in Rome".
Baroque architects sometimes used forced perspective to create illusions. For the Palazzo Spada in Rome, Francesco Borromini used columns of diminishing size, a narrowing floor and a miniature statue in the garden beyond to create the illusion that a passageway was thirty meters long, when it was actually only seven meters long. A statue at the end of the passage appears to be life-size, though it is only sixty centimeters high. Borromini designed the illusion with the assistance of a mathematician.
Italian Baroque
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Basilique Saint Pierre - Vatican (VA) - 2021-08-25 - 4.jpg|St. Peter's Basilica, Rome, by Donato Bramante, Michelangelo, Carlo Maderno and others, completed in 1615
File:Santa Maria della Salute from Hotel Monaco.jpg|Santa Maria della Salute, Venice, by Baldassare Longhena, 1631–1687
San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane - Front.jpg|San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Rome, by Francesco Borromini, 1638–1677
File:Obelisco Fontana dei Fiumi Piazza Navona Roma.jpg|Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, Rome, by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 1648–1651
File:St Peter's Square, Vatican City - April 2007.jpg|St. Peter's Square, Rome, by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 1656–1667
File:Église Santa Maria Pace - Rome (IT62) - 2021-08-28 - 3.jpg|Santa Maria della Pace, Rome, by Pietro da Cortona, 1656–1667
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The first building in Rome to have a Baroque façade was the Church of the Gesù in 1584; it was plain by later Baroque standards, but marked a break with the traditional Renaissance façades that preceded it. The interior of this church remained very austere until the high Baroque, when it was lavishly ornamented.
In Rome in 1605, Paul V became the first of series of popes who commissioned basilicas and church buildings designed to inspire emotion and awe through a proliferation of forms, and a richness of colours and dramatic effects. Among the most influential monuments of the Early Baroque were the façade of St. Peter's Basilica (1606–1619), and the new nave and loggia which connected the façade to Michelangelo's dome in the earlier church. The new design created a dramatic contrast between the soaring dome and the disproportionately wide façade, and the contrast on the façade itself between the Doric columns and the great mass of the portico.
In the mid to late 17th century the style reached its peak, later termed the High Baroque. Many monumental works were commissioned by Popes Urban VIII and Alexander VII. The sculptor and architect Gian Lorenzo Bernini designed a new quadruple colonnade around St. Peter's Square (1656 to 1667). The three galleries of columns in a giant ellipse balance the oversize dome and give the Church and square a unity and the feeling of a giant theatre.
Another major innovator of the Italian High Baroque was Francesco Borromini, whose major work was the Church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane or Saint Charles of the Four Fountains (1634–1646). The sense of movement is given not by the decoration, but by the walls themselves, which undulate and by concave and convex elements, including an oval tower and balcony inserted into a concave traverse. The interior was equally revolutionary; the main space of the church was oval, beneath an oval dome.
The style spread quickly from Rome to other regions of Italy: It appeared in Venice in the church of Santa Maria della Salute (1631–1687) by Baldassare Longhena, a highly original octagonal form crowned with an enormous cupola. It appeared also in Turin, notably in the Chapel of the Holy Shroud (1668–1694) by Guarino Guarini. The style also began to be used in palaces; Guarini designed the Palazzo Carignano in Turin, while Longhena designed the Ca' Rezzonico on the Grand Canal, (1657), finished by Giorgio Massari with decorated with paintings by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo. A series of massive earthquakes in Sicily required the rebuilding of most of them and several were built in the exuberant late Baroque or Rococo style.
Spanish Baroque
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File:Palacio San Telmo facade Seville Spain.jpg|Palacio de San Telmo, Seville, Andalusia, by Leonardo de Figueroa, 1682–1754
File:Palacio de La Merced (52004775643).jpg|Palacio de la Merced, Córdoba, Andalusia, 1245–1760
Palacio Real de Madrid - 13.jpg|Royal Palace of Madrid, by Jean Bautista Sachetti, 1735–1764
File:Catedral de Santiago de Compostela agosto 2018 (cropped).jpg|Façade of the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, by Fernando de Casas Novoa, 1738
File:Barcelona - Palau de la Virreina - façana.jpg|Virreina Palace in Barcelona, Catalonia, built between 1772 and 1778 by Josep Ausich
File:Basílica Mercè BCN.jpg|Basilica of Our Lady of Mercy in Barcelona, Catalonia, built between 1765 and 1775 by José Mas Dordal
File:Salamanca - Clerecia 13.jpg|La Clerecía, Salamanca, Castile and León, built between 1617 and 1754.
Iglesia-convento de Santa Teresa - Ávila 001.jpg|Iglesia-convento de Santa Teresa, in Ávila, Castile and León, built in the early 17th century
Ayuntamiento de Cuenca.JPG|Casa consistorial de Cuenca, in Cuenca, Castile-La Mancha, built between 1760 and 1788 by Lorenzo de Santa María and Mateo López
File:Iglesia de los Juanes, Valencia, España, 2014-06-29, DD 19.JPG|Church of Santos Juanes, Valencia, built between 1240 and 1702
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The Catholic Church in Spain, and particularly the Jesuits, were the driving force of Spanish Baroque architecture. The first major work in this style was the San Isidro Chapel in Madrid, begun in 1643 by Pedro de la Torre. It contrasted an extreme richness of ornament on the exterior with simplicity in the interior, divided into multiple spaces and using effects of light to create a sense of mystery. The Santiago de Compostela Cathedral was modernized with a series of Baroque additions beginning at the end of the 17th century, starting with a highly ornate bell tower (1680), then flanked by two even taller and more ornate towers, called the Obradorio, added between 1738 and 1750 by Fernando de Casas Novoa. Another landmark of the Spanish Baroque is the chapel tower of the Palace of San Telmo in Seville by Leonardo de Figueroa.
Granada had only been conquered from the Moors in the 15th century, and had its own distinct variety of Baroque. The painter, sculptor and architect Alonso Cano designed the Baroque interior of Granada Cathedral between 1652 and his death in 1657. It features dramatic contrasts of the massive white columns and gold decor.
The most ornamental and lavishly decorated architecture of the Spanish Baroque is called Churrigueresque style, named after the brothers Churriguera, who worked primarily in Salamanca and Madrid. Their works include the buildings on Salamanca's main square, the Plaza Mayor (1729).
Central Europe
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File:Iglesia colegial de Poznan, Poznan, Polonia, 2014-09-18, DD 19-21 HDR.jpg|Poznań Fara, Poznań, Poland, by Bartłomiej Nataniel Wąsowski, Giovanni Catenazzi and Pompeo Ferrari, 1651–1732
281012 Detail of the Wilanów Palace - 19.jpg|Wilanów Palace, Warsaw, Poland, unknown architect, 1677–1679
File:Wien Graben Pestsäule Ostseite.jpg|Plague Column, Vienna, Austria, by Matthias Rauchmiller and Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, 1682 and 1694
File:St. Nikolaus auf der Kleinseite Innenraum 1.jpg|Church of Saint Nicholas, Prague, Czech Republic, by Christoph Dientzenhofer, 1703–1711
Karlskirche Wien September 2016.jpg|Exterior of the Karlskirche, Vienna, by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, 1715–1737
Iglesia de San Carlos Borromeo, Viena, Austria, 2020-01-31, DD 49-51 HDR.jpg|Interior of the Karlskirche, by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, 1715–1737
File:Palacio Belvedere, Viena, Austria, 2020-02-01, DD 87-89 HDR.jpg|Upper Belvedere, Vienna, by Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt, 1717–1723
File:Pałac w Rogalinie od strony ogrodu 02.jpg|Rogalin Palace, Rogalin, Poland, unknown architect, 1768–1774
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From 1680 to 1750, many highly ornate cathedrals, abbeys, and pilgrimage churches were built in Central Europe, Austria, Bohemia and southwestern Poland. Some were in Rococo style, a distinct, more flamboyant and asymmetric style which emerged from the Baroque, then replaced it in Central Europe in the first half of the 18th century, until it was replaced in turn by classicism.
The princes of the multitude of states in that region also chose Baroque or Rococo for their palaces and residences, and often used Italian-trained architects to construct them.
A notable example is the St. Nicholas Church (Malá Strana) in Prague (1704–1755), built by Christoph Dientzenhofer and his son Kilian Ignaz Dientzenhofer. Decoration covers all of walls of interior of the church. The altar is placed in the nave beneath the central dome, and surrounded by chapels, light comes down from the dome above and from the surrounding chapels. The altar is entirely surrounded by arches, columns, curved balustrades and pilasters of coloured stone, which are richly decorated with statuary, creating a deliberate confusion between the real architecture and the decoration. The architecture is transformed into a theatre of light, colour and movement. The palatial residence style was exemplified by the Wilanów Palace, constructed between 1677 and 1696. The most renowned Baroque architect active in Poland was Dutchman Tylman van Gameren and his notable works include Warsaw's St. Kazimierz Church and Krasiński Palace, Church of St. Anne, Kraków and Branicki Palace, Białystok. However, the most celebrated work of Polish Baroque is the Poznań Fara Church, with details by Pompeo Ferrari. After Thirty Years' War under the agreements of the Peace of Westphalia two unique baroque wattle and daub structures was built: Church of Peace in Jawor, Holy Trinity Church of Peace in Świdnica the largest wooden Baroque temple in Europe.
German Baroque
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File:Dresden Germany Zwinger-01.jpg|Zwinger, Dresden, Germany, by Matthäus Daniel Pöppelmann and Balthasar Permoser, 1710–1728
File:Würzburger Residenz, Gartenfront.jpg|Würzburg Residence, Würzburg, Germany, Balthasar Neumann, 1720–1744
File:100130 150006 Dresden Frauenkirche winter blue sky-2.jpg|Frauenkirche, Dresden, Germany, by George Bähr, 1726 and 1743
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The many states within the Holy Roman Empire on the territory of today's Germany all looked to represent themselves with impressive Baroque buildings. Notable architects included Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, Lukas von Hildebrandt and Dominikus Zimmermann in Bavaria, Balthasar Neumann in Bruhl, and Matthäus Daniel Pöppelmann in Dresden. In Prussia, Frederick II of Prussia was inspired by the Grand Trianon of the Palace of Versailles, and used it as the model for his summer residence, Sanssouci, in Potsdam, designed for him by Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff (1745–1747). Another work of Baroque palace architecture is the Zwinger (Dresden), the former orangerie of the palace of the electors of Saxony in the 18th century.
One of the best examples of a rococo church is the Basilika Vierzehnheiligen, or Basilica of the Fourteen Holy Helpers, a pilgrimage church located near the town of Bad Staffelstein near Bamberg, in Bavaria, southern Germany. The Basilica was designed by Balthasar Neumann and was constructed between 1743 and 1772, its plan a series of interlocking circles around a central oval with the altar placed in the exact centre of the church. The interior of this church illustrates the summit of Rococo decoration.
Another notable example of the style is the Pilgrimage Church of Wies (). It was designed by the brothers J. B. and Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps, in the municipality of Steingaden in the Weilheim-Schongau district, Bavaria, Germany. Construction took place between 1745 and 1754, and the interior was decorated with frescoes and with stuccowork in the tradition of the Wessobrunner School. It is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
French Baroque
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File:Château de Maisons-Laffitte 001.jpg|Château de Maisons, France, by François Mansart, 1630–1651
Galerie d'Apollon du Louvre déserte 1.jpg|Galerie d'Apollon, Louvre Palace, Paris, by Louis Le Vau and Charles Le Brun, after 1661
File:Louvre-facade-est.jpg|East front of the Louvre Palace, Paris, by Claude Perrault and Louis Le Vau, 1665–1680
Versailles Chapel - July 2006 edit.jpg|Chapel of the Palace of Versailles, Versailles, France, 1696–1710
File:Porte Saint-Denis 01.jpg|Porte Saint-Denis, Paris, by François Blondel, 1672
File:Cathédrale Saint-Louis-des-Invalides, 140309 2.jpg|Dôme des Invalides, Paris, by Jules Hardouin-Mansart, 1677–1706
File:Chateau Versailles Galerie des Glaces.jpg|Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles, 1678–1684
File:Palace of Versailles June 2010.jpg|Garden façade of the Palace of Versailles, by Jules Hardouin-Mansart, 1678–1688
File:Cour de Marbre du Château de Versailles October 5, 2011.jpg|Marble Court of the Palace of Versailles, 1680
File:Place Vendome, Paris 20 April 2011.jpg|Place Vendôme, Paris, by Jules Hardouin-Mansart, 1699–1706
File:Hôtel de Rothelin - façade cour.jpg|Hôtel de Rothelin-Charolais, Paris, by Pierre Cailleteau, 1700–1704
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Baroque in France developed quite differently from the ornate and dramatic local versions of Baroque from Italy, Spain and the rest of Europe. It appears severe, more detached and restrained by comparison, preempting Neoclassicism and the architecture of the Enlightenment. Unlike Italian buildings, French Baroque buildings have no broken pediments or curvilinear façades. Even religious buildings avoided the intense spatial drama one finds in the work of Borromini. The style is closely associated with the works built for Louis XIV (reign 1643–1715), and because of this, it is also known as the Louis XIV style. Louis XIV invited the master of Baroque, Bernini, to submit a design for the new east wing of the Louvre, but rejected it in favor of a more classical design by Claude Perrault and Louis Le Vau.
The main architects of the style included François Mansart (1598–1666), Pierre Le Muet (Church of Val-de-Grâce, 1645–1665) and Louis Le Vau (Vaux-le-Vicomte, 1657–1661). Mansart was the first architect to introduce Baroque styling, principally the frequent use of an applied order and heavy rustication, into the French architectural vocabulary. The mansard roof was not invented by Mansart, but it has become associated with him, as he used it frequently.
The major royal project of the period was the expansion of Palace of Versailles, begun in 1661 by Le Vau with decoration by the painter Charles Le Brun. The gardens were designed by André Le Nôtre specifically to complement and amplify the architecture. The Galerie des Glaces (Hall of Mirrors), the centerpiece of the château, with paintings by Le Brun, was constructed between 1678 and 1686. Mansart completed the Grand Trianon in 1687. The chapel, designed by Robert de Cotte, was finished in 1710. Following the death of Louis XIV, Louis XV added the more intimate Petit Trianon and the highly ornate theatre. The fountains in the gardens were designed to be seen from the interior, and to add to the dramatic effect. The palace was admired and copied by other monarchs of Europe, particularly Peter the Great of Russia, who visited Versailles early in the reign of Louis XV, and built his own version at Peterhof Palace near Saint Petersburg, between 1705 and 1725.
Portuguese Baroque
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File:Biblioteca Joanina Universidade de Coimbra IMG 0664.JPG|University Library, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal, by Gaspar Ferreira, 1716–1728
File:Mafra (27595630149) (cropped).jpg|Palace of Mafra, Mafra, Portugal, by João Frederico Ludovice, 1717–1755
Patriarcato di Lisbona (3093346552).jpg|Azulejo in the cloisters of the Monastery of São Vicente de Fora, Lisbon, Portugal, with a scene based on a print by Jean Le Pautre, unknown architect or craftsman, 1730–1735
File:Bom Jesus 2017 (10).jpg|Grand Staircase of the Sanctuary of Bom Jesus do Monte, Braga, Portugal, by Carlos Luís Ferreira Amarante and others,
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Baroque architecture in Portugal lasted about two centuries (the late seventeenth century and eighteenth century). The reigns of John V and Joseph I had increased imports of gold and diamonds, in a period called Royal Absolutism, which allowed the Portuguese Baroque to flourish.
Baroque architecture in Portugal enjoys a special situation and different timeline from the rest of Europe.
It is conditioned by several political, artistic, and economic factors, that originate several phases, and different kinds of outside influences, resulting in a unique blend, often misunderstood by those looking for Italian art, find instead specific forms and character which give it a uniquely Portuguese variety. Another key factor is the existence of the Jesuitical architecture, also called "plain style" (Estilo Chão or Estilo Plano) which like the name evokes, is plainer and appears somewhat austere.
The buildings are single-room basilicas, deep main chapel, lateral chapels (with small doors for communication), without interior and exterior decoration, simple portal and windows.
It is a practical building, allowing it to be built throughout the empire with minor adjustments, and prepared to be decorated later or when economic resources are available.
In fact, the first Portuguese Baroque does not lack in building because "plain style" is easy to be transformed, by means of decoration (painting, tiling, etc.), turning empty areas into pompous, elaborate baroque scenarios. The same could be applied to the exterior. Subsequently, it is easy to adapt the building to the taste of the time and place, and add on new features and details. Practical and economical.
With more inhabitants and better economic resources, the north, particularly the areas of Porto and Braga, witnessed an architectural renewal, visible in the large list of churches, convents and palaces built by the aristocracy.
Porto is the city of Baroque in Portugal. Its historical centre is part of UNESCO World Heritage List.
Many of the Baroque works in the historical area of the city and beyond, belong to Nicolau Nasoni an Italian architect living in Portugal, drawing original buildings with scenographic emplacement such as the church and tower of Clérigos, the logia of the Porto Cathedral, the church of Misericórdia, the Palace of São João Novo, the Palace of Freixo, the Episcopal Palace (Portuguese: Paço Episcopal do Porto) along with many others.Russian Baroque
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File:2019-08-02-3847-Saint Petersburg.jpg|Peterhof Gardens, Saint Petersburg, Russia, unknown architect, 1746–1758
File:Smolny Cathedral SPB 02.jpg|Smolny Convent, Saint Petersburg, by Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli, 1748
File:Catherine Palace in Tsarskoe Selo.jpg|Tsarskoe Selo, Pushkin, Russia, by Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli, 1749–1756
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The debut of Russian Baroque, or Petrine Baroque, followed a long visit of Peter the Great to western Europe in 1697–1698, where he visited the Châteaux of Fontainebleau and Versailles as well as other architectural monuments. He decided, on his return to Russia, to construct similar monuments in St. Petersburg, which became the new capital of Russia in 1712. Early major monuments in the Petrine Baroque include the Peter and Paul Cathedral and Menshikov Palace.
During the reign of Anna and Elisabeth, Russian architecture was dominated by the luxurious Baroque style of Italian-born Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli, which developed into Elizabethan Baroque. Rastrelli's signature buildings include the Winter Palace, the Catherine Palace and the Smolny Cathedral. Other distinctive monuments of the Elizabethan Baroque are the bell tower of the Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra and the Red Gate.
In Moscow, Naryshkin Baroque became widespread, especially in the architecture of Eastern Orthodox churches in the late 17th century. It was a combination of western European Baroque with traditional Russian folk styles.
Baroque in the Spanish and Portuguese Colonial Americas
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Igreja de São Francisco de Assis (Ouro Preto, MG) por Rodrigo Tetsuo Argenton.jpg|Church of Saint Francis of Assisi (Ouro Preto), Minas Gerais, Brazil, by Aleijadinho, 1765–1788
File:Basilica Menor de San Francisco de Asis in Havana 2016.jpg|Basilica of San Francisco de Asís, Havana, Cuba, unknown architect, 1548–1738
File:Vista de la Fachada del Templo de San Francisco Acatepec 9.jpg|Church of San Francisco Acatepec, San Andrés Cholula, Puebla, Mexico, unknown architect, 17th–18th centuries
File:Catedral metropolitana de Quito - panoramio - Quito magnífico (17).jpg|Quito Metropolitan Cathedral, Quito, Ecuador, by Antonio García and others, 1535–1799
Church in Historic Center - Sucre - Bolivia.jpg|Metropolitan Cathedral of Sucre in Sucre, Bolivia, 1551–1712
File:Iglesia de Santo Domingo, Santiago, 2017-09-24.jpg|Santo Domingo Church, Santiago, Chile, unknown architect, 1747–1808
File:Taxco Santa Prisca.jpg|Church of Santa Prisca de Taxco, Taxco, Mexico, by Diego Durán and Cayetano Sigüenza, 1751–1758
File:Iglesia de la Recoleccion - Leon - Nicaragua - 01 (31416391552).jpg|Church of la Recolección, León, Nicaragua, 1786–1788
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Due to the colonization of the Americas by European countries, the Baroque naturally moved to the New World, finding especially favorable ground in the regions dominated by Spain and Portugal, both countries being centralized and irreducibly Catholic monarchies, by extension subject to Rome and adherents of the Baroque Counter-Reformation. European artists migrated to America and made school, and along with the widespread penetration of Catholic missionaries, many of whom were skilled artists, created a multiform Baroque often influenced by popular taste. The Criollo and indigenous crafters did much to give this Baroque unique features. The main centres of American Baroque cultivation, that are still standing, are (in this order) Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Cuba, Ecuador, Colombia, Bolivia, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Puerto Rico and Panama.
Of particular note is the so-called "Missionary Baroque", developed in the framework of the Spanish reductions in areas extending from Mexico and southwestern portions of current-day United States to as far south as Argentina and Chile, indigenous settlements organized by Spanish Catholic missionaries in order to convert them to the Christian faith and acculturate them in the Western life, forming a hybrid Baroque influenced by Native culture, where flourished Criollos and many indigenous artisans and musicians, even literate, some of great ability and talent of their own. Missionaries' accounts often repeat that Western art, especially music, had a hypnotic impact on foresters, and the images of saints were viewed as having great powers. Many natives were converted, and a new form of devotion was created, of passionate intensity, laden with mysticism, superstition, and theatricality, which delighted in festive masses, sacred concerts, and mysteries.
The Colonial Baroque architecture in the Spanish America is characterized by a profuse decoration (portal of La Profesa Church, Mexico City; façades covered with Puebla-style azulejos, as in the Church of San Francisco Acatepec in San Andrés Cholula and Convent Church of San Francisco, Puebla), which will be exacerbated in the so-called Churrigueresque style (Façade of the Tabernacle of the Mexico City Metropolitan Cathedral, by Lorenzo Rodríguez; Church of San Francisco Javier, Tepotzotlán; Church of Santa Prisca de Taxco). In Peru, the constructions mostly developed in the cities of Lima, Cusco, Arequipa and Trujillo, since 1650 show original characteristics that are advanced even to the European Baroque, as in the use of cushioned walls and solomonic columns (Iglesia de la Compañía de Jesús, Cusco; Basilica and Convent of San Francisco, Lima). Other countries include: the Metropolitan Cathedral of Sucre in Bolivia; Cathedral Basilica of Esquipulas in Guatemala; Tegucigalpa Cathedral in Honduras; León Cathedral in Nicaragua; the Church of la Compañía de Jesús, Quito, Ecuador; the Church of San Ignacio, Bogotá, Colombia; the Caracas Cathedral in Venezuela; the Cabildo of Buenos Aires in Argentina; the Church of Santo Domingo in Santiago, Chile; and Havana Cathedral in Cuba. It is also worth remembering the quality of the churches of the Spanish Jesuit Missions in Bolivia, Spanish Jesuit missions in Paraguay, the Spanish missions in Mexico and the Spanish Franciscan missions in California.
In Brazil, as in the metropolis, Portugal, the architecture has a certain Italian influence, usually of a Borrominesque type, as can be seen in the Co-Cathedral of Recife (1784) and Church of Nossa Senhora da Glória do Outeiro in Rio de Janeiro (1739). In the region of Minas Gerais, highlighted the work of Aleijadinho, author of a group of churches that stand out for their curved planimetry, façades with concave-convex dynamic effects and a plastic treatment of all architectural elements (Church of São Francisco de Assis, Ouro Preto, 1765–1788).
Baroque in the Spanish and Portuguese Colonial Asia
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File:Restos de la Catedral de San Pablo, Macao, 2013-08-08, DD 05.jpg|São Paulo in Macau, China, unknown architect, 1601
File:Eglise St Paul.jpg|São Paulo in Diu, India, unknown architect, 1601
File:Manila Cathedral (1792) by Brambila.jpg|Manila Cathedral in a painting of 1792, in Intramuros, Manila, Philippines
File:Old Goa Church 01.jpg|Basilica of Bom Jesus in Goa, India, 1594–1605
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In the Portuguese colonies of India (Goa, Daman and Diu) an architectural style of Baroque forms mixed with Hindu elements flourished, such as the Se Cathedral and the Basilica of Bom Jesus of Goa, which houses the tomb of St. Francis Xavier. The set of churches and convents of Goa was declared a World Heritage Site in 1986.
In the Philippines, which was a Spanish colony for over three centuries, a large number of Baroque constructions are preserved. Four of these as well as the Baroque and Neoclassical city of Vigan are both UNESCO World Heritage Sites; and although they lack formal classification, The Walled City of Manila along with the city of Tayabas both contain a significant extent of Spanish-Baroque-era architecture.
Echoes in Wallachia and Moldavia
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File:Biserica „Înălțarea Domnului” (1).jpg|Golia Monastery Church, Iași, Romania, unknown architect, 1650–1660
Hurezi (14572944446).jpg|Horezu Monastery, Horezu, Romania, with a Solomonic column, unknown architect, 17th–18th centuries
File:Horezu bis man portal.jpg|Door and pisanie of the Saints Constantine and Helena Church, Horezu Monastery, unknown architect or sculptor, 1692–1694
File:Palatul Brâncovenesc, Potlogi, DB, 4.JPG|Maximalist railing of the Potlogi Palace, Potlogi, unknown architect, 1698
File:Mogosoaia Museum (128813769).jpeg|Twisting columns and railings of the Mogoșoaia Palace, Mogoșoaia, unknown architect, early 18th century
Stone in the courtyard of the Antim Monastery 19.jpg|Cartouche on a damaged stone in the courtyard of Antim Monastery, Bucharest, unknown sculptor, late 17th-early 18th century
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As we saw, the Baroque is a Western style, born in Italy. Through the commercial and cultural relationships of Italians with countries of the Balkan Peninsula, including Moldavia and Wallachia, Baroque influences arrive to Eastern Europe. These influences were not very strong, since they usually take place in architecture and stone-sculpted ornaments, and are also mixed intensely with details taken from Byzantine and Islamic art.
Before and after the fall of the Byzantine Empire, all the art of Wallachia and Moldavia was primarily influenced by that of Constantinople. Until the end of the 16th century, with little modifications, the plans of churches and monasteries, the murals, and the ornaments carved in stone remain the same as before. From a period starting with the reigns of Matei Basarab (1632–1654) and Vasile Lupu (1634–1653), which coincided with the popularization of Italian Baroque, new ornaments were added, and the style of religious furniture changed. This was not random at all. Decorative elements and principles were brought from Italy, through Venice, or through the Dalmatian regions, and they were adopted by architects and craftsmen from the east. The window and door frames, the pisanie with dedication, the tombstones, the columns and railings, and a part of the bronze, silver or wooden furniture, received a more important role than the one they had before. They existed before too, inspired by the Byzantine tradition, but they gained a more realist look, showing delicate floral motifs. The relief that existed before too, became more accentuated, having volume and consistency. Before this period, reliefs from Wallachia and Moldavia, like the ones from the East, had only two levels, at a small distance one from the other, one at the surface and the other in depth. Big flowers, maybe roses, peonies or thistles, thick leaves, of acanthus or another similar plant, were twisting on columns, or surround door and windows. A place where the Baroque had a strong influence was columns and the railings. Capitals were more decorated than before with foliage. Columns have often twisting shafts, a local reinterpretation of the Solomonic column. Maximalist railings are placed between these columns, decorated with rinceaux. Some of the ones from the Mogoșoaia Palace are also decorated with dolphins. Cartouches are also used sometimes, mostly on tombstones, like on the one of Constantin Brâncoveanu. This movement, is known as the Brâncovenesc style, after Constantin Brâncoveanu, a ruler of Wallachia whose reign (1654–1714) is highly associated with this kind of architecture and design. The style is also present during the 18th century, and in a part of the 19th. Many of the churches and residences erected by boyards and voivodes of these periods are Brâncovenesc. Although Baroque influences can be clearly seen, the Brâncovenesc style takes much more inspiration from the local tradition.
As the 18th century passed, with the Phanariot (members of prominent Greek families in Phanar, Istanbul) reigns in Wallachia and Moldavia, Baroque influences come from Istanbul too. They came before too, during the 17th century, but with the Phanariots, more Western Baroque motifs that arrived to the Ottoman Empire had their final destination in present-day Romania. In Moldavia, Baroque elements come from Russia too, where the influence of Italian art was strong.
Painting
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File:Annibale Carracci, Resurrezione, Louvre.jpg|Resurrection of Christ; by Annibale Carracci; 1593; oil on canvas; 217 x 160 cm; Louvre
File:The Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne - Annibale Carracci - 1597 - Farnese Gallery, Rome.jpg|Triumph of Bacchus and Adriane (part of The Loves of the Gods); by Annibale Carracci; 1597–1600; fresco; length (gallery): 20.2 m; Palazzo Farnese, Rome
File:The Calling of Saint Matthew-Caravaggo (1599-1600).jpg|The Calling of St Matthew; by Caravaggio; 1602–1604; oil on canvas; 3 x 2 m; San Luigi dei Francesi, Rome
File:Artemisia Gentileschi - Giuditta decapita Oloferne - Google Art Project-Adjust.jpg|Judith Slaying Holofernes; by Artemisia Gentileschi; 1611–1612; oil on canvas; 163 x 126 cm; Uffizi, Florence, Italy
File:Peter Paul Rubens - The Four Continents.jpg|The Four Continents; by Peter Paul Rubens; 1615; oil on canvas; 209 x 284 cm; Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria
File:Nicolas Poussin - L'Enlèvement des Sabines (1634-5).jpg|The Rape of the Sabine Women; by Nicolas Poussin; 1634–1635; oil on canvas; 1.55 × 2.1 m; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City
File:La ronda de noche, por Rembrandt van Rijn.jpg|The Night Watch; by Rembrandt; 1642; oil on canvas; 3.63 × 4.37 m; Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
File:Claude Lorrain 008.jpg|The Embarkation of the Queen of Sheba; by Claude Lorrain; 1648; oil on canvas; 149.1 × 196.7 cm; National Gallery, London
File:Las Meninas, by Diego Velázquez, from Prado in Google Earth.jpg|Las Meninas; by Diego Velázquez; 1656; oil on canvas; 3.18 cm × 2.76 m; Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain
File:Michaelina wautier-triunfo de baco.JPG|The Triumph of Bacchus; by Michaelina Wautier; before 1659; oil on canvas; 270 x 354 cm; Kunsthistorisches Museum
File:Maria van Oosterwijck, Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, Gemäldegalerie - Vanitas-Stilleben - GG 5714.jpg|Vanitas Still Life; by Maria van Oosterwijck; 1668; oil on canvas; 73 x 88.5 cm; Kunsthistorisches Museum
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Baroque painters worked deliberately to set themselves apart from the painters of the Renaissance and the Mannerism period after it. In their palette, they used intense and warm colours, and particularly made use of the primary colours red, blue and yellow, frequently putting all three in close proximity. They avoided the even lighting of Renaissance painting and used strong contrasts of light and darkness on certain parts of the picture to direct attention to the central actions or figures. In their composition, they avoided the tranquil scenes of Renaissance paintings, and chose the moments of the greatest movement and drama. Unlike the tranquil faces of Renaissance paintings, the faces in Baroque paintings clearly expressed their emotions. They often used asymmetry, with action occurring away from the centre of the picture, and created axes that were neither vertical nor horizontal, but slanting to the left or right, giving a sense of instability and movement. They enhanced this impression of movement by having the costumes of the personages blown by the wind, or moved by their own gestures. The overall impressions were movement, emotion and drama. Another essential element of baroque painting was allegory; every painting told a story and had a message, often encrypted in symbols and allegorical characters, which an educated viewer was expected to know and read.
Early evidence of Italian Baroque ideas in painting occurred in Bologna, where Annibale Carracci, Agostino Carracci and Ludovico Carracci sought to return the visual arts to the ordered Classicism of the Renaissance. Their art, however, also incorporated ideas central the Counter-Reformation; these included intense emotion and religious imagery that appealed more to the heart than to the intellect.
Another influential painter of the Baroque era was Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio. His realistic approach to the human figure, painted directly from life and dramatically spotlit against a dark background, shocked his contemporaries and opened a new chapter in the history of painting. Other major painters associated closely with the Baroque style include Artemisia Gentileschi, Elisabetta Sirani, Giovanna Garzoni, Guido Reni, Domenichino, Andrea Pozzo, and Paolo de Matteis in Italy; Francisco de Zurbarán, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo and Diego Velázquez in Spain; Adam Elsheimer in Germany; and Nicolas Poussin and Georges de La Tour in France (though Poussin spent most of his working life in Italy). Poussin and de La Tour adopted a "classical" Baroque style with less focus on emotion and greater attention to the line of the figures in the painting than to colour.
Peter Paul Rubens was the most important painter of the Flemish Baroque style. Rubens' highly charged compositions reference erudite aspects of classical and Christian history. His unique and immensely popular Baroque style emphasised movement, colour, and sensuality, which followed the immediate, dramatic artistic style promoted in the Counter-Reformation. Rubens specialized in making altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects.
One important domain of Baroque painting was Quadratura, or paintings in ''trompe-l'œil'', which literally "fooled the eye". These were usually painted on the stucco of ceilings or upper walls and balustrades, and gave the impression to those on the ground looking up were that they were seeing the heavens populated with crowds of angels, saints and other heavenly figures, set against painted skies and imaginary architecture.
In Italy, artists often collaborated with architects on interior decoration; Pietro da Cortona was one of the painters of the 17th century who employed this illusionist way of painting. Among his most important commissions were the frescoes he painted for the Palazzo Barberini (1633–39), to glorify the reign of Pope Urban VIII. Pietro da Cortona's compositions were the largest decorative frescoes executed in Rome since the work of Michelangelo at the Sistine Chapel.
François Boucher was an important figure in the more delicate French Rococo style, which appeared during the late Baroque period. He designed tapestries, carpets and theatre decoration as well as painting. His work was extremely popular with Madame de Pompadour, the Mistress of King Louis XV. His paintings featured mythological romantic, and mildly erotic themes.
Hispanic Americas
): an Arquebusier Angel; by Master of Calamarca; 17th century]]
In the Hispanic Americas, the first influences were from Sevillan Tenebrism, mainly from Zurbarán—some of whose works are still preserved in Mexico and Peru—as can be seen in the work of the Mexicans José Juárez and Sebastián López de Arteaga, and the Bolivian Melchor Pérez de Holguín. The Cusco School of painting arose after the arrival of the Italian painter Bernardo Bitti in 1583, who introduced Mannerism in the Americas. It highlighted the work of Luis de Riaño, disciple of the Italian Angelino Medoro, author of the murals of the Church of San Pedro, Andahuaylillas. It also highlighted the Indian (Quechua) painters Diego Quispe Tito and Basilio Santa Cruz Pumacallao, as well as Marcos Zapata, author of the fifty large canvases that cover the high arches of Cusco Cathedral. In Ecuador, the Quito School was formed, mainly represented by the mestizo Miguel de Santiago and the criollo Nicolás Javier de Goríbar.
In the 18th century sculptural altarpieces began to be replaced by paintings, developing notably the Baroque painting in the Americas. Similarly, the demand for civil works, mainly portraits of the aristocratic classes and the ecclesiastical hierarchy, grew. The main influence was the Murillesque, and in some cases—as in the criollo Cristóbal de Villalpando–that of Juan de Valdés Leal. The painting of this era has a more sentimental tone, with sweet and softer shapes. Its proponents include Gregorio Vasquez de Arce y Ceballos in Colombia, and Juan Rodríguez Juárez and Miguel Cabrera in Mexico.
Sculpture
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File:Francesco mochi, santa veronica, 1632, 02,2.jpg|Saint Veronica; by Francesco Mochi; 1629–1639; Carrara marble; height: 5 m; St. Peter's Basilica, Rome
File:Ecstasy of Saint Teresa September 2015-2a.jpg|Ecstasy of Saint Teresa; by Gian Lorenzo Bernini; 1647–1652; marble; height: 3.5 m; Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome
File:Fame riding Pegasus Coysevox Louvre MR1824.jpg|''The King's Fame Riding Pegasus; by Antoine Coysevox; 1698–1702; Carrara marble; height: 3.15 m; Louvre
File:Venus Giving Arms to Aeneas MET DT215153.jpg|Venus Giving Arms to Aeneas; by Jean Cornu; 1704; terracotta and painted wood; height: 108 cm; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City
File:Ermitáž (39).jpg|The Death of Adonis''; by Giuseppe Mazzuoli; 1710s; marble; height: 193 cm; Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg, Russia
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The dominant figure in baroque sculpture was Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Under the patronage of Pope Urban VIII, he made a remarkable series of monumental statues of saints and figures whose faces and gestures vividly expressed their emotions, as well as portrait busts of exceptional realism, and highly decorative works for the Vatican such as the imposing Chair of St. Peter beneath the dome in St. Peter's Basilica. In addition, he designed fountains with monumental groups of sculpture to decorate the major squares of Rome.
Baroque sculpture was inspired by ancient Roman statuary, particularly by the famous first century CE statue of Laocoön and His Sons, which was unearthed in 1506 and put on display in the gallery of the Vatican. When he visited Paris in 1665, Bernini addressed the students at the academy of painting and sculpture. He advised the students to work from classical models, rather than from nature. He told the students, "When I had trouble with my first statue, I consulted the Antinous like an oracle." That Antinous statue is known today as the Hermes of the Museo Pio-Clementino.
Notable late French baroque sculptors included Étienne Maurice Falconet and Jean Baptiste Pigalle. Pigalle was commissioned by Frederick the Great to make statues for Frederick's own version of Versailles at Sanssouci in Potsdam, Germany. Falconet also received an important foreign commission, creating the famous Bronze Horseman statue of Peter the Great found in St. Petersburg.
In Spain, the sculptor Francisco Salzillo worked exclusively on religious themes, using polychromed wood. Some of the finest baroque sculptural craftsmanship was found in the gilded stucco altars of churches of the Spanish colonies of the New World, made by local craftsmen; examples include the Chapel del Rosario, Puebla, (Mexico), 1724–1731.
Furniture
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File:Decorative arts in the Louvre - Room 32 D201903 (cropped).jpg|Four-poster bed from the Château d'Effiat; 1650; natural walnut, chiselled Genoa silk velvet and embroidered silks; 295 cm; Louvre
Antichambre du prince-évêque (Palais Rohan, Strasbourg) cabinet.JPG|Cabinet with caryatids; 1675; ebony, kingwood, marquetry of hard stones, gilt bronze, pewter, glass, tinted mirror and horn; unknown dimensions; Musée des Arts décoratifs, Strasbourg, France
File:Francia, tavolo da parete, 1685-90 ca.jpg|Pier table; 1685–1690; carved, gessoed, and gilded wood, with a marble top; 83.6 × 128.6 × 71.6 cm; Art Institute of Chicago, US
File:Armoire aux perroquets du Louvre.jpg|Cupboard; by André Charles Boulle; 1700; ebony and amaranth veneering, polychrome woods, brass, tin, shell, and horn marquetry on an oak frame, gilt-bronze; 255.5 x 157.5 cm; Louvre
File:Andrea brustolon, sedie con etiopi, 1700-15 ca. 09.jpg|Armchair; by Andrea Brustolon; 1700–1715; wood and upholstery; unknown dimsensions; Ca' Rezzonico, Venice
Trono di pio VI, usato il 10 marzo 1782, databile al 1700-20 ca.jpg|Throne; 1700–1720; gilded wood and upholstery; unknown dimsensions; Ca' Rezzonico
File:Commode MET DP108742.jpg|Commode; by André-Charles Boulle; 1710–1732; walnut veneered with ebony and marquetry of engraved brass and tortoiseshell, gilt-bronze mounts, antique marble top; 87.6 x 128.3 x 62.9 cm; Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York City)
File:Heinrich ludwig rohde o ferdinand plitzner (attr.), scrittoio a ribalta, magonza 1720 ca.jpg|German slant-front desk; by Heinrich Ludwig Rohde or Ferdinand Plitzner; 1715–1725; marquetry with maple, amaranth, mahogany, and walnut on spruce and oak; 90 × 84 × 44.5 cm; Art Institute of Chicago
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The main motifs used are: horns of plenty, festoons, baby angels, lion heads holding a metal ring in their mouths, female faces surrounded by garlands, oval cartouches, acanthus leaves, classical columns, caryatids, pediments, and other elements of Classical architecture sculpted on some parts of pieces of furniture, baskets with fruits or flowers, shells, armour and trophies, heads of Apollo or Bacchus, and C-shaped volutes.
During the first period of the reign of Louis XIV, furniture followed the previous Louis XIII style, and was massive, and profusely decorated with sculpture and gilding. After 1680, thanks in large part to the furniture designer André-Charles Boulle, a more original and delicate style appeared, sometimes known as Boulle work. It was based on the inlay of ebony and other rare woods, a technique first used in Florence in the 15th century, which was refined and developed by Boulle and others working for Louis XIV. Furniture was inlaid with plaques of ebony, copper, and exotic woods of different colors.
New and often enduring types of furniture appeared; the commode, with two to four drawers, replaced the old coffre, or chest. The canapé, or sofa, appeared, in the form of a combination of two or three armchairs. New kinds of armchairs appeared, including the fauteuil en confessionale or "Confessional armchair", which had padded cushions ions on either side of the back of the chair. The console table also made its first appearance; it was designed to be placed against a wall. Another new type of furniture was the table à gibier, a marble-topped table for holding dishes. Early varieties of the desk appeared; the Mazarin desk had a central section set back, placed between two columns of drawers, with four feet on each column. and it was not until 1940 that it was first used in English in an article published by Manfred Bukofzer.
The baroque was a period of musical experimentation and innovation which explains the amount of ornaments and improvisation performed by the musicians. New forms were invented, including the concerto and sinfonia. Opera was born in Italy at the end of the 16th century (with Jacopo Peri's mostly lost Dafne, produced in Florence in 1598) and soon spread through the rest of Europe: Louis XIV created the first Royal Academy of Music. In 1669 the poet Pierre Perrin opened an academy of opera in Paris, the first opera theatre in France open to the public, and premiered Pomone, the first grand opera in French, with music by Robert Cambert, with five acts, elaborate stage machinery, and a ballet. Heinrich Schütz in Germany, Jean-Baptiste Lully in France, and Henry Purcell in England all helped to establish their national traditions in the 17th century.
Several new instruments, including the piano, were introduced during this period. The invention of the piano is credited to Bartolomeo Cristofori (1655–1731) of Padua, Italy, who was employed by Ferdinando de' Medici, Grand Prince of Tuscany, as the Keeper of the Instruments. Cristofori named the instrument un cimbalo di cipresso di piano e forte ("a keyboard of cypress with soft and loud"), abbreviated over time as pianoforte, fortepiano, and later, simply, piano.Composers and examples
* Giovanni Gabrieli (/1557–1612) ''Sonata pian' e forte (1597), In Ecclesiis (from Symphoniae sacrae book 2, 1615)
* Cristóbal de Medrano (c. 1561 – 1597), voce mea cum sex vocibus (1594)
* Giovanni Girolamo Kapsperger (c. 1580–1651) Libro primo di villanelle, 20 (1610)
* Claudio Monteverdi (1567–1643), L'Orfeo, favola in musica (1610)
* Heinrich Schütz (1585–1672), Musikalische Exequien (1629, 1647, 1650)
* Francesco Cavalli (1602–1676), L'Egisto (1643), Ercole amante (1662), Scipione affricano (1664)]]
* Johann Jacob Froberger (1616–1667), Complete Music for Harpsichord and Organ, Simone Stella
* Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632–1687), Armide (1686)
* Marc-Antoine Charpentier (1643–1704), Te Deum (1688–1698)
* Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber (1644–1704), Mystery Sonatas (1681)
* John Blow (1649–1708), Venus and Adonis (1680–1687)
* Johann Pachelbel (1653–1706), Canon in D (1680)
* Arcangelo Corelli (1653–1713), 12 concerti grossi, Op. 6 (1714)
* Marin Marais (1656–1728), Sonnerie de Ste-Geneviève du Mont-de-Paris (1723)
* Henry Purcell (1659–1695), Dido and Aeneas (1688)
* Alessandro Scarlatti (1660–1725), L'honestà negli amori (1680), Il Pompeo (1683), Mitridate Eupatore (1707)
* François Couperin (1668–1733), Les barricades mystérieuses (1717)
* Tomaso Albinoni (1671–1751), Didone abbandonata (1724)
* Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741), The Four Seasons (1725)
* Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679–1745), Il Serpente di Bronzo (1730), Missa Sanctissimae Trinitatis (1736)
* Georg Philipp Telemann (1681–1767), Der Tag des Gerichts (1762)
* Johann David Heinichen (1683–1729)
* Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683–1764), Dardanus (1739)
* George Frideric Handel (1685–1759), Water Music (1717), Music for the Royal Fireworks (1749), Messiah (1741)
* Domenico Scarlatti (1685–1757), Sonatas for harpsichord
* Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), Toccata and Fugue in D minor (1703–1707), Brandenburg Concertos (1721), St Matthew Passion (1727)
* Nicola Porpora (1686–1768), Semiramide riconosciuta (1729)
* Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710–1736), Stabat Mater'' (1736)
Dance
The classical ballet also originated in the Baroque era. The style of court dance was brought to France by Marie de' Medici, and in the beginning the members of the court themselves were the dancers. Louis XIV himself performed in public in several ballets. In March 1662, the Académie Royale de Danse, was founded by the King. It was the first professional dance school and company, and set the standards and vocabulary for ballet throughout Europe during the period.Literary theoryHeinrich Wölfflin was the first to transfer the term Baroque to literature. The key concepts of Baroque literary theory, such as "conceit" (concetto), "wit" (acutezza, ingegno), and "wonder" (meraviglia), were not fully developed in literary theory until the publication of Emanuele Tesauro's Il Cannocchiale aristotelico (The Aristotelian Telescope) in 1654. This seminal treatise - inspired by Giambattista Marino's epic Adone and the work of the Spanish Jesuit philosopher Baltasar Gracián - developed a theory of metaphor as a universal language of images and as a supreme intellectual act, at once an artifice and an epistemologically privileged mode of access to truth.
Theatre
, (1650)]]
for the ballet Les Noces de Thétis, from Décorations et machines aprestées aux nopces de Tétis, Ballet Royal]]
The Baroque period was a golden age for theatre in France and Spain; playwrights included Corneille, Racine and Molière in France; and Lope de Vega and Pedro Calderón de la Barca in Spain.
During the Baroque period, the art and style of the theatre evolved rapidly, alongside the development of opera and of ballet. The design of newer and larger theatres, the invention the use of more elaborate machinery, the wider use of the proscenium arch, which framed the stage and hid the machinery from the audience, encouraged more scenic effects and spectacle.
The Baroque had a Catholic and conservative character in Spain, following an Italian literary model during the Renaissance. The Hispanic Baroque theatre aimed for a public content with an ideal reality that manifested fundamental three sentiments: Catholic religion, monarchist and national pride and honour originating from the chivalric, knightly world.
Two periods are known in the Baroque Spanish theatre, with the division occurring in 1630. The first period is represented chiefly by Lope de Vega, but also by Tirso de Molina, Gaspar Aguilar, Guillén de Castro, Antonio Mira de Amescua, Luis Vélez de Guevara, Juan Ruiz de Alarcón, Diego Jiménez de Enciso, Luis Belmonte Bermúdez, Felipe Godínez, Luis Quiñones de Benavente or Juan Pérez de Montalbán. Many of these figures attended academias literarias (literary academies) including the famous Medrano Academy founded by Sebastián Francisco de Medrano. The second period is represented by Pedro Calderón de la Barca and fellow dramatists Antonio Hurtado de Mendoza, Álvaro Cubillo de Aragón, Jerónimo de Cáncer, Francisco de Rojas Zorrilla, Juan de Matos Fragoso, Antonio Coello y Ochoa, Agustín Moreto, and Francisco Bances Candamo. These classifications are loose because each author had his own way and could occasionally adhere himself to the formula established by Lope. It may even be that Lope's "manner" was more liberal and structured than Calderón's.
Lope de Vega introduced through his Arte nuevo de hacer comedias en este tiempo (1609) the new comedy. He established a new dramatic formula that broke the three Aristotle unities of the Italian school of poetry (action, time, and place) and a fourth unity of Aristotle which is about style, mixing of tragic and comic elements showing different types of verses and stanzas upon what is represented. Although Lope has a great knowledge of the plastic arts, he did not use it during the major part of his career nor in theatre or scenography. The Lope's comedy granted a second role to the visual aspects of the theatrical representation.
Tirso de Molina, Lope de Vega, and Calderón were the most important play writers in Golden Era Spain. Their works, known for their subtle intelligence and profound comprehension of a person's humanity, could be considered a bridge between Lope's primitive comedy and the more elaborate comedy of Calderón. Tirso de Molina is best known for two works, The Convicted Suspicions and The Trickster of Seville, one of the first versions of the Don Juan myth.
Upon his arrival to Madrid, Cosimo Lotti brought to the Spanish court the most advanced theatrical techniques of Europe. His techniques and mechanic knowledge were applied in palace exhibitions called "Fiestas" and in lavish exhibitions of rivers or artificial fountains called "Naumaquias". He was in charge of styling the Gardens of Buen Retiro, of Zarzuela, and of Aranjuez and the construction of the theatrical building of Coliseo del Buen Retiro. Lope's formulas begin with a verse that it unbefitting of the palace theatre foundation and the birth of new concepts that begun the careers of some play writers like Calderón de la Barca. Marking the principal innovations of the New Lopesian Comedy, Calderón's style marked many differences, with a great deal of constructive care and attention to his internal structure. Calderón's work is in formal perfection and a very lyric and symbolic language. Liberty, vitality and openness of Lope gave a step to Calderón's intellectual reflection and formal precision. In his comedy it reflected his ideological and doctrine intentions in above the passion and the action, the work of Autos sacramentales achieved high ranks. The genre of Comedia is political, multi-artistic and in a sense hybrid. The poetic text interweaved with Medias and resources originating from architecture, music and painting freeing the deception that is in the Lopesian comedy was made up from the lack of scenery and engaging the dialogue of action.
The best known German playwright was Andreas Gryphius, who used the Jesuit model of the Dutch Joost van den Vondel and Pierre Corneille. There was also Johannes Velten who combined the traditions of the English comedians and the commedia dell'arte with the classic theatre of Corneille and Molière. His touring company was perhaps the most significant and important of the 17th century.
The foremost Italian baroque tragedian was Federico Della Valle. His literary activity is summed up by the four plays that he wrote for the courtly theater: the tragicomedy Adelonda di Frigia (1595) and especially his three tragedies, Judith (1627), Esther (1627) and La reina di Scotia (1628). Della Valle had many imitators and followers who combined in their works Baroque taste and the didactic aims of the Jesuits (Francesco Sforza Pallavicino, Girolamo Graziani, etc.)
In the Tsardom of Russia, the development of the Russian version of Baroque took shape only in the second half of the 17th century, primarily due to the initiative of tsar Alexis of Russia, who wanted to open a court theatre in 1672. Its director and dramatist was Johann Gottfried Gregorii, a German-Russian Lutheran pastor, who wrote, in particular, a 10-hour play The Action of Artaxerxes. The dramaturgy of Symeon of Polotsk and Demetrius of Rostov became key contribution to the Russian Baroque.Spanish colonial AmericasFollowing the evolution marked from Spain, at the end of the 16th century, the companies of comedians, essentially transhumant, began to professionalize. With professionalization came regulation and censorship: as in Europe, the theatre oscillated between tolerance and even government protection and rejection (with exceptions) or persecution by the Church. The theatre was useful to the authorities as an instrument to disseminate the desired behavior and models, respect for the social order and the monarchy, school of religious dogma.
The corrales were administered for the benefit of hospitals that shared the benefits of the representations. The itinerant companies (or "of the league"), who carried the theatre in improvised open-air stages by the regions that did not have fixed locals, required a viceregal license to work, whose price or pinción was destined to alms and works pious. but later settled in Spain, Juan Ruiz de Alarcón is the most prominent figure in the Baroque theatre of New Spain. Despite his accommodation to Lope de Vega's new comedy, his "marked secularism", his discretion and restraint, and a keen capacity for "psychological penetration" as distinctive features of Alarcón against his Spanish contemporaries have been noted. Noteworthy among his works La verdad sospechosa, a comedy of characters that reflected his constant moralizing purpose.
Baroque gardens required enormous numbers of gardeners, continual trimming, and abundant water. In the later part of the Baroque period, the formal elements began to be replaced with more natural features, including winding paths, groves of varied trees left to grow untrimmed; rustic architecture and picturesque structures, such as Roman temples or Chinese pagodas, as well as "secret gardens" on the edges of the main garden, filled with greenery, where visitors could read or have quiet conversations. By the mid-18th century most of the Baroque gardens were partially or entirely transformed into variations of the English landscape garden.
is located directly in front of St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City.]]
The replanning of the city of Rome under the rule of Pope Sixtus V revived and expanded the city in the 16th century. Many grand piazzas and squares were added as public spaces to contribute to the dramatic effect of the Baroque style. The piazzas featured fountains and other decorative features to embody the emotions of the time. An important factor in Baroque style planning was to connect churches, government structures, and piazzas together in a refined network of axis'. This allowed the important landmarks of the Catholic Church to become the focal points of the city.
As another example of Baroque urban planning, Paris was in desperate need for an urban revival in the 19th century. The city underwent a dramatic change within its urban fabric through the help of Baron Haussmann. Under the rule of Napoleon III, Haussmann was appointed to reconstruct Paris by adding a new network of streets, parks, trains, and public services. Some of the characteristics of Haussmann's design include straight, wide boulevards lined with trees, and short access to parks and green spaces. The plan highlights some important buildings, such as the Paris Opera House.
More characteristics of Baroque urban planning are embodied in Barcelona. The Eixample district, designed by Ildefons Cerdà, showcases wide avenues in a grid system with a few diagonal boulevards. The intersections are unique with octagonal blocks, which provide the streets with great visibility and light. Many works in this district come from architect Antoni Gaudí, who displays a unique style. Centered in the Eixample district design is the Sagrada Família by Gaudí, which poses great significance to the city.PosterityTransition to rococo
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File:Meudon observatoire 2016 (15).jpg|Meudon Observatory, Château de Meudon, Meudon, France, an example of an early Rococo building from the last years of Louis XIV, unknown architect, 1706–1709
File:Charles Cressent, Chest of drawers, c. 1730 at Waddesdon Manor.jpg|Chest of drawers; by Charles Cressent; 1730; various wood types; gilt-bronze mounts and a Brèche d'Aleps marble top; height: 91.1 cm; Waddesdon Manor, Waddesdon, UK
20230209 Amalienburg Nymphenburg.jpg|Amalienburg, Nymphenburg Palace Park, Munich, Germany, by François de Cuvilliés, 1734–1739
File:Salon ovale de la princesse in the Hôtel de Soubise (11).jpg|Salon Oval de la Princesse of the Hôtel de Soubise, Paris, by Germain Boffrand, Charles-Joseph Natoire and Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, 1737–1739
File:The Triumph of Venus, by François Boucher.jpg|The Triumph of Venus; by François Boucher; 1740; oil on canvas; 130 × 162 cm; Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden
File:Vienna (124619801).jpeg|Vieux-Laque Room, Schönbrunn Palace, Vienna, Austria, decorated with Chinese black lacquerware panels, by Nikolaus Pacassi, 1743–1763
File:Gate - Residence Square Würzburg - DSC02894.JPG|Gate with two statues and elaborate wrought-iron grilles, Würzburg, Germany, grilles by Johann Georg Oegg, 1752
Chinese House Potsdam-, Germany.jpg|Chinese House, Sanssouci Park, Potsdam, Germany, an example of Chinoiserie, by Johann Gottfried Büring, 1755–1764
File:Coffeepot MET DP103144 (cropped),.jpg|Coffeepot, decorated with foliage; 1757; silver; height: 29.5 cm; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The Music Lesson MET DP-14272-001 (cropped).jpg|The Music Lesson; by the Chelsea porcelain factory; 1765; soft-paste porcelain; 39.1 × 31.1 × 22.2 cm; Metropolitan Museum of Art
Nodding pagod, Meissen, Germany, c. 1760, porcelain, 1892.60.325 - Metropolitan Museum of Art - New York City - DSC07727.jpg|Pagod, based on Asian figures of Budai, an example of Chinoiserie; by Johann Joachim Kändler; 1765; hard paste porcelain; Metropolitan Museum of Art
File:Cartouche bekroond met drietand Second livre de cartouches (serietitel op object), RP-P-2011-164-8.jpg|Cartouche from the Second , an example of asymmetry; 1710–1772; engraving on paper; 23 x 19.8 cm; Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
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The Rococo is the final stage of the Baroque, and in many ways took the Baroque's fundamental qualities of illusion and drama to their logical extremes. Beginning in France as a reaction against the heavy Baroque grandeur of Louis XIV's court at the Palace of Versailles, the rococo movement became associated particularly with the powerful (1721–1764), the mistress of the new king, Louis XV (1710–1774). Because of this, the style was also known as Pompadour. Although it's highly associated with the reign of Louis XV, it didn't appear in this period. Multiple works from the last years of Louis XIV's reign are examples of early Rococo. The name of the movement derives from the French , or pebble, and refers to stones and shells that decorate the interiors of caves, as similar shell forms became a common feature in Rococo design. It began as a design and decorative arts style, and was characterized by elegant flowing shapes. Architecture followed and then painting and sculpture. The French painter with whom the term Rococo is most often associated is Jean-Antoine Watteau, whose pastoral scenes, or , dominate the early part of the 18th century.
There are multiple similarities between Rococo and Baroque. Both styles insist on monumental forms, and so use continuous spaces, double columns or pilasters, and luxurious materials (including gilded elements). There also noticeable differences. Rococo designed freed themselves from the adherence to symmetry that had dominated architecture and design since the Renaissance. Many small objects, like ink pots or porcelain figures, but also some ornaments, are often asymmetrical. This goes hand in hand with the fact that most ornamentation consisted of interpretation of foliage and sea shells, not as many Classical ornaments inherited from the Renaissance like in Baroque. Another key difference is the fact that since the Baroque is the main cultural manifestation of the spirit of the Counter-Reformation, it is most often associated with ecclesiastical architecture. In contrast, the Rococo is mainly associated with palaces and domestic architecture. In Paris, the popularity of the Rococo coincided with the emergence of the salon as a new type of social gathering, the venues for which were often decorated in this style. Rococo rooms were typically smaller than their Baroque counterparts, reflecting a movement towards domestic intimacy. Colours also match this change, from the earthy tones of Caravaggio's paintings, and the interiors of red marble and gilded mounts of the reign of Louis XIV, to the pastel and relaxed pale blue, Pompadour pink, and white of the Louis XV and Madame de Pompadour's France. Similarly to colours, there was also a transition from serious, dramatic and moralistic subjects in painting and sculpture, to lighthearted and joyful themes.
One last difference between Baroque and Rococo is the interest that 18th century aristocrats had for East Asia. Chinoiserie was a style in fine art, architecture and design, popular during the 18th century, that was heavily inspired by Chinese art, but also by Rococo at the same time. Because traveling to China or other Far Eastern countries was hard at that time and so remained mysterious to most Westerners, European imagination were fuelled by perceptions of Asia as a place of wealth and luxury, and consequently patrons from emperors to merchants vied with each other in adorning their living quarters with Asian goods and decorating them in Asian styles. Where Asian objects were hard to obtain, European craftsmen and painters stepped up to fill the demand, creating a blend of Rococo forms and Asian figures, motifs and techniques. Aside from European recreations of objects in East Asian style, Chinese lacquerware was reused in multiple ways. European aristocrats fully decorated a handful of rooms of palaces, with Chinese lacquer panels used as wall panels. Due to its aspect, black lacquer was popular for Western men's studies. Those panels used were usually glossy and black, made in the Henan province of China. They were made of multiple layers of lacquer, then incised with motifs in-filled with colour and gold. Chinese, but also Japanese lacquer panels were also used by some 18th century European carpenters for making furniture. In order to be produced, Asian screens were dismantled and used to veneer European-made furniture.
Condemnation and academic rediscovery
The pioneer German art historian and archeologist Johann Joachim Winckelmann also condemned the baroque style, and praised the superior values of classical art and architecture. By the 19th century, Baroque was a target for ridicule and criticism. The neoclassical critic Francesco Milizia wrote: "Borrominini in architecture, Bernini in sculpture, Pietro da Cortona in painting...are a plague on good taste, which infected a large number of artists." In the 19th century, criticism went even further; the British critic John Ruskin declared that baroque sculpture was not only bad, but also morally corrupt.
The Swiss-born art historian Heinrich Wölfflin (1864–1945) started the rehabilitation of the word Baroque in his Renaissance und Barock (1888); Wölfflin identified the Baroque as "movement imported into mass", an art antithetic to Renaissance art. He did not make the distinctions between Mannerism and Baroque that modern writers do, and he ignored the later phase, the academic Baroque that lasted into the 18th century. Baroque art and architecture became fashionable in the interwar period, and has largely remained in critical favor. The term "Baroque" may still be used, often pejoratively, describing works of art, craft, or design that are thought to have excessive ornamentation or complexity of line. At the same time "baroque" has become an accepted terms for various trends in Roman art and Roman architecture in the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD, which display some of the same characteristics as the later Baroque.
Revivals and influence through eclecticism
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File:Beauvais (Oise) - MUDO - "Cabaret à la manière de Boulle" (vers 1850-1870).jpg|Cabinet; 1850–1870; Boulle marquetry; unknown dimensions; Musée départemental de l'Oise, Beauvais, France
File:Decorative arts in the Louvre - Room 85 (01).jpg|Large console with central projection; by Benjamin Deguil and Benjamin-Paul Ramillon; 1850–1875; gilt wood and marble; 100 x 283 x 77 cm; Napoleon III Apartments, Louvre Palace, Paris
Napoleon III Apartments (44883695984).jpg|The Grand Salon of the apartments of the minister of state, currently known as the Napoleon III Apartments, designed by Hector Lefuel and decorated with paintings by Charles Raphaël Maréchal, 1859–1860
File:Château de Compiègne-Serre bijoux de l'Impèratrice Eugènie-20150303.jpg|Jewelry toilet of Empress Eugénie; by Jules Fossey; 1860; unknown materials; unknown dimensions; Château de Compiègne, Compiègne, France
File:Decorative_arts_in_the_Louvre_-_Room_83_(07).jpg|Candelabrum with eleven lights; by Ferdinand Barbedienne; 1861; gilt bronze; height: 83.7 cm, length: 49.4 cm; Napoleon III Apartments
Paris Palais Garnier 2010-04-06 16.55.07.jpg|Exterior of the Palais Garnier, Paris, an example of Beaux Arts architecture, by Charles Garnier, 1860–1875
File:Foyer (51865286672).jpg|Grand foyer of the Palais Garnier, inspired by the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles, but with some ornaments taken from other historical styles, like the neo-Renaissance column lower parts, or the Greek Revival lyres at the tops of windows, by Charles Garnier, 1860–1875
File:Table, European workshop, second half of the 19th century.jpg|Table; 2nd half of the 19th century; Boulle marquetry; unknown dimensions; in a temporary exhibition called "Dress Code Parfum de Secol XIX" at the Suțu Palace, Bucharest, Romania
Petit-Palais-Paris-02-2018.jpg|Petit Palais, Paris, an example of Beaux Arts architecture, with Ionic columns very similar to those of the reign of Louis XIV, by Charles Giraud, 1900
File:Rue de Vaugirard, Paris 15 April 2017.jpg|Rue Guynemer no. 2, Paris, with a facade made up from a mix of detailed stone elements and big simple brick surfaces like what is in Place des Vosges from Paris, by Louis Périn, 1914
File:Porte d'un immeuble, 2 rue Guynemer à Paris.jpg|Door of Rue Guynemer no. 2, Paris, with palmettes, shells, volutes, garlands, proportions and other elements seen on wrought iron, furniture, textiles and ceramics from the reign of Louis XIV
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Highly criticized, the Baroque would later be a source of inspiration for artists, architects and designers during the 19th century through Romanticism, a movement that developed in the 18th century and that reached its peak in the 19th. It was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism, as well as glorification of the past and nature, preferring the medieval to the classical. A mix of literary, religious, and political factors prompted late-18th and 19th century British architects and designers to look back to the Middle Ages for inspiration. Romanticism is the reason the 19th century is best known as the century of revivals. In France, Romanticism was not the key factor that led to the revival of Gothic architecture and design. Vandalism of monuments and buildings associated with the Ancien Régime (Old Regime) happened during the French Revolution. Because of this an archaeologist, Alexandre Lenoir, was appointed curator of the Petits-Augustins depot, where sculptures, statues and tombs removed from churches, abbeys and convents had been transported. He organized the Museum of French Monuments (1795–1816), and was the first to bring back the taste for the art of the Middle Ages, which progressed slowly to flourish a quarter of a century later.
This taste and revival of medieval art led to the revival of other periods, including the Baroque and Rococo. Revivalism started with themes first from the Middle Ages, then, towards the end of the reign of Louis Philippe I (1830–1848), from the Renaissance. Baroque and Rococo inspiration was more popular during the reign of Napoleon III (1852–1870), and continued later, after the fall of the Second French Empire.
Compared to how in England architects and designers saw the Gothic as a national style, Rococo was seen as one of the most representative movements for France. The French felt much more connected to the styles of the Ancien Régime and Napoleon's Empire, than to the medieval or Renaissance past, although Gothic architecture appeared in France, not in England.
The revivalism of the 19th century led in time to eclecticism (mix of elements of different styles). Because architects often revived Classical styles, most Eclectic buildings and designs have a distinctive look. Besides pure revivals, the Baroque was also one of the main sources of inspiration for eclecticism. The coupled column and the giant order, two elements widely used in Baroque, are often present in this kind of 19th and early 20th century buildings. Eclecticism was not limited only to architecture. Many designs from the Second Empire style (1848–1870) have elements taken from different styles. Little furniture from the period escaped its three most prevalent historicist influences, which are sometimes kept distinct and sometimes combined: the Renaissance, Louis XV (Rococo), and Louis XVI styles. Revivals and inspiration also came sometimes from Baroque, like in the case of remakes and arabesques that imitate Boulle marquetry, and from other styles, like Gothic, Renaissance, or English Regency.
The Belle Époque was a period that begun around 1871–1880 and that ended with the outbreak of World War I in 1914. It was characterized by optimism, regional peace, economic prosperity, colonial expansion, and technological, scientific, and cultural innovations. Eclecticism reached its peak in this period, with Beaux Arts architecture. The style takes its name from the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where it developed and where many of the main exponents of the style studied. Buildings in this style often feature Ionic columns with their volues on the corner (like those found in French Baroque), a rusticated basement level, overall simplicity but with some really detailed parts, arched doors, and an arch above the entrance like the one of the Petit Palais in Paris. The style aimed for a Baroque opulence through lavishly decorated monumental structures that evoked Louis XIV's Versailles. When it comes to the design of the Belle Époque, all furniture from the past was admired, including, perhaps, contrary to expectations, the Second Empire style (the style of the proceeding period), which remained popular until 1900. In the years around 1900, there was a gigantic recapitulation of styles of all countries in all preceding periods. Everything from Chinese to Spanish models, from Boulle to Gothic, found its way into furniture production, but some styles were more appreciated than others. The High Middle Ages and the early Renaissance were especially prized. Exoticism of every stripe and exuberant Rococo designs were also favoured.
Revivals and influence of the Baroque faded away and disappeared with Art Deco, a style created as a collective effort of multiple French designers to make a new modern style around 1910. It was obscure before WW1, but became very popular during the interwar period, being heavily associated with the 1920s and the 1930s. The movement was a blend of multiple characteristics taken from Modernist currents from the 1900s and the 1910s, like the Vienna Secession, Cubism, Fauvism, Primitivism, Suprematism, Constructivism, Futurism, De Stijl, and Expressionism. Besides Modernism, elements taken from styles popular during the Belle Époque, like Rococo Revival, Neoclassicism, or the neo-Louis XVI style, are also present in Art Deco. The proportions, volumes and structure of Beaux Arts architecture before WW1 is present in early Art Deco buildings of the 1910s and 1920s. Elements taken from Baroque are quite rare, architects and designers preferring the Louis XVI style.
At the end of the interwar period, with the rise in popularity of the International Style, characterized by the complete lack of any ornamentation led to the complete abandonment of influence and revivals of the Baroque. Multiple International Style architects and designers, but also Modernist artists criticized Baroque for its extravagance and what they saw as "excess". Ironically this was just at the same time as the critical appreciation of the original Baroque was reviving strongly.
Postmodern appreciation and reinterpretations
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File:Notre dame de la paix yamoussoukro by felix krohn.jpg|Basilica of Our Lady of Peace, Yamoussoukro, Ivory Coast, by Pierre Fakhoury, 1985–1990
File:Via della Conciliazione at dawn.JPG|St. Peter's Basilica, Rome, by Donato Bramante, Michelangelo, Carlo Maderno and others, completed in 1615
File:Downtown Disney 05.JPG|Dolphin Hotel, Orlando, Florida, US, with urn tops that are reminiscent of urns that decorate corners, tops and roof railings of buildings and furniture from the reign of Louis XIV, by Michael Graves, 1989
File:Versailles roof details dormer windows.jpg|Urns that decorate the roof railing of the Marble Court of the Palace of Versailles, Versailles, France, by Louis Le Vau and Jules Hardouin-Mansart, –1715
File:Catanzaro - Teatro Politeama02.jpg|Concave facade of the Teatro Politeama, Catanzaro, Italy, by Paolo Portoghesi, 2002
File:Oratorio dei Filippini in Rome (1).jpg|Rounded facade of the Oratorio dei Filippini, Rome, by Francesco Borromini, 1637-1650
Bourgie lamp, by Ferruccio Laviani for Kartell, 2004, polycarbonate, sold at Kartell Milano on Via Carlo Porta in Milan.jpg|Bourgie lamp, by Ferruccio Laviani for Kartell, 2004, polycarbonate, sold at Kartell Milano (Via Carlo Porta no. 1), Milan, Italy
File:Coppia di candelabri in argento, 1681, 02.JPG|Church candlestick, 1681, silver, Museum of the Kotor Cathedral, Kotor, Montenegro
File:Zaanstad Inntel Hotel 15.jpg|Hotel Zaandam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, inspired by Dutch 16th and 17th century canal houses, by Wam Architecten, 2010
File:WLM2011 - Amsterdam - Herengracht 120.JPG|Herengracht no. 120, Amsterdam, unknown architect, 1625
File:Rosenthal Porzellandose 018.jpg|Box, part of the Le Jardin de Versace collection, with complex rinceaux that are reminiscent of the Baroque ones from the 17th and very early 18th centuries, but also similar to the ones from the reign of Napoleon; designed by Versace and produced by Rosenthal; unknown date; porcelain; unknown dimensions or location
File:Hôtel Colbert de Villacerf 3.jpg|Baroque rinceaux with putti painted on the boiserie of a room from the Hôtel Colbert de Villacerf, now in the Musée Carnavalet, Paris, unknown architect, sculptor and painter, 1650
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Appreciation for the Baroque reappeared with the rise of Postmodernism, a movement that questioned Modernism (the status quo after WW2), and which promoted the inclusion of elements of historic styles in new designs, and appreciation for the pre-Modernist past. Specific references to Baroque are rare, since Postmodernism often included highly simplified elements that were 'quotations' of Classicism in general, like pediments or columns.
More references to Baroque are found in Versace ceramic ware and fashion, decorated with maximalist acanthus rinceaux, very similar to the ones found in Italian Baroque ornament plates and in Boulle work, but also similar to the ones found on Empire objects, especially textiles, from the reign of Napoleon I.
See also
* List of Baroque architecture
* Baroque in Brazil
* Czech Baroque architecture
* Dutch Baroque architecture
* Earthquake Baroque
* English Baroque
* French Baroque architecture
* Italian Baroque
* Sicilian Baroque
* New Spanish Baroque
* Ottoman Baroque
* Mexican Baroque
* Neoclassicism (music)
* Andean Baroque
* Baroque in Poland
* Baroque architecture in Portugal
* Naryshkin Baroque
* Siberian Baroque
* Spanish Baroque literature
* Ukrainian Baroque
* Pasquale Bellonio
*
Notes
Sources
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* Causa, Raffaello, ''L'Art au XVIII siècle du rococo à Goya (1963), (in French) Hachcette, Paris
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* Gardner, Helen, Fred S. Kleiner, and Christin J. Mamiya. 2005. Gardner's Art Through the Ages, 12th edition. Belmont, CA: Thomson/Wadsworth. (hardcover)
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* Prater, Andreas, and Bauer, Hermann, La Peinture du baroque (1997), (in French), Taschen, Paris
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* Tazartes, Maurizia, Fontaines de Rome, (2004), (in French) Citadelles, Paris
Further reading
* Andersen, Liselotte. 1969. Baroque and Rococo Art, New York: H. N. Abrams.
* Bailey, Gauvin Alexander. 2012. Baroque & Rococo, London: Phaidon Press.
* Bazin, Germain, 1964. Baroque and Rococo. Praeger World of Art Series. New York: Praeger. (Originally published in French, as Classique, baroque et rococo. Paris: Larousse. English edition reprinted as Baroque and Rococo Art, New York: Praeger, 1974)
* Buci-Glucksmann, Christine. 1994. Baroque Reason: The Aesthetics of Modernity. Sage.
* Bailey, Gauvin; Lanthier, Lillian, [http://www.oxfordartonline.com/subscriber/article/grove/art/T006459 "Baroque"] (2003), Grove Art Online, Oxford Art Online, Oxford University Press, Web. Retrieved 30 March 2021.
* Hills, Helen (ed.). 2011. Rethinking the Baroque. Farnham, Surrey; Burlington, VT: Ashgate. .
*Hofer, Philip. 1951.Baroque Book Illustration: A Short Survey.Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
* Hortolà, Policarp, 2013, The Aesthetics of Haemotaphonomy: Stylistic Parallels between a Science and Literature and the Visual Arts. Sant Vicent del Raspeig: ECU. .
* Kitson, Michael. 1966. The Age of Baroque''. Landmarks of the World's Art. London: Hamlyn; New York: McGraw-Hill.
* Lambert, Gregg, 2004. Return of the Baroque in Modern Culture. Continuum. .
* Martin, John Rupert. 1977. Baroque. Icon Editions. New York: Harper and Rowe. (cloth); (pbk.)
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* Vuillemin, Jean-Claude, 2013. Episteme baroque: le mot et la chose. Hermann. .
* Wakefield, Steve. 2004. ''Carpentier's Baroque Fiction: Returning Medusa's Gaze. Colección Támesis. Serie A, Monografías 208. Rochester, NY: Tamesis. .
* Massimo Colella, Separatezza e conversazione. Sondaggi intertestuali attorno a Ciro di Pers, in «Xenia. Trimestrale di Letteratura e Cultura» (Genova), IV, 1, 2019, pp. 11–37.
* Massimo Colella, Il Barocco sabaudo tra mecenatismo e retorica. Maria Giovanna Battista di Savoia Nemours e l'Accademia Reale Letteraria di Torino'', con Prefazione di Maria Luisa Doglio, Fondazione 1563 per l'Arte e la Cultura della Compagnia di San Paolo, Torino ("Alti Studi sull'Età e la Cultura del Barocco", IV-1), 2019.
* Massimo Colella, Seicento satirico: "Il Viaggio" di Antonio Abati (con edizione critica in appendice), in «La parola del testo», XXVI, 1–2, 2022, pp. 77–100.
External links
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* [http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/glo/baroque/ Webmuseum Paris]
* (archived 2 September 2018)
* [http://www.all-art.org/history252_contents_Baroque_Rococo.html Baroque in the "History of Art"]
* (archived 24 June 2007)
* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/inourtime/inourtime.shtml Melvyn Bragg's BBC Radio 4 program In Our Time: The Baroque]
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Category:17th century in art
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Category:Art movements in Europe
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Category:Lutheran art
Category:Decorative arts
Category:Early modern period
Category:Catholic art by period | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baroque | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.260800 |
3959 | Boolean algebra (structure) | In abstract algebra, a Boolean algebra or Boolean lattice is a complemented distributive lattice. This type of algebraic structure captures essential properties of both set operations and logic operations. A Boolean algebra can be seen as a generalization of a power set algebra or a field of sets, or its elements can be viewed as generalized truth values. It is also a special case of a De Morgan algebra and a Kleene algebra (with involution).
Every Boolean algebra gives rise to a Boolean ring, and vice versa, with ring multiplication corresponding to conjunction or meet ∧, and ring addition to exclusive disjunction or symmetric difference (not disjunction ∨). However, the theory of Boolean rings has an inherent asymmetry between the two operators, while the axioms and theorems of Boolean algebra express the symmetry of the theory described by the duality principle.
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History
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The term "Boolean algebra" honors George Boole (1815–1864), a self-educated English mathematician. He introduced the algebraic system initially in a small pamphlet, The Mathematical Analysis of Logic, published in 1847 in response to an ongoing public controversy between Augustus De Morgan and William Hamilton, and later as a more substantial book, The Laws of Thought, published in 1854. Boole's formulation differs from that described above in some important respects. For example, conjunction and disjunction in Boole were not a dual pair of operations. Boolean algebra emerged in the 1860s, in papers written by William Jevons and Charles Sanders Peirce. The first systematic presentation of Boolean algebra and distributive lattices is owed to the 1890 Vorlesungen of Ernst Schröder. The first extensive treatment of Boolean algebra in English is A. N. Whitehead's 1898 Universal Algebra. Boolean algebra as an axiomatic algebraic structure in the modern axiomatic sense begins with a 1904 paper by Edward V. Huntington. Boolean algebra came of age as serious mathematics with the work of Marshall Stone in the 1930s, and with Garrett Birkhoff's 1940 Lattice Theory. In the 1960s, Paul Cohen, Dana Scott, and others found deep new results in mathematical logic and axiomatic set theory using offshoots of Boolean algebra, namely forcing and Boolean-valued models.
Definition
A Boolean algebra is a set , equipped with two binary operations (called "meet" or "and"), (called "join" or "or"), a unary operation (called "complement" or "not") and two elements and in (called "bottom" and "top", or "least" and "greatest" element, also denoted by the symbols and , respectively), such that for all elements , and of , the following axioms hold:
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Note, however, that the absorption law and even the associativity law can be excluded from the set of axioms as they can be derived from the other axioms (see Proven properties).
A Boolean algebra with only one element is called a trivial Boolean algebra or a degenerate Boolean algebra. (In older works, some authors required and to be distinct elements in order to exclude this case.)
It follows from the last three pairs of axioms above (identity, distributivity and complements), or from the absorption axiom, that
: if and only if .
The relation defined by if these equivalent conditions hold, is a partial order with least element 0 and greatest element 1. The meet and the join of two elements coincide with their infimum and supremum, respectively, with respect to ≤.
The first four pairs of axioms constitute a definition of a bounded lattice.
It follows from the first five pairs of axioms that any complement is unique.
The set of axioms is self-dual in the sense that if one exchanges with and with in an axiom, the result is again an axiom. Therefore, by applying this operation to a Boolean algebra (or Boolean lattice), one obtains another Boolean algebra with the same elements; it is called its dual. Examples
* The simplest non-trivial Boolean algebra, the two-element Boolean algebra, has only two elements, and , and is defined by the rules:
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:* It has applications in logic, interpreting as false, as true, as and, as or, and as not. Expressions involving variables and the Boolean operations represent statement forms, and two such expressions can be shown to be equal using the above axioms if and only if the corresponding statement forms are logically equivalent.
:* The two-element Boolean algebra is also used for circuit design in electrical engineering; here 0 and 1 represent the two different states of one bit in a digital circuit, typically high and low voltage. Circuits are described by expressions containing variables, and two such expressions are equal for all values of the variables if and only if the corresponding circuits have the same input–output behavior. Furthermore, every possible input–output behavior can be modeled by a suitable Boolean expression.
:* The two-element Boolean algebra is also important in the general theory of Boolean algebras, because an equation involving several variables is generally true in all Boolean algebras if and only if it is true in the two-element Boolean algebra (which can be checked by a trivial brute force algorithm for small numbers of variables). This can for example be used to show that the following laws (Consensus theorems) are generally valid in all Boolean algebras:
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* The power set (set of all subsets) of any given nonempty set forms a Boolean algebra, an algebra of sets, with the two operations (union) and (intersection). The smallest element 0 is the empty set and the largest element is the set itself.
:* After the two-element Boolean algebra, the simplest Boolean algebra is that defined by the power set of two atoms:
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* The set of all subsets of that are either finite or cofinite is a Boolean algebra and an algebra of sets called the finite–cofinite algebra. If is infinite then the set of all cofinite subsets of , which is called the Fréchet filter, is a free ultrafilter on . However, the Fréchet filter is not an ultrafilter on the power set of .
* Starting with the propositional calculus with sentence symbols, form the Lindenbaum algebra (that is, the set of sentences in the propositional calculus modulo logical equivalence). This construction yields a Boolean algebra. It is in fact the free Boolean algebra on generators. A truth assignment in propositional calculus is then a Boolean algebra homomorphism from this algebra to the two-element Boolean algebra.
* Given any linearly ordered set with a least element, the interval algebra is the smallest Boolean algebra of subsets of containing all of the half-open intervals such that is in and is either in or equal to . Interval algebras are useful in the study of Lindenbaum–Tarski algebras; every countable Boolean algebra is isomorphic to an interval algebra.
of the Boolean algebra of divisors of 30.]]
* For any natural number , the set of all positive divisors of , defining if divides , forms a distributive lattice. This lattice is a Boolean algebra if and only if is square-free. The bottom and the top elements of this Boolean algebra are the natural numbers and , respectively. The complement of is given by . The meet and the join of and are given by the greatest common divisor () and the least common multiple () of and , respectively. The ring addition is given by . The picture shows an example for . As a counter-example, considering the non-square-free , the greatest common divisor of 30 and its complement 2 would be 2, while it should be the bottom element 1.
* Other examples of Boolean algebras arise from topological spaces: if is a topological space, then the collection of all subsets of that are both open and closed forms a Boolean algebra with the operations (union) and (intersection).
* If is an arbitrary ring then its set of central idempotents, which is the set
<math displayblock>A \left\{e \in R : e^2 e \text{ and } ex xe \; \text{ for all } \; x \in R\right\},</math>
becomes a Boolean algebra when its operations are defined by and .
Homomorphisms and isomorphisms
<!-- "Boolean homomorphism" redirects here -->
A homomorphism between two Boolean algebras and is a function such that for all , in :
: ,
: ,
: ,
: .
It then follows that for all in . The class of all Boolean algebras, together with this notion of morphism, forms a full subcategory of the category of lattices.
<!--The constant function with f(a) 1 for all a in A satisfies the first, second, and fourth conditions but not the third (unless B is the degenerate singleton Boolean algebra with 0 1), so it is not a Boolean algebra homomorphism.-->
An isomorphism between two Boolean algebras and is a homomorphism with an inverse homomorphism, that is, a homomorphism such that the composition is the identity function on , and the composition is the identity function on . A homomorphism of Boolean algebras is an isomorphism if and only if it is bijective.
Boolean rings
Every Boolean algebra gives rise to a ring by defining (this operation is called symmetric difference in the case of sets and XOR in the case of logic) and . The zero element of this ring coincides with the 0 of the Boolean algebra; the multiplicative identity element of the ring is the of the Boolean algebra. This ring has the property that for all in ; rings with this property are called Boolean rings.
Conversely, if a Boolean ring is given, we can turn it into a Boolean algebra by defining and .
Since these two constructions are inverses of each other, we can say that every Boolean ring arises from a Boolean algebra, and vice versa. Furthermore, a map is a homomorphism of Boolean algebras if and only if it is a homomorphism of Boolean rings. The categories of Boolean rings and Boolean algebras are equivalent; in fact the categories are isomorphic.
Hsiang (1985) gave a rule-based algorithm to check whether two arbitrary expressions denote the same value in every Boolean ring.
<!---probably too much details(?):---
Hsiang (1985) gave a confluent and terminating rewrite system for Boolean rings, thus solving their word problem: to check whether two arbitrary expressions s and t denote the same value in every Boolean ring, apply rewrite rules to s as long as possible, resulting in an expression s<sub>n</sub>, obtain t<sub>n</sub> from t in a similar way, and check whether s<sub>n</sub> and t<sub>n</sub> are literally identical, except for different parenthezation and order of operands of "+" or "·".
--->
More generally, Boudet, Jouannaud, and Schmidt-Schauß (1989) gave an algorithm to solve equations between arbitrary Boolean-ring expressions.
Employing the similarity of Boolean rings and Boolean algebras, both algorithms have applications in automated theorem proving.
Ideals and filters
An ideal of the Boolean algebra is a nonempty subset such that for all , in we have ∨ }} in and for all in we have ∧ }} in . This notion of ideal coincides with the notion of ring ideal in the Boolean ring . An ideal of is called prime if ≠ }} and if ∧ }} in always implies in or in . Furthermore, for every ∈ }} we have that ∧ − 0 ∈ }}, and then if is prime we have ∈ }} or ∈ }} for every ∈ }}. An ideal of is called maximal if ≠ }} and if the only ideal properly containing is itself. For an ideal , if ∉ }} and ∉ }}, then ∪ }}}} or ∪ }}}} is contained in another proper ideal . Hence, such an is not maximal, and therefore the notions of prime ideal and maximal ideal are equivalent in Boolean algebras. Moreover, these notions coincide with ring theoretic ones of prime ideal and maximal ideal in the Boolean ring .
The dual of an ideal is a filter. A filter of the Boolean algebra is a nonempty subset such that for all , in we have ∧ }} in and for all in we have ∨ }} in . The dual of a maximal (or prime) ideal in a Boolean algebra is ultrafilter. Ultrafilters can alternatively be described as 2-valued morphisms from to the two-element Boolean algebra. The statement every filter in a Boolean algebra can be extended to an ultrafilter is called the ultrafilter lemma and cannot be proven in Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory (ZF), if ZF is consistent. Within ZF, the ultrafilter lemma is strictly weaker than the axiom of choice.
The ultrafilter lemma has many equivalent formulations: every Boolean algebra has an ultrafilter, every ideal in a Boolean algebra can be extended to a prime ideal, etc.
Representations
It can be shown that every finite Boolean algebra is isomorphic to the Boolean algebra of all subsets of a finite set. Therefore, the number of elements of every finite Boolean algebra is a power of two.
Stone's celebrated representation theorem for Boolean algebras states that every Boolean algebra is isomorphic to the Boolean algebra of all clopen sets in some (compact totally disconnected Hausdorff) topological space.
Axiomatics
{| align"right" class"wikitable collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! colspan="2" | Proven properties
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! UId<sub>1</sub> !! !! colspan"2" | If x ∨ o x for all x, then o = 0
|-
| Proof: || || colspan"2" | If x ∨ o x, then
|-
| || || 0
|-
| || = || 0 ∨ o || by assumption
|-
| || = || o ∨ 0 || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || o || by Idn<sub>1</sub>
|}
| UId<sub>2</sub> [dual] If x ∧ i x for all x, then i 1
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! Idm<sub>1</sub> !! !! x ∨ x = x
|-
| Proof: || || x ∨ x
|-
| || = || (x ∨ x) ∧ 1 || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (x ∨ x) ∧ (x ∨ ¬x) || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∨ (x ∧ ¬x) || by Dst<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∨ 0 || by Cpl<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || x || by Idn<sub>1</sub>
|}
| Idm<sub>2</sub> [dual] x ∧ x = x
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! Bnd<sub>1</sub> !! !! x ∨ 1 = 1
|-
| Proof: || || x ∨ 1
|-
| || = || (x ∨ 1) ∧ 1 || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 ∧ (x ∨ 1) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (x ∨ ¬x) ∧ (x ∨ 1) || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∨ (¬x ∧ 1) || by Dst<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∨ ¬x || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|}
| Bnd<sub>2</sub> [dual] x ∧ 0 = 0
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! Abs<sub>1</sub> !! !! x ∨ (x ∧ y) = x
|-
| Proof: || || x ∨ (x ∧ y)
|-
| || = || (x ∧ 1) ∨ (x ∧ y) || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∧ (1 ∨ y) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∧ (y ∨ 1) || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∧ 1 || by Bnd<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|}
| Abs<sub>2</sub> [dual] x ∧ (x ∨ y) = x
|- valign="top"
| colspan="2" |
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! UNg !! !! colspan"2" | If x ∨ x<sub>n</sub> 1 and x ∧ x<sub>n</sub> 0, then x<sub>n</sub> ¬x
|-
| Proof: || || colspan"2" | If x ∨ x<sub>n</sub> 1 and x ∧ x<sub>n</sub> = 0, then
|-
| || ||x<sub>n</sub>
|-
| || = || x<sub>n</sub> ∧ 1 || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || x<sub>n</sub> ∧ (x ∨ ¬x) || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (x<sub>n</sub> ∧ x) ∨ (x<sub>n</sub> ∧ ¬x) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (x ∧ x<sub>n</sub>) ∨ (¬x ∧ x<sub>n</sub>) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 ∨ (¬x ∧ x<sub>n</sub>) || by assumption
|-
| || = || (x ∧ ¬x) ∨ (¬x ∧ x<sub>n</sub>) || by Cpl<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (¬x ∧ x) ∨ (¬x ∧ x<sub>n</sub>) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || ¬x ∧ (x ∨ x<sub>n</sub>) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || ¬x ∧ 1 || by assumption
|-
| || = || ¬x || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|}
|- valign="top"
| colspan="2" |
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! DNg !! !! ¬¬x = x
|-
| Proof: || || ¬x ∨ x x ∨ ¬x 1 || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>, Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || and || ¬x ∧ x x ∧ ¬x 0 || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>, Cpl<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || hence || x = ¬¬x || by UNg
|}
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! A<sub>1</sub> !! !! x ∨ (¬x ∨ y) = 1
|-
| Proof: || || x ∨ (¬x ∨ y)
|-
| || = || (x ∨ (¬x ∨ y)) ∧ 1 || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 ∧ (x ∨ (¬x ∨ y)) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (x ∨ ¬x) ∧ (x ∨ (¬x ∨ y)) || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∨ (¬x ∧ (¬x ∨ y)) || by Dst<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∨ ¬x || by Abs<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|}
| A<sub>2</sub> [dual] x ∧ (¬x ∧ y) = 0
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! B<sub>1</sub> !! !! (x ∨ y) ∨ (¬x ∧ ¬y) = 1
|-
| Proof: || || (x ∨ y) ∨ (¬x ∧ ¬y)
|-
| || = || ((x ∨ y) ∨ ¬x) ∧ ((x ∨ y) ∨ ¬y) || by Dst<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (¬x ∨ (x ∨ y)) ∧ (¬y ∨ (y ∨ x)) || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (¬x ∨ (¬¬x ∨ y)) ∧ (¬y ∨ (¬¬y ∨ x)) || by DNg
|-
| || = || 1 ∧ 1 || by A<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|}
| B<sub>2</sub> [dual] (x ∧ y) ∧ (¬x ∨ ¬y) = 0
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! C<sub>1</sub> !! !! (x ∨ y) ∧ (¬x ∧ ¬y) = 0
|-
| Proof: || || (x ∨ y) ∧ (¬x ∧ ¬y)
|-
| || = || (¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ (x ∨ y) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ x) ∨ ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ y) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (x ∧ (¬x ∧ ¬y)) ∨ (y ∧ (¬y ∧ ¬x)) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 ∨ 0 || by A<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 || by Idn<sub>1</sub>
|}
| C<sub>2</sub> [dual] (x ∧ y) ∨ (¬x ∨ ¬y) = 1
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! DMg<sub>1</sub> !! !! ¬(x ∨ y) = ¬x ∧ ¬y
|-
| Proof: || || by B<sub>1</sub>, C<sub>1</sub>, and UNg
|}
| DMg<sub>2</sub> [dual] ¬(x ∧ y) = ¬x ∨ ¬y
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! D<sub>1</sub> !! !! (x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬x = 1
|-
| Proof: || || (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) ∨ ¬x
|-
| || = || ¬x ∨ (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || ¬x ∨ (¬¬x ∨ (y ∨ z)) || by DNg
|-
| || = || 1 || by A<sub>1</sub>
|}
| D<sub>2</sub> [dual] (x∧(y∧z)) ∧ ¬x = 0
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! E<sub>1</sub> !! !! y ∧ (x∨(y∨z)) = y
|-
| Proof: || || y ∧ (x ∨ (y ∨ z))
|-
| || = || (y ∧ x) ∨ (y ∧ (y ∨ z)) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (y ∧ x) ∨ y || by Abs<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || y ∨ (y ∧ x) || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || y || by Abs<sub>1</sub>
|}
| E<sub>2</sub> [dual] y ∨ (x∧(y∧z)) = y
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! F<sub>1</sub> !! !! (x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬y = 1
|-
| Proof: || || (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) ∨ ¬y
|-
| || = || ¬y ∨ (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (¬y ∨ (x ∨ (y ∨ z))) ∧ 1 || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 ∧ (¬y ∨ (x ∨ (y ∨ z))) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (y ∨ ¬y) ∧ (¬y ∨ (x ∨ (y ∨ z))) || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (¬y ∨ y) ∧ (¬y ∨ (x ∨ (y ∨ z))) || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || ¬y ∨ (y ∧ (x ∨ (y ∨ z))) || by Dst<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || ¬y ∨ y || by E<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || y ∨ ¬y || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 || by Cpl<sub>1</sub>
|}
| F<sub>2</sub> [dual] (x∧(y∧z)) ∧ ¬y = 0
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! G<sub>1</sub> !! !! (x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬z = 1
|-
| Proof: || || (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) ∨ ¬z
|-
| || = || (x ∨ (z ∨ y)) ∨ ¬z || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 || by F<sub>1</sub>
|}
| G<sub>2</sub> [dual] (x∧(y∧z)) ∧ ¬z = 0
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! H<sub>1</sub> !! !! ¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ x = 0
|-
| Proof: || || ¬((x ∨ y) ∨ z) ∧ x
|-
| || = || (¬(x ∨ y) ∧ ¬z) ∧ x || by DMg<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ ¬z) ∧ x || by DMg<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∧ ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ ¬z) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (x ∧ ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ ¬z)) ∨ 0 || by Idn<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 ∨ (x ∧ ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ ¬z)) || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (x ∧ ¬x) ∨ (x ∧ ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ ¬z)) || by Cpl<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∧ (¬x ∨ ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ ¬z)) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∧ (¬x ∨ (¬z ∧ (¬x ∧ ¬y))) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || x ∧ ¬x || by E<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 || by Cpl<sub>2</sub>
|}
| H<sub>2</sub> [dual] ¬((x∧y)∧z) ∨ x = 1
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! I<sub>1</sub> !! !! ¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ y = 0
|-
| Proof: || || ¬((x ∨ y) ∨ z) ∧ y
|-
| || = || ¬((y ∨ x) ∨ z) ∧ y || by Cmm<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 || by H<sub>1</sub>
|}
| I<sub>2</sub> [dual] ¬((x∧y)∧z) ∨ y = 1
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! J<sub>1</sub> !! !! ¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ z = 0
|-
| Proof: || || ¬((x ∨ y) ∨ z) ∧ z
|-
| || = || (¬(x ∨ y) ∧ ¬z) ∧ z || by DMg<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || z ∧ (¬(x ∨ y) ∧ ¬z) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || z ∧ ( ¬z ∧ ¬(x ∨ y)) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 || by A<sub>2</sub>
|}
| J<sub>2</sub> [dual] ¬((x∧y)∧z) ∨ z = 1
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! K<sub>1</sub> !! !! (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) ∨ ¬((x ∨ y) ∨ z) = 1
|-
| Proof: || || (x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬((x ∨ y) ∨ z)
|-
| || = || (x∨(y∨z)) ∨ (¬(x ∨ y) ∧ ¬z) || by DMg<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ((¬x ∧ ¬y) ∧ ¬z) || by DMg<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || ((x∨(y∨z)) ∨ (¬x ∧ ¬y)) ∧ ((x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬z)|| by Dst<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (((x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬x) ∧ ((x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬y)) ∧ ((x∨(y∨z)) ∨ ¬z)|| by Dst<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || (1 ∧ 1) ∧ 1 || by D<sub>1</sub>,F<sub>1</sub>,G<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || 1 || by Idn<sub>2</sub>
|}
| K<sub>2</sub> [dual] (x ∧ (y ∧ z)) ∧ ¬((x ∧ y) ∧ z) = 0
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! L<sub>1</sub> !! !! (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) ∧ ¬((x ∨ y) ∨ z) = 0
|-
| Proof: || || (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) ∧ ¬((x ∨ y) ∨ z)
|-
| || = || ¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ (x ∨ (y ∨ z)) || by Cmm<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ x) ∨ (¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ (y ∨ z)) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || (¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ x) ∨ ((¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ y) ∨ (¬((x∨y)∨z) ∧ z)) || by Dst<sub>2</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 ∨ (0 ∨ 0) || by H<sub>1</sub>,I<sub>1</sub>,J<sub>1</sub>
|-
| || = || 0 || by Idn<sub>1</sub>
|}
| L<sub>2</sub> [dual] (x ∧ (y ∧ z)) ∨ ¬((x ∧ y) ∧ z) = 1
|- valign="top"
|
{| align"left" class"collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! Ass<sub>1</sub> !! !! x ∨ (y ∨ z) = (x ∨ y) ∨ z
|-
| Proof: || || by K<sub>1</sub>, L<sub>1</sub>, UNg, DNg
|}
| Ass<sub>2</sub> [dual] x ∧ (y ∧ z) = (x ∧ y) ∧ z
|-
| colspan="2" |
{| align"left" class"collapsible" style="text-align:left"
|-
! colspan="2" | Abbreviations
|-
| UId || Unique Identity
|-
| Idm || Idempotence
|-
| Bnd || Boundaries
|-
| Abs || Absorption law
|-
| UNg || Unique Negation
|-
| DNg || Double negation
|-
| DMg || De Morgan's Law
|-
| Ass || Associativity
|}
|}
{| align"right" class"wikitable collapsible collapsed" style="text-align:left"
! colspan="4"| Huntington 1904 Boolean algebra axioms
|- valign="top"
| Idn<sub>1</sub> || x ∨ 0 = x
| Idn<sub>2</sub> || x ∧ 1 = x
|- valign="top"
| Cmm<sub>1</sub> || x ∨ y = y ∨ x
| Cmm<sub>2</sub> || x ∧ y = y ∧ x
|- valign="top"
| Dst<sub>1</sub> || x ∨ (y∧z) = (x∨y) ∧ (x∨z)
| Dst<sub>2</sub> || x ∧ (y∨z) = (x∧y) ∨ (x∧z)
|- valign="top"
| Cpl<sub>1</sub> || x ∨ ¬x = 1
| Cpl<sub>2</sub> || x ∧ ¬x = 0
|-
| colspan="4" |
{| align"left" class"collapsible" style="text-align:left"
|-
! colspan="2" | Abbreviations
|-
| Idn || Identity
|-
| Cmm || Commutativity
|-
| Dst || Distributivity
|-
| Cpl || Complements
|}
|}
The first axiomatization of Boolean lattices/algebras in general was given by the English philosopher and mathematician Alfred North Whitehead in 1898.
It included the above axioms and additionally and .
In 1904, the American mathematician Edward V. Huntington (1874–1952) gave probably the most parsimonious axiomatization based on , , , even proving the associativity laws (see box).
He also proved that these axioms are independent of each other.
In 1933, Huntington set out the following elegant axiomatization for Boolean algebra. It requires just one binary operation and a unary functional symbol , to be read as 'complement', which satisfy the following laws:
.
|2Associativity: .
|3Huntington equation: .
}}
Herbert Robbins immediately asked: If the Huntington equation is replaced with its dual, to wit:
,
}}
do (1), (2), and (4) form a basis for Boolean algebra? Calling (1), (2), and (4) a Robbins algebra, the question then becomes: Is every Robbins algebra a Boolean algebra? This question (which came to be known as the Robbins conjecture) remained open for decades, and became a favorite question of Alfred Tarski and his students. In 1996, William McCune at Argonne National Laboratory, building on earlier work by Larry Wos, Steve Winker, and Bob Veroff, answered Robbins's question in the affirmative: Every Robbins algebra is a Boolean algebra. Crucial to McCune's proof was the computer program EQP he designed. For a simplification of McCune's proof, see Dahn (1998).
Further work has been done for reducing the number of axioms; see Minimal axioms for Boolean algebra.
Generalizations
Removing the requirement of existence of a unit from the axioms of Boolean algebra yields "generalized Boolean algebras". Formally, a distributive lattice is a generalized Boolean lattice, if it has a smallest element and for any elements and in such that , there exists an element such that and . Defining as the unique such that and , we say that the structure is a generalized Boolean algebra, while is a generalized Boolean semilattice. Generalized Boolean lattices are exactly the ideals of Boolean lattices.
A structure that satisfies all axioms for Boolean algebras except the two distributivity axioms is called an orthocomplemented lattice. Orthocomplemented lattices arise naturally in quantum logic as lattices of closed linear subspaces for separable Hilbert spaces.
See also
Notes
References Works cited
*
*
*.
*
*
*
*.
*
* General references
*. See Section 2.5.
*
*. See Chapter 2.
*.
*.
*.
*.
*
*
*. In 3 volumes. (Vol.1:, Vol.2:, Vol.3:)
*.
*. Reprinted by Dover Publications, 1979.External links
*
* Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: "[http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/boolalg-math/ The Mathematics of Boolean Algebra]", by J. Donald Monk.
* McCune W., 1997. [http://www.cs.unm.edu/~mccune/papers/robbins/ Robbins Algebras Are Boolean] JAR 19(3), 263–276
* [http://demonstrations.wolfram.com/BooleanAlgebra/ "Boolean Algebra"] by Eric W. Weisstein, Wolfram Demonstrations Project, 2007.
* Burris, Stanley N.; Sankappanavar, H. P., 1981. [http://www.thoralf.uwaterloo.ca/htdocs/ualg.html A Course in Universal Algebra.] Springer-Verlag. .
*
Category:Algebraic structures
Category:Ockham algebras | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boolean_algebra_(structure) | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.450173 |
3960 | Bank of Italy | | president = Fabio Panetta
| leader_title = Governor
| bank_of = Italy
| website =
| succeeded = European Central Bank (1999, 2014)<sup>1</sup>
| footnotes = <sup>1</sup> The Bank of Italy still exists but the ECB took over monetary policy in 1999 and European banking supervision in 2014.
| reserves €225 billion (2023)
| reserve_requirements | interest_rate_target
}}
The Bank of Italy (Italian: ''Banca d'Italia, , informally referred to as Bankitalia'') is the Italian member of the Eurosystem and has been the monetary authority for Italy from 1893 to 1998, issuing the Italian lira. Since 2014, it has also been Italy's national competent authority within European Banking Supervision. It is located in Palazzo Koch, via Nazionale, Rome.
History
The institution was established in 1893 from the combination of three major banks in Italy (after the Banca Romana scandal). The new central bank first issued banknotes during 1926. Until 1928, it was directed by a general manager, after this time instead by a governor elected by an internal commission of managers, with a decree from the President of the Italian Republic, for a term of seven years.
In 1863 the crisis of the world money market created panic and the rush to the counters to collect the metallic currency in exchange for the banknotes. The Italian government responded in 1866 by introducing the fiat and legal tender of paper money. The government was accused in this way of favouring the issuing banks, and a long debate called the "banking question" arose about the advisability of having one or more issuers.
The Minghetti-Finali law of 1873 established the mandatory consortium of issuing institutions among the six existing issuing institutions, the National Bank of the Kingdom of Italy, Banca Nazionale Toscana, Banca Toscana di Credito, Banca Romana, Banco di Napoli, and Banco di Sicilia; but the measure proved insufficient.
After the First World War, in 1921, it was always the Bank of Italy that led the consortium that managed the liquidation of the Italian Discount Bank and saved the Banco di Roma once again from crisis.
The Banking Law of 1926
, built when the city was the capital of Italy (1865–1871)]]
Even with these strong regulatory and intervention powers, the fascist state allowed the crisis of the banks that were headed by the National Credit, the Popular Party bank, to worsen.
In this way, fascism, which equally aimed at the political control of monetary issuance, intended to strike one of the electoral strengths and of the business system that orbited around the industrial policy of the Catholic world, supported by credit institutions.
With R.D.L. 812 of 6 May 1926, the Bank of Italy obtained the exclusive right to issue the currency (the royal decree of 28 April 1910, no. 204 was thus repealed, which had confirmed the prerogative also to the Bank of Naples and the Bank of Sicily).
The subsequent R.D.L. 6 November 1926 n. 1830 entrusted the Bank of Italy with the task of supervising savings banks. In 1928 the Bank was reorganized. The general manager was joined by a governor with greater powers.
Meanwhile, in 1926 the Subsidy Consortium had been transformed into a Liquidation Institute, still under the control of the central bank. In 1933 it was absorbed by the new Institute for Industrial Reconstruction, autonomous from the Bank of Italy.
While all the banks were in very bad conditions, the Banca Nazionale del Lavoro of the self-styled socialist Arturo Osio, in 1929 confiscated eleven Catholic banks, and in 1932 the Banca Agricola Italiana which had financed SNIA Viscosa di Gualino.
Banks and the economy of the 1930s
]]
Italy in the 1930s had an agricultural economy, a small number of industrial families who relied on the subcontracting of local suppliers, formed by a myriad of small family-run businesses, not international and whose survival depended on large groups of industrialists, in turn, linked to commercial banks.
The savings from agriculture flowed into the rural coffers, the popular banks and the cooperative credit which financed the life of the provincial crafts, small businesses and construction. The job of the banks was to match the customers' short-term investment horizon with the long-term investments of large groups (Rediscount). National banks turned to local banks that had large deposits of deposits for smaller, low-risk loans.
The Cassa Depositi e Prestiti channelled postal savings in favour of local authorities, public institutions and infrastructures, which were a way of absorbing mass unemployment, through a vast program of public works.
The ideological basis of the law was that savings are a matter of national interest and must be protected by the State, a principle also enshrined in the Republican Constitution and concretized in the first place in the law establishing the interbank guarantee fund and in the policy of public bailouts. The banking legislation of 1936-1938 established a banking supervisory agency, the (IDREC), chaired by the Bank of Italy's governor. The bank no longer had the right to give credit to individuals but only to other banks as a lender of last resort. public bailout policy. Finally, it had the power to require other banks to deposit a portion of the available funds with the same central bank; by varying the share, the Bank of Italy could operate credit tightening or enlargements.
The law established certain minimum capital and management requirements necessary to guarantee risk management, stability and operational continuity: minimum capital, minimum ratio between loans and deposits, credit limits, provisions for compulsory reserve.
IRI and the war
]]
After the "defenestration" of Bonaldo Stringher, Alberto Beneduce took over and was forced to retire in 1936 after a "heart attack" during a meeting at the Bank for International Settlements in Basel. They conceived the duty of the banks towards the public interest of the country, as the subject who had to collect savings to lend them to entrepreneurs, as a tool for development and growth. The process was to be led by a "circulation bank", which would increase the speed of circulation of money in the real economy.
The Central Bank supported the fascist monetary policy of defending the stability of the Italian lira (known as the "Quota 90"), through the reduction of discounts and advances, and financing the enormous expenses of wars in the 1930s and 1940s through the unlimited issuing of money (and the "inflation tax", not progressive with income), as Hjalmar Schacht did in Germany under Hitler.
Operationally, the government issued and sold debt securities to finance military spending, and the military industry reinvested its government profits in the purchase of such bonds as a de facto advance on future orders, fueling a closed financial circuit. In simple terms, this was something like the ECB issuing money and lending it to private banks who keep it in their current accounts with the ECB.
This mechanism was called "capital circuit". The printing of tickets and the scarcity of consumer goods created an overabundance of money that poured into bank deposits, allowing a new expansion of credit, which was directed in favour of the economic sectors themselves. given that the state paid the banks a higher interest on the BOTs than the savers. The absorption of savings into investments in fixed capital had already taken place in the First World War and industries were working with existing production capacities. Without consumption and investments, public spending by the state remained.
]]
The war could start with a modest tax levy and inflation within the normal limits in the first months, before the black market and ration cards.
The situation followed the conflict of interest between the state entrepreneur and the state bank, albeit in the name of a higher ideological purpose.
In 1938, the government decreed the power to directly appoint presidents and vice-presidents of the board of directors of banks.
Beneduce planned to have a public bank take over the long-term credit of large companies, financed with bonds of equal duration for public works, energy, and industry. After them, the Central Bank maintained a low-profile monetary policy, consistent with the directives of fascism.
IRI operated differently, in agreement with the Italian banks and industries that supported fascism. The banks renounced exercising an option by "converting" the debts into shares (or a law in this regard), preferring not to enter directly into the ownership of the industrial groups.
The groups transferred the bank debts to IRI, which became the new owner in exchange for shares (at the book value, not always the same as the market value), until they held control of the property and therefore of management.
The debt of the IRI rose to nine and a half billion lire at the time, two-thirds of which were paid within the war, because they were drastically diluted by inflation which has the effect of lowering the real weight of debts until the accounting entries are cancelled. of issuance, but also to halve the purchasing power of small savers. The remaining debt was paid by 1953. The IRI in turn had debts towards the Bank of Italy for five billion lire: the State issued bonds for IRI for one and a half billion, "sterilizing" the debt that should have been repaid with "annuity" interest. accrued until 1971. The change of constitutional order and currency (exchange rate for conversion), and inflation meant that IRI (and industries) paid the Bank of Italy less than a third of the sum.
After the armistice of 8 September, the German authorities demanded the delivery of the gold reserve. 173 tons of gold were first transferred to the Milan office, and then to Fortezza. Traces of it were subsequently lost.
In the 1960s, the public debt increased and so did inflation. Governor Guido Carli made a policy of credit crunch to stop inflation, particularly in 1964. In general, the Bank of Italy played an important political role under this governorship. Other credit crunches were implemented between 1969 and 1970 due to the flight of capital abroad and in 1974 as a result of the oil crisis.
In March 1979 the governor of the Bank of Italy, Paolo Baffi, and the deputy director in charge of supervision, Mario Sarcinelli, were accused by the Rome public prosecutor of private interest in official acts and personal aiding and abetting. Sarcinelli was arrested, and released from prison only after being suspended from duties relating to surveillance, while Baffi avoided prison due to his age. In 1981 the two will be completely acquitted. Subsequently, the suspicion will emerge that the indictment was wanted by P2 to prevent the Bank of Italy from supervising Roberto Cavali Banco Ambrosiano.
The postwar period
]]
The post-war inflation, also due to the Am-lire, was fought with the credit crunch desired by the governor Luigi Einaudi, which was obtained through the compulsory reserve on deposits. In particular, the instrument of compulsory reserves of banks at the central bank was used, introduced in 1926 but never really applied. In 1948 the governor was given the task of regulating the money supply and deciding the discount rate.
The universal banks were the ones that had gained the most from war and inflation (under the Authorization Regime of the Interministerial Credit Committee), with the greatest growth in deposits.
Along with the recovery, speculative stocks and capital flight abroad appeared. Credit limits were no longer tied to equity, as equity figures were completely distorted by inflation.
The squeeze on lending, the liquidity crisis and the Eenaudian deflation pushed operators to finance themselves by placing stocks on the market and returning capital, thus blocking the rise in prices; and by resorting to self-financing (even without distributing profits), aided by the fact that inflation had made it possible to quickly amortize fixed assets whose book value was now nominal.
During the years of the Reconstruction, governor Donato Menichella governed the issue in a gradual and balanced way: he did not implement expansionary manoeuvres to encourage growth but was careful to avoid the creation of credit crunches. In this, he was helped by the low public debt. Its monetary policy program was stability for development.
A part of the available bank savings was channelled annually to the Treasury to cover the budget deficit (in the current year), while during his tenure the public debt of the state never rose above 1% of GDP, until 1964.
In July 1981, a "divorce" between the State (Ministry of the Treasury) and its central bank was initiated by the decision of the then Treasury Minister Beniamino Andreatta. From that moment on, the institute was no longer required to purchase the bonds that the government was unable to place on the market, thus ceasing the monetization of the Italian public debt that it had carried out since the Second World War up to that moment. This decision was opposed by the Minister of Finance Rino Formica, who would have liked the Bank of Italy to be required to repay at least a portion of these securities, and from the summer of 1982 a series of intra-government verbal clashes between the two ministers known as the wives' quarrel, which was followed by the fall of the second Spadolini government a few months later.
The divorce between the Ministry of the Treasury and the Bank of Italy is still considered by economic doctrine as a factor of great stabilization of inflation (which went from over 20% in 1980 to less than 5% in the following years) and a central prerequisite for guarantee the full independence of the technical monetary policy body (central bank) from the choices related to fiscal policy (under the responsibility of the government), but also a factor of considerable incidence of growth of the Italian public debt.
The law of 7 February 1992 n. 82, proposed by the then Minister of the Treasury Guido Carli, clarifies that the decision on the discount rate is the exclusive competence of the governor and must no longer be agreed in concert with the Minister of the Treasury (the previous decree of the President of the Republic is modified in relation to the new law with the Presidential Decree of 18 July).
The euro and the 2006 reform
]]
The Legislative Decree 10 March 1998 n. 43 removes the Bank of Italy from management by the Italian government, sanctioning its belonging to the European system of central banks. From this date, therefore, the quantity of currency in circulation is decided autonomously by the Central Bank. With the introduction of the Euro on 1 January 1999, the Bank thus loses the function of presiding over national monetary policy. This function has since been exercised collectively by the Governing Council of the European Central Bank, which also includes the Governor of the Bank of Italy.
On 13 June 1999 the Senate of the Republic, during the XIII Legislature, discussed bill no. 4083 "Rules on the ownership of the Bank of Italy and on the criteria for appointing the Board of Governors of the Bank of Italy". This bill would like the state to acquire all the shares of the institute, but it is never approved.
On 4 January 2004, the weekly "Famiglia Cristiana" reports, for the first time in history, the list of participants in the capital of the Bank of Italy with the relative shares. The source is a Mediobanca Research & Studies dossier, directed by the researcher Fulvio Coltorti, who, by investigating backwards on the balance sheets of banks, insurance companies and institutions, and gradually noting the shares that indicated a shareholding in the capital of the Bank of Italia managed to reconstruct a large part of the list of participants of the highest Italian financial institution.
On 20 September 2005, the list of shareholders was officially made available by the Bank of Italy; until now it was considered confidential. On 19 December 2005, after intense press campaigns and criticism of his actions in the context of the Bancopoli scandal, Governor Antonio Fazio resigned. A few days later, Mario Draghi, who took office on 16 January 2006, was appointed in his place.
The law of 28 December 2005, n. 262, as part of various measures to protect savings, introduces for the first time a term to the mandate of the governor and the members of the directorate. It also dealt with (article 19, paragraph 10) the issue of ownership of the capital of the Bank of Italy, providing for the redefinition of the Bank's shareholding structure by means of a government regulation to be issued within three years of the law's entry into force. This regulation should have governed the methods of transferring shares held by "subjects other than the State or other public bodies". The delegation made by law 262/2005, therefore, expired without the regulation being issued, but the right to ownership of the shares of the current participants is in any case safeguarded by a provision of the Bank's Statute. On the basis of law 262/2005, Mario Draghi becomes the first governor to have a term of six years, renewable once for a further six years.
Missions and organization
Missions
]]
After the charge of monetary and exchange rate policies was shifted in 1998 to the European Central Bank, within the European institutional framework, the bank implements the decisions, issues euro banknotes and withdraws and destroys worn pieces.
The main function has thus become banking and financial supervision. The objective is to ensure the stability and efficiency of the system and compliance with rules and regulations; the bank pursues it through secondary legislation, controls and cooperation with governmental authorities.
Following a reform in 2005, which was prompted by takeover scandals, the bank has lost exclusive antitrust authority in the credit sector, which is now shared with the Italian Competition Authority ().
Other functions include market supervision, oversight of the payment system and provision of settlement services, State treasury service, Central Credit Register, economic analysis and institutional consultancy.
As of 2021, the Bank of Italy owned 2,451.8 tonnes of gold, the third-largest gold reserve in the world.
Governing bodies
The bank's governing bodies are the General Meeting of Shareholders, the board of directors, the governor, the director general and three deputy directors-general; the last five constitute the directorate.
The general meeting takes place yearly and with the purpose of approving accounts and appointing the auditors. The board of directors has administrative powers and is chaired by the governor (or by the director-general in his absence). Following a reform in 2005, the governor lost exclusive responsibility regarding decisions of external relevance (i.e. banking and financial supervision), which has been transferred to the directorate (by majority vote). The director-general is responsible for the day-to-day administration of the bank and acts as governor when absent.
The board of auditors assesses the bank's administration and compliance with the law, regulations and statute.
Appointment
The directorate's term of office lasts six years and is renewable once. The appointment of the governor is the responsibility of the government, head of the board of directors, with the approval of the president (formally a decree of the president). The board of directors is elected by the shareholders according to the bank statute.
On 25 October 2011, Silvio Berlusconi nominated Ignazio Visco to be the bank's new governor to replace Mario Draghi when he left to become president of the European Central Bank in November.
Currency and coinage
coin, 1914, with the personification of Italy standing on a quadriga depicted on the reverse]]
holding an olive tree and a long spear depicted on the reverse]]
Italy has a long history of different coinage types, which spans thousands of years. Since Italy has been for centuries divided into many historic states, they all had different coinage systems, but when the country became unified in 1861, the Italian lira came into place, and was used until 2002. The term originates from libra, the largest unit of the Carolingian monetary system used in Western Europe and elsewhere from the 8th to the 20th century.
Italian lira was introduced by the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy in 1807 at par with the French franc, and was subsequently adopted by the different states that would eventually form the Kingdom of Italy in 1861. It was subdivided into 100 centesimi (singular: centesimo), which means "hundredths" or "cents". The lira was also the currency of the Albanian Kingdom from 1941 to 1943.
There was no standard sign or abbreviation for the Italian lira. The abbreviations Lit. (standing for Lira italiana) and L. (standing for Lira) and the signs ₤ or £ were all accepted representations of the currency. Banks and financial institutions, including the Bank of Italy, often used Lit. and this was regarded internationally as the abbreviation for the Italian lira. Handwritten documents and signs at market stalls would often use "£" or "₤", while coins used "L." Italian postage stamps mostly used the word in full but some (such as the 1975 monuments series) used "L." The name of the currency could also be written in full as a prefix or a suffix (e.g. Lire 100,000 or 100,000 lire). The ISO 4217 currency code for the lira was ITL.
The Italian lira was the official unit of currency in Italy until 1 January 1999, when it was replaced by the euro (euro coins and notes were not introduced until 2002). Old lira denominated currency ceased to be legal tender on 28 February 2002. The conversion rate is 1,936.27 lire to the euro.
All lira banknotes in use immediately before the introduction of the euro, as all post WW2 coins, were still exchangeable for euros in all branches of the Bank of Italy until 29 February 2012.ShareholdersBanca d'Italia had 300,000 shares with a nominal value of €25,000. Originally scattered around the banks of Italy, the shares now accumulated due to the merger of the banks since the 1990s and also a number of pension and social security institutions. The status of the bank states that a minimum of 54% of profits would go to the Italian government, and only a maximum of 6% of profits would be distributed as dividends according to share ratios. Even so, the Bank of Italy stands out among central banks in the Eurosystem as having no state ownership (the National Bank of Belgium and Bank of Greece have mixed ownership).
As of early 2024, the 15 largest shareholders represented slightly over half of the bank's equity, namely UniCredit (5.0 percent), (4.9 percent), (4.9 percent), (4.9 percent), Intesa Sanpaolo (4.9 percent), (3.7 percent), BPER Banca (3.3 percent), ICCREA Banca (3.1 percent), Generali Italia (3.0 percent), the National Institute for Social Security (3.0 percent), Istituto nazionale per l'assicurazione contro gli infortuni sul lavoro (3.0 percent), (3.0 percent), Cassa di Risparmio di Asti (3.0 percent), Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (2.8 percent), and Crédit Agricole Italia (2.8 percent). The remaining 49 percent were dispersed among 157 shareholders, mainly banks and banking foundations.
See also
* Banking in Italy
* Commissione Nazionale per le Società e la Borsa
* Economy of Italy
* Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato
* Italian lira
* Governor of the Bank of Italy
* List of central banks
References
External links
*
Category:Banks of Italy
Italy
Italy
Italy
Category:Banks established in 1893
Category:Italian companies established in 1893
Category:Banknote printing companies
Italy
Italy | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank_of_Italy | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.463427 |
3962 | British | British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies.
British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture
British English, the English language as spoken and written in United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and, more broadly, throughout the British Isles
Celtic Britons, an ancient ethno-linguistic group
Brittonic languages, a branch of the Insular Celtic language family (formerly called British)
Common Brittonic, an ancient language
Other uses
People or things associated with:
Great Britain, an island
British Isles, an island group
United Kingdom, a sovereign state
British Empire, a historical global colonial empire
Kingdom of Great Britain (1707–1800)
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1801–1922)
British Raj, colonial India under the British Empire
British Hong Kong, colonial Hong Kong under the British Empire
British Columbia, a province of Canada
British Airways, the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom
British Museum, a public museum in London
British Monarchy, the royal family of the United Kingdom
British Army, one of the armed forces of the United Kingdom
Brit(ish), a 2018 memoir by Afua Hirsch
See also
Terminology of the British Isles
Alternative names for the British
English (disambiguation)
Britannic (disambiguation)
British Isles
Brit (disambiguation)
Briton (disambiguation)
Britain (disambiguation)
Great Britain (disambiguation)
British Empire
United Kingdom (disambiguation) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.467068 |
3963 | Beachcomber (pen name) | Beachcomber is a nom de plume that has been used by several journalists writing a long-running humorous column in the Daily Express. It was originated in 1917 by Major John Bernard Arbuthnot MVO as his signature on the column, titled 'By the Way'. The name Beachcomber was then passed to D. B. Wyndham Lewis in 1919 and, in turn, to J. B. Morton, who wrote the column till 1975. It was later revived by William Hartston, current author of the column.
"By the Way" column
"By the Way" was originally a column in The Globe, consisting of unsigned humorous pieces; P. G. Wodehouse was assistant editor of the column from August 1903 and editor from August 1904 to May 1909, during which time he was assisted by Herbert Westbrook. After the Globes closure, it was re-established as a society news column in the Daily Express from 1917, initially written by social correspondent Major John Arbuthnot, who invented the name "Beachcomber".
After Arbuthnot was promoted to deputy editor, it was taken over sometime in 1919 by Wyndham-Lewis, who reinvented it as an outlet for his wit and humour. It was then passed to Morton during 1924, though it is likely there was a period when they overlapped. Morton wrote the column until 1975; it was revived in January 1996 and continues today, written by William Hartston. The column is unsigned except by "Beachcomber" and it was not publicly known that Morton or Wyndham-Lewis wrote it until the 1930s. The name is mainly associated with Morton, who has been credited as an influence by Spike Milligan amongst others. Morton introduced the recurring characters and serial stories that were a major feature of the column during his 51-year run.
The format of the column was a random assortment of small paragraphs which were otherwise unconnected. These could be anything, such as:
court reports, often involving Twelve Red-Bearded Dwarfs before Mr Justice Cocklecarrot.
angry exchanges of letters between characters such as Florence McGurgle and her dissatisfied boarders.
interruptions from "Prodnose", representing the public, who would then be roundly cursed by the author and kicked out.
instalments of serials that could stop, restart from earlier, be abandoned altogether or change direction abruptly without warning.
parodies of poetry or drama, particularly of the extremely "literary" type such as Ibsen.
unlikely headlines, such as "SIXTY HORSES WEDGED IN A CHIMNEY", for which the copy in its entirety was "The story to fit this sensational headline has not turned up yet."
news reports from around the country.
or just anything that the author thought funny at the time.
Morton's other interest, France, was occasionally represented by epic tales of his rambling walks through the French countryside. These were not intended as humour.
"By the Way" was popular with the readership, and of course, this is one of the reasons it lasted so long. Its style and randomness could be off-putting and it is safe to say the humour could be something of an acquired taste. Oddly, one of the column's greatest opponents was the Express newspaper's owner, Lord Beaverbrook, who had to keep being assured the column was indeed funny. A prominent critic was George Orwell, who frequently referred to him in his essays and diaries as "A Catholic Apologist" and accused him of being "silly-clever", in line with his criticisms of G. K. Chesterton, Hilaire Belloc, Ronald Knox and Wyndham-Lewis.
By the Way was one of the few features kept continuously running in the often seriously reduced Daily Express throughout World War II, when Morton's lampooning of Hitler, including the British invention of bracerot to make the Nazis' trousers fall down at inopportune moments, was regarded as valuable for morale. The column appeared daily until 1965 when it was changed to weekly. It was cancelled in 1975 and revived as a daily piece in January 1996. It continues to the present day in much the same format but is now entitled "Beachcomber", not "By the Way".
Recurrent characters
Mr. Justice Cocklecarrot: well-meaning but ineffectual High Court judge, plagued by litigation involving the twelve red-bearded dwarfs. Often appears in Private Eye.
Mrs. Justice Cocklecarrot: Mr. Cocklecarrot's wife. Very silent, until she observes that "Wivens has fallen down a manhole". An enquiry from the judge as to which Wivens that would be elicits the response "E. D. Wivens". After a worrying interval she reveals that E. D. Wivens is a cat. His Lordship observes that cats do not have initials, to which she replies, "This one does".
Tinklebury Snapdriver and Honeygander Gooseboote: two counsel. The elbow of one has a mysterious tendency to become jammed in the jaws of the other.
Twelve red-bearded dwarfs, with a penchant for farcical litigation. Their names "appear to be" Scorpion de Rooftrouser, Cleveland Zackhouse, Frums Gillygottle, Edeledel Edel, Churm Rincewind, Sophus Barkayo-Tong, Amaninter Axling, Guttergorm Guttergormpton, Badly Oronparser, Listenis Youghaupt, Molonay Tubilderborst and Farjole Merrybody. They admit that these are not genuine names, one of them stating that his real name is "Bogus". (Further red-bearded dwarfs, to the number of forty-one, appear in other litigation.)
Captain Foulenough: archetypal cad and gatecrasher who impersonates the upper class in order to wreck their social events. Educated at Narkover''', a school specializing in card-playing, horse-racing and bribery. His title of "Captain" is probably spurious; but even if it had been a genuine military title, his use of it in civilian life, when at that time only officers who had achieved the rank of Major and above were allowed to do so, gives a subtle hint as to his nature.
Mountfalcon Foulenough: the Captain's priggish nephew, who brings havoc to Narkover and "makes virtue seem even more horrifying than usual".
Vita Brevis: debutante frequently plagued by, but with a certain reluctant admiration for, Captain Foulenough.
Dr. Smart-Allick: genteel, but ludicrous and criminal, headmaster of Narkover.
Miss Topsy Turvey: neighbouring headmistress, courted by Smart-Allick.
Dr. Strabismus (whom God preserve) of Utrecht: eccentric scientist and inventor.
The announcement of the annual list of Huntingdonshire Cabmen, with an enthusiastic endorsement of an arbitrary page.
Lord Shortcake: absent-minded peer obsessed by his enormous collection of goldfish.
Mrs. McGurgle: seaside landlady. Fearsomely British, until she decides to reinvent her house as "Hôtel McGurgle et de l'Univers" to attract the tourists.
Ministry of Bubbleblowing: possible ancestor of Monty Python's Ministry of Silly Walks.
Charlie Suet: disastrous civil servant.
Mimsie Slopcorner: Charlie's on-off girlfriend, an ill-informed and irritating social activist.
The Filthistan Trio: Ashura, Kazbulah and Rizamughan, three Persians from "Thurralibad", two of whom play seesaw on a plank laid across the third. They have a series of contretemps with British bureaucracy and the artistic establishment, in which the trio generally represents the voice of reason.
Dingi-Poos: the Tibetan Venus. She obtains desirable commercial contracts by using her charms to hoodwink visiting British envoys, principally Colonel Egham and Duncan Mince.
Big White Carstairs: Buchanesque empire builder, with a tendency to mislay his dress trousers.
O. Thake: naive, accident-prone Old Etonian and man-about-town.
Lady Cabstanleigh: Society hostess.
Stultitia: Cabstanleigh's niece, a playwright.
Boubou Flaring: glamorous but vacuous actress.
Emilia Rustiguzzi: voluminous (both in bulk and in decibels) opera singer.
Tumbelova, Serge Trouserin, Chuckusafiva: ballet dancers.
Colin Velvette: ballet impresario.
"Thunderbolt" Footle: handsome, socially celebrated boxer, who can do everything except actually fight.
The M'Babwa of M'Gonkawiwi: African chief, who occasions great administrative problems in connection with his invitation to the coronation of King George VI.
The Clam of Chowdah: oriental potentate
Mrs. Wretch: formerly the glamorous circus performer Miss Whackaway, now wife to Colonel Wretch and "horrible welfare worker".
Roland Milk: insipid poet (possible ancestor of Private Eyes "E. J. Thribb").
Prodnose: humourless, reasonable oaf who interrupts Beachcomber's flights of fancy. (The name is journalistic slang for a sub-editor; the broadcaster Danny Baker has appropriated it as his Twitter name.)
Other media
The Will Hay film Boys Will Be Boys (1935) was set at Morton's Narkover school.
According to Spike Milligan, the columns were an influence on the comedic style of his radio series, The Goon Show.
In 1969, Milligan based a BBC television series named The World of Beachcomber on the columns. A small selection was issued on a 1971 LP and a 2-cassette set of the series' soundtrack was made available in the late 1990s.
In 1989, BBC Radio 4 broadcast the first of three series based on Morton's work. This featured Richard Ingrams as Beachcomber, John Wells as Prodnose, Patricia Routledge and John Sessions. The compilations prepared by Mike Barfield. Series 1 was also made available as a 2-cassette set.
Bibliography
Books featuring Wyndham-Lewis' workA London Farrago (1922)
Books featuring Morton's work
Original collectionsMr Thake: his life and letters (1929)Mr Thake Again (1931)By the Way (1931)Morton's Folly (1933)The Adventures of Mr Thake (1934, republished 2008): identical to Mr Thake: his life and lettersMr Thake and the Ladies (1935)Stuff and Nonsense (1935)Gallimaufry (1936)Sideways Through Borneo (1937)The Dancing Cabman and other verses (1938)A Diet of Thistles (1938)A Bonfire of Weeds (1939)I Do Not Think So (1940)Fool's Paradise (1941)Captain Foulenough and Company (1944)Here and Now (1947)The Misadventures of Dr Strabismus (1949)The Tibetan Venus (1951)Merry-Go-Round (1958)
Later omnibus editionsThe Best of Beachcomber (ed. Michael Frayn, 1963)Beachcomber: the works of J. B. Morton (ed. Richard Ingrams, 1974, Muller, London)Cram Me With Eels: The Best of Beachcomber's Unpublished Humour'' (ed. Mike Barfield, 1995, Mandarin, London ())
References
External links
A fan site about J B Morton and The World of Beachcomber
"Beachcomber's Stuff": review by Clive James
Category:Collective pseudonyms
Category:British humorists | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beachcomber_(pen_name) | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.475852 |
3965 | Bill Joy | | birth_place = Farmington Hills, Michigan, U.S.
| death_date | death_place
| fields = Computer science
| workplaces | alma_mater
| doctoral_advisor | academic_advisors Bob Fabry
| doctoral_students | notable_students
| known_for = BSDvicshchrootTCP/IP driverco-founder of Sun MicrosystemsJavaSPARCSolarisNFS''Why The Future Doesn't Need Us''
| author_abbrev_bot | author_abbrev_zoo
| influences | influenced
| spouse | children 2
| awards = *ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award (1986)
*Elected to National Academy of Engineering (1999)
*Elected to American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1999)
*Fellow of the Computer History Museum (2011)
| education = University of Michigan (BS)<br/> University of California, Berkeley (MS)
}}
William Nelson Joy (born November 8, 1954) is an American computer engineer and venture capitalist. He co-founded Sun Microsystems in 1982 along with Scott McNealy, Vinod Khosla, and Andy Bechtolsheim, and served as Chief Scientist and CTO at the company until 2003.
He played an integral role in the early development of BSD UNIX while being a graduate student at Berkeley, and he is the original author of the vi text editor. He also wrote the 2000 essay "Why The Future Doesn't Need Us", in which he expressed deep concerns over the development of modern technologies.
Joy was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering (1999) for contributions to operating systems and networking software.
Early career
Joy was born in the Detroit suburb of Farmington Hills, Michigan, to William Joy, a school vice-principal and counselor, and Ruth Joy. He earned a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from the University of Michigan and a Master of Science in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1979.
While a graduate student at Berkeley, he worked for Fabry's Computer Systems Research Group (CSRG) on the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) version of the Unix operating system. He initially worked on a Pascal compiler left at Berkeley by Ken Thompson, who had been visiting the university when Joy had just started his graduate work. Some of his most notable contributions were the ex and vi editors and the C shell. Joy's prowess as a computer programmer is legendary, with an oft-told anecdote that he wrote the vi editor in a weekend. Joy denies this assertion. A few of his other accomplishments have also been sometimes exaggerated; Eric Schmidt, CEO of Novell at the time, inaccurately reported during an interview in PBS's documentary Nerds 2.0.1 that Joy had personally rewritten the BSD kernel in a weekend.
In 1980, he also wrote <code>cat -v</code>, about which Rob Pike and Brian W. Kernighan wrote that it went against Unix philosophy.
According to a Salon article, during the early 1980s, DARPA had contracted the company Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN) to add TCP/IP to Berkeley UNIX. Joy had been instructed to plug BBN's stack into Berkeley Unix, but he refused to do so, as he had a low opinion of BBN's TCP/IP. So, Joy wrote his own high-performance TCP/IP stack. According to John Gage:
In his 2013 book Makers, author Chris Anderson credited Joy with establishing "Joy's law" based on a quip: "No matter who you are, most of the smartest people work for someone else [other than you]." His argument was that companies use an inefficient process by not hiring the best employees, only those they are able to hire. His "law" was a continuation of Friedrich Hayek's "The Use of Knowledge in Society" and warned that the competition outside of a company would always have the potential to be greater than the company itself.
Of computing
Joy devised a formula in 1983, also called ''Joy's law'', stating that the peak computer speed doubles each year and thus is given by a simple function of time. Specifically,
:<math>S = 2^{Y-1984},</math>
in which is the peak computer speed attained during year , expressed in MIPS.ReferencesExternal links
*
*
<!-- * -->
*
* [http://ex-vi.sourceforge.net/viin/paper.html An Introduction to Display Editing with Vi]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120507165453/http://www.bigpicture.tv/speakers/bill_joy Bill Joy], video clips at Big Picture TV
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20140603174753/https://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/09/11/bill_joys_greatest_gift/ Excerpts from a 1999 Linux Magazine interview regarding the development of vi]
* [https://www.pbs.org/cringely/nerdtv/shows/#3 NerdTV interview] (video, audio, and transcript available) - 30 June 2005
* [http://video.mit.edu/watch/the-six-webs-10-years-on-9110/ The Six Webs, 10 Years On - speech at MIT Emerging Technologies conference], September 29, 2005
* [http://www.droppingknowledge.org/bin/user/listitems/answer_view/6439.page Bill Joy at Dropping Knowledge], his answers to the 100 questions at Dropping Knowledge's Table of Free Voices event in Berlin, 2006.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110420215435/http://www.computerhistory.org/events/index.php?id=1120598654 Computer History Museum, Sun Founders Panel], January 11, 2006
Category:1954 births
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Category:University of Michigan College of Engineering alumni
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Category:Wired (magazine) people | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Joy | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.485457 |
3967 | Bandwidth (signal processing) | right|300px|thumb|Amplitude (a) vs. frequency (f) graph illustrating baseband bandwidth. Here the bandwidth equals the upper frequency.
Bandwidth is the difference between the upper and lower frequencies in a continuous band of frequencies. It is typically measured in unit of hertz (symbol Hz).
It may refer more specifically to two subcategories: Passband bandwidth is the difference between the upper and lower cutoff frequencies of, for example, a band-pass filter, a communication channel, or a signal spectrum. Baseband bandwidth is equal to the upper cutoff frequency of a low-pass filter or baseband signal, which includes a zero frequency.
Bandwidth in hertz is a central concept in many fields, including electronics, information theory, digital communications, radio communications, signal processing, and spectroscopy and is one of the determinants of the capacity of a given communication channel.
A key characteristic of bandwidth is that any band of a given width can carry the same amount of information, regardless of where that band is located in the frequency spectrum. For example, a 3 kHz band can carry a telephone conversation whether that band is at baseband (as in a POTS telephone line) or modulated to some higher frequency. However, wide bandwidths are easier to obtain and process at higher frequencies because the is smaller.
Overview
Bandwidth is a key concept in many telecommunications applications. In radio communications, for example, bandwidth is the frequency range occupied by a modulated carrier signal. An FM radio receiver's tuner spans a limited range of frequencies. A government agency (such as the Federal Communications Commission in the United States) may apportion the regionally available bandwidth to broadcast license holders so that their signals do not mutually interfere. In this context, bandwidth is also known as channel spacing.
For other applications, there are other definitions. One definition of bandwidth, for a system, could be the range of frequencies over which the system produces a specified level of performance. A less strict and more practically useful definition will refer to the frequencies beyond which performance is degraded. In the case of frequency response, degradation could, for example, mean more than 3 dB below the maximum value or it could mean below a certain absolute value. As with any definition of the width of a function, many definitions are suitable for different purposes.
In the context of, for example, the sampling theorem and Nyquist sampling rate, bandwidth typically refers to baseband bandwidth. In the context of Nyquist symbol rate or Shannon-Hartley channel capacity for communication systems it refers to passband bandwidth.
The of a simple radar pulse is defined as the inverse of its duration. For example, a one-microsecond pulse has a Rayleigh bandwidth of one megahertz.
The is defined as the portion of a signal spectrum in the frequency domain which contains most of the energy of the signal.
x dB bandwidth
right|300px|thumb|The magnitude response of a band-pass filter illustrating the concept of −3 dB bandwidth at a gain of approximately 0.707
In some contexts, the signal bandwidth in hertz refers to the frequency range in which the signal's spectral density (in W/Hz or V2/Hz) is nonzero or above a small threshold value. The threshold value is often defined relative to the maximum value, and is most commonly the , that is the point where the spectral density is half its maximum value (or the spectral amplitude, in \mathrm{V} or \mathrm{V/\sqrt{Hz}}, is 70.7% of its maximum). This figure, with a lower threshold value, can be used in calculations of the lowest sampling rate that will satisfy the sampling theorem.
The bandwidth is also used to denote system bandwidth, for example in filter or communication channel systems. To say that a system has a certain bandwidth means that the system can process signals with that range of frequencies, or that the system reduces the bandwidth of a white noise input to that bandwidth.
The 3 dB bandwidth of an electronic filter or communication channel is the part of the system's frequency response that lies within 3 dB of the response at its peak, which, in the passband filter case, is typically at or near its center frequency, and in the low-pass filter is at or near its cutoff frequency. If the maximum gain is 0 dB, the 3 dB bandwidth is the frequency range where attenuation is less than 3 dB. 3 dB attenuation is also where power is half its maximum. This same half-power gain convention is also used in spectral width, and more generally for the extent of functions as full width at half maximum (FWHM).
In electronic filter design, a filter specification may require that within the filter passband, the gain is nominally 0 dB with a small variation, for example within the ±1 dB interval. In the stopband(s), the required attenuation in decibels is above a certain level, for example >100 dB. In a transition band the gain is not specified. In this case, the filter bandwidth corresponds to the passband width, which in this example is the 1 dB-bandwidth. If the filter shows amplitude ripple within the passband, the x dB point refers to the point where the gain is x dB below the nominal passband gain rather than x dB below the maximum gain.
In signal processing and control theory the bandwidth is the frequency at which the closed-loop system gain drops 3 dB below peak.
In communication systems, in calculations of the Shannon–Hartley channel capacity, bandwidth refers to the 3 dB-bandwidth. In calculations of the maximum symbol rate, the Nyquist sampling rate, and maximum bit rate according to the Hartley's law, the bandwidth refers to the frequency range within which the gain is non-zero.
The fact that in equivalent baseband models of communication systems, the signal spectrum consists of both negative and positive frequencies, can lead to confusion about bandwidth since they are sometimes referred to only by the positive half, and one will occasionally see expressions such as B = 2W, where B is the total bandwidth (i.e. the maximum passband bandwidth of the carrier-modulated RF signal and the minimum passband bandwidth of the physical passband channel), and W is the positive bandwidth (the baseband bandwidth of the equivalent channel model). For instance, the baseband model of the signal would require a low-pass filter with cutoff frequency of at least W to stay intact, and the physical passband channel would require a passband filter of at least B to stay intact.
Relative bandwidth
The absolute bandwidth is not always the most appropriate or useful measure of bandwidth. For instance, in the field of antennas the difficulty of constructing an antenna to meet a specified absolute bandwidth is easier at a higher frequency than at a lower frequency. For this reason, bandwidth is often quoted relative to the frequency of operation which gives a better indication of the structure and sophistication needed for the circuit or device under consideration.
There are two different measures of relative bandwidth in common use: fractional bandwidth (B_\mathrm F) and ratio bandwidth (B_\mathrm R). In the following, the absolute bandwidth is defined as follows,
B \Delta f f_\mathrm H - f_\mathrm L
where f_\mathrm H and f_\mathrm L are the upper and lower frequency limits respectively of the band in question.
Fractional bandwidth
Fractional bandwidth is defined as the absolute bandwidth divided by the center frequency (f_\mathrm C),
B_\mathrm F = \frac {\Delta f}{f_\mathrm C} \, .
The center frequency is usually defined as the arithmetic mean of the upper and lower frequencies so that,
f_\mathrm C = \frac {f_\mathrm H + f_\mathrm L}{2} \ and
B_\mathrm F = \frac {2 (f_\mathrm H - f_\mathrm L)}{f_\mathrm H + f_\mathrm L} \, .
However, the center frequency is sometimes defined as the geometric mean of the upper and lower frequencies,
f_\mathrm C = \sqrt {f_\mathrm H f_\mathrm L} and
B_\mathrm F = \frac {f_\mathrm H - f_\mathrm L}{\sqrt {f_\mathrm H f_\mathrm L}} \, .
While the geometric mean is more rarely used than the arithmetic mean (and the latter can be assumed if not stated explicitly) the former is considered more mathematically rigorous. It more properly reflects the logarithmic relationship of fractional bandwidth with increasing frequency. For narrowband applications, there is only marginal difference between the two definitions. The geometric mean version is inconsequentially larger. For wideband applications they diverge substantially with the arithmetic mean version approaching 2 in the limit and the geometric mean version approaching infinity.
Fractional bandwidth is sometimes expressed as a percentage of the center frequency (percent bandwidth, \%B),
\%B_\mathrm F = 100 \frac {\Delta f}{f_\mathrm C} \, .
Ratio bandwidth
Ratio bandwidth is defined as the ratio of the upper and lower limits of the band,
B_\mathrm R= \frac {f_\mathrm H}{f_\mathrm L} \, .
Ratio bandwidth may be notated as B_\mathrm R:1. The relationship between ratio bandwidth and fractional bandwidth is given by,
B_\mathrm F = 2 \frac {B_\mathrm R - 1}{B_\mathrm R + 1} and
B_\mathrm R = \frac {2 + B_\mathrm F}{2 - B_\mathrm F} \, .
Percent bandwidth is a less meaningful measure in wideband applications. A percent bandwidth of 100% corresponds to a ratio bandwidth of 3:1. All higher ratios up to infinity are compressed into the range 100–200%.
Ratio bandwidth is often expressed in octaves (i.e., as a frequency level) for wideband applications. An octave is a frequency ratio of 2:1 leading to this expression for the number of octaves, \log_2 \left(B_\mathrm R\right) .
Noise equivalent bandwidth
right|300px|thumb|Setup for the measurement of the noise equivalent bandwidth B_n of the system with frequency response H(f).
The noise equivalent bandwidth (or equivalent noise bandwidth (enbw)) of a system of frequency response H(f) is the bandwidth of an ideal filter with rectangular frequency response centered on the system's central frequency that produces the same average power outgoing H(f) when both systems are excited with a white noise source.
The value of the noise equivalent bandwidth depends on the ideal filter reference gain used. Typically, this gain equals |H(f)| at its center frequency, but it can also equal the peak value of |H(f)|.
The noise equivalent bandwidth B_n can be calculated in the frequency domain using H(f) or in the time domain by exploiting the Parseval's theorem with the system impulse response h(t). If H(f) is a lowpass system with zero central frequency and the filter reference gain is referred to this frequency, then:
B_n \frac{\int_{-\infty}^{\infty} |H(f)|^2 df}{2|H(0)|^2} \frac{\int_{-\infty}^{\infty} |h(t)|^2 dt}{2\left|\int_{-\infty}^{\infty} h(t)dt\right|^2} \, .
The same expression can be applied to bandpass systems by substituting the equivalent baseband frequency response for H(f).
The noise equivalent bandwidth is widely used to simplify the analysis of telecommunication systems in the presence of noise.
Photonics
In photonics, the term bandwidth carries a variety of meanings:
the bandwidth of the output of some light source, e.g., an ASE source or a laser; the bandwidth of ultrashort optical pulses can be particularly large
the width of the frequency range that can be transmitted by some element, e.g. an optical fiber
the gain bandwidth of an optical amplifier
the width of the range of some other phenomenon, e.g., a reflection, the phase matching of a nonlinear process, or some resonance
the maximum modulation frequency (or range of modulation frequencies) of an optical modulator
the range of frequencies in which some measurement apparatus (e.g., a power meter) can operate
the data rate (e.g., in Gbit/s) achieved in an optical communication system; see bandwidth (computing).
A related concept is the spectral linewidth of the radiation emitted by excited atoms.
See also
Bandwidth extension
Broadband
Noise bandwidth
Rise time
Spectral efficiency
Spectral width
Notes
References
Category:Signal processing
Category:Telecommunication theory
Category:Filter frequency response
Category:Spectrum (physical sciences) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandwidth_(signal_processing) | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.501741 |
3968 | Bodhisattva | In Buddhism, a bodhisattva (<small>English:</small> ; ; ) or bodhisatva is a person who is on the path towards bodhi ('awakening') or Buddhahood.
In the Early Buddhist schools, as well as modern Theravāda Buddhism, bodhisattva (or bodhisatta) refers to someone who has made a resolution to become a Buddha and has also received a confirmation or prediction from a living Buddha that this will come to pass.
In Theravāda Buddhism, the bodhisattva is mainly seen as an exceptional and rare individual. Only a few select individuals are ultimately able to become bodhisattvas, such as Maitreya. Mahāyāna Buddhism generally understands the bodhisattva path as being open to everyone, and Mahāyāna Buddhists encourage all individuals to become bodhisattvas. Spiritually advanced bodhisattvas such as Avalokiteshvara, Maitreya, and Manjushri are also widely venerated across the Mahāyāna Buddhist world and are believed to possess great magical power, which they employ to help all living beings.
Early Buddhism
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, 50 CE)]]
depicting the bodhisattva (future Gautama Buddha) taking a vow at the foot of Dipankara Buddha, Art Institute of Chicago]]
In pre-sectarian Buddhism, the term bodhisatta is used in the early texts to refer to Gautama Buddha in his previous lives and as a young man in his last life, when he was working towards liberation. In the early Buddhist discourses, the Buddha regularly uses the phrase "when I was an unawakened Bodhisatta" to describe his experiences before his attainment of awakening. The early texts which discuss the period before the Buddha's awakening mainly focus on his spiritual development. According to Bhikkhu Analayo, most of these passages focus on three main themes: "the bodhisattva's overcoming of unwholesome states of mind, his development of mental tranquillity, and the growth of his insight."
Other early sources like the Acchariyabbhutadhamma-sutta (MN 123, and its Chinese parallel in Madhyama-āgama 32) discuss the marvelous qualities of the bodhisattva Gautama in his previous life in Tuṣita heaven. The Pali text focuses on how the bodhisattva was endowed with mindfulness and clear comprehension while living in Tuṣita, while the Chinese source states that his lifespan, appearance, and glory was greater than all the devas (gods). These sources also discuss various miracles which accompanied the bodhisattva's conception and birth, most famously, his taking seven steps and proclaiming that this was his last life. The Chinese source (titled Discourse on Marvellous Qualities) also states that while living as a monk under the Buddha Kāśyapa he "made his initial vow to [realize] Buddhahood [while] practicing the holy life."
Another early source that discusses the qualities of bodhisattvas is the Mahāpadāna sutta. This text discusses bodhisattva qualities in the context of six previous Buddhas who lived long ago, such as Buddha Vipaśyī. Yet another important element of the bodhisattva doctrine, the a prediction of someone's future Buddhahood, is found in another Chinese early Buddhist text, the Discourse on an Explanation about the Past (MĀ 66). In this discourse, a monk named Maitreya aspires to become a Buddha in the future and the Buddha then predicts that Maitreya will become a Buddha in the future Other discourses found in the Ekottarika-āgama present the "bodhisattva Maitreya" as an example figure (EĀ 20.6 and EĀ 42.6) and one sutra in this collection also discuss how the Buddha taught the bodhisattva path of the six perfections to Maitreya (EĀ 27.5).
'Bodhisatta' may also connote a being who is "bound for enlightenment", in other words, a person whose aim is to become fully enlightened. In the Pāli canon, the Bodhisatta (bodhisattva) is also described as someone who is still subject to birth, illness, death, sorrow, defilement, and delusion. According to the Theravāda monk Bhikkhu Bodhi, while all the Buddhist traditions agree that to attain Buddhahood, one must "make a deliberate resolution" and fulfill the spiritual perfections (pāramīs or pāramitās) as a bodhisattva, the actual bodhisattva path is not taught in the earliest strata of Buddhist texts such as the Pali Nikayas (and their counterparts such as the Chinese Āgamas) which instead focus on the ideal of the arahant.
The oldest known story about how Gautama Buddha becomes a bodhisattva is the story of his encounter with the previous Buddha, Dīpankara. During this encounter, a previous incarnation of Gautama, variously named Sumedha, Megha, or Sumati offers five blue lotuses and spreads out his hair or entire body for Dīpankara to walk on, resolving to one day become a Buddha. Dīpankara then confirms that they will attain Buddhahood. Early Buddhist authors saw this story as indicating that the making of a resolution (abhinīhāra) in the presence of a living Buddha and his prediction/confirmation (vyākaraṇa) of one's future Buddhahood was necessary to become a bodhisattva. According to Drewes, "all known models of the path to Buddhahood developed from this basic understanding." None of these have survived. Dar Hayal attributes the historical development of the bodhisattva ideal to "the growth of bhakti (devotion, faith, love) and the idealisation and spiritualisation of the Buddha."
The North Indian Sarvāstivāda school held it took Gautama three "incalculable aeons" (asaṃkhyeyas) and ninety one aeons (kalpas) to become a Buddha after his resolution (praṇidhāna) in front of a past Buddha. During the first incalculable aeon he is said to have encountered and served 75,000 Buddhas, and 76,000 in the second, after which he received his first prediction (vyākaraṇa) of future Buddhahood from Dīpankara, meaning that he could no longer fall back from the path to Buddhahood. This set of four phases of the path is also found in other sources, including the Gandhari “Many-Buddhas Sūtra” (*Bahubudha gasutra) and the Chinese Fó běnxíng jí jīng (佛本行 集經, Taisho vol. 3, no. 190, pp. 669a1–672a11).
The four caryās (Gandhari: caria) are the following: Several sources in the Pali Canon depict the idea that there are multiple Buddhas and that there will be many future Buddhas, all of which must train as bodhisattas. Non-canonical Theravada Jataka literature also teaches about bodhisattvas and the bodhisattva path.
The Sri Lankan commentator Dhammapāla (6th century CE) wrote a commentary on the Cariyāpiṭaka, a text which focuses on the bodhisattva path and on the ten perfections of a bodhisatta. Kings of Sri Lanka were often described as bodhisattvas, starting at least as early as Sirisanghabodhi (r. 247–249), who was renowned for his compassion, took vows for the welfare of the citizens, and was regarded as a mahāsatta (Sanskrit: mahāsattva), an epithet used almost exclusively in Mahayana Buddhism. Many other Sri Lankan kings from the 3rd until the 15th century were also described as bodhisattas and their royal duties were sometimes clearly associated with the practice of the ten pāramitās. In some cases, they explicitly claimed to have received predictions of Buddhahood in past lives. Various modern figures of esoteric Theravada traditions (such as the weizzās of Burma) have also claimed to be bodhisattvas. He also quotes the 10th century king of Sri Lanka, Mahinda IV (956–972 CE), who had the words inscribed "none but the bodhisattvas will become kings of a prosperous Lanka," among other examples.
Jeffrey Samuels echoes this perspective, noting that while in Mahayana Buddhism the bodhisattva path is held to be universal and for everyone, in Theravada it is "reserved for and appropriated by certain exceptional people."
Mahāyāna
Early Mahāyāna
standing Maitreya (3rd century), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York]]
(the protector of the Buddha) resembling Heracles, second-century]]
Mahāyāna Buddhism (often also called Bodhisattvayāna, "Bodhisattva Vehicle") is based principally upon the path of a bodhisattva. This path was seen as higher and nobler than becoming an arhat or a solitary Buddha. Hayal notes that Sanskrit sources generally depict the bodhisattva path as reaching a higher goal (i.e. anuttara-samyak-sambodhi) than the goal of the path of the "disciples" (śrāvakas), which is the nirvana attained by arhats. For example, the Lotus Sutra states:
<blockquote>To the sravakas, he preached the doctrine which is associated with the four Noble Truths and leads to Dependent Origination. It aims at transcending birth, old age, disease, death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress of mind and weariness; and it ends in nirvana. But, to the great being, the bodhisattva, he preached the doctrine, which is associated with the six perfections and which ends in the Knowledge of the Omniscient One after the attainment of the supreme and perfect bodhi.</blockquote>
According to Peter Skilling, the Mahayana movement began when "at an uncertain point, let us say in the first century BCE, groups of monks, nuns, and lay-followers began to devote themselves exclusively to the Bodhisatva vehicle." These Mahayanists universalized the bodhisattvayana as a path which was open to everyone and which was taught for all beings to follow. This was in contrast to the Nikaya schools, which held that the bodhisattva path was only for a rare set of individuals. This definition is given as the following: "Because he has bodhi as his aim, a bodhisattva-mahāsattva is so called."
Mahayana sutras also depict the bodhisattva as a being which, because they want to reach Buddhahood for the sake of all beings, is more loving and compassionate than the sravaka (who only wishes to end their own suffering). Thus, another major difference between the bodhisattva and the arhat is that the bodhisattva practices the path for the good of others (par-ārtha), due to their bodhicitta, while the sravakas do so for their own good (sv-ārtha) and thus, do not have bodhicitta (which is compassionately focused on others).
Mahayana bodhisattvas were not just abstract models for Buddhist practice, but also developed as distinct figures which were venerated by Indian Buddhists. These included figures like Manjushri and Avalokiteshvara, which are personifications of the basic virtues of wisdom and compassion respectively and are the two most important bodhisattvas in Mahayana. The development of bodhisattva devotion parallels the development of the Hindu bhakti movement. Indeed, Dayal sees the development of Indian bodhisattva cults as a Buddhist reaction to the growth of bhakti centered religion in India which helped to popularize and reinvigorate Indian Buddhism.
Some Mahayana sutras promoted another revolutionary doctrinal turn, claiming that the three vehicles of the Śrāvakayāna, Pratyekabuddhayāna and the Bodhisattvayāna were really just one vehicle (ekayana). This is most famously promoted in the Lotus Sūtra which claims that the very idea of three separate vehicles is just an upaya, a skillful device invented by the Buddha to get beings of various abilities on the path. But ultimately, it will be revealed to them that there is only one vehicle, the ekayana, which ends in Buddhahood.
Mature scholastic Mahāyāna
. Liao China, 907–1125]]
Classical Indian mahayanists held that the only sutras which teach the bodhisattva vehicle are the Mahayana sutras. Thus, Nagarjuna writes "the subjects based on the deeds of Bodhisattvas were not mentioned in [non-Mahāyāna] sūtras." They also held that the bodhisattva path was superior to the śrāvaka vehicle and so the bodhisattva vehicle is the "great vehicle" (mahayana) due to its greater aspiration to save others, while the śrāvaka vehicle is the "small" or "inferior" vehicle (hinayana). Thus, Asanga argues in his Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkāra that the two vehicles differ in numerous ways, such as intention, teaching, employment (i.e., means), support, and the time that it takes to reach the goal.
Over time, Mahayana Buddhists developed mature systematized doctrines about the bodhisattva. The authors of the various Madhyamaka treatises often presented the view of the ekayana, and thus held that all beings can become bodhisattvas. The texts and sutras associated with the Yogacara school developed a different theory of three separate gotras (families, lineages), that inherently predisposed a person to either the vehicle of the arhat, pratyekabuddha or samyak-saṃbuddha (fully self-awakened one). For the yogacarins then, only some beings (those who have the "bodhisattva lineage") can enter the bodhisattva path. In East Asian Buddhism, the view of the one vehicle (ekayana) which holds that all Buddhist teachings are really part of a single path, is the standard view.
The term bodhisattva was also used in a broader sense by later authors. According to the eighth-century Mahāyāna philosopher Haribhadra, the term "bodhisattva" can refer to those who follow any of the three vehicles, since all are working towards bodhi. Therefore, the specific term for a Mahāyāna bodhisattva is a mahāsattva (great being) bodhisattva. According to Atiśa's 11th century Bodhipathapradīpa, the central defining feature of a Mahāyāna bodhisattva is the universal aspiration to end suffering for all sentient beings, which is termed bodhicitta (the mind set on awakening).
The bodhisattva doctrine went through a significant transformation during the development of Buddhist tantra, also known as Vajrayana. This movement developed new ideas and texts which introduced new bodhisattvas and re-interpreted old ones in new forms, developed in elaborate mandalas for them and introduced new practices which made use of mantras, mudras and other tantric elements.
Entering the bodhisattva path
in Ajanta Caves. India, 5th century]]
attended by White Tara and Bhrikuti, India, Madhya Pradesh, Sirpur, c. 8th century]]
According to David Drewes, "Mahayana sutras unanimously depict the path beginning with the first arising of the thought of becoming a Buddha (prathamacittotpāda), or the initial arising of bodhicitta, typically aeons before one first receives a Buddha's prediction, and apply the term bodhisattva from this point."
Bodhisattva conduct (caryā)
After a being has entered the path by giving rise to bodhicitta, they must make effort in the practice or conduct (caryā) of the bodhisattvas, which includes all the duties, virtues and practices that bodhisattvas must accomplish to attain Buddhahood. An important early Mahayana source for the practice of the bodhisattva is the Bodhisattvapiṭaka sūtra, a major sutra found in the Mahāratnakūṭa collection which was widely cited by various sources. According to Ulrich Pagel, this text is "one of the longest works on the bodhisattva in Mahayana literature" and thus provides extensive information on the topic bodhisattva training, especially the perfections (pāramitā). Pagel also argues that this text was quite influential on later Mahayana writings which discuss the bodhisattva and thus was "of fundamental importance to the evolution of the bodhisattva doctrine." Other sutras in the Mahāratnakūṭa collection are also important sources for the bodhisattva path.
According to Pagel, the basic outline of the bodhisattva practice in the Bodhisattvapiṭaka is outlined in a passage which states "the path to enlightenment comprises benevolence towards all sentient beings, striving after the perfections and compliance with the means of conversion." This path begins with contemplating the failures of samsara, developing faith in the Buddha, giving rise to bodhicitta and practicing the four immesurables. It then proceeds through all six perfections and finally discusses the four means of converting sentient beings (saṃgrahavastu). The path is presented through prose exposition, mnemonic lists (matrka) and also through Jataka narratives. Using this general framework, the Bodhisattvapiṭaka incorporates discussions related to other practices including super knowledge (abhijñā), learning, 'skill' (kauśalya), accumulation of merit (puṇyasaṃbhāra), the thirty-seven factors of awakening (bodhipakṣadharmas), perfect mental quietude (śamatha) and insight (vipaśyanā).
Later Mahayana treatises (śāstras) like the Bodhisattvabhumi and the Mahāyānasūtrālamkāra provide the following schema of bodhisattva practices:
* Bodhipakṣa-caryā, the practice of the 37 bodhipakṣadharmas (the principles conducive to bodhi) which are: the four applications of mindfulness, the four right efforts, the four bases of spiritual power, the five spiritual faculties, the five strengths, the seven factors of awakening and the noble eightfold path.
* Abhijñā-caryā, the practice of the super-knowledges (which are mainly developed in order to convert, help and guide others).
* Pāramitā-caryā, the practice of the perfections, which are: Dāna (generosity), Śīla (virtue, ethics), Kṣānti (patient endurance), Vīrya (heroic energy), Dhyāna (meditation), Prajñā (wisdom), Upāya (skillful means), Praṇidhāna (vow, resolve), Bala (spiritual power), and Jñāna (knowledge).
* Sattvaparipāka-caryā, the practice of maturing the living beings, i.e. preaching and teaching others.
The first six perfections (pāramitās) are the most significant and popular set of bodhisattva virtues and thus they serve as a central framework for bodhisattva practice. They are the most widely taught and commented upon virtues throughout the history of Mahayana Buddhist literature and feature prominently in major Sanskrit sources such as the Bodhisattvabhumi, the Mahāyānasūtrālamkāra, the King of Samadhis Sutra and the Ten Stages Sutra. They are extolled and praised by these sources as "the great oceans of all the bright virtues and auspicious principles" (Bodhisattvabhumi) and "the Teacher, the Way and the Light...the Refuge and the Shelter, the Support and the Sanctuary" (Aṣṭasāhasrikā).
While many Mahayana sources discuss the bodhisattva's training in ethical discipline (śīla) in classic Buddhist terms, over time, there also developed specific sets of ethical precepts for bodhisattvas (Skt. bodhisattva-śīla). These various sets of precepts are usually taken by bodhisattva aspirants (lay and ordained monastics) along with classic Buddhist pratimoksha precepts. However, in some Japanese Buddhist traditions, monastics rely solely on the bodhisattva precepts.
thumb|Prajnaparamita of Java|Bodhisattva Prajñaparamita, a female personification of the perfection of wisdom, Singhasari period, East Java, Indonesia, 13th century
The perfection of wisdom (prajñāpāramitā) is generally seen as the most important and primary of the perfections, without which all the others fall short. Thus, the Madhyamakavatara (6:2) states that wisdom leads the other perfections as a man with eyes leads the blind. This perfect or transcendent wisdom has various qualities, such as being non-attached (asakti), non-conceptual and non-dual (advaya) and signless (animitta). It is generally understood as a kind of insight into the true nature of all phenomena (dharmas) which in Mahayana sutras is widely described as emptiness (shunyatā).
Another key virtue which the bodhisattva must develop is great compassion (mahā-karuṇā), a vast sense of care aimed at ending the suffering of all sentient beings. This great compassion is the ethical foundation of the bodhisattva, and it is also an applied aspect of their bodhicitta. Great compassion must also be closely joined with the perfection of wisdom, which reveals that all the beings that the bodhisattva strives to save are ultimately empty of self (anātman) and lack inherent existence (niḥsvabhāva''). Due to the bodhisattva's compassionate wish to save all beings, they develop innumerable skillful means or strategies (upaya) with which to teach and guide different kinds of beings with all sorts of different inclinations and tendencies.
Another key virtue for the bodhisattva is mindfulness (smṛti), which Dayal calls "the sine qua non of moral progress for a bodhisattva." Mindfulness is widely emphasized by Buddhist authors and Sanskrit sources and it appears four times in the list of 37 bodhipakṣadharmas. According to the Aṣṭasāhasrikā, a bodhisattva must never lose mindfulness so as not to be confused or distracted. The Mahāyānasūtrālamkāra states that mindfulness is the principal asset of a bodhisattva, while both Asvaghosa and Shantideva state that without mindfulness, a bodhisattva will be helpless and uncontrolled (like a mad elephant) and will not succeed in conquering the mental afflictions. Length and nature of the path
thumb|Tibetan painting of Vajrapani, 19th-century
Just as with non-Mahayana sources, Mahayana sutras generally depict the bodhisattva path as a long path that takes many lifetimes across many aeons. Some sutras state that a beginner bodhisattva could take anywhere from 3 to 22 countless eons (mahāsaṃkhyeya kalpas) to become a Buddha. The Mahāyānasaṃgraha of Asanga states that the bodhisattva must cultivate the six paramitas for three incalculable aeons (kalpāsaṃkhyeya). Shantideva meanwhile states that bodhisattvas must practice each perfection for sixty aeons or kalpas and also declares that a bodhisattva must practice the path for an "inconceivable" (acintya) number of kalpas. Thus, the bodhisattva path could take many billions upon billions of years to complete.
Later developments in Indian and Asian Mahayana Buddhism (especially in Vajrayana or tantric Buddhism) lead to the idea that certain methods and practices could substantially shorten the path (and even lead to Buddhahood in a single lifetime).
Some of early depictions of the Bodhisattva path in texts such as the Ugraparipṛcchā Sūtra describe it as an arduous, difficult monastic path suited only for the few which is nevertheless the most glorious path one can take. Three kinds of bodhisattvas are mentioned: the forest, city, and monastery bodhisattvas—with forest dwelling being promoted a superior, even necessary path in sutras such as the Ugraparipṛcchā and the Samadhiraja sutras. The early Rastrapalapariprccha sutra also promotes a solitary life of meditation in the forests, far away from the distractions of the householder life. The Rastrapala is also highly critical of monks living in monasteries and in cities who are seen as not practicing meditation and morality.
The Ratnagunasamcayagatha also says the bodhisattva should undertake ascetic practices (dhūtaguṇa), "wander freely without a home", practice the paramitas and train under a guru in order to perfect his meditation practice and realization of prajñaparamita. The twelve dhūtaguṇas are also promoted by the King of Samadhis Sutra, the Ten Stages Sutra and Shantideva. Some scholars have used these texts to argue for "the forest hypothesis", the theory that the initial Bodhisattva ideal was associated with a strict forest asceticism. But other scholars point out that many other Mahayana sutras do not promote this ideal, and instead teach "easy" practices like memorizing, reciting, teaching and copying Mahayana sutras, as well as meditating on Buddhas and bodhisattvas (and reciting or chanting their names). That a bodhisattva has the option to pursue such a lesser path, but instead chooses the long path towards Buddhahood is one of the five criteria for one to be considered a bodhisattva. The other four are: being human, being a man, making a vow to become a Buddha in the presence of a previous Buddha, and receiving a prophecy from that Buddha.
Over time, a more varied analysis of bodhisattva careers developed focused on one's motivation. This can be seen in the Tibetan Buddhist teaching on three types of motivation for generating bodhicitta. According to Patrul Rinpoche's 19th-century Words of My Perfect Teacher (''Kun bzang bla ma'i gzhal lung), a bodhisattva might be motivated in one of three ways. They are:Bodhisattva stages
thumb|Green Tara and her devotees, Folio from a Bengali manuscript of the Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā (Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines), Metropolitan Museum of Art|MET
According to James B. Apple, if one studies the earliest textual materials which discuss the bodhisattva path (which includes the translations of Lokakshema and the Gandharan manuscripts), "one finds four key stages that are demarcated throughout this early textual material that constitute the most basic elements in the path of a bodhisattva". These main elements are:
Drewes notes that Mahāyāna sūtras mainly depict a bodhisattvas' first arising of bodhicitta as occurring in the presence of a Buddha. Furthermore, according to Drewes, most Mahāyāna sūtras "never encourage anyone to become a bodhisattva or present any ritual or other means of doing so."
Within the framework of the Bodhisattva path, various Buddhist scriptures identify different stages at which non-retrogression is attained. Some sources associate it with the path of preparation (prayogamārga), where a bodhisattva solidifies their commitment and will no longer turn back to pursue the path of an arhat. Others link it to the first bhūmi (stage) of the bodhisattva path or, in later systematic presentations, to the eighth bhūmi, after which full Buddhahood becomes inevitable.
The Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra, particularly in its early Chinese translation by Lokakṣema, emphasizes avaivartika as a pivotal attainment. It describes how the bodhisattva, upon reaching the state of anutpattikadharmakṣānti (the realization of the unborn nature of phenomena), becomes irreversible in their journey toward complete enlightenment. Unlike later Mahāyāna texts, which integrate this stage within the structured bhūmi system, Lokakṣema’s version presents it more fluidly, portraying the avaivartin as one of a few key categories of bodhisattvas.
In Pure Land traditions, rebirth in Amitābha Buddha’s Pure Land (Sukhāvatī) is equated with entering the stage of non-retrogression. It is believed that those who attain birth in Sukhāvatī are assured of progressing toward enlightenment without the risk of falling back into lower states of existence.
The Śūraṅgama Sūtra recognizes 57 stages. Various Vajrayāna schools recognize additional grounds (varying from 3 to 10 further stages), mostly 6 more grounds with variant descriptions. A bodhisattva above the 7th ground is called a mahāsattva. Some bodhisattvas such as Samantabhadra are also said to have already attained Buddhahood.Sōtō Zen
As part of the Sōtō Zen school of Mahāyanā, Dōgen Zenji described Four Exemplary Acts of a Bodhisattva:
* Offering Alms: Not being covetous or greedy;
* Kind Speech: Feeling genuine affection for other sentient beings and offering words that are neither harsh nor rude.
* Benevolence: Working out skillful methods to benefit sentient beings, be they of low or high station.
* Manifesting Sympathy: Not making differences, not treating yourself as different and not treating others as different.
Mahayana bodhisattvas
figure from Candi Jago, 14th century Java, Indonesia]]
, the background art depicts his pure land and attendant bodhisattvas. From a Buddhist temple in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam]]
Buddhists (especially Mahayanists) venerate several bodhisattvas (such as Maitreya, Manjushri and Avalokiteshvara) which are seen as highly spiritually advanced (having attained the tenth bhumi) and thus possessing immense magical power. According to Lewis Lancaster, these "celestial" or "heavenly" bodhisattvas are seen as "either the manifestations of a Buddha or they are beings who possess the power of producing many bodies through great feats of magical transformation."
The religious devotion to these bodhisattvas probably first developed in north India, and they are widely depicted in Gandharan and Kashmiri art. In Asian art, they are typically depicted as princes and princesses, with royal robes and jewellery (since they are the princes of the Dharma). In Buddhist art, a bodhisattva is often described as a beautiful figure with a serene expression and graceful manner. This is probably in accordance to the description of Prince Siddhārtha Gautama as a bodhisattva. The depiction of bodhisattva in Buddhist art around the world aspires to express the bodhisattva's qualities such as loving-kindness (metta), compassion (karuna), empathetic joy (mudita) and equanimity (upekkha).
These celestial bodhisattvas like Avalokiteshvara (Guanyin) are also seen as compassionate savior figures, constantly working for the good of all beings. The Avalokiteshvara chapter of the Lotus Sutra even states that calling Avalokiteshvara to mind can help save someone from natural disasters, demons, and other calamities. It is also supposed to protect one from the afflictions (lust, anger and ignorance). Bodhisattvas can also transform themselves into whatever physical form is useful for helping sentient beings (a god, a bird, a male or female, even a Buddha). Because of this, bodhisattvas are seen as beings that one can pray to for aid and consolation from the sufferings of everyday life as well as for guidance in the path to enlightenment. Thus, the great translator Xuanzang is said to have constantly prayed to Avalokiteshvara for protection on his long journey to India.
Eight main Bodhisattvas
thumb|Eight great bodhisattvas at Ellora Caves (cave no. 12).
thumb|A Japanese illustration of the "sonsho mandala" which depicts Vairocana surrounded by the eight great bodhisattvas
In the later Indian Vajrayana tradition, there arose a popular grouping of eight bodhisattvas known as the "Eight Great Bodhisattvas", or "Eight Close Sons" (Skt. aṣṭa utaputra; Tib. nyewé sé gyé) and are seen as the most important Mahayana bodhisattvas and appear in numerous esoteric mandalas (e.g. Garbhadhatu mandala).
While there are numerous lists of Eight Great Bodhisattvas, the most widespread or "standard" listing is:]]
The bodhisattva Prajñāpāramitā-devi is a female personification of the perfection of wisdom and the Prajñāpāramitā sutras. She became an important figure, widely depicted in Indian Buddhist art.
Guanyin (Jp: Kannon), a female form of Avalokiteshvara, is the most widely revered bodhisattva in East Asian Buddhism, generally depicted as a motherly figure. Guanyin is venerated in various other forms and manifestations, including Cundī, Cintāmaṇicakra, Hayagriva, Eleven-Headed Thousand-Armed Guanyin and Guanyin Of The Southern Seas among others.
Gender variant representations of some bodhisattvas, most notably Avalokiteśvara, has prompted conversation regarding the nature of a bodhisattva's appearance. Chan master Sheng Yen has stated that Mahāsattvas such as Avalokiteśvara (known as Guanyin in Chinese) are androgynous (Ch. 中性; pinyin: "zhōngxìng"), which accounts for their ability to manifest in masculine and feminine forms of various degrees.
In Tibetan Buddhism, Tara or Jetsun Dölma (rje btsun sgrol ma) is the most important female bodhisattva.
Numerous Mahayana sutras feature female bodhisattvas as main characters and discuss their life, teachings and future Buddhahood. These include The Questions of the Girl Vimalaśraddhā (Tohoku Kangyur - Toh number 84), The Questions of Vimaladattā (Toh 77), ''The Lion's Roar of Śrīmālādevī (Toh 92), The Inquiry of Lokadhara (Toh 174), The Sūtra of Aśokadattā's Prophecy (Toh 76), The Questions of Vimalaprabhā (Toh 168), The Sūtra of Kṣemavatī's Prophecy (Toh 192), The Questions of the Girl Sumati (Toh 74), The Questions of Gaṅgottara (Toh 75), The Questions of an Old Lady (Toh 171), The Miraculous Play of Mañjuśrī (Toh 96), and The Sūtra of the Girl Candrottarā's Prophecy (Toh 191).
Popular figures
for the benefit of sentient beings.]]
Over time, numerous historical Buddhist figures also came to be seen as bodhisattvas in their own right, deserving of devotion. For example, an extensive hagiography developed around Nagarjuna, the Indian founder of the madhyamaka school of philosophy. Followers of Tibetan Buddhism consider the Dalai Lamas and the Karmapas to be an emanation of Chenrezig, the Bodhisattva of Compassion. Various Japanese Buddhist schools consider their founding figures like Kukai and Nichiren to be bodhisattvas. In Chinese Buddhism, various historical figures have been called bodhisattvas.
Furthermore, various Hindu deities are considered to be bodhisattvas in Mahayana Buddhist sources. For example, in the Kāraṇḍavyūhasūtra, Vishnu, Shiva, Brahma and Saraswati are said to be bodhisattvas, all emanations of Avalokiteshvara. Deities like Saraswati (Chinese: Biàncáitiān, 辯才天, Japanese: Benzaiten) and Shiva (C: Dàzìzàitiān, 大自在天; J: Daikokuten) are still venerated as bodhisattva devas and dharmapalas (guardian deities) in East Asian Buddhism. Both figures are closely connected with Avalokiteshvara. In a similar manner, the Hindu deity Harihara is called a bodhisattva in the famed Nīlakaṇṭha Dhāraṇī, which states: "O Effulgence, World-Transcendent, come, oh Hari, the great bodhisattva."
The empress Wu Zetian of the Tang dynasty, was the only female ruler of China. She used the growing popularity of Esoteric Buddhism in China for her own needs. Though she was not the only ruler to have made such a claim, the political utility of her claims, coupled with sincerity make her a great example. She built several temples and contributed to the finishing of the Longmen Caves and even went on to patronise Buddhism over Confucianism or Daoism. She ruled by the title of "Holy Emperor", and claimed to be a Bodhisattva too. She became one of China's most influential rulers.
Others
thumb|Fierce bodhisattva Vajrapani from Inner Mongolia, Östasiatiska museet, Stockholm, Sweden
Other important bodhisattvas in Mahayana Buddhism include:
* Bhadrapāla, appearing in various sutras like the Lotus
* Vajrasattva, an important figure in Vajrayana Buddhism
* Vimalakirti the famous lay bodhisattva of the Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa
* Akṣayamati, the main character in the influential Akṣayamatinirdeśa Sūtra
* Sadāprarudita, a major bodhisattva in the Prajñāpāramitā sutras
* Sudhana, the main character of the Gaṇḍavyūha Sutra
* The Four Bodhisattvas of the Earth from the Lotus Sutra
* Bhaiṣajyarāja or "Medicine King"
* Candraprabha ("Moon Light")
* Sūryaprabha ("Solar Light")
* Jambhala, a bodhisattva of wealth
* Mahāsthāmaprāpta, the second attendant bodhisattva to Amitabha (after Avalokiteshvara)
* Akṣayamati
Fierce bodhisattvas
, a wrathful manifestation of Manjushri in Tibetan Buddhism]]
While bodhisattvas tend to be depicted as conventionally beautiful, there are instances of their manifestation as fierceful and monstrous looking beings. A notable example is Guanyin's manifestation as a preta named "Flaming Face" (面燃大士). This trope is commonly employed among the Wisdom Kings, among whom Mahāmāyūrī Vidyārājñī stands out with a feminine title and benevolent expression. In some depictions, her mount takes on a wrathful appearance. This variation is also found among images of Vajrapani.
In Tibetan Buddhism, fierce manifestations (Tibetan: trowo) of the major bodhisattvas are quite common and they often act as protector deities.
Sacred places
]]
The place of a bodhisattva's earthly deeds, such as the achievement of enlightenment or the acts of Dharma, is known as a bodhimaṇḍa (place of awakening), and may be a site of pilgrimage. Many temples and monasteries are famous as bodhimaṇḍas. Perhaps the most famous bodhimaṇḍa of all is the Bodhi Tree under which Śākyamuṇi achieved Buddhahood. There are also sacred places of awakening for bodhisattvas located throughout the Buddhist world. Mount Potalaka, a sacred mountain in India, is traditionally held to be Avalokiteshvara's bodhimaṇḍa.
In Chinese Buddhism, there are four mountains that are regarded as bodhimaṇḍas for bodhisattvas, with each site having major monasteries and being popular for pilgrimages by both monastics and laypeople. These four sacred places are:
* Mount Putuo for Guanyin (Avalokiteśvara), the bodhisattva of Compassion ()
* Mount Emei for Samantabhadra, the bodhisattva of practice ()
* Mount Wutai for Mañjuśrī, the bodhisattva of wisdom ()
* Mount Jiuhua for Kṣitigarbha, the bodhisattva of the great vow ()
In Theravada Buddhism
-Vishnu, Seema Malaka, Sri Lanka]]
While the veneration of bodhisattvas is much more widespread and popular in the Mahayana Buddhist world, it is also found in Theravada Buddhist regions. Bodhisattvas which are venerated in Theravada lands include Natha Deviyo (Avalokiteshvara), Metteya (Maitreya), Upulvan (i.e. Vishnu), Saman (Samantabhadra) and Pattini. The veneration of some of these figures may have been influenced by Mahayana Buddhism.
* The Sanskrit term sattva may mean "strength, energy, vigour, power, courage" and therefore, bodhisattva could also mean "one whose energy and power is directed towards bodhi". This reading of sattva is found in Ksemendra's AvadanakalpaIata. Har Dayal supports this reading, noting that the term sattva is "almost certainly related to the Vedic word satvan, which means 'a strong or valiant man, hero, warrior and thus, the term bodhisatta should be interpreted as "heroic being, spiritual warrior."
* Sattva may also mean spirit, mind, sense, consciousness, or geist. Various Indian commentators like Prajñakaramati interpret the term as a synonym for citta (mind, thought) or vyavasāya (decision, determination). Thus, the term bodhisattva could also mean: "one whose mind, intentions, thoughts or wishes are fixed on bodhi". In this sense, this meaning of sattva is similar to the meaning it has in the Yoga-sutras, where it means mind.
* Tibetan lexicographers translate bodhisattva as byang chub (bodhi) sems dpa (sattva). In this compound, sems means mind, while dpa means "hero, strong man" (Skt. vīra). Thus, this translation combines two possible etymologies of sattva explained above: as "mind" and as "courageous, hero".
* Chinese Buddhists generally use the term pusa (菩薩), a phonetic transcription of the Sanskrit term. However, early Chinese translators sometimes used a meaning translation of the term bodhisattva, which they rendered as mingshi (明士), which means "a person who understands", reading sattva as "man" or "person" (shi, 士).
* In Sanskrit, sattva can mean "essence, nature, true essence", and the Pali satta can mean "substance". Some modern scholars interpret bodhisattva in this light, such as Monier-Williams, who translates the term as "one who has bodhi or perfect wisdom as his essence." Gallery
<gallery>
File:Bodhisattva Maitreya (musée Guimet) (5424601351).jpg|Standing bodhisattva. Gandhāra, 2nd–3rd century
File:Museum für Indische Kunst Dahlem Berlin Mai 2006 006.jpg|Standing bodhisattva. Gandhāra, 2nd–3rd century
File:COLLECTIE TROPENMUSEUM Boeddhistisch beeld van mogelijk acoliet in de tempel Tjandi Mendoet rechts. TMnr 60004721.jpg|Bodhisattva Vajrapani. Mendut near Borobudur, Central Java, Indonesia. Sailendran art c. 8th century
File:Avalokiteçvara, Malayu Srivijaya style.jpg|The golden Srivijayan Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, Muarabulian, Jambi, Indonesia c. 11th century
File:Sanjusangendo Thousand-armed Kannon.JPG|Thousand-armed Bodhisattva, Sanjūsangen-dō, Japan. 13th century
File:Avalokiteshvara, Weligama 0699.jpg|A rock carving of Avalokiteshvara, Weligama, Sri Lanka
File:COLLECTIE TROPENMUSEUM Zilveren Manjusri beeld afkomstig uit Ngemplak Semongan TMnr 10016132.jpg|Silver Manjushri, Sailendra, early 9th century Central Java, National Museum
File:Bodhisattva Manjushri as Tikshna-Manjushri (Minjie Wenshu) MET DP164061.jpg|Bodhisattva Manjushri as Tikshna-Manjushri (Minjie Wenshu), China
File:Wood Bodhisattva.jpg|Wooden gilded statue of Avalokiteśvara, Song Dynasty (960–1279)
File:地蔵菩薩像-Jizō Bosatsu MET DT289459.jpg|Jizō Bosatsu, Japan
File:Detail, Anonymous-Bodhisattva Leading the Way (cropped).jpg|Bodhisattva painting at Dun Huang in the "1000 Buddha cave" (cave 17)
File:MET DT258174.jpg|Manjushri, 17th–18th century China
File:MET DT5228.jpg|Padmapani Lokeshvara, Nepal, 11th century
File:MET DP123371.jpg|Standing Bodhisattva, probably Maitreya, Gandhara
File:Yulin Cave 3 w wall Samantabhadra (Western Xia).jpg|Samantabhadra, Yulin Cave 3, Western Xia
File:如意輪観音坐像-Nyoirin Kannon MET DP338626.jpg|Nyoirin Kannon, Japan, 1693
File:Bodhisattva White Avalokiteshvara (Amoghapasha Lokeshvara), early Malla period, 14th century, Nepal, polychromed wood - Freer Gallery of Art - DSC05217.JPG|White Avalokiteshvara (Amoghapasha Lokeshvara), 14th century, Nepal
File:Bodhisattva Maitreya, the Future Buddha - Google Art Project.jpg|Maitreya, Himalayan, 15th century
File:Bodhisattva Padmapani, India, Gandharan period, 200s AD, schist - Dallas Museum of Art - DSC05034.jpg|Padmapani, India, Gandharan period, 200s CE, schist
File:Gandharan sculpture - head of a bodhisattva.jpg|Gandharan sculpture, head of a bodhisattva
File:Bodhisattva Vajrapani (14131432038).jpg|Vajrapani, Cambodia, 10th century
File:Bodhisattva Musée Guimet 27972B.jpg|Lokesvara, Cambodia, 10th–11th century
File:Bodhisattva Lokeshvara Museum Rietberg RVI 106.jpg|Lokeshvara, Bihar, Teladha Vihara
File:Avalokiteshvara, One of the Eight Great Bodhisattvas - Google Art Project.jpg|Avalokiteshvara, 18th century
File:Bodhisattva Guanyin Statue, Nanshan Guanyin Park (10098551095).jpg|Guanyin Statue, Nanshan Guanyin Park
File:The Bodhisattva Maitreya LACMA M.69.13.7 (3 of 7).jpg|Maitreya, Bihar, Gaya District, 11th century
File:Nepal, bodhisattva della sapienza manjushri, bronzo dorato, xv secolo.jpg|Manjusri, Nepal, 15th century
</gallery>
See also
* Bodhicharyavatara (A Guide to the Bodhisattva Way of Life)
* Bodhisattvas of the Earth
* Bodhisattva vows
* Buddhist holidays
* Junzi
* Karuna (compassion'' in Sanskrit)
* List of bodhisattvas
* Vegetarianism in Buddhism
References
Works cited
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
*
* Gampopa; The Jewel Ornament of Liberation; Snow Lion Publications;
*
* Fully digitized text from The Metropolitan Museum of Art libraries.
* Lampert, K.; Traditions of Compassion: From Religious Duty to Social Activism. Palgrave-Macmillan;
*
*
*
* White, Kenneth R.; The Role of Bodhicitta in Buddhist Enlightenment: Including a Translation into English of Bodhicitta-sastra, Benkemmitsu-nikyoron, and Sammaya-kaijo; Lewiston, New York: Edwin Mellen Press, 2005;
External links
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jFxkEQacVA Bodhisattva, probably Avalokiteshvara (Guanyin), Northern Qi dynasty, c. 550--60], video, Smarthistory. Archived at [https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/8jFxkEQacVA ghostarchive.org] on 24 May 2022.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070610212029/http://dhechen.com/pub/spiritual/37prac.htm The Thirty-Seven Practices of Bodhisattvas], all-in-one page with memory aids & collection of different versions.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060715041706/http://sealevel.ns.ca/bodhi/index.html What A Bodhisattva Does: Thirty-Seven Practices by Ngulchu Thogme] with slide show format.
Category:Buddhist philosophical concepts
Category:Buddhist titles
Category:Gender and Buddhism
Category:Buddhist stages of enlightenment | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhisattva | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.684307 |
3969 | Buckingham Palace | Buckingham Palace () is a royal residence in London, and the administrative headquarters of the monarch of the United Kingdom. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is often at the centre of state occasions and royal hospitality. It has been a focal point for the British people at times of national rejoicing and mourning.
Originally known as Buckingham House, the building at the core of today's palace was a large townhouse built for the Duke of Buckingham and Normanby in 1703 on a site that had been in private ownership for at least 150 years. It was acquired by George III in 1761 as a private residence for Queen Charlotte and became known as The Queen's House. During the 19th century it was enlarged by architects John Nash and Edward Blore, who constructed three wings around a central courtyard. Buckingham Palace became the London residence of the British monarch on the accession of Queen Victoria in 1837.
The last major structural additions were made in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including the East Front, which contains the balcony on which the royal family traditionally appears to greet crowds. A German bomb destroyed the palace chapel during the Second World War; the King's Gallery was built on the site and opened to the public in 1962 to exhibit works of art from the Royal Collection.
The original early-19th-century interior designs, many of which survive, include widespread use of brightly coloured scagliola and blue and pink lapis, on the advice of Charles Long. King Edward VII oversaw a partial redecoration in a Belle Époque cream and gold colour scheme. Many smaller reception rooms are furnished in the Chinese regency style with furniture and fittings brought from the Royal Pavilion at Brighton and from Carlton House. The palace has 775 rooms, and the garden is the largest private garden in London. The state rooms, used for official and state entertaining, are open to the public each year for most of August and September and on some days in winter and spring.
History
Pre-1624
In the Middle Ages, the site of the future palace formed part of the Manor of Ebury (also called Eia). The marshy ground was watered by the river Tyburn, which still flows below the courtyard and south wing of the palace. Where the river was fordable (at Cow Ford), the village of Eye Cross grew. Ownership of the site changed hands many times; owners included Edward the Confessor and Edith of Wessex in late Saxon times, and, after the Norman Conquest, William the Conqueror. William gave the site to Geoffrey de Mandeville, who bequeathed it to the monks of Westminster Abbey.
In 1531, Henry VIII acquired the Hospital of St James, which became St James's Palace, from Eton College, and in 1536 he took the Manor of Ebury from Westminster Abbey. These transfers brought the site of Buckingham Palace back into royal hands for the first time since William the Conqueror had given it away almost 500 years earlier. Various owners leased it from royal landlords, and the freehold was the subject of frenzied speculation during the 17th century. By then, the old village of Eye Cross had long since fallen into decay, and the area was mostly wasteland. Needing money, James VI and I sold off part of the Crown freehold but retained part of the site on which he established a mulberry garden for the production of silk. (This is at the north-west corner of today's palace.) Clement Walker in Anarchia Anglicana (1649) refers to "new-erected sodoms and spintries at the Mulberry Garden at S. James's"; this suggests it may have been a place of debauchery. Eventually, in the late 17th century, the freehold was inherited from the property tycoon Hugh Audley by the great heiress Mary Davies.First houses on the site (1624–1761)<span class"anchor" id"Arlington House"></span>Possibly the first house erected within the site was that of William Blake, around 1624. The next owner was George Goring, 1st Earl of Norwich, who from 1633 extended Blake's house, which came to be known as Goring House, and developed much of today's garden, then known as Goring Great Garden. He did not, however, obtain the freehold interest in the mulberry garden. Unbeknown to Goring, in 1640 the document "failed to pass the Great Seal before Charles I fled London, which it needed to do for legal execution". It was this critical omission that would help the British royal family regain the freehold under George III. When the improvident Goring defaulted on his rents, Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington was able to purchase the lease of Goring House and he was occupying it when it burned down in 1674, Buckingham House was built for Sheffield in 1703 to the design of William Winde. The style chosen was of a large, three-floored central block with two smaller flanking service wings. It was eventually sold by Buckingham's illegitimate son, Charles Sheffield, in 1761 to George III for £21,000. Sheffield's leasehold on the mulberry garden site, the freehold of which was still owned by the royal family, was due to expire in 1774.
From Queen's House to palace (1761–1837)
<!-- Queen's House (disambiguation) links here-->
]]
Under the new royal ownership, the building was originally intended as a private retreat for Queen Charlotte, and was accordingly known as The Queen's House. Remodelling of the structure began in 1762. In 1775, an Act of Parliament settled the property on Queen Charlotte, in exchange for her rights to nearby Old Somerset House, and 14 of her 15 children were born there. Some furnishings were transferred from Carlton House and others had been bought in France after the French Revolution of 1789. While St James's Palace remained the official and ceremonial royal residence,
After his accession to the throne in 1820, George IV continued the renovation, intending to create a small, comfortable home. However, in 1826, while the work was in progress, the King decided to modify the house into a palace with the help of his architect John Nash. The façade was designed with George IV's preference for French neoclassical architecture in mind. The cost of the renovations grew dramatically, and by 1829 the extravagance of Nash's designs resulted in his removal as the architect. On the death of George IV in 1830, his younger brother William IV hired Edward Blore to finish the work. William never moved into the palace, preferring Clarence House, which had been built to his specifications and which had been his London home while he was heir presumptive. After the Palace of Westminster was destroyed by fire in 1834, he offered to convert Buckingham Palace into a new Houses of Parliament, but his offer was declined.Queen Victoria (1837–1901)
at left, a ceremonial entrance. It was moved next to Hyde Park to make way for the new east wing in 1847.]]
Buckingham Palace became the principal royal residence in 1837, on the accession of Queen Victoria, who was the first monarch to reside there. While the state rooms were a riot of gilt and colour, the necessities of the new palace were somewhat less luxurious. The chimneys were said to smoke so much that the fires had to be allowed to die down, and consequently the palace was often cold. Ventilation was so bad that the interior smelled, and when it was decided to install gas lamps, there was a serious worry about the build-up of gas on the lower floors. It was also said that the staff were lax and lazy and the palace was dirty. By the end of 1840, all the problems had been rectified. However, the builders were to return within a decade.
By 1847, the couple found the palace too small for court life and their growing family and a new wing, designed by Edward Blore, was built by Thomas Cubitt, enclosing the central quadrangle. The work, carried out from 1847 to 1849, was paid for by the sale of Brighton Pavilion in 1850. The ballroom wing and a further suite of state rooms were also built in this period, designed by Nash's student James Pennethorne. Before Prince Albert's death, in addition to royal ceremonies, investitures and presentations Buckingham Palace was frequently the scene of lavish costume balls and musical entertainments. The most celebrated contemporary musicians entertained there; for example Felix Mendelssohn is known to have played there on three occasions, and Johann Strauss II and his orchestra played there when in England.
Widowed in 1861, the grief-stricken Queen withdrew from public life and left Buckingham Palace to live at Windsor Castle, Balmoral Castle and Osborne House. For many years the palace was seldom used, even neglected. In 1864, a note was found pinned to the fence, saying: "These commanding premises to be let or sold, in consequence of the late occupant's declining business." Eventually, public opinion persuaded the Queen to return to London, though even then she preferred to live elsewhere whenever possible. Court functions were still held at Windsor Castle, presided over by the sombre Queen habitually dressed in mourning black, while Buckingham Palace remained shuttered for most of the year.Early 20th century (1901–1945)
In 1901, the new king, Edward VII, began redecorating the palace. He and his wife, Queen Alexandra, had always been at the forefront of London high society, and their friends, known as "the Marlborough House Set", were considered to be the most eminent and fashionable of the age. Buckingham Palace—the Ballroom, Grand Entrance, Marble Hall, Grand Staircase, vestibules and galleries were redecorated in the Belle Époque cream and gold colour scheme they retain today—once again became a setting for entertaining on a majestic scale but leaving some to feel Edward's heavy redecorations were at odds with Nash's original work.
The last major building work took place during the reign of George V when, in 1913, Aston Webb redesigned Blore's 1850 East Front to resemble in part Giacomo Leoni's Lyme Park in Cheshire. This new refaced principal façade (of Portland stone) was designed to be the backdrop to the Victoria Memorial, a large memorial statue of Queen Victoria created by sculptor Thomas Brock, erected outside the main gates on a surround constructed by architect Aston Webb. George V, who had succeeded Edward VII in 1910, had a more serious personality than his father; greater emphasis was now placed on official entertainment and royal duties than on lavish parties. He arranged a series of command performances featuring jazz musicians such as the Original Dixieland Jazz Band (1919; the first jazz performance for a head of state), Sidney Bechet and Louis Armstrong (1932), which earned the palace a nomination in 2009 for a (Kind of) Blue Plaque by the Brecon Jazz Festival as one of the venues making the greatest contribution to jazz music in the United Kingdom.
During the First World War, which lasted from 1914 until 1918, the palace escaped unscathed. Its more valuable contents were evacuated to Windsor, but the royal family remained in residence. The King imposed rationing at the palace, much to the dismay of his guests and household. To the King's later regret, David Lloyd George persuaded him to go further and ostentatiously lock the wine cellars and refrain from alcohol, to set a good example to the supposedly inebriated working class. The workers continued to imbibe, and the King was left unhappy at his enforced abstinence.
George V's wife, Queen Mary, was a connoisseur of the arts and took a keen interest in the Royal Collection of furniture and art, both restoring and adding to it. Queen Mary also had many new fixtures and fittings installed, such as the pair of marble Empire style chimneypieces by Benjamin Vulliamy, dating from 1810, in the ground floor Bow Room, the huge low room at the centre of the garden façade. Queen Mary was also responsible for the decoration of the Blue Drawing Room. This room, long, previously known as the South Drawing Room, has a ceiling designed by Nash, coffered with huge gilt console brackets. In 1938, the northwest pavilion, designed by Nash as a conservatory, was converted into a swimming pool.Second World War
During the Second World War, which broke out in 1939, the palace was bombed nine times. The most serious and publicised incident destroyed the palace chapel in 1940. One bomb fell in the palace quadrangle while George VI and Queen Elizabeth (the future Queen Mother) were in the palace, and many windows were blown in and the chapel destroyed. <!-- Wartime coverage of such incidents was severely restricted, however. --> The King and Queen were filmed inspecting their bombed home, and the newsreel footage shown in cinemas throughout the United Kingdom to show the common suffering of rich and poor. As The Sunday Graphic reported:
It was at this time the Queen famously declared: "I'm glad we have been bombed. Now I can look the East End in the face".
On 15 September 1940, known as Battle of Britain Day, an RAF pilot, Ray Holmes of No. 504 Squadron, rammed a German Dornier Do 17 bomber he believed was going to bomb the palace. Holmes had run out of ammunition to shoot down the bomber and made the quick decision to ram it. He bailed out and the bomber crashed into the forecourt of London Victoria station. Its engine was later exhibited at the Imperial War Museum in London. Holmes became a King's Messenger after the war and died at the age of 90 in 2005.
On VE Day—8 May 1945—the palace was the centre of British celebrations. The King, the Queen, Princess Elizabeth (the future queen) and Princess Margaret appeared on the balcony, with the palace's blacked-out windows behind them, to cheers from a vast crowd in The Mall. The damaged palace was carefully restored after the war by John Mowlem & Co.Mid-20th century to present day
during a dress rehearsal for Trooping the Colour in 2015, seen from within the palace]]
Many of the palace's contents are part of the Royal Collection; they can, on occasion, be viewed by the public at the King's Gallery, near the Royal Mews. The purpose-built gallery opened in 1962 and displays a changing selection of items from the collection. It occupies the site of the chapel that was destroyed in the Second World War. Its state rooms have been open to the public during August and September and on some dates throughout the year since 1993. The money raised in entry fees was originally put towards the rebuilding of Windsor Castle after the 1992 fire devastated many of its staterooms. In the year to 31 March 2017, 580,000 people visited the palace, and 154,000 visited the gallery. In 2004, the palace attempted to claim money from the community energy fund to heat Buckingham Palace, but the claim was rejected due to fear of public backlash.
The palace used to racially segregate staff. In 1968, Charles Tryon, 2nd Baron Tryon, acting as treasurer to Queen Elizabeth II, sought to exempt Buckingham Palace from full application of the Race Relations Act 1968. He stated that the palace did not hire people of colour for clerical jobs, only as domestic servants. He arranged with civil servants for an exemption that meant that complaints of racism against the royal household would be sent directly to the Home Secretary and kept out of the legal system. nor are they the monarch's personal property, unlike Sandringham House and Balmoral Castle. The Government of the United Kingdom is responsible for maintaining the palace in exchange for the profits made by the Crown Estate. In 2015, the State Dining Room was closed for a year and a half because its ceiling had become potentially dangerous. A 10-year schedule of maintenance work, including new plumbing, wiring, boilers and radiators, and the installation of solar panels on the roof, has been estimated to cost £369 million and was approved by the prime minister in November 2016. It will be funded by a temporary increase in the Sovereign Grant paid from the income of the Crown Estate and is intended to extend the building's working life by at least 50 years. In 2017, the House of Commons backed funding for the project by 464 votes to 56.
Buckingham Palace is a symbol and home of the British monarchy, an art gallery and a tourist attraction. Behind the gilded railings and gates that were completed by the Bromsgrove Guild in 1911, Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh and Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh continue to have a private apartment in the palace for use when they are in London. The palace also houses their offices, as well as those of the Princess Royal and Princess Alexandra, and is the workplace of more than 800 people. Charles III lives at Clarence House while restoration work continues, although he conducts official business at Buckingham Palace, including weekly meetings with the prime minister. Every year, some 50,000 invited guests are entertained at garden parties, receptions, audiences and banquets. Three garden parties are held in the summer, usually in July. The forecourt of Buckingham Palace is used for the Changing of the Guard, a major ceremony and tourist attraction (daily from April to July; every other day in other months).Interior
'' of Buckingham Palace. The areas defined by shaded walls represent lower minor wings. Note: this is an unscaled sketch plan for reference only. Proportions of some rooms may differ slightly in reality.]]
The front of the palace measures across, by deep, by high and contains over of floorspace. There are 775 rooms, including 188 staff bedrooms, 92 offices, 78 bathrooms, 52 principal bedrooms and 19 state rooms. It also has a post office, cinema, swimming pool, doctor's surgery, and jeweller's workshop. The royal family occupy a small suite of private rooms in the north wing. Principal rooms The principal rooms are contained on the first-floor piano nobile behind the west-facing garden façade at the rear of the palace. The centre of this ornate suite of state rooms is the Music Room, its large bow the dominant feature of the façade. Flanking the Music Room are the Blue and the White Drawing Rooms. At the centre of the suite, serving as a corridor to link the state rooms, is the Picture Gallery, which is top-lit and long. The Gallery is hung with numerous works including some by Rembrandt, van Dyck, Rubens and Vermeer; other rooms leading from the Picture Gallery are the Throne Room and the Green Drawing Room. The Green Drawing Room serves as a huge anteroom to the Throne Room, and is part of the ceremonial route to the throne from the Guard Room at the top of the Grand Staircase.
Semi-state apartments
and his wife Catherine greeting Barack and Michelle Obama in the 1844 room]]
Directly underneath the state apartments are the less grand semi-state apartments. Opening from the Marble Hall, these rooms are used for less formal entertaining, such as luncheon parties and private audiences. At the centre of this floor is the Bow Room, through which thousands of guests pass annually to the monarch's garden parties. When paying a state visit to Britain, foreign heads of state are usually entertained by the monarch at Buckingham Palace. They are allocated an extensive suite of rooms known as the Belgian Suite, situated at the foot of the Minister's Staircase, on the ground floor of the west-facing Garden Wing. Some of the rooms are named and decorated for particular visitors, such as the 1844 Room, decorated in that year for the state visit of Nicholas I of Russia, and the 1855 Room, in honour of the visit of Napoleon III of France. The former is a sitting room that also serves as an audience room and is often used for personal investitures. Narrow corridors link the rooms of the suite; one of them is given extra height and perspective by saucer domes designed by Nash in the style of Soane. A second corridor in the suite has Gothic-influenced cross-over vaulting.
East wing
celebrations in 2022]]
Between 1847 and 1850, when Blore was building the new east wing, the Brighton Pavilion was once again plundered of its fittings. As a result, many of the rooms in the new wing have a distinctly oriental atmosphere. The red and blue Chinese Luncheon Room is made up of parts of the Brighton Banqueting and Music Rooms with a large oriental chimneypiece designed by Robert Jones and sculpted by Richard Westmacott. It was formerly in the Music Room at the Brighton Pavilion. The Yellow Drawing Room has hand-painted Chinese wallpaper supplied in 1817 for the Brighton Saloon, and a chimneypiece which is a European vision of a Chinese chimneypiece. It has nodding mandarins in niches and fearsome winged dragons, designed by Robert Jones.
At the centre of this wing is the famous balcony with the Centre Room behind its glass doors. This is a Chinese-style saloon enhanced by Queen Mary, who, working with the designer Charles Allom, created a more "binding" Chinese theme in the late 1920s, although the lacquer doors were brought from Brighton in 1873. Running the length of the piano nobile of the east wing is the Great Gallery, modestly known as the Principal Corridor, which runs the length of the eastern side of the quadrangle. It has mirrored doors and mirrored cross walls reflecting porcelain pagodas and other oriental furniture from Brighton. The Chinese Luncheon Room and Yellow Drawing Room are situated at each end of this gallery, with the Centre Room in between.Court ceremonies
conducting an Investiture in the Throne Room in 2023]]
Investitures for the awarding of honours (which include the conferring of knighthoods by dubbing with a sword) usually take place in the palace's Throne Room. Investitures are conducted by the King or another senior member of the royal family: a military band plays in the musicians' gallery, as recipients receive their honours, watched by their families and friends.
hosted President Barack Obama]]
State banquets take place in the Ballroom, built in 1854. At long, wide and high, State Banquets are formal dinners held on the first evening of a state visit by a foreign head of state.
The largest and most formal reception at Buckingham Palace takes place every November when the King entertains members of the diplomatic corps. On this grand occasion, all the state rooms are in use, as the royal family proceed through them, beginning at the great north doors of the Picture Gallery. As Nash had envisaged, all the large, double-mirrored doors stand open, reflecting the numerous crystal chandeliers and sconces, creating a deliberate optical illusion of space and light.
Smaller ceremonies such as the reception of new ambassadors take place in the "1844 Room". Here too, the King holds small lunch parties, and often meetings of the Privy Council. Larger lunch parties often take place in the curved and domed Music Room or the State Dining Room. Since the bombing of the palace chapel in World War II, royal christenings have sometimes taken place in the Music Room. Queen Elizabeth II's first three children were all baptised there. On all formal occasions, the ceremonies are attended by the Yeomen of the Guard, in their historic uniforms, and other officers of the court such as the Lord Chamberlain. Following his accession in 1936, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth allowed the hemline of daytime skirts to rise. Today, there is no official dress code.
Court presentation of débutantes
Débutantes were aristocratic young ladies making their first entrée into society through a presentation to the monarch at court. These occasions, known as "coming out", took place at the palace from the reign of Edward VII. The débutantes entered—wearing full court dress, with three ostrich feathers in their hair—curtsied, performed a backwards walk and a further curtsey, while manoeuvring a dress train of prescribed length. The ceremony, known as an evening court, corresponded to the "court drawing rooms" of Victoria's reign. After World War II, the ceremony was replaced by less formal afternoon receptions, omitting the requirement of court evening dress. In 1958, Queen Elizabeth II abolished the presentation parties for débutantes, replacing them with Garden Parties, for up to 8,000 invitees in the Garden. They are the largest functions of the year.Garden and surroundings
At the rear of the palace is the large and park-like garden, which together with its lake is the largest private garden in London. There, Elizabeth II hosted her annual garden parties each summer and also held large functions to celebrate royal milestones, such as jubilees. It covers and includes a helicopter landing area, a lake and a tennis court. It was last used for the coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla. Also housed in the mews are the coach horses used at royal ceremonial processions as well as many of the cars used by the royal family.
The Mall, a ceremonial approach route to the palace, was designed by Aston Webb and completed in 1911 as part of a grand memorial to Queen Victoria. It extends from Admiralty Arch, across St James's Park to the Victoria Memorial, concluding at the entrance gates into the palace forecourt. This route is used by the cavalcades and motorcades of visiting heads of state, and by the royal family on state occasions—such as the annual Trooping the Colour.
Security breachesThe boy Jones was an intruder who gained entry to the palace on three occasions between 1838 and 1841. At least 12 people have managed to gain unauthorised entry into the palace or its grounds since 1914, including Michael Fagan, who broke into the palace twice in 1982 and entered Queen Elizabeth II's bedroom on the second occasion on 9 July. At the time, news media reported that he had a long conversation with her while she waited for security officers to arrive, but in a 2012 interview with The Independent, Fagan said she ran out of the room, and no conversation took place. It was only in 2007 that trespassing on the palace grounds became a specific criminal offence.
See also
* Flags at Buckingham Palace
* List of British royal residences
* King's Guard
Notes
References
Bibliography
* Allison, Ronald; Riddell, Sarah (1991). [https://archive.org/details/royalencyclopedi0000unse The Royal Encyclopedia]. London: Macmillan.
* Blaikie, Thomas (2002). [https://books.google.com/books?idSOQ8LDRIRlEC&printsecfrontcover&dqYou+Look+Awfully+Like+the+Queen:+Wit+and+Wisdom+from+the+House+of+Windsor&hlen&newbks1&newbks_redir0&saX&ved2ahUKEwiOj4uX9pKMAxXSrokEHZbWN84Q6AF6BAgIEAM#vonepage&q&ffalse You Look Awfully Like the Queen: Wit and Wisdom from the House of Windsor]. London: HarperCollins. .
* Goring, O. G. (1937). [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.89709 From Goring House to Buckingham Palace]. London: Ivor Nicholson & Watson.
* Harris, John; de Bellaigue, Geoffrey; & Miller, Oliver (1968). [https://archive.org/details/buckinghampalace0000harr Buckingham Palace]. London: Nelson. .
* Healey, Edma (1997). ''[https://archive.org/details/queenshousesocia0000heal The Queen's House: A Social History of Buckingham Palace]. London: Penguin Group. .
* Hedley, Olwen (1971) [https://archive.org/details/pictorialhistory0000hedl The Pictorial History of Buckingham Palace]. Pitkin, .
*
*
* Mackenzie, Compton (1953). [https://archive.org/details/queenshousehisto0000comp The Queen's House]''. London: Hutchinson.
* .
*
*
*
* .
*
*
External links
* [https://www.royal.uk/royal-residences-buckingham-palace Buckingham Palace] at the Royal Family website
* [http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=45183 Account of Buckingham Palace, with prints of Arlington House and Buckingham House] from Old and New London (1878)
* [http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=41820 Account of the acquisition of the Manor of Ebury] from Survey of London (1977)
* [https://www.rct.uk/visit/the-state-rooms-buckingham-palace The State Rooms, Buckingham Palace] at the Royal Collection Trust
*
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Category:Geographical articles missing image alternative text | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buckingham_Palace | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.748742 |
3970 | British Airways | | frequent_flyer = Executive Club/Avios
| alliance = Oneworld
| fleet_size = 244
| destinations 206
| parent = International Airlines Group
| num_employees | logo British Airways Logo.svg
| logo_size | image Airbus A321-251NX ‘G-NEOR’ British Airways.jpg
| caption = An Airbus A321 of British Airways, departing London-Heathrow Airport
| founded
| headquarters = Waterside<br> London, England
| subsidiaries =
| key_people CEO)|José Antonio Barrionuevo (CFO and director)}}
| revenue £3,693 million (2021)
| net_income £1,900 million (2021)
The airline is the second largest UK-based carrier, based on fleet size and passengers carried, behind easyJet. In January 2011, BA merged with Iberia, creating the International Airlines Group (IAG), a holding company registered in Madrid, Spain. IAG is the world's third-largest airline group in terms of annual revenue and the second-largest in Europe. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and in the FTSE 100 Index. British Airways is the first passenger airline to have generated more than US$1 billion on a single air route in a year (from 1 April 2017, to 31 March 2018, on the New York-JFK – London-Heathrow route).
BA was created in 1974 after a British Airways Board was established by the British government to manage the two nationalised airline corporations, British Overseas Airways Corporation and British European Airways, and two regional airlines, Cambrian Airways and Northeast Airlines. On 31 March 1974, all four companies were merged to form British Airways. However, it marked 2019 as its centenary based on predecessor companies. After almost 13 years as a state company, BA was privatised in February 1987 as part of a wider privatisation plan by the Conservative government. The carrier expanded with the acquisition of British Caledonian in 1987, Dan-Air in 1992, and British Midland International in 2012.
It is a founding member of the Oneworld airline alliance, along with American Airlines, the now-defunct Canadian Airlines, Cathay Pacific, and Qantas. The alliance has since grown to become the third-largest, after SkyTeam and Star Alliance.
History
in BOAC-British Airways transition livery (1976)]]
Proposals to establish a joint British airline, combining the assets of the British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) and British European Airways (BEA), were first raised in 1953 as a result of difficulties in attempts by BOAC and BEA to negotiate air rights through the British colony of Cyprus. Increasingly BOAC was protesting that BEA was using its subsidiary Cyprus Airways to circumvent an agreement that BEA would not fly routes further east than Cyprus, particularly to the increasingly important oil regions in the Middle East. The chairman of BOAC, Miles Thomas, was in favour of a merger as a potential solution to this disagreement and had backing for the idea from the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time, Rab Butler. However, opposition from the Treasury blocked the proposal.
Consequently, it was only following the recommendations of the 1969 Edwards Report that a new British Airways Board, managing both BEA and BOAC, and the two regional British airlines Cambrian Airways based at Cardiff, and Northeast Airlines based at Newcastle upon Tyne, was constituted on 1 April 1972. Although each airline's branding was maintained initially, two years later the British Airways Board unified its branding, effectively establishing British Airways as an airline on 31 March 1974.
Following two years of fierce competition with British Caledonian, the second-largest airline in the United Kingdom at the time, the Government changed its aviation policy in 1976 so that the two carriers would no longer compete on long-haul routes.
British Airways and Air France operated the supersonic Concorde airliner, and the world's first supersonic passenger service flew on 21 January 1976 from London Heathrow Airport to Bahrain International Airport. Services to the U.S. began on 24 May 1976 with a flight to Washington Dulles airport, and flights to New York JFK airport followed on 22 September 1977. Service to Singapore was established in co-operation with Singapore Airlines as a continuation of the flight to Bahrain.
in its transitional scheme with BEA livery but with British Airways titles]]
In 1981 the airline was instructed to prepare for privatisation by the Conservative Thatcher government. Sir John King, later Lord King, was appointed chairman, charged with bringing the airline back into profitability. While many other large airlines struggled, King was credited with transforming British Airways into one of the most profitable air carriers in the world. The flag carrier was privatised and was floated on the London Stock Exchange in February 1987. British Airways effected the takeover of the UK's "second" airline, British Caledonian, in July of that same year.
The formation of Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic in 1984 created a competitor for BA. The intense rivalry between British Airways and Virgin Atlantic culminated in the former being sued for libel in 1993, arising from claims and counterclaims over a "dirty tricks" campaign against Virgin. This campaign included allegations of poaching Virgin Atlantic customers, tampering with private files belonging to Virgin, and undermining Virgin's financial reputation in the city. As a result of the case BA management apologised "unreservedly", and the company agreed to pay £110,000 in damages to Virgin, £500,000 to Branson personally and £3 million legal costs. Lord King stepped down as chairman in 1993 and was replaced by his deputy, Colin Marshall, while Bob Ayling took over as CEO. In September 1998, British Airways, along with American Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Qantas, and Canadian Airlines, formed the Oneworld airline alliance. Oneworld began operations on 1 February 1999, and is the third-largest airline alliance in the world, behind SkyTeam and Star Alliance. The next year, however, British Airways reported an 84% drop in profits in its first quarter alone, its worst in seven years. In March 2000, Ayling was removed from his position and British Airways announced Rod Eddington as his successor. That year, British Airways and KLM conducted talks on a potential merger, reaching a decision in July to file an official merger plan with the European Commission. The plan fell through in September 2000. British Asia Airways ceased operations in 2001 after BA suspended flights to Taipei. Go was sold to its management and the private equity firm 3i in June 2001. Eddington would make further workforce cuts due to reduced demand following 11 September attacks in 2001, In 2005 Willie Walsh, managing director of Aer Lingus and a former pilot, became the chief executive officer of British Airways. BA unveiled its new subsidiary OpenSkies in January 2008, taking advantage of the liberalisation of transatlantic traffic rights between Europe and the United States. OpenSkies flies non-stop from Paris to New York's JFK and Newark airports.
In July 2008, British Airways announced a merger plan with Iberia, another flag carrier airline in the Oneworld alliance, wherein each airline would retain its original brand. The agreement was confirmed in April 2010, and in July the European Commission and U.S. Department of Transportation permitted the merger and began to co-ordinate transatlantic routes with American Airlines. On 6 October 2010 the alliance between British Airways, American Airlines and Iberia formally began operations. The alliance generates an estimated £230 million in annual cost-saving for BA, in addition to the £330 million which would be saved by the merger with Iberia. This merger was finalised on 21 January 2011, resulting in the establishment of International Airlines Group S.A. (IAG), the world's third-largest airline in terms of annual revenue and the second-largest airline group in Europe. Prior to merging, British Airways owned a 13.5% stake in Iberia, and thus received ownership of 55% of the combined International Airlines Group; Iberia's other shareholders received the remaining 45%. As a part of the merger, British Airways ceased trading independently on the London Stock Exchange after 23 years as a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.
In September 2010 Willie Walsh, now CEO of IAG, announced that the group was considering acquiring other airlines and had drawn up a shortlist of twelve possible acquisitions. In November 2011 IAG announced an agreement in principle to purchase British Midland International from Lufthansa. A contract to purchase the airline was agreed the next month, and the sale was completed for £172.5 million on 30 March 2012. The airline established a new subsidiary based at London City Airport operating Airbus A318s.
British Airways was the official airline partner of the London 2012 Olympic Games. On 18 May 2012 it flew the Olympic flame from Athens International Airport to RNAS Culdrose while carrying various dignitaries, including Lord Sebastian Coe, Princess Anne, the Olympics minister Hugh Robertson and the London Mayor Boris Johnson, along with the footballer David Beckham.
On 27 May 2017, British Airways suffered a computer power failure. All flights were cancelled and thousands of passengers were affected. By the following day, the company had not succeeded in reestablishing the normal function of its computer systems. When asked by reporters for more information on the ongoing problems, British Airways stated "The root cause was a power supply issue which our affected our IT systems - we continue to investigate this" and declined to comment further. Willie Walsh later attributed the crash to an electrical engineer disconnecting the UPS and said there would be an independent investigation.
Amidst the decline in the value of Iranian currency due to the reintroduction of U.S. sanctions on Iran, BA announced that the Iranian route is "not commercially viable". As a result, BA decided to stop its services in Iran, effective 22 September 2018.
In 2018, British Airways partnered with British tailor and designer Ozwald Boateng to redesign the company's historic uniforms, in honour of its approaching centenary, creating a new look for BA, while adhering to its traditional style. The new collection "A British Original" was launched in 2023. This design initiative also included English bone china manufactured by William Edwards and cutlery by Studio William for the company's first class service.
In 2019, as part of the celebrations of a centenary of airline operations in the United Kingdom, British Airways announced that four aircraft would receive retro liveries. The first of these is a Boeing 747-400 (G-BYGC), which was repainted into the former BOAC livery, which it retained until its retirement. Two more Boeing 747-400s were repainted with former British Airways liveries. One wore the "Landor" livery until its retirement in 2020 (G-BNLY), the other (G-CIVB), wore the original "Union Jack" livery until its retirement in 2020 also. An Airbus A319 was repainted into British European Airways livery, which is still flying as G-EUPJ.
On 28 April 2020, the company set out plans to make up to 12,000 staff redundant because of the global collapse of air traffic due to the COVID-19 pandemic and that it may not reopen its operations at Gatwick airport. They reopened at Gatwick in March 2022.
In July 2020, British Airways announced the immediate retirement of its entire 747-400 fleet, having originally intended to phase out the remaining 747s in 2024. The airline stated that its decision to bring forward the date was in part due to the downturn in air travel following the COVID-19 pandemic and to focus on incorporating more modern and fuel-efficient aircraft such as the Airbus A350 and Boeing 787. At the same time, British Airways also announced its intention to eliminate carbon emissions by 2050. On 28 July 2020, the company's cabin crew union issued an "industrial action" warning in order to prevent the 12,000 job cuts and pay cuts.
On 12 October 2020, it was announced that Sean Doyle, CEO of Aer Lingus (also part of the IAG airline group) would succeed Álex Cruz as CEO.
Corporate affairs
Business trends
The key trends for the British Airways PLC Group are shown below.
On the merger with Iberia, the accounting reference date was changed from 31 March to 31 December; figures below are therefore for the years to 31 March up to 2010, for the nine months to 31 December 2010, and for the years to 31 December thereafter:
{| class"wikitable" style"text-align:center;"
|-
!Year
! Turnover<br>(£ bn)
! Net profit<br>(£ m)
! Number of<br>employees<br>(FTE)
! Number of<br>passengers<br>(m)
! Passenger<br>load factor<br>(%)
! Number of<br>aircraft
! References
|-
| align="left" | 2008 Mar
|8.7
|694
|41,745
|34.6
|79.1
|245
|
|-
| align="left" | 2009 Mar
|8.9
|
|41,473
|33.1
|77.0
|245
|
|-
| align="left" | 2011
|9.9
|672
|36,164
|34.2
|78.2
|245
|
|-
| align="left" | 2013
|11.4
|281
|38,592
|39.9
|81.3
|278
|
|-
| align="left" | 2015
|11.3
|975
|39,309
|43.3
|81.5
|284
|
|-
| align="left" | 2016
|11.4
|1,345
|39,024
|44.5
|81.2
|293
|
|-
| align="left" | 2017
|12.2
|1,447
|38,347
|45.2
|81.8
|293
|
|-
| align="left" | 2018
|13.0
|2,091
|38,202
|46.8
|82.5
|294
|
|-
| align="left" | 2019
|13.2
|1,109
|38,230
|47.7
|83.6
|305
|
|-
| align="left" | 2020
|4.0
|
|33,898
|12.2
|61.4
|277
|
|-
| align="left" | 2021
|3.6
|
|26,890
|10.3
|58.3
|276
|
|-
| align="left" | 2022
|11.0
|61
|33,644
|33.0
|79.9
|276
|
|-
| align="left" | 2023
|14.3
|1,161
|37,401
|43.0
|83.6
|284
|
|}
In 2020, due to the crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, British Airways had to reduce its 42,000-strong workforce by 12,000 jobs. According to the estimate by IAG, a parent company, it will take the air travel industry several years to return to previous performance and profitability levels.
However, 2022 saw a dramatic increase in travel, and the company now faced a worker shortage, forcing it to cancel more than 1,500 flights. During February 2023, The international airlines group, the owners of British Airways announced that the group has returned to making an annual profit of €1.3 billion for the first time since the pandemic, following a €2.8 billion loss in 2021. The company warned that due to the surge in demand for flying this could lead to more disruption.
Operations
British Airways is the largest airline based in the United Kingdom in terms of fleet size, international flights, and international destinations and was, until 2008, the largest airline by passenger numbers. The airline carried 34.6 million passengers in 2008, but, rival carrier easyJet transported 44.5 million passengers that year, passing British Airways for the first time. British Airways holds a United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority Type A Operating Licence, it is permitted to carry passengers, cargo, and mail on aircraft with 20 or more seats.
, the head office building of British Airways]]
The airlines' head office, Waterside, stands in Harmondsworth, a village that is near Heathrow Airport. Waterside was completed in June 1998 to replace British Airways' previous head office, Speedbird House, located in Technical Block C on the grounds of Heathrow.
British Airways' main base is at Heathrow Airport, but it also has a major presence at Gatwick Airport. It also has a base at London City Airport, where its subsidiary BA CityFlyer is the largest operator. BA had previously operated a significant hub at Manchester Airport. Manchester to New York (JFK) services were withdrawn; later all international services outside London ceased when the subsidiary BA Connect was sold. Passengers wishing to travel internationally with BA either to or from regional UK destinations must now transfer in London. Heathrow Airport is dominated by British Airways, which owns 50% of the slots available at the airport as of 2019, growing from 40% in 2004. The majority of BA services operate from Terminal 5, with the exception of some flights at Terminal 3 owing to insufficient capacity at Terminal 5. At London City Airport, the company owns 52% of the slots as of 2019.SubsidiariesOver its history, BA has had many subsidiaries. In addition to the below, British Airways also owned Airways Aero Association, the operator of the British Airways flying club based at Wycombe Air Park in High Wycombe, until it was sold to Surinder Arora in 2007.
Boeing 757-200 landing at Frankfurt Airport]]
{| class="wikitable"
! Airline
! Still owned by BA
! Current status
! Details
|-
| BA CityFlyer
| Yes
| Active
| Founded 25 March 2007 as a reforming of the former subsidiary CityFlyer Express with assets of BA Connect not sold to Flybe
|-
| British Airways Engineering
| Yes
| Active
| Responsible for the maintenance, repair, and overhaul of British Airways' aircraft. BAE was formed from the merger of the engineering divisions of BOAC and BEA's when the two airlines merged in 1974 to form British Airways.
|-
| British Airways World Cargo
| No
| Merged with fellow Cargo subsidiaries of IAG to form IAG Cargo
| British Airways first opened a World Cargo centre at Heathrow in 1999. The company ended operations on 30 April 2014, having been fully merged into IAG Cargo
|-
| British Airways Helicopters
| No
| Sold
| Sold in 1986 - Now trades as British International Helicopters
|-
| BA Connect
| No
| Closed
| Formerly known as BA CitiExpress. Sold in 2007 to Flybe, closed down in 2020
|-
| OpenSkies
| Yes
| Reorganised
| Founded in 2008. OpenSkies ceased to operate under its own brand after summer 2018 to operate for IAG's new low-cost subsidiary brand Level.
|-
| British Airways Limited
| No
| Closed
| Established in 2012 to take over the operation of the premium service between London City Airport and New York-JFK. The flights returned to be directly operated by British Airways plc in 2015. The service was suspended in March 2020 amidst COVID-19, before being cancelled in August 2020.
|-
| CityFlyer Express
| No
| Closed
| Formerly a short-haul regional airline founded in 1991 (as Euroworld Airways). In 1993 it became the first British Airways (BA) franchisee operating as British Airways Express. CityFlyer's ownership passed to BA in 1999 when that company bought out the original promoters as well as 3i, the airline's main shareholder at the time. Initially, CityFlyer continued to operate as a separate unit, but it was eventually absorbed into British Airways' mainline short haul operation at Gatwick in 2001.
|-
| British Regional Airlines
| No
| Closed
| Founded in March 1991 when Manx Airlines created Manx Airlines Europe in order to expand and fly routes within the United Kingdom. In 1994 Manx Airlines Europe became a franchise carrier for British Airways. In March 2001 British Airways purchased the British Regional Airlines Group (holding company of British Regional Airlines and Manx Airlines) for £78m and merged it with Brymon Airways to create British Airways CitiExpress.
|-
| Deutsche BA
| No
| Closed
| Sold in 2008 to Air Berlin where it traded as dba by Air Berlin, before closing down in 2008
|-
| Air Liberté
| No
| Closed
| Purchased Air Liberté together with TAT and inaugurated them under one management. On 5 May 2000, BA sold Air Liberté to a partnership between Taitbout Antibes and Swissair.
|-
|BA Euroflyer
|Yes
|Active
|Created in 2022, was established to compete with easyJet at Gatwick by providing a lower cost option to the primary airline.
|}
Franchises
Boeing 727-230 at O. R. Tambo International Airport]]
{| class="wikitable"
! Airline
! Still a BA franchisee
! Still operating
! Details
|-
| Sun-Air of Scandinavia
| Yes
| Active
| Founded in 1978. Became a franchisee in 1996
|-
| Comair
| No
| Closed
| Founded in 1943. Became a franchisee in 1996 The company entered into voluntary business rescue proceedings on 5 May 2020, due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Operations were suspended on 31 May 2022.
|-
| Loganair
| No
| Active
| Founded in February 1962. In 1993, the airline became a franchisee of British Airways, operating its Islanders in the British Airways livery. This would stand until July 2008, when it became the new franchisee of Flybe.
|-
| Maersk Air UK
| No
| Closed
| Founded in May 1993 as part of the demerger of BEA. It flew out of Birmingham Airport to domestic and European destinations under a British Airways franchise agreement. By early 2003 the Maersk Group had given up on operating an airline in the UK and put Maersk Air UK up for sale. However, there were not interested buyers and the company was therefore sold in a management buyout in 2003, with the airline becoming Duo Airways before ceasing operations in May 2004, when an investor withdrew support at short notice.
|-
|}
Shareholdings
British Airways obtained a 15% stake in the now-defunct UK regional airline Flybe from the sale of BA Connect in March 2007. It sold the stake in 2014.
BA also owned a 10% stake in InterCapital and Regional Rail (ICRR), the company that managed the operations of Eurostar (UK) Ltd from 1998 to 2010, when the management of Eurostar was restructured.Industrial relationsStaff working for British Airways are represented by a number of trade unions, pilots are represented by British Air Line Pilots' Association, cabin crew by British Airlines Stewards and Stewardesses Association (a branch of Unite the Union), while other branches of Unite the Union and the GMB Union represent other employees. Bob Ayling's management faced strike action by cabin crew over a £1 billion cost-cutting drive to return BA to profitability in 1997; this was the last time BA cabin crew would strike until 2009, although staff morale has reportedly been unstable since that incident. In an effort to increase interaction between management, employees, and the unions, various conferences and workshops have taken place, often with thousands in attendance.
In 2005, wildcat action was taken by union members over a decision by Gate Gourmet not to renew the contracts of 670 workers and replace them with agency staff; it is estimated that the strike cost British Airways £30 million and caused disruption to 100,000 passengers. In October 2006, BA became involved in a civil rights dispute when a Christian employee was forbidden to wear a necklace bearing the cross, a religious symbol. BA's practice of forbidding such symbols has been publicly questioned by British politicians such as the former Home Secretary John Reid and the former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.
Relations have been turbulent between BA and Unite. In 2007, cabin crew threatened strike action over salary changes to be imposed by BA management. The strike was called off at the last minute, British Airways losing £80 million. action was blocked by a court injunction that deemed the ballot illegal. Negotiations failed to stop strike action in March, BA withdrew perks for strike participants. Allegations were made by The Guardian newspaper that BA had consulted outside firms methods to undermine the unions: the story was later withdrawn. A strike was announced for May 2010, British Airways again sought an injunction. Members of the Socialist Workers Party disrupted negotiations between BA management and Unite to prevent industrial action. Further disruption struck when Derek Simpson, a Unite co-leader, was discovered to have leaked details of confidential negotiations online via Twitter. Industrial action re-emerged in 2017, this time by BA's Mixed Fleet flight attendants, whom were employed on much less favorable pay and terms and conditions compared to previous cabin staff who joined prior to 2010. A ballot for industrial action was distributed to Mixed Fleet crew in November 2016 and resulted in an overwhelming yes majority for industrial action. Unite described Mixed Fleet crew as on "poverty pay", with many Mixed Fleet flight attendants sleeping in their cars in between shifts because they cannot afford the fuel to drive home, or operating while sick as they cannot afford to call in sick and lose their pay for the shift. Unite also blasted BA of removing staff travel concessions, bonus payments and other benefits to all cabin crew who undertook industrial action, as well as strike-breaking tactics such as wet-leasing aircraft from other airlines and offering financial incentives for cabin crew not to strike. The first dates of strikes during Christmas 2016 were cancelled due to pay negotiations. Industrial action by Mixed Fleet commenced in January 2017 after rejecting a pay offer. Strike action continued throughout 2017 in numerous discontinuous periods, resulting in one of the longest running disputes in aviation history. On 31 October 2017, after 85 days of discontinuous industrial action, Mixed Fleet accepted a new pay deal from BA which ended the dispute.
Senior leadership
* Chairman: Sean Doyle (since April 2021)
* Chief Executive: Sean Doyle (since October 2020) Alliances British Airways co-founded the airline alliance Oneworld in 1999 with airlines American Airlines, Cathay Pacific and Qantas.Codeshare agreementsBritish Airways has codeshares with the following airlines:
* Aer Lingus
* airBaltic
* Alaska Airlines
* American Airlines
* Bangkok Airways
* Cathay Pacific
* China Eastern Airlines
* China Southern Airlines
* Finnair
* Iberia
* Japan Airlines
* Kenya Airways
* LATAM Brasil
* LATAM Chile
* Loganair
* Malaysia Airlines
* Qantas
* Qatar Airways
* Royal Jordanian
* S7 Airlines
* TAAG Angola Airlines
* Vueling
Fleet
, the British Airways operates a fleet of 274 aircraft with 42 orders. BA operates a mix of Airbus narrow and wide-body aircraft, and Boeing wide-body aircraft, specifically the 777 and 787. In October 2020, British Airways retired its fleet of 747-400 aircraft. It was one of the largest operators of the 747, having previously operated the -100, -200, and -400 aircraft from 1974 (1969 with BOAC).
British Airways Engineering
The airline has its own engineering branch to maintain its aircraft fleet, this includes line maintenance at over 70 airports around the world. Amongst the company's various hangar facilities are its two major maintenance centres at Glasgow and Cardiff Airports.MarketingBranding
]]
The musical theme predominantly used on British Airways advertising has been "The Flower Duet" by Léo Delibes. This was first used in a 1984 advertisement directed by Tony Scott, in an arrangement by Howard Blake. It was reworked by Malcolm McLaren and Yanni for 1989's iconic "Face" advertisement, and subsequently appeared in many different arrangements between 1990 and 2010. The slogan 'the world's favourite airline', first used in 1983, was dropped in 2001 after Lufthansa overtook BA in terms of passenger numbers. Other advertising slogans have included "The World's Best Airline", "We'll Take More Care of You", "Fly the Flag", and "To Fly, To Serve". and the influential "Face" campaign. Saatchi & Saatchi later imitated this advert for Silverjet, a rival of BA, after BA discontinued their business activities. Since 2007, BA used Bartle Bogle Hegarty as its advertising agency.
In October 2022, BA launched a brand new ad campaign, titled "A British Original" produced by London-based Uncommon Creative Studio. This was to be another record-breaking campaign for its use of 500 unique executions along with a series of 32 short films, coinciding with the launch of Ozwald Boateng's new collection of uniform.
British Airways purchased the internet domain ba.com in 2002 from previous owner Bell Atlantic, 'BA' being the company's initialism and its IATA Airline code.
British Airways is the official airline of the Wimbledon Championship tennis tournament, and was the official airline and tier one partner of the 2012 Summer Olympics and Paralympics. BA was also the official airline of England's bid to host the 2018 Football World Cup.
High Life, founded in 1973, is the official in-flight magazine of the airline.
Safety video
The airline used a cartoon safety video from circa 2005<!--2017 - 12 --> until 2017. Beginning on 1 September 2017 the airline introduced the new Comic Relief live action safety video hosted by Chabuddy G, with appearances by British celebrities Gillian Anderson, Rowan Atkinson, Jim Broadbent, Rob Brydon, Warwick Davis, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Ian McKellen, Thandie Newton, and Gordon Ramsay. The two videos are part of Comic Relief's charity programme. On 17 April 2023, the airline launched a new safety video as a part of “A British Original” campaign, with Emma Raducanu, Robert Peston, Little Simz, and Steven Bartlett.
Liveries, logos, and tail fins
aircraft (registered as G-BNLY) is painted in the Landor Associates design.]]
The aeroplanes that British Airways inherited from the four-way merger between BOAC, BEA, Cambrian, and Northeast were temporarily given the text logo "British airways" but retained the original airline's livery. With its formation in 1974, British Airways' aeroplanes were given a new white, blue, and red colour scheme with a cropped Union Jack painted on their tail fins, designed by Negus & Negus. In 1984, a new livery designed by Landor Associates updated the airline's look as it prepared for privatization. To celebrate its centenary in 2019, BA announced four retro liveries: three on Boeing 747-400 aircraft (one in each of BOAC, Negus & Negus, and Landor Associates liveries), and one A319 in BEA livery.
In 1997, there was a controversial change to a new Project Utopia livery; all aircraft used the corporate colours consistently on the fuselage, but tailfins bore one of multiple designs. Several people spoke out against the change, including the former prime minister Margaret Thatcher, who famously covered the tail of a model 747 at an event with a handkerchief, to show her displeasure. BA's traditional rival, Virgin Atlantic, took advantage of the negative press coverage by applying the Union flag to the winglets of their aircraft along with the slogan "Britain's national flagcarrier".
In 1999, the CEO of British Airways, Bob Ayling, announced that all BA planes would adopt the tailfin design Chatham Dockyard Union Flag originally intended to be used only on the Concorde, based on the Union Flag.
Arms
In 2011, British Airways made a brand relaunch project, in which BA introduced a stylised, metallic version of the arms by For People Design to be used along with its Speedmarque logo. This is used exclusively on aircraft, First Wing Lounge and advertisements.
In 2024, the damaged letters patent of the arms went up for auction online before being withdrawn.Loyalty programmesBritish Airways' tiered loyalty programme, called the Executive Club, includes access to special lounges and dedicated "fast" queues.
Members of the programme were also granted status within the Oneworld alliance, which permitted similar benefits when flying with Oneworld member airlines. The level of benefits were determined by the member's tier.
The Executive Club is being rebranded to "The British Airways Club" starting 1 April 2025. The change means that you earn 1 tier point per £1 spent, with the new thresholds being set as the following:
Bronze: 3500 points
Silver: 7500 points
Gold: 20,000 points
Cabins and services
Short haul
Economy class
Euro Traveller is British Airways' economy class cabin on all short-haul flights within Europe, including domestic flights within the UK.
All flights from Heathrow and Gatwick have a buy on board system with a range of food designed by Tom Kerridge. Food can be pre-ordered through the British Airways mobile application. Alternatively, a limited selection can be purchased on-board using credit and debit card or by using Frequent Flyer Avios points. British Airways is rolling out Wi-Fi across its fleet of aircraft with 90% expected to be Wi-Fi enabled by 2020.Business classClub Europe is the short-haul business class available on all short-haul flights. This class allows for access to business lounges at most airports and complimentary onboard catering, as well as fast-track security at most airports. The middle seat of the standard Airbus configured cabin is left free. Instead, a cocktail table folds up from under the middle seat on refurbished aircraft.Mid-haul and long haulFirst classFirst is offered on all Airbus A380s, Boeing 777-300ERs, Boeing 787-9/10s and on some Boeing 777-200ERs. There are between eight and fourteen private suites depending on the aircraft type. Each First suite comes with a bed, a wide entertainment screen, in-seat power and complimentary Wi-Fi access on select aircraft.
The exclusive Concorde Room lounge at Heathrow Terminal 5 offers pre-flight dining with waiter service and more intimate space. Dedicated British Airways 'Galleries First' lounges are available at some airports, and Business lounges are used where these are not available. Some feature a 'First Dining' section where passengers holding a first class ticket can access a pre-flight dining service.
Club World
Club World is the long-haul business class cabin. The cabin features fully convertible flat bed seats. In March 2019, BA unveiled its new business-class seats - named Club Suite - on the new A350 aircraft, which feature a suite with a door. Since the unveiling, Club Suite has been installed on the Boeing 787-10 and is currently being installed on BA's Boeing 777s. The remaining aircraft are due to have their seats re-fitted over the coming years and they currently feature an older seat type introduced in 2006.World Traveller PlusWorld Traveller Plus is the premium economy class cabin provided on all BA long haul aircraft. This cabin offers wider seats, extended leg-room, additional seat comforts such as larger IFE screen, a foot rest and power sockets.World Traveller
, World Traveller cabin]]
World Traveller is the mid-haul and long-haul economy class cabin. It offers seat-back entertainment, complimentary food and drink, pillows, and blankets. While the in-flight entertainment screens are available on all long-haul aircraft, international power outlets are available on the aircraft based at Heathrow. Wifi is also available on selected aircraft at an extra fee.
Award and recognition
On 24 June 2024, British Airways was voted 2024 Most Family Friendly Airline in the World by Skytrax. The award encompasses the overall family travel experience such as seating policies, check-in facilities, priority boarding, meals and amenities for children, as well as other family-oriented aspects.Incidents and accidentsBritish Airways is known to have a strong reputation for safety and has been consistently ranked within the top 20 safest airlines globally according to Business Insider and AirlineRatings.com.
Since BA's inception in 1974, it has been involved in three hull-loss incidents (British Airways Flight 149 was destroyed on the ground at Kuwait International Airport as a result of military action during the First Gulf War with no one on board) and two hijacking attempts. To date, the only fatal accident experienced by a BA aircraft occurred in 1976 with British Airways Flight 476 which was involved in a midair collision later attributed to an error made by air traffic control.
* On 10 September 1976, a Trident 3B on British Airways Flight 476 departed from London-Heathrow to Istanbul. It collided in mid-air with an Inex Adria DC9-31 near Zagreb. All 54 passengers and 9 crew members on the BA aircraft died. This is the only fatal accident to a British Airways aircraft since the company's formation in 1974.
* On 24 June 1982, British Airways Flight 9, a Boeing 747-200 registration G-BDXH, flew through a cloud of volcanic ash and dust from the eruption of Mount Galunggung. The ash and dust caused extensive damage to the aircraft, including the failure of all four engines. The crew managed to glide the plane out of the dust cloud and restart all four of its engines, although one later had to be shut down again. The volcanic ash caused the cockpit window to be scratched to such an extent that it was difficult for the pilots to see out of the plane. However, the aircraft made a successful emergency landing at Halim Perdanakusuma International Airport just outside Jakarta. There were no fatalities or injuries.
* On 10 June 1990, British Airways Flight 5390, a BAC One-Eleven flight between Birmingham and Málaga, suffered a windscreen blowout due to the fitting of incorrect bolts the previous day. The captain sustained major injuries after being partially blown out of the aircraft, but the co-pilot landed the plane safely at Southampton Airport.
* On 2 August 1990, British Airways Flight 149 landed at Kuwait International Airport four hours after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. The aircraft, a Boeing 747-100 G-AWND, was destroyed, and all passengers and crew were captured. Two of the landing gears were salvaged, and are on display in Waterside, BA Headquarters in London.
* On 29 December 2000, British Airways Flight 2069 was en route from London to Nairobi when a mentally ill passenger entered the cockpit and grabbed the controls. As the pilots struggled to remove the intruder, the Boeing 747-400 stalled twice and banked to 94 degrees. Several people on board were injured by the violent manoeuvres, which briefly caused the aircraft to descend at 30,000 ft per minute. The man was finally restrained with the help of several passengers, and the co-pilot regained control of the aircraft. The flight landed safely in Nairobi.
* On 17 January 2008, British Airways Flight 38, a Boeing 777-200ER G-YMMM, from Beijing to London crash-landed approximately short of Heathrow Airport's runway 27L, and slid onto the runway's displaced threshold. The aircraft sustained damage to its landing gear, wing roots, and engines, resulting in the first hull loss of a Boeing 777. There were no fatalities, but there was one serious injury and 46 minor injuries. The accident was caused by icing in the fuel system, resulting in a loss of power.<!--PLEASE SEE the discussion at WT:AV re the INCIDENT ON 24 MAY before adding it here-->
* On 24 May 2013, British Airways Flight 762, using an Airbus A319-131 and registered as G-EUOE, returned to Heathrow Airport after fan cowl doors detached from both engines shortly after takeoff. During the approach, a fire broke out in the right engine and persisted after the engine was shut down. The aircraft landed safely with no injuries to the 80 people on board. The accident report revealed that the cowlings had been left unlatched following overnight maintenance. The separation of the doors caused airframe damage and the right-hand engine fire resulted from a ruptured fuel pipe.
* On 22 December 2013, British Airways Flight 34, a Boeing 747-436 G-BNLL, hit a building at O. R. Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg after missing a turning on a taxiway. The starboard wing was severely damaged but there were no injuries amongst the crew or 189 passengers, however, four members of ground staff were injured when the wing smashed into the building. The aircraft was officially withdrawn from service in February 2014.
* On 8 September 2015, British Airways Flight 2276, a Boeing 777-236ER G-VIIO, aborted its takeoff at Las Vegas' McCarran International Airport due to an uncontained engine failure of its left (#1) General Electric GE90 engine, which led to a substantial fire. The aircraft was evacuated on the main runway. All 157 passengers and 13 crew escaped the aircraft, at least 14 people sustaining minor injuries.<!-- not stated as hull loss in article-->
* Between 21 August 2018 and 5 September 2018, an attacker stole data for almost 500,000 British Airways customers, including credit card details for 250,000. The company was subsequently fined £20 million in October 2020, by the Information Commissioner's Office, the highest ever fine handed by the ICO at the time of issuing.
* On 18 June 2021, a British Airways Boeing 787-8 G-ZBJB, had a nose landing gear collapse while on the tarmac at Heathrow Airport. A British Airways spokesperson confirmed that no passengers were on board the plane when the incident occurred.
See also
* Air transport in the United Kingdom
* Plane Saver Credit Union
* Transport in the United Kingdom
* List of airlines of the United Kingdom
Notes
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Wood, Alan. "Airline at War: British Airways Goes to War". Air Enthusiast, No. 55, Autumn 1994, pp. 62–74.
External links
*
* [https://www.britishairways.com/travel/history-and-heritage/public/en_gb British Airways Heritage Collection]
}}
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Category:Price fixing convictions | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Airways | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.822990 |
3973 | Bicycle | Bicyclus|other uses}}
The "dandy horse", also called Draisienne or Laufmaschine ("running machine"), was the first human means of transport to use only two wheels in tandem and was invented by the German Baron Karl von Drais. It is regarded as the first bicycle and von Drais is seen as the "father of the bicycle", but it did not have pedals. Von Drais introduced it to the public in Mannheim in 1817 and in Paris in 1818. Its rider sat astride a wooden frame supported by two in-line wheels and pushed the vehicle along with his or her feet while steering the front wheel.
In the early 1860s, Frenchmen Pierre Michaux and Pierre Lallement took bicycle design in a new direction by adding a mechanical crank drive with pedals on an enlarged front wheel (the velocipede). This was the first in mass production. Another French inventor named Douglas Grasso had a failed prototype of Pierre Lallement's bicycle several years earlier. Several inventions followed using rear-wheel drive, the best known being the rod-driven velocipede by Scotsman Thomas McCall in 1869. In that same year, bicycle wheels with wire spokes were patented by Eugène Meyer of Paris. The French vélocipède, made of iron and wood, developed into the "penny-farthing" (historically known as an "ordinary bicycle", a retronym, since there was then no other kind). It featured a tubular steel frame on which were mounted wire-spoked wheels with solid rubber tires. These bicycles were difficult to ride due to their high seat and poor weight distribution. In 1868 Rowley Turner, a sales agent of the Coventry Sewing Machine Company (which soon became the Coventry Machinists Company), brought a Michaux cycle to Coventry, England. His uncle, Josiah Turner, and business partner James Starley, used this as a basis for the 'Coventry Model' in what became Britain's first cycle factory.
The dwarf ordinary addressed some of these faults by reducing the front wheel diameter and setting the seat further back. This, in turn, required gearing—effected in a variety of ways—to efficiently use pedal power. Having to both pedal and steer via the front wheel remained a problem. Englishman J.K. Starley (nephew of James Starley), J.H. Lawson, and Shergold solved this problem by introducing the chain drive (originated by the unsuccessful "bicyclette" of Englishman Henry Lawson), connecting the frame-mounted cranks to the rear wheel. These models were known as safety bicycles, dwarf safeties, or upright bicycles for their lower seat height and better weight distribution, although without pneumatic tires the ride of the smaller-wheeled bicycle would be much rougher than that of the larger-wheeled variety. Starley's 1885 Rover, manufactured in Coventry is usually described as the first recognizably modern bicycle. Soon the seat tube was added which created the modern bike's double-triangle diamond frame.
Further innovations increased comfort and ushered in a second bicycle craze, the 1890s Golden Age of Bicycles. In 1888, Scotsman John Boyd Dunlop introduced the first practical pneumatic tire, which soon became universal. Willie Hume demonstrated the supremacy of Dunlop's tyres in 1889, winning the tyre's first-ever races in Ireland and then England. Soon after, the rear freewheel was developed, enabling the rider to coast. This refinement led to the 1890s invention of coaster brakes. Dérailleur gears and hand-operated Bowden cable-pull brakes were also developed during these years, but were only slowly adopted by casual riders.
The Svea Velocipede with vertical pedal arrangement and locking hubs was introduced in 1892 by the Swedish engineers Fredrik Ljungström and Birger Ljungström. It attracted attention at the World Fair and was produced in a few thousand units.
In the 1870s many cycling clubs flourished. They were popular in a time when there were no cars on the market and the principal mode of transportation was horse-drawn vehicles, such the horse and buggy or the horsecar. Among the earliest clubs was The Bicycle Touring Club, which has operated since 1878. By the turn of the century, cycling clubs flourished on both sides of the Atlantic, and touring and racing became widely popular. The Raleigh Bicycle Company was founded in Nottingham, England in 1888. It became the biggest bicycle manufacturing company in the world, making over two million bikes per year.
Bicycles and horse buggies were the two mainstays of private transportation just prior to the automobile, and the grading of smooth roads in the late 19th century was stimulated by the widespread advertising, production, and use of these devices. More than 1 billion bicycles have been manufactured worldwide as of the early 21st century. while most produced car, the Toyota Corolla, has reached 44 million and counting. They are also used professionally by mail carriers, paramedics, police, messengers, and general delivery services. Military uses of bicycles include communications, reconnaissance, troop movement, supply of provisions, and patrol, such as in bicycle infantries.
They are also used for recreational purposes, including bicycle touring, mountain biking, physical fitness, and play. Bicycle sports include racing, BMX racing, track racing, criterium, roller racing, sportives and time trials. Major multi-stage professional events are the Giro d'Italia, the Tour de France, the Vuelta a España, the Tour de Pologne, and the Volta a Portugal. They are also used for entertainment and pleasure in other ways, such as in organised mass rides, artistic cycling and freestyle BMX.
Technical aspects
The bicycle has undergone continual adaptation and improvement since its inception. These innovations have continued with the advent of modern materials and computer-aided design, allowing for a proliferation of specialized bicycle types, improved bicycle safety, and riding comfort.
Types
]]
Bicycles can be categorized in many different ways: by function, by number of riders, by general construction, by gearing or by means of propulsion. The more common types include utility bicycles, mountain bicycles, racing bicycles, touring bicycles, hybrid bicycles, cruiser bicycles, and BMX bikes. Less common are tandems, low riders, tall bikes, fixed gear, folding models, amphibious bicycles, cargo bikes, recumbents and electric bicycles.
Unicycles, tricycles and quadracycles are not strictly bicycles, as they have respectively one, three and four wheels, but are often referred to informally as "bikes" or "cycles".
Dynamics
A bicycle stays upright while moving forward by being steered so as to keep its center of mass over the wheels. This steering is usually provided by the rider, but under certain conditions may be provided by the bicycle itself.
The combined center of mass of a bicycle and its rider must lean into a turn to successfully navigate it. This lean is induced by a method known as countersteering, which can be performed by the rider turning the handlebars directly with the hands or indirectly by leaning the bicycle.
Short-wheelbase or tall bicycles, when braking, can generate enough stopping force at the front wheel to flip longitudinally. The act of purposefully using this force to lift the rear wheel and balance on the front without tipping over is a trick known as a stoppie, endo, or front wheelie.Performance
The bicycle is extraordinarily efficient in both biological and mechanical terms. The bicycle is the most efficient human-powered means of transportation in terms of energy a person must expend to travel a given distance. From a mechanical viewpoint, up to 99% of the energy delivered by the rider into the pedals is transmitted to the wheels, although the use of gearing mechanisms may reduce this by 10–15%. In terms of the ratio of cargo weight a bicycle can carry to total weight, it is also an efficient means of cargo transportation.
A human traveling on a bicycle at low to medium speeds of around uses only the power required to walk. Air drag, which is proportional to the square of speed, requires dramatically higher power outputs as speeds increase. If the rider is sitting upright, the rider's body creates about 75% of the total drag of the bicycle/rider combination. Drag can be reduced by seating the rider in a more aerodynamically streamlined position. Drag can also be reduced by covering the bicycle with an aerodynamic fairing. The fastest recorded unpaced speed on a flat surface is .
In addition, the carbon dioxide generated in the production and transportation of the food required by the bicyclist, per mile traveled, is less than that generated by energy efficient motorcars.
<gallery mode"packed" heights"160px">
Image:Corsa bacchetta.jpg|A recumbent bicycle
File:Wooden bicycle for young child.jpg|Balance bicycle for young children
</gallery>
Parts
Frame
The great majority of modern bicycles have a frame with upright seating that looks much like the first chain-driven bike. These upright bicycles almost always feature the diamond frame, a truss consisting of two triangles: the front triangle and the rear triangle. The front triangle consists of the head tube, top tube, down tube, and seat tube. The head tube contains the headset, the set of bearings that allows the fork to turn smoothly for steering and balance. The top tube connects the head tube to the seat tube at the top, and the down tube connects the head tube to the bottom bracket. The rear triangle consists of the seat tube and paired chain stays and seat stays. The chain stays run parallel to the chain, connecting the bottom bracket to the rear dropout, where the axle for the rear wheel is held. The seat stays connect the top of the seat tube (at or near the same point as the top tube) to the rear fork ends.
Historically, women's bicycle frames had a top tube that connected in the middle of the seat tube instead of the top, resulting in a lower standover height at the expense of compromised structural integrity, since this places a strong bending load in the seat tube, and bicycle frame members are typically weak in bending. This design, referred to as a step-through frame or as an open frame, allows the rider to mount and dismount in a dignified way while wearing a skirt or dress. While some women's bicycles continue to use this frame style, there is also a variation, the mixte, which splits the top tube laterally into two thinner top tubes that bypass the seat tube on each side and connect to the rear fork ends. The ease of stepping through is also appreciated by those with limited flexibility or other joint problems. Because of its persistent image as a "women's" bicycle, step-through frames are not common for larger frames.
Step-throughs were popular partly for practical reasons and partly for social mores of the day. For most of the history of bicycles' popularity women have worn long skirts, and the lower frame accommodated these better than the top-tube. Furthermore, it was considered "unladylike" for women to open their legs to mount and dismount—in more conservative times women who rode bicycles at all were vilified as immoral or immodest. These practices were akin to the older practice of riding horse sidesaddle.
Another style is the recumbent bicycle. These are inherently more aerodynamic than upright versions, as the rider may lean back onto a support and operate pedals that are on about the same level as the seat. The world's fastest bicycle is a recumbent bicycle but this type was banned from competition in 1934 by the Union Cycliste Internationale.
Historically, materials used in bicycles have followed a similar pattern as in aircraft, the goal being high strength and low weight. Since the late 1930s alloy steels have been used for frame and fork tubes in higher quality machines. By the 1980s aluminum welding techniques had improved to the point that aluminum tube could safely be used in place of steel. Since then aluminum alloy frames and other components have become popular due to their light weight, and most mid-range bikes are now principally aluminum alloy of some kind. More expensive bikes use carbon fibre due to its significantly lighter weight and profiling ability, allowing designers to make a bike both stiff and compliant by manipulating the lay-up. Virtually all professional racing bicycles now use carbon fibre frames, as they have the best strength to weight ratio. A typical modern carbon fiber frame can weigh less than .
Other exotic frame materials include titanium and advanced alloys. Bamboo, a natural composite material with high strength-to-weight ratio and stiffness has been used for bicycles since 1894. Recent versions use bamboo for the primary frame with glued metal connections and parts, priced as exotic models.
<gallery mode"packed" heights"160px">
File:Bicycle diagram.svg|Diagram of a bicycle
File:Triumph Bicycle.JPG|A Triumph with a step-through frame
File:Trek Y Foil.jpg|A carbon fiber Trek Y-Foil from the late 1990s
</gallery>
Drivetrain and gearing
The drivetrain begins with pedals which rotate the cranks, which are held in axis by the bottom bracket. Most bicycles use a chain to transmit power to the rear wheel. A very small number of bicycles use a shaft drive to transmit power, or special belts. Hydraulic bicycle transmissions have been built, but they are currently inefficient and complex.
Since cyclists' legs are most efficient over a narrow range of pedaling speeds, or cadence, a variable gear ratio helps a cyclist to maintain an optimum pedalling speed while covering varied terrain. Some, mainly utility, bicycles use hub gears with between 3 and 14 ratios, but most use the generally more efficient dérailleur system, by which the chain is moved between different cogs called chainrings and sprockets to select a ratio. A dérailleur system normally has two dérailleurs, or mechs, one at the front to select the chainring and another at the back to select the sprocket. Most bikes have two or three chainrings, and from 5 to 12 sprockets on the back, with the number of theoretical gears calculated by multiplying front by back. In reality, many gears overlap or require the chain to run diagonally, so the number of usable gears is fewer.
An alternative to chaindrive is to use a synchronous belt. These are toothed and work much the same as a chain—popular with commuters and long distance cyclists they require little maintenance. They cannot be shifted across a cassette of sprockets, and are used either as single speed or with a hub gear.
Different gears and ranges of gears are appropriate for different people and styles of cycling. Multi-speed bicycles allow gear selection to suit the circumstances: a cyclist could use a high gear when cycling downhill, a medium gear when cycling on a flat road, and a low gear when cycling uphill. In a lower gear every turn of the pedals leads to fewer rotations of the rear wheel. This allows the energy required to move the same distance to be distributed over more pedal turns, reducing fatigue when riding uphill, with a heavy load, or against strong winds. A higher gear allows a cyclist to make fewer pedal turns to maintain a given speed, but with more effort per turn of the pedals.
With a chain drive transmission, a chainring attached to a crank drives the chain, which in turn rotates the rear wheel via the rear sprocket(s) (cassette or freewheel). There are four gearing options: two-speed hub gear integrated with chain ring, up to 3 chain rings, up to 12 sprockets, hub gear built into rear wheel (3-speed to 14-speed). The most common options are either a rear hub or multiple chain rings combined with multiple sprockets (other combinations of options are possible but less common).
<gallery mode"packed" heights"160px">
File:Dsb-1.jpg|A bicycle with shaft drive instead of a chain
File:Shimano xt rear derailleur.jpg|A set of rear sprockets (also known as a cassette) and a derailleur
File:Hub gear.jpg|upright|Hub gear
</gallery>
Steering
to prevent cyclist's palsy (ulnar syndrome).]]
The handlebars connect to the stem that connects to the fork that connects to the front wheel, and the whole assembly connects to the bike and rotates about the steering axis via the headset bearings. Three styles of handlebar are common. Upright handlebars, the norm in Europe and elsewhere until the 1970s, curve gently back toward the rider, offering a natural grip and comfortable upright position. Drop handlebars "drop" as they curve forward and down, offering the cyclist best braking power from a more aerodynamic "crouched" position, as well as more upright positions in which the hands grip the brake lever mounts, the forward curves, or the upper flat sections for increasingly upright postures. Mountain bikes generally feature a 'straight handlebar' or 'riser bar' with varying degrees of sweep backward and centimeters rise upwards, as well as wider widths which can provide better handling due to increased leverage against the wheel.
Seating
Saddles also vary with rider preference, from the cushioned ones favored by short-distance riders to narrower saddles which allow more room for leg swings. Comfort depends on riding position. With comfort bikes and hybrids, cyclists sit high over the seat, their weight directed down onto the saddle, such that a wider and more cushioned saddle is preferable. For racing bikes where the rider is bent over, weight is more evenly distributed between the handlebars and saddle, the hips are flexed, and a narrower and harder saddle is more efficient. Differing saddle designs exist for male and female cyclists, accommodating the genders' differing anatomies and sit bone width measurements, although bikes typically are sold with saddles most appropriate for men. Suspension seat posts and seat springs provide comfort by absorbing shock but can add to the overall weight of the bicycle.
A recumbent bicycle has a reclined chair-like seat that some riders find more comfortable than a saddle, especially riders who suffer from certain types of seat, back, neck, shoulder, or wrist pain. Recumbent bicycles may have either under-seat or over-seat steering.
Brakes
trademark: V-Brake, on rear wheel of a mountain bike]]
Bicycle brakes may be rim brakes, in which friction pads are compressed against the wheel rims; hub brakes, where the mechanism is contained within the wheel hub, or disc brakes, where pads act on a rotor attached to the hub. Most road bicycles use rim brakes, but some use disc brakes. Disc brakes are more common for mountain bikes, tandems and recumbent bicycles than on other types of bicycles, due to their increased power, coupled with an increased weight and complexity.
and hub]]
With hand-operated brakes, force is applied to brake levers mounted on the handlebars and transmitted via Bowden cables or hydraulic lines to the friction pads, which apply pressure to the braking surface, causing friction which slows the bicycle down. A rear hub brake may be either hand-operated or pedal-actuated, as in the back pedal coaster brakes which were popular in North America until the 1960s.
Track bicycles do not have brakes, because all riders ride in the same direction around a track which does not necessitate sharp deceleration. Track riders are still able to slow down because all track bicycles are fixed-gear, meaning that there is no freewheel. Without a freewheel, coasting is impossible, so when the rear wheel is moving, the cranks are moving. To slow down, the rider applies resistance to the pedals, acting as a braking system which can be as effective as a conventional rear wheel brake, but not as effective as a front wheel brake.
Suspension
Bicycle suspension refers to the system or systems used to suspend the rider and all or part of the bicycle. This serves two purposes: to keep the wheels in continuous contact with the ground, improving control, and to isolate the rider and luggage from jarring due to rough surfaces, improving comfort.
Bicycle suspensions are used primarily on mountain bicycles, but are also common on hybrid bicycles, as they can help deal with problematic vibration from poor surfaces. Suspension is especially important on recumbent bicycles, since while an upright bicycle rider can stand on the pedals to achieve some of the benefits of suspension, a recumbent rider cannot.
Basic mountain bicycles and hybrids usually have front suspension only, whilst more sophisticated ones also have rear suspension. Road bicycles tend to have no suspension.
Wheels and tires
The wheel axle fits into fork ends in the frame and fork. A pair of wheels may be called a wheelset, especially in the context of ready-built "off the shelf", performance-oriented wheels.
Tires vary enormously depending on their intended purpose. Road bicycles use tires 18 to 25 millimeters wide, most often completely smooth, or slick, and inflated to high pressure to roll fast on smooth surfaces. Off-road tires are usually between wide, and have treads for gripping in muddy conditions or metal studs for ice.GroupsetGroupset generally refers to all of the components that make up a bicycle excluding the bicycle frame, fork, stem, wheels, tires, and rider contact points, such as the saddle and handlebars.Accessories
, fenders (called mud-guards), water bottles in cages, four panniers and a handlebar bag]]
Some components, which are often optional accessories on sports bicycles, are standard features on utility bicycles to enhance their usefulness, comfort, safety and visibility. Fenders with spoilers (mudflaps) protect the cyclist and moving parts from spray when riding through wet areas. In some countries (e.g. Germany, UK), fenders are called mudguards. The chainguards protect clothes from oil on the chain while preventing clothing from being caught between the chain and crankset teeth. Kick stands keep bicycles upright when parked, and bike locks deter theft. Front-mounted baskets, front or rear luggage carriers or racks, and panniers mounted above either or both wheels can be used to carry equipment or cargo. Pegs can be fastened to one, or both of the wheel hubs to either help the rider perform certain tricks, or allow a place for extra riders to stand, or rest. Parents sometimes add rear-mounted child seats, an auxiliary saddle fitted to the crossbar, or both to transport children. Bicycles can also be fitted with a hitch to tow a trailer for carrying cargo, a child, or both.
Toe-clips and toestraps and clipless pedals help keep the foot locked in the proper pedal position and enable cyclists to pull and push the pedals. Technical accessories include cyclocomputers for measuring speed, distance, heart rate, GPS data etc. Other accessories include lights, reflectors, mirrors, racks, trailers, bags, water bottles and cages, and bell. Bicycle lights, reflectors, and helmets are required by law in some geographic regions depending on the legal code. It is more common to see bicycles with bottle generators, dynamos, lights, fenders, racks and bells in Europe. Bicyclists also have specialized form fitting and high visibility clothing.
Children's bicycles may be outfitted with cosmetic enhancements such as bike horns, streamers, and spoke beads. Training wheels are sometimes used when learning to ride, but a dedicated balance bike teaches independent riding more effectively.
Bicycle helmets can reduce injury in the event of a collision or accident, and a suitable helmet is legally required of riders in many jurisdictions. Helmets may be classified as an accessory
Bike trainers are used to enable cyclists to cycle while the bike remains stationary. They are frequently used to warm up before races or indoors when riding conditions are unfavorable. Standards
A number of formal and industry standards exist for bicycle components to help make spare parts exchangeable and to maintain a minimum product safety.
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has a special technical committee for cycles, TC149, that has the scope of "Standardization in the field of cycles, their components and accessories with particular reference to terminology, testing methods and requirements for performance and safety, and interchangeability".
The European Committee for Standardization (CEN) also has a specific Technical Committee, TC333, that defines European standards for cycles. Their mandate states that EN cycle standards shall harmonize with ISO standards. Some CEN cycle standards were developed before ISO published their standards, leading to strong European influences in this area. European cycle standards tend to describe minimum safety requirements, while ISO standards have historically harmonized parts geometry.
Maintenance and repair
Like all devices with mechanical moving parts, bicycles require a certain amount of regular maintenance and replacement of worn parts. A bicycle is relatively simple compared with a car, so some cyclists choose to do at least part of the maintenance themselves. Some components are easy to handle using relatively simple tools, while other components may require specialist manufacturer-dependent tools.
Many bicycle components are available at several different price/quality points; manufacturers generally try to keep all components on any particular bike at about the same quality level, though at the very cheap end of the market there may be some skimping on less obvious components (e.g. bottom bracket).
* There are several hundred assisted-service Community Bicycle Organizations worldwide. At a Community Bicycle Organization, laypeople bring in bicycles needing repair or maintenance; volunteers teach them how to do the required steps.
* Full service is available from bicycle mechanics at a local bike shop.
* In areas where it is available, some cyclists purchase roadside assistance from companies such as the Better World Club or the American Automobile Association.
Maintenance
The most basic maintenance item is keeping the tires correctly inflated; this can make a noticeable difference as to how the bike feels to ride. Bicycle tires usually have a marking on the sidewall indicating the pressure appropriate for that tire. Bicycles use much higher pressures than cars: car tires are normally in the range of , whereas bicycle tires are normally in the range of .
Another basic maintenance item is regular lubrication of the chain and pivot points for derailleurs and brake components. Most of the bearings on a modern bike are sealed and grease-filled and require little or no attention; such bearings will usually last for or more. The crank bearings require periodic maintenance, which involves removing, cleaning and repacking with the correct grease.
The chain and the brake blocks are the components which wear out most quickly, so these need to be checked from time to time, typically every or so. Most local bike shops will do such checks for free. Note that when a chain becomes badly worn it will also wear out the rear cogs/cassette and eventually the chain ring(s), so replacing a chain when only moderately worn will prolong the life of other components.
Over the longer term, tires do wear out, after ; a rash of punctures is often the most visible sign of a worn tire.
Repair
Very few bicycle components can actually be repaired; replacement of the failing component is the normal practice.
The most common roadside problem is a puncture of the tire's inner tube. A patch kit may be employed to fix the puncture or the tube can be replaced, though the latter solution comes at a greater cost and waste of material. Some brands of tires are much more puncture-resistant than others, often incorporating one or more layers of Kevlar; the downside of such tires is that they may be heavier and/or more difficult to fit and remove.
Tools
to clean off an area of the inner tube around the puncture, a tube of rubber solution (vulcanizing fluid), round and oval patches, a metal grater and piece of chalk to make chalk powder (to dust over excess rubber solution). Kits often also include a wax crayon to mark the puncture location.]]
There are specialized bicycle tools for use both in the shop and at the roadside. Many cyclists carry tool kits. These may include a tire patch kit (which, in turn, may contain any combination of a hand pump or CO<sub>2</sub> pump, tire levers, spare tubes, self-adhesive patches, or tube-patching material, an adhesive, a piece of sandpaper or a metal grater (for roughening the tube surface to be patched) and sometimes even a block of French chalk), wrenches, hex keys, screwdrivers, and a chain tool. Special, thin wrenches are often required for maintaining various screw-fastened parts, specifically, the frequently lubricated ball-bearing "cones". There are also cycling-specific multi-tools that combine many of these implements into a single compact device. More specialized bicycle components may require more complex tools, including proprietary tools specific for a given manufacturer.
Social and historical aspects
The bicycle has had a considerable effect on human society, in both the cultural and industrial realms.
In daily life
, New Zealand (c.1898-1905)]]
Around the turn of the 20th century, bicycles reduced crowding in inner-city tenements by allowing workers to commute from more spacious dwellings in the suburbs. They also reduced dependence on horses. Bicycles allowed people to travel for leisure into the country, since bicycles were three times as energy efficient as walking and three to four times as fast.
, USA (2008)]]
In built-up cities around the world, urban planning uses cycling infrastructure like bikeways to reduce traffic congestion and air pollution. A number of cities around the world have implemented schemes known as bicycle sharing systems or community bicycle programs. The first of these was the White Bicycle plan in Amsterdam in 1965. It was followed by yellow bicycles in La Rochelle and green bicycles in Cambridge. These initiatives complement public transport systems and offer an alternative to motorized traffic to help reduce congestion and pollution. In Europe, especially in the Netherlands and parts of Germany and Denmark, bicycle commuting is common. In Copenhagen, a cyclists' organization runs a Cycling Embassy that promotes biking for commuting and sightseeing. The United Kingdom has a tax break scheme (IR 176) that allows employees to buy a new bicycle tax free to use for commuting.
In the Netherlands all train stations offer free bicycle parking, or a more secure parking place for a small fee, with the larger stations also offering bicycle repair shops. Cycling is so popular that the parking capacity may be exceeded, while in some places such as Delft the capacity is usually exceeded. In Trondheim in Norway, the Trampe bicycle lift has been developed to encourage cyclists by giving assistance on a steep hill. Buses in many cities have bicycle carriers mounted on the front.
There are towns in some countries where bicycle culture has been an integral part of the landscape for generations, even without much official support. That is the case of Ílhavo, in Portugal.
In cities where bicycles are not integrated into the public transportation system, commuters often use bicycles as elements of a mixed-mode commute, where the bike is used to travel to and from train stations or other forms of rapid transit. Some students who commute several miles drive a car from home to a campus parking lot, then ride a bicycle to class. Folding bicycles are useful in these scenarios, as they are less cumbersome when carried aboard. Los Angeles removed a small amount of seating on some trains to make more room for bicycles and wheel chairs.
, Denmark, at a traffic light]]
Some US companies, notably in the tech sector, are developing both innovative cycle designs and cycle-friendliness in the workplace. Foursquare, whose CEO Dennis Crowley "pedaled to pitch meetings ... [when he] was raising money from venture capitalists" on a two-wheeler, chose a new location for its New York headquarters "based on where biking would be easy". Parking in the office was also integral to HQ planning. Mitchell Moss, who runs the Rudin Center for Transportation Policy & Management at New York University, said in 2012: "Biking has become the mode of choice for the educated high tech worker".
Bicycles offer an important mode of transport in many developing countries. Until recently, bicycles have been a staple of everyday life throughout Asian countries. They are the most frequently used method of transport for commuting to work, school, shopping, and life in general. In Europe, bicycles are commonly used. They also offer a degree of exercise to keep individuals healthy.
Bicycles are also celebrated in the visual arts. An example of this is the Bicycle Film Festival, a film festival hosted all around the world.
Poverty alleviation
Female emancipation
learning to ride a bicycle The bicycle craze in the 1890s also led to a movement for so-called rational dress, which helped liberate women from corsets and ankle-length skirts and other restrictive garments, substituting the then-shocking bloomers.
The bicycle was recognized by 19th-century feminists and suffragists as a "freedom machine" for women. American Susan B. Anthony said in a New York World interview on 2 February 1896: "I think it has done more to emancipate woman than any one thing in the world. I rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a wheel. It gives her a feeling of self-reliance and independence the moment she takes her seat; and away she goes, the picture of untrammelled womanhood."Economic implications
advertisement from 1886]]
Bicycle manufacturing proved to be a training ground for other industries and led to the development of advanced metalworking techniques, both for the frames themselves and for special components such as ball bearings, washers, and sprockets. These techniques later enabled skilled metalworkers and mechanics to develop the components used in early automobiles and aircraft.
Wilbur and Orville Wright, a pair of businessmen, ran the Wright Cycle Company which designed, manufactured and sold their bicycles during the bike boom of the 1890s.
They also served to teach the industrial models later adopted, including mechanization and mass production (later copied and adopted by Ford and General Motors), vertical integration (also later copied and adopted by Ford), aggressive advertising (as much as 10% of all advertising in U.S. periodicals in 1898 was by bicycle makers), lobbying for better roads (which had the side benefit of acting as advertising, and of improving sales by providing more places to ride), all first practiced by Pope. In addition, bicycle makers adopted the annual model change (later derided as planned obsolescence, and usually credited to General Motors), which proved very successful.
Early bicycles were an example of conspicuous consumption, being adopted by the fashionable elites. In addition, by serving as a platform for accessories, which could ultimately cost more than the bicycle itself, it paved the way for the likes of the Barbie doll.
Bicycles helped create, or enhance, new kinds of businesses, such as bicycle messengers, traveling seamstresses, riding academies, and racing rinks. Their board tracks were later adapted to early motorcycle and automobile racing. There were a variety of new inventions, such as spoke tighteners, and specialized lights, socks and shoes, and even cameras, such as the Eastman Company's Poco. Probably the best known and most widely used of these inventions, adopted well beyond cycling, is Charles Bennett's Bike Web, which came to be called the jock strap.
, Burkina Faso.]]
They also presaged a move away from public transit that would explode with the introduction of the automobile.
J. K. Starley's company became the Rover Cycle Company Ltd. in the late 1890s, and then renamed the Rover Company when it started making cars. Morris Motors Limited (in Oxford) and Škoda also began in the bicycle business, as did the Wright brothers. Alistair Craig, whose company eventually emerged to become the engine manufacturers Ailsa Craig, also started from manufacturing bicycles, in Glasgow in March 1885.
In general, U.S. and European cycle manufacturers used to assemble cycles from their own frames and components made by other companies, although very large companies (such as Raleigh) used to make almost every part of a bicycle (including bottom brackets, axles, etc.) In recent years, those bicycle makers have greatly changed their methods of production. Now, almost none of them produce their own frames.
Many newer or smaller companies only design and market their products; the actual production is done by Asian companies. For example, some 60% of the world's bicycles are now being made in China. Despite this shift in production, as nations such as China and India become more wealthy, their own use of bicycles has declined due to the increasing affordability of cars and motorcycles. One of the major reasons for the proliferation of Chinese-made bicycles in foreign markets is the lower cost of labor in China.
In line with the European financial crisis of that time, in 2011 the number of bicycle sales in Italy (1.75 million) passed the number of new car sales.
Environmental impact
, Netherlands]]
One of the profound economic implications of bicycle use is that it liberates the user from motor fuel consumption. (Ballantine, 1972) The bicycle is an inexpensive, fast, healthy and environmentally friendly mode of transport. Ivan Illich stated that bicycle use extended the usable physical environment for people, while alternatives such as cars and motorways degraded and confined people's environment and mobility. Currently, two billion bicycles are in use around the world. Children, students, professionals, laborers, civil servants and seniors are pedaling around their communities. They all experience the freedom and the natural opportunity for exercise that the bicycle easily provides. Bicycle also has lowest carbon intensity of travel.
Manufacturing
The global bicycle market is $61 billion in 2011. , 130 million bicycles were sold every year globally and 66% of them were made in China.
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"text-align: center;"
|+ EU28 Bicycle market 2000–2014
|-
! Country !! Production (M) !! Parts (M€) !! Sales (M) !! Avg !! Sales (M€)
|-
| Italy || 2.729 || 491 || 1.696 || 288 ||
|-
| Germany || 2.139 || 286 || 4.100 || 528 ||
|-
| Poland || .991 || 58 || 1.094 || 380 ||
|-
| Bulgaria || .950 || 9 || .082 || 119 ||
|-
| The Netherlands || .850 || 85 || 1.051 || 844 ||
|-
| Romania || .820 || 220 || .370 || 125 ||
|-
| Portugal || .720 || 120 || .340 || 160 ||
|-
| France || .630 || 170 || 2.978 || 307 ||
|-
| Hungary || .370 || 10 || .044 || 190 ||
|-
| Spain || .356 || 10 || 1.089 || 451 ||
|-
| Czech Republic || .333 || 85 || .333 || 150 ||
|-
| Lithuania || .323 || 0 || .050 || 110 ||
|-
| Slovakia || .210 || 9 || .038 || 196 ||
|-
| Austria || .138 || 0 || .401 || 450 ||
|-
| Greece || .108 || 0 || .199 || 233 ||
|-
| Belgium || .099 || 35 || .567 || 420 ||
|-
| Sweden || .083 || 0 || .584 || 458 ||
|-
| Great Britain || .052 || 34 || 3.630 || 345 ||
|-
| Finland || .034 || 32 || .300 || 320 ||
|-
| Slovenia || .005 || 9 || .240 || 110 ||
|-
| Croatia || 0 || 0 || .333 || 110 ||
|-
| Cyprus || 0 || 0 || .033 || 110 ||
|-
| Denmark || 0 || 0 || .470 || 450 ||
|-
| Estonia || 0 || 0 || .062 || 190 ||
|-
| Ireland || 0 || 0 || .091 || 190 ||
|-
| Latvia || 0 || 0 || .040 || 110 ||
|-
| Luxembourg || 0 || 0 || .010 || 450 ||
|-
| Malta || 0 || 0 || .011 || 110 ||
|-
! EU 28 !! 11.939 !! 1662 !! 20.234 || || 7941.2
|}
Legal requirements
Early in its development, as with automobiles, there were restrictions on the operation of bicycles. Along with advertising, and to gain free publicity, Albert A. Pope litigated on behalf of cyclists.
The 1968 Vienna Convention on Road Traffic of the United Nations considers a bicycle to be a vehicle, and a person controlling a bicycle (whether actually riding or not) is considered an operator or driver. The traffic codes of many countries reflect these definitions and demand that a bicycle satisfy certain legal requirements before it can be used on public roads. In many jurisdictions, it is an offense to use a bicycle that is not in a roadworthy condition.
In some countries, bicycles must have functioning front and rear lights when ridden after dark.
Some countries require child and/or adult cyclists to wear helmets, as this may protect riders from head trauma. Countries which require adult cyclists to wear helmets include Spain, New Zealand and Australia. Mandatory helmet wearing is one of the most controversial topics in the cycling world, with proponents arguing that it reduces head injuries and thus is an acceptable requirement, while opponents argue that by making cycling seem more dangerous and cumbersome, it reduces cyclist numbers on the streets, creating an overall negative health effect (fewer people cycling for their own health, and the remaining cyclists being more exposed through a reversed safety in numbers effect).
Theft
in Durham, North Carolina.]]
Bicycles are popular targets for theft, due to their value and ease of resale. The number of bicycles stolen annually is difficult to quantify as a large number of crimes are not reported. Around 50% of the participants in the Montreal International Journal of Sustainable Transportation survey were subjected to a bicycle theft in their lifetime as active cyclists. Most bicycles have serial numbers that can be recorded to verify identity in case of theft.
See also
* Bicycle and motorcycle geometry
* Bicycle drum brake
* Bicycle fender
* Bicycle lighting
* Bicycle parking station
* Bicycle-friendly
* Bicycle-sharing system
* Cyclability
* Cycling advocacy
* Cycling in the Netherlands
* Danish bicycle VIN-system
* List of bicycle types
* List of films about bicycles and cycling
* Outline of bicycles
* Outline of cycling
* rattleCAD (software for bicycle design)
* Skirt guard
* Twike
* Velomobile
* Wooden bicycle
* World Bicycle Day
Notes
References
Citations
Sources
; General
*
*
Further reading
*
External links
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20140916100955/http://www.sciencetech.technomuses.ca/english/collection/cycles.cfm A History of Bicycles and Other Cycles] at the Canada Science and Technology Museum
Category:19th-century inventions
Category:Appropriate technology
Category:Articles containing video clips
Category:German inventions
Category:Sustainable technologies
Category:Sustainable transport | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.894231 |
3974 | Biopolymer | Biopolymers are natural polymers produced by the cells of living organisms. Like other polymers, biopolymers consist of monomeric units that are covalently bonded in chains to form larger molecules. There are three main classes of biopolymers, classified according to the monomers used and the structure of the biopolymer formed: polynucleotides, polypeptides, and polysaccharides. The Polynucleotides, RNA and DNA, are long polymers of nucleotides. Polypeptides include proteins and shorter polymers of amino acids; some major examples include collagen, actin, and fibrin. Polysaccharides are linear or branched chains of sugar carbohydrates; examples include starch, cellulose, and alginate. Other examples of biopolymers include natural rubbers (polymers of isoprene), suberin and lignin (complex polyphenolic polymers), cutin and cutan (complex polymers of long-chain fatty acids), melanin, and polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs).
In addition to their many essential roles in living organisms, biopolymers have applications in many fields including the food industry, manufacturing, packaging, and biomedical engineering. is a pair of biopolymers, polynucleotides, forming the double helix structure ]]
Biopolymers versus synthetic polymers
A major defining difference between biopolymers and synthetic polymers can be found in their structures. All polymers are made of repetitive units called monomers. Biopolymers often have a well-defined structure, though this is not a defining characteristic (example: lignocellulose): The exact chemical composition and the sequence in which these units are arranged is called the primary structure, in the case of proteins. Many biopolymers spontaneously fold into characteristic compact shapes (see also "protein folding" as well as secondary structure and tertiary structure), which determine their biological functions and depend in a complicated way on their primary structures. Structural biology is the study of the structural properties of biopolymers. In contrast, most synthetic polymers have much simpler and more random (or stochastic) structures. This fact leads to a molecular mass distribution that is missing in biopolymers. In fact, as their synthesis is controlled by a template-directed process in most in vivo systems, all biopolymers of a type (say one specific protein) are all alike: they all contain similar sequences and numbers of monomers and thus all have the same mass. This phenomenon is called monodispersity in contrast to the polydispersity encountered in synthetic polymers. As a result, biopolymers have a dispersity of 1.
Conventions and nomenclature
Polypeptides
The convention for a polypeptide is to list its constituent amino acid residues as they occur from the amino terminus to the carboxylic acid terminus. The amino acid residues are always joined by peptide bonds. Protein, though used colloquially to refer to any polypeptide, refers to larger or fully functional forms and can consist of several polypeptide chains as well as single chains. Proteins can also be modified to include non-peptide components, such as saccharide chains and lipids. Nucleic acids The convention for a nucleic acid sequence is to list the nucleotides as they occur from the 5' end to the 3' end of the polymer chain, where 5' and 3' refer to the numbering of carbons around the ribose ring which participate in forming the phosphate diester linkages of the chain. Such a sequence is called the primary structure of the biopolymer.
Polysaccharides
Polysaccharides (sugar polymers) can be linear or branched and are typically joined with glycosidic bonds. The exact placement of the linkage can vary, and the orientation of the linking functional groups is also important, resulting in α- and β-glycosidic bonds with numbering definitive of the linking carbons' location in the ring. In addition, many saccharide units can undergo various chemical modifications, such as amination, and can even form parts of other molecules, such as glycoproteins. Structural characterization There are a number of biophysical techniques for determining sequence information. Protein sequence can be determined by Edman degradation, in which the N-terminal residues are hydrolyzed from the chain one at a time, derivatized, and then identified. Mass spectrometer techniques can also be used. Nucleic acid sequence can be determined using gel electrophoresis and capillary electrophoresis. Lastly, mechanical properties of these biopolymers can often be measured using optical tweezers or atomic force microscopy. Dual-polarization interferometry can be used to measure the conformational changes or self-assembly of these materials when stimulated by pH, temperature, ionic strength or other binding partners.
Common biopolymers
Collagen: Collagen is the primary structure of vertebrates and is the most abundant protein in mammals. Because of this, collagen is one of the most easily attainable biopolymers, and used for many research purposes. Because of its mechanical structure, collagen has high tensile strength and is a non-toxic, easily absorbable, biodegradable, and biocompatible material. Therefore, it has been used for many medical applications such as in treatment for tissue infection, drug delivery systems, and gene therapy.
Silk fibroin: Silk Fibroin (SF) is another protein rich biopolymer that can be obtained from different silkworm species, such as the mulberry worm Bombyx mori. In contrast to collagen, SF has a lower tensile strength but has strong adhesive properties due to its insoluble and fibrous protein composition. In recent studies, silk fibroin has been found to possess anticoagulation properties and platelet adhesion. Silk fibroin has been additionally found to support stem cell proliferation in vitro.
Gelatin: Gelatin is obtained from type I collagen consisting of cysteine, and produced by the partial hydrolysis of collagen from bones, tissues and skin of animals. There are two types of gelatin, Type A and Type B. Type A collagen is derived by acid hydrolysis of collagen and has 18.5% nitrogen. Type B is derived by alkaline hydrolysis containing 18% nitrogen and no amide groups. Elevated temperatures cause the gelatin to melts and exists as coils, whereas lower temperatures result in coil to helix transformation. Gelatin contains many functional groups like NH2, SH, and COOH which allow for gelatin to be modified using nanoparticles and biomolecules. Gelatin is an Extracellular Matrix protein which allows it to be applied for applications such as wound dressings, drug delivery and gene transfection.
Alginate: Alginate is the most copious marine natural polymer derived from brown seaweed. Alginate biopolymer applications range from packaging, textile and food industry to biomedical and chemical engineering. The first ever application of alginate was in the form of wound dressing, where its gel-like and absorbent properties were discovered. When applied to wounds, alginate produces a protective gel layer that is optimal for healing and tissue regeneration, and keeps a stable temperature environment. Additionally, there have been developments with alginate as a drug delivery medium, as drug release rate can easily be manipulated due to a variety of alginate densities and fibrous composition.
Biopolymer applications
The applications of biopolymers can be categorized under two main fields, which differ due to their biomedical and industrial use. Compared to synthetic polymers, which can present various disadvantages like immunogenic rejection and toxicity after degradation, many biopolymers are normally better with bodily integration as they also possess more complex structures, similar to the human body.
More specifically, polypeptides like collagen and silk, are biocompatible materials that are being used in ground-breaking research, as these are inexpensive and easily attainable materials. Gelatin polymer is often used on dressing wounds where it acts as an adhesive. Scaffolds and films with gelatin allow for the scaffolds to hold drugs and other nutrients that can be used to supply to a wound for healing.
As collagen is one of the more popular biopolymers used in biomedical science, here are some examples of their use:
Collagen based drug delivery systems: collagen films act like a barrier membrane and are used to treat tissue infections like infected corneal tissue or liver cancer. Collagen films have all been used for gene delivery carriers which can promote bone formation.
Collagen sponges: Collagen sponges are used as a dressing to treat burn victims and other serious wounds. Collagen based implants are used for cultured skin cells or drug carriers that are used for burn wounds and replacing skin.
Chitosan as an anti-microbial agent: Chitosan is used to stop the growth of microorganisms. It performs antimicrobial functions in microorganisms like algae, fungi, bacteria, and gram-positive bacteria of different yeast species.
Chitosan composite for tissue engineering: Chitosan powder blended with alginate is used to form functional wound dressings. These dressings create a moist, biocompatible environment which aids in the healing process. This wound dressing is also biodegradable and has porous structures that allows cells to grow into the dressing.
Industrial
Food: Biopolymers are being used in the food industry for things like packaging, edible encapsulation films and coating foods. Polylactic acid (PLA) is very common in the food industry due to is clear color and resistance to water. However, most polymers have a hydrophilic nature and start deteriorating when exposed to moisture. Biopolymers are also being used as edible films that encapsulate foods. These films can carry things like antioxidants, enzymes, probiotics, minerals, and vitamins. The food consumed encapsulated with the biopolymer film can supply these things to the body.
Packaging: The most common biopolymers used in packaging are polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs), polylactic acid (PLA), and starch. Starch and PLA are commercially available and biodegradable, making them a common choice for packaging. However, their barrier properties (either moisture-barrier or gas-barrier properties) and thermal properties are not ideal. Hydrophilic polymers are not water resistant and allow water to get through the packaging which can affect the contents of the package. Polyglycolic acid (PGA) is a biopolymer that has great barrier characteristics and is now being used to correct the barrier obstacles from PLA and starch.
Water purification: Chitosan has been used for water purification. It is used as a flocculant that only takes a few weeks or months rather than years to degrade in the environment. Chitosan purifies water by chelation. This is the process in which binding sites along the polymer chain bind with the metal ions in the water forming chelates. Chitosan has been shown to be an excellent candidate for use in storm and wastewater treatment.
As materials
Some biopolymers- such as PLA, naturally occurring zein, and poly-3-hydroxybutyrate can be used as plastics, replacing the need for polystyrene or polyethylene based plastics.
Some plastics are now referred to as being 'degradable', 'oxy-degradable' or 'UV-degradable'. This means that they break down when exposed to light or air, but these plastics are still primarily (as much as 98 per cent) oil-based and are not currently certified as 'biodegradable' under the European Union directive on Packaging and Packaging Waste (94/62/EC). Biopolymers will break down, and some are suitable for domestic composting.
Biopolymers (also called renewable polymers) are produced from biomass for use in the packaging industry. Biomass comes from crops such as sugar beet, potatoes, or wheat: when used to produce biopolymers, these are classified as non food crops. These can be converted in the following pathways:
Sugar beet > Glyconic acid > Polyglyconic acid
Starch > (fermentation) > Lactic acid > Polylactic acid (PLA)
Biomass > (fermentation) > Bioethanol > Ethene > Polyethylene
Many types of packaging can be made from biopolymers: food trays, blown starch pellets for shipping fragile goods, thin films for wrapping.
Environmental impacts
Biopolymers can be sustainable, carbon neutral and are always renewable, because they are made from plant or animal materials which can be grown indefinitely. Since these materials come from agricultural crops, their use could create a sustainable industry. In contrast, the feedstocks for polymers derived from petrochemicals will eventually deplete. In addition, biopolymers have the potential to cut carbon emissions and reduce CO<sub>2</sub> quantities in the atmosphere: this is because the CO<sub>2</sub> released when they degrade can be reabsorbed by crops grown to replace them: this makes them close to carbon neutral.
Almost all biopolymers are biodegradable in the natural environment: they are broken down into CO<sub>2</sub> and water by microorganisms. These biodegradable biopolymers are also compostable: they can be put into an industrial composting process and will break down by 90% within six months. Biopolymers that do this can be marked with a 'compostable' symbol, under European Standard EN 13432 (2000). Packaging marked with this symbol can be put into industrial composting processes and will break down within six months or less. An example of a compostable polymer is PLA film under 20μm thick: films which are thicker than that do not qualify as compostable, even though they are "biodegradable". In Europe there is a home composting standard and associated logo that enables consumers to identify and dispose of packaging in their compost heap.<ref name"nnfcc" />See also
* Biomaterials
* Bioplastic
* Biopolymers & Cell (journal)
* Condensation polymers
* Condensed tannins
* DNA sequence
*
* Melanin
* Non food crops
* Phosphoramidite
* Polymer chemistry
* Sequence-controlled polymers
* Sequencing
* Small molecules
* Worm-like chain
References
External links
* [http://www.nnfcc.co.uk/ NNFCC: The UK's National Centre for Biorenewable Energy, Fuels and Materials]
* [http://www.bioplasticsmagazine.com/ Bioplastics Magazine]
* [http://www.biopolymer.net/ Biopolymer group]
* [https://archive.today/20121209011537/http://boldlygo.org/blog/whats-stopping-bioplastic/ What's Stopping Bioplastic?]
Category:Biomolecules
Category:Polymers
Category:Molecular biology
Category:Molecular genetics
Category:Biotechnology products
Category:Bioplastics
Category:Biomaterials | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biopolymer | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.907260 |
3975 | 2001 United Kingdom general election | 11.9 pp)
| registered = 44,403,238
| opinion_polls = Opinion polling for the United Kingdom general election, 2001
<!-- Labour -->| image1
| leader1 = Tony Blair
| leader_since1 = 21 July 1994
| party1 = Labour Party (UK)
| leaders_seat1 = Sedgefield
| last_election1 = 418 seats, 43.2%
| seats1 = 412
| seat_change1 = 6
| popular_vote1 = 10,724,953
| percentage1 = 40.7%
| swing1 = 2.5 pp
<!-- Conservative -->| image2
| leader2 = William Hague
| leader_since2 = 19 June 1997
| party2 = Conservative Party (UK)
| leaders_seat2 = Richmond (Yorks)
| last_election2 = 165 seats, 30.7%
| seats2 = 166
| seat_change2 = 1
| popular_vote2 = 8,357,615
| percentage2 = 31.7%
| swing2 = 1.0 pp
<!-- Liberal Democrats -->| image3
| leader3 = Charles Kennedy
| leader_since3 = 9 August 1999
| party3 = Liberal Democrats (UK)
| leaders_seat3 = Ross, Skye and<br />Inverness West
| last_election3 = 46 seats, 16.8%
| seats3 = 52
| seat_change3 = 6
| popular_vote3 = 4,814,321
| percentage3 = 18.3%
| swing3 = 1.5 pp
<!-- Map -->| map_image = UK General Election, 2001.svg
| map_size = 200px
| map_caption = Colours denote the winning party, as shown in the main table of results.
| map2_image = File:House of Commons elected members, 2001.svg
| map2_size = 360px
| map2_caption = Composition of the House of Commons after the election
<!-- Post election -->| title = Prime Minister
| posttitle = Prime Minister after election
| before_election = Tony Blair
| before_party = Labour Party (UK)
| after_election = Tony Blair
| after_party = Labour Party (UK)
}}
The 2001 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 7 June 2001, four years after the previous election on 1 May 1997, to elect 659 members to the House of Commons. The governing Labour Party led by Prime Minister Tony Blair was re-elected to serve a second term in government with another landslide victory with a 165-seat majority, returning 412 members of Parliament versus 418 from the previous election, a net loss of six seats, although with a significantly lower turnout than before—59.4%, compared to 71.6% at the previous election.
The number of votes Labour received fell by nearly three million. Blair went on to become the only Labour prime minister to serve two consecutive full terms in office. As Labour retained almost all of their seats won in the 1997 landslide victory, the media dubbed the 2001 election "the quiet landslide". There was little change outside Northern Ireland, with 620 out of the 641 seats in Great Britain electing candidates from the same party as they did in 1997. A strong economy contributed to the Labour victory.
The opposition Conservative Party under William Hague's leadership was still deeply divided on the issue of Europe and the party's policy platform had drifted considerably to the right. The party put the issue of European monetary union, in particular the prospect of the UK joining the Eurozone, at the centre of its campaign but failed to resonate with the electorate. The Conservatives briefly had a narrow lead in the polls during the 2000 fuel strikes but Labour successfully resolved them by year end. Furthermore, a series of publicity stunts that backfired also harmed Hague, and he immediately announced his resignation as party leader when the election result was clear, formally stepping down three months later, therefore becoming the first leader of the Conservative Party in the House of Commons since Austen Chamberlain nearly eighty years prior not to serve as prime minister.
The election was largely a repeat of the 1997 general election, with Labour losing only six seats overall and the Conservatives making a net gain of one seat (gaining nine seats but losing eight). The Conservatives gained a seat in Scotland, which ended the party's status as an "England-only" party in the prior parliament, but failed again to win any seats in Wales. Although they did not gain many seats, three of the few new MPs elected were future Conservative Prime Ministers David Cameron and Boris Johnson and future Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne; Osborne would serve in the same Cabinet as Cameron from 2010 to 2016. The Liberal Democrats led by Charles Kennedy made a net gain of six seats.
Change was seen in Northern Ireland, with the moderate unionist Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) losing four seats to the more hardline Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). A similar transition appeared in the nationalist community, with the moderate Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) losing votes to the more staunchly republican and abstentionist Sinn Féin.
Exceptionally low voter turnout, which fell below 60% for the first time since 1918, also marked this election. The election was broadcast live on BBC One and presented by David Dimbleby, Jeremy Paxman, Andrew Marr, Peter Snow, and Tony King. The 2001 general election was notable for being the first in which pictures of the party logos appeared on the ballot paper. Prior to this, the ballot paper had only displayed the candidate's name, address, and party name.
Notable departing MPs included former Prime Ministers Edward Heath (also Father of the House) and John Major, former Deputy Prime Minister Michael Heseltine, former Liberal Democrat leader Paddy Ashdown, former Cabinet ministers Tony Benn, Tom King, John Morris, Mo Mowlam, John MacGregor and Peter Brooke, Teresa Gorman, and then Mayor of London Ken Livingstone.
Background
The elections were marked by voter apathy, with turnout falling to 59.4%, the lowest (and first under 70%) since the Coupon Election of 1918. Throughout the election the Labour Party had maintained a significant lead in the opinion polls and the result was deemed to be so certain that some bookmakers paid out for a Labour majority before election day. However, the opinion polls the previous autumn had shown the first Tory lead (though only by a narrow margin) in the opinion polls for eight years as they benefited from the public anger towards the government over the fuel protests which had led to a severe shortage of motor fuel.
By the end of 2000, however, the dispute had been resolved and Labour were firmly back in the lead of the opinion polls. In total, a mere 29 parliamentary seats changed hands at the 2001 Election.
2001 also saw the rare election of an independent. Richard Taylor of Independent Kidderminster Hospital and Health Concern (usually now known simply as "Health Concern") unseated a government MP, David Lock, in Wyre Forest. There was also a high vote for British National Party leader Nick Griffin in Oldham West and Royton, in the wake of recent race riots in the town of Oldham.
In Northern Ireland, the election was far more dramatic and marked a move by unionists away from support for the Good Friday Agreement, with the moderate unionist Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) losing to the more hardline Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). This polarisation was also seen in the nationalist community, with the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) vote losing out to more left-wing and republican Sinn Féin. It also saw a tightening of the parties as the small UK Unionist Party lost its only seat.
Campaign
The election had been expected on 3 May, to coincide with local elections, but on 2 April 2001, the local elections were postponed to 7 June because of rural movement restrictions imposed in response to the foot-and-mouth outbreak that had started in February.
On 8 May, Prime Minister Tony Blair announced that the general election would be held on the 7 June as expected, on the same day as the local elections. Blair made the announcement in a speech at St Saviour's and St Olave's Church of England School in Bermondsey, London rather than on the steps of Downing Street. The party had successfully defended all their by election seats, and many suspected a Labour win was inevitable from the start.
Many in the party, however, were afraid of voter apathy, which was epitomised in a poster of "Hague with Margaret Thatcher's hair", captioned "Get out and vote. Or they get in." Despite recessions in mainland Europe and the United States, due to the bursting of global tech bubbles, Britain was notably unaffected and Labour however could rely on a strong economy as unemployment continued to decline toward election day, putting to rest any fears of a Labour government putting the economic situation at risk.
For William Hague, however, the Conservative Party had still not fully recovered from the loss in 1997. The party was still divided over Europe, and talk of a referendum on joining the Eurozone was rife, and as a result "Save The Pound" was one of the key slogans deployed in the Conservatives' campaign. As Labour remained at the political centre, the Conservatives moved to the right. A policy gaffe by Oliver Letwin over public spending cuts left the party with an own goal that Labour soon exploited.
Thatcher gave a speech to the Conservative Election Rally in Plymouth on 22 May 2001, calling New Labour "rootless, empty, and artificial." She also added to Hague's troubles when speaking out strongly against the Euro to applause. Hague himself, although a witty performer at Prime Minister's Questions, was dogged in the press and reminded of his speech, given at the age of 16, at the 1977 Conservative Conference. The Sun newspaper only added to the Conservatives' woes by backing Labour for a second consecutive election, calling Hague a "dead parrot" during the Conservative Party's conference in October 1998.
The Conservatives campaigned on a strongly right-wing platform, emphasising the issues of Europe, immigration and tax, the fabled "Tebbit Trinity". They also released a poster showing a heavily pregnant Tony Blair, stating "Four years of Labour and he still hasn't delivered". However, Labour countered by asking where the proposed tax cuts were going to come from, and decried the Tory policy as "cut here, cut there, cut everywhere", in reference to the widespread belief that the Conservatives would make major cuts to public services in order to fund tax cuts. Labour also capitalised on the strong economic conditions of the time, and another major line of attack (primarily directed towards Michael Portillo, now Shadow Chancellor after returning to Parliament via a by-election) was to warn of a return to "Tory Boom and Bust" under a Conservative administration.
Charles Kennedy contested his first election as leader of the Liberal Democrats.
During the election Sharron Storer, a resident of Birmingham, criticised Prime Minister Tony Blair in front of television cameras about conditions in the National Health Service. The widely televised incident happened on 16 May during a campaign visit by Blair to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. Sharron Storer's partner, Keith Sedgewick, a cancer patient with non-Hodgkin lymphoma and therefore highly susceptible to infection, was being treated at the time in the bone marrow unit, but no bed could be found for him and he was transferred to the casualty unit for his first 24 hours. On the evening of the same day Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott punched a protestor after being hit by an egg on his way to an election rally in Rhyl, North Wales.Endorsements* Labour received endorsements from The Sun, The Times, and The Daily Express (The Express for the first time in its history), The Daily Mirror, The Financial Times, The Economist, and The Guardian.
* The Independent endorsed Labour and the Liberal Democrats.
For the Conservatives, the huge loss they had sustained in 1997 was repeated. Despite gaining nine seats, they lost seven to the Liberal Democrats, and one even to Labour (South Dorset). William Hague was quick to announce his resignation, doing so at 07:44 outside the Conservative Party headquarters. Some believed that Hague had been unlucky; although most considered him to be a talented orator and an intelligent statesman, he had come up against the charismatic Tony Blair in the peak of his political career, and it was no surprise that little progress was made in reducing Labour's majority after a relatively smooth parliament.
Staying at what they considered rock bottom, however, showed that the Conservatives had failed to improve their negative public image, had remained somewhat disunited over Europe, and had not regained the trust that they had lost in the 1990s. Hague's focus on the "Save The Pound" campaign narrative had failed to gain any traction; Labour's successful countertactic was to be repeatedly vague over the issue of future monetary union – and said that the UK would only consider joining the Eurozone "when conditions were right". But in Scotland, despite flipping one seat from the Scottish National Party, their vote collapse continued. They failed to retake former strongholds in Scotland as the Nationalists consolidated their grip on the Northeastern portion of the country.
The Liberal Democrats could point to steady progress under their new leader, Charles Kennedy, gaining more seats than the main two parties—albeit only six overall—and maintaining the performance of a pleasing 1997 election, where the party had doubled its number of seats from 20 to 46. While they had yet to become electable as a government, they underlined their growing reputation as a worthwhile alternative to Labour and Conservative, offering plenty of debate in Parliament and representing more than a mere protest vote.
The SNP failed to gain any new seats and lost a seat to the Conservatives by just 79 votes. In Wales, Plaid Cymru both gained a seat from Labour and lost one to them.
In Northern Ireland the Ulster Unionists, despite gaining North Down, lost five other seats.
<!-- this section is transcluded on Electoral history of Tony Blair -->:
<section begin="UK General Election 2001"/>
{| class"wikitable" style"width:630px"
|-
|'''Government's new majority
|165'
|-
|Total votes cast
|26,367,383
|-
|Turnout
|59.4%
|}
<section end="UK General Election 2001"/>
All parties with more than 500 votes shown.
The seat gains reflect changes on the 1997 general election result. Two seats had changed hands in by-elections in the intervening period. These were as follows:
* Romsey from Conservative to Liberal Democrats. The Liberal Democrats held this seat in 2001.
* South Antrim from Ulster Unionists to Democratic Unionists. The Ulster Unionists won this seat back in 2001.
The results of the election give a Gallagher index of dis-proportionality of 17.74.
|40.7}}
|31.7}}
|18.3}}
|1.8}}
|1.5}}
}}
|62.7}}
|25.2}}
|7.9}}
|0.9}}
|0.8}}
|0.8}}
}}
Results by constituent country
{| class="wikitable"
!
!LAB
!CON
!LD
!SNP
!PC
!NI parties
!Others
!Total
|-
|England
|323
|165
|40
| –
| –
| –
|1
|529
|-
|Wales
|34
| –
|2
| –
|4
| –
| –
|40
|-
|Scotland
|56
|1
|10
|5
| –
| –
| –
|72
|-
|Northern Ireland
| –
| –
| –
| –
| –
|18
| –
|18
|-
|Total
|413
|166
|52
|5
|4
|18
|1
|659
|}
Seats changing hands
{| class="wikitable plainrowheaders"
|-
! rowspan=2 | Seat
! colspan2 rowspan2| 1997 election
! colspan="6"|Constituency result 2001 by party
! colspan2 rowspan2| 2001 election
|-
!Con
!Lab
!Lib
!PC
!SNP
!Others
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Belfast North
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Carmarthen East and Dinefwr
|
|4,912
|13,540
|2,815
|16,130
|
|656
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Castle Point
|
|17,738
|16,753
|3,116
|
|
|1273
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Cheadle
|
|18,444
|6,086
|18,477
|
|
|599
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Chesterfield
|
|3,613
|18,663
|21,249
|
|
|437
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Dorset Mid and Poole North
|
|17,974
|6,765
|18,358
|
|
|621
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Dorset South
|
|18,874
|19,027
|6,531
|
|
|913
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Fermanagh and South Tyrone
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Galloway and Upper Nithsdale
|
|12,222
|7,258
|3,698
|
|12,148
|588
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Guildford
|
|19,820
|6,558
|20,358
|
|
|736
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Isle of Wight
|
|25,223
|9,676
|22,397
|
|
|2,106
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Londonderry East
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Ludlow
|
|16,990
|5,785
|18,620
|
|
|871
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Newark
|
|20,983
|16,910
|5,970
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Norfolk North
|
|23,495
|7,490
|23,978
|
|
|649
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Norfolk North West
|
|24,846
|21,361
|4,292
|
|
|704
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | North Down
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Romford
|
|18,931
|12,954
|2,869
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Romsey
|
|20,386
|3,986
|22,756
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Strangford
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Tatton
|
|19,860
|11,249
|7,685
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Taunton
|
|23,033
|8,254
|22,798
|
|
|1,140
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Teignbridge
|
|23,332
|7,366
|26,343
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Tyrone West
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Upminster
|
|15,410
|14,169
|3,183
|
|
|1,089
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Wyre Forest
|
|9,350
|10,857
|
|
|
|28,487
|
|-
! scope"row" style"text-align: left;" | Ynys Mon
|
|7,653
|11,906
|2,772
|11,106
|
|
|
|}
MPs who lost their seats
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"font-size: 95%;"
|-
!colspan=2|Party
!Name
!Constituency
!Office held whilst in power
!Year elected
!Defeated by
!colspan=2|Party
|-
! rowspan7 style"background-color: " |
| rowspan=7|Labour Party
|Alan Williams
|Carmarthen East and Dinefwr
|
|1987
|Adam Price
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Plaid Cymru
|-
|Christine Butler
|Castle Point
|
|1997
|Dr. Bob Spink
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|-
|Fiona Jones
|Newark
|
|1997
|<small>Colonel</small><br /> Patrick Mercer
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|-
|George Turner
|Norfolk North West
|
|1997
|Henry Bellingham
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|-
|Eileen Gordon
|Romford
|
|1997
|Andrew Rosindell
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|-
|Keith Darvill
|Upminster
|
|1997
|Angela Watkinson
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|-
|David Lock
|Wyre Forest
|
|1997
|Dr. Richard Taylor
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Independent Kidderminster Hospital and Health Concern
|-
! rowspan6 style"background-color: " |
| rowspan=6|Conservative Party
|Stephen Day
|Cheadle
|
|1987
|Patsy Calton
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Liberal Democrats
|-
|Christopher Fraser
|Mid Dorset and North Poole
|
|1997
|Annette Brooke
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Liberal Democrats
|-
|Ian Bruce
|Dorset South
|
|1987
|Jim Knight
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Labour Party
|-
|Nick St Aubyn
|Guildford
|
|1997
|Sue Doughty
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Liberal Democrats
|-
|<small>The Hon.</small><br /> David Prior
|Norfolk North
|
|1997
|Norman Lamb
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Liberal Democrats
|-
|Patrick Nicholls
|Teignbridge
|
|1983
|Richard Younger-Ross
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Liberal Democrats
|-
! rowspan2 style"background-color: " |
| rowspan=2|Liberal Democrats
|Dr. Peter Brand
|Isle of Wight
|
|1997
|Andrew Turner
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|-
|Jackie Ballard
|Taunton
|
|1997
|Adrian Flook
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|-
! rowspan3 style"background-color: " |
| rowspan=3|Ulster Unionist Party
|Willie Ross
|East Londonderry
|
|1974
|Gregory Campbell
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Democratic Unionist Party
|-
|Cecil Walker
|North Belfast
|
|1983
|Nigel Dodds
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Democratic Unionist Party
|-
|William Thompson
|West Tyrone
|
|1997
|Pat Doherty
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Sinn Féin
|-
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Democratic Unionist Party
|William McCrea
|Antrim South
|
|2000
|David Burnside
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Ulster Unionist Party
|-
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||UK Unionist Party
|Robert McCartney
|North Down
|
|1995
|Lady Hermon
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Ulster Unionist Party
|-
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Independent
|Martin Bell
|Tatton contesting Brentwood and Ongar
|
|1997
|Eric Pickles
! rowspan1 style"background-color: " |
||Conservative Party
|}
Voter Demographics
MORI interviewed 18,657 adults in Great Britain after the election which suggested the following demographic breakdown...
{| class"wikitable sortable mw-datatable" style"text-align:center;font-size:90%;line-height:14px;"
!colspan=7|The 2001 UK general election vote in Great Britain (in per cent)
|-
!rowspan=2|Social Group
!class"unsortable" style"width:50px;"|Lab
!class"unsortable" style"width:50px;"|Con
!class"unsortable" style"width:50px;"|Lib Dem
!rowspan=2|Others
!rowspan=2|Lead
!rowspan=2|Turnout
|-
!data-sort-type"number" style"background:;"|
!data-sort-type"number" style"background:;"|
!data-sort-type"number" style"background:;"|
|-
|Total
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|42
|33
|19
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|9
|59
|-
!colspan=7|Gender
|-
|Men
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|42
|32
|18
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|10
|61
|-
|Women
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|42
|33
|19
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|9
|58
|-
!colspan=7|Age
|-
|18–24
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|41
|27
|24
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|14
|39
|-
|25–34
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|51
|24
|19
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|27
|46
|-
|35–44
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|45
|28
|19
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|17
|59
|-
|45–54
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|41
|32
|20
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|9
|65
|-
|55–64
|37
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|39
|17
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|2
|69
|-
|65+
|39
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|40
|17
|4
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|1
|70
|-
!colspan=7|Social class
|-
|AB
|30
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|39
|25
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|9
|68
|-
|C1
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|38
|36
|20
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|2
|60
|-
|C2
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|49
|29
|15
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|20
|56
|-
|DE
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|55
|24
|13
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|31
|53
|-
!colspan=7|Work status
|-
|Full time
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|43
|30
|20
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|13
|57
|-
|Part time
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|43
|29
|21
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|14
|56
|-
|Not working
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|41
|36
|18
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|5
|63
|-
|Unemployed
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|54
|23
|11
|12
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|31
|44
|-
|Self-employed
|32
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|39
|18
|11
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|7
|60
|-
!colspan=7|Housing tenure
|-
|Owner
|32
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|43
|19
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|11
|68
|-
|Mortgage
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|42
|31
|20
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|11
|59
|-
|Council/HA
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|60
|18
|14
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|42
|52
|-
|Private rent
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|40
|28
|25
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|12
|46
|-
!colspan=7|Men by age
|-
|18–24
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|38
|29
|26
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|9
|43
|-
|25–34
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|52
|24
|19
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|28
|47
|-
|35–54
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|43
|29
|19
|9
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|14
|64
|-
|55+
|39
|39
|16
|6
|Tie
|73
|-
!colspan=7|Men by social class
|-
|AB
|31
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|38
|25
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|7
|68
|-
|C1
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|39
|36
|14
|11
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|3
|62
|-
|C2
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|49
|28
|14
|9
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|21
|56
|-
|DE
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|55
|23
|14
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|32
|56
|-
!colspan=7|Women by age
|-
|18–24
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|45
|24
|23
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|21
|36
|-
|25–34
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|49
|25
|19
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|24
|46
|-
|35–54
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|43
|31
|20
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|12
|60
|-
|55+
|38
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|40
|18
|4
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|2
|67
|-
!colspan=7|Women by social class
|-
|AB
|28
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|41
|26
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|13
|68
|-
|C1
|37
|37
|20
|6
|Tie
|59
|-
|C2
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|48
|30
|17
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|18
|56
|-
|DE
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|56
|25
|13
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|31
|50
|-
!colspan=7|Readership
|-
|Daily Express
|33
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|43
|19
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|10
|63
|-
|Daily Mail
|24
|style="background:#66C2FF;color:black"|55
|17
|4
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|31
|65
|-
|The Mirror
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|71
|11
|13
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|58
|62
|-
|Daily Record
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|59
|8
|10
|23
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|36
|57
|-
|Daily Telegraph
|16
|style="background:#66C2FF;color:black"|65
|14
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|49
|71
|-
|Financial Times
|30
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|48
|21
|1
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|18
|64
|-
|The Guardian
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|52
|6
|34
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|18
|68
|-
|The Independent
|38
|12
|style="background:#FEECCD;color:black"|44
|6
|style="background:;"|6
|69
|-
|Daily Star
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|56
|21
|17
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|35
|48
|-
|The Sun
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|52
|29
|11
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|23
|50
|-
|The Times
|28
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|40
|26
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|12
|66
|-
|No daily paper
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|45
|27
|22
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|18
|56
|-
|Evening Standard
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|42
|29
|21
|8
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|13
|51
|-
!colspan=7|Sunday Readership
|-
|News of World
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|55
|27
|12
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|28
|52
|-
|Sunday Express
|29
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|47
|20
|4
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|18
|67
|-
|Sunday Mail
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|53
|14
|13
|20
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|33
|59
|-
|Sunday Mirror
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|72
|16
|9
|3
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|56
|62
|-
|Sunday Post
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|43
|22
|18
|17
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|21
|64
|-
|Sunday Telegraph
|17
|style="background:#66C2FF;color:black"|63
|13
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|46
|71
|-
|Mail on Sunday
|25
|style="background:#66C2FF;color:black"|53
|17
|5
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|28
|65
|-
|The Observer
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|53
|4
|34
|9
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|19
|71
|-
|Sunday People
|style="background:#FF668C;color:black"|65
|19
|13
|3
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|46
|60
|-
|Sunday Times
|29
|style="background:#CCEBFF;color:black"|40
|24
|7
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|11
|67
|-
|Independent on Sunday
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|47
|10
|37
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|10
|70
|-
|No Sunday paper
|style="background:#FFCCD9;color:black"|42
|30
|22
|6
|style="background:;color:#FFFFFF;"|12
|55
|}
, mainly between Labour and the Liberal Democrats.]]
See also
* List of MPs elected in the 2001 United Kingdom general election
* Results of the 2001 United Kingdom general election
* List of MPs for constituencies in Wales (2001–2005)
* List of MPs for constituencies in Scotland (2001–2005)
* 2001 United Kingdom foot-and-mouth outbreak
* 2001 United Kingdom general election in Northern Ireland
* 2001 United Kingdom general election in England
* 2001 United Kingdom general election in Scotland
* 2001 United Kingdom general election in Wales
* 2001 United Kingdom local elections
Notes
References
Bibliography
* Butler, David and Dennis Kavanagh. The British General Election of 2001'' (2002), the standard scholarly study
* External links
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/news/vote2001/ BBC News: Vote 2001] – in depth coverage.
* [https://archives.lse.ac.uk/TreeBrowse.aspx?srcCalmView.Catalog&fieldRefNo&key=GENERAL%20ELECTION%202001 Catalogue of 2001 general election ephemera] at the [https://archives.lse.ac.uk/ Archives Division] of the London School of Economics.
Category:2001 elections in the United Kingdom
2001
Category:June 2001 in the United Kingdom
Category:Premiership of Tony Blair
Category:New Labour
Category:History of the Labour Party (UK)
Category:Landslide victories in the United Kingdom | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001_United_Kingdom_general_election | 2025-04-05T18:26:38.983457 |
3978 | Book of Mormon | The Book of Mormon is a religious text of the <!-- Do not change to Latter-day Saint or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "Latter Day Saint movement" refers to all the religious denominations and practices that descend in some way from Joseph Smith Jr.'s 1830 publication of the Book of Mormon and founding of the Church of Christ. The Book of Mormon is a sacred text to several churches, including The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Community of Christ, the Church of Jesus Christ (Bickertonite), and more. -->Latter Day Saint movement, first published in 1830 by Joseph Smith as The Book of Mormon: An Account Written by the Hand of Mormon upon Plates Taken from the Plates of Nephi.
The book is one of the earliest and most well-known unique writings of the Latter Day Saint movement. The denominations of the Latter Day Saint movement typically regard the text primarily as scripture (sometimes as one of four standard works) and secondarily as a record of God's dealings with ancient inhabitants of the Americas. The majority of Latter Day Saints believe the book to be a record of real-world history, with Latter Day Saint denominations viewing it variously as an inspired record of scripture to the linchpin or "keystone" of their religion. Independent archaeological, historical, and scientific communities have discovered little evidence to support the existence of the civilizations described therein. Characteristics of the language and content point toward a nineteenth-century origin of the Book of Mormon. Various academics and apologetic organizations connected to the Latter Day Saint movement nevertheless argue that the book is an authentic account of the pre-Columbian exchange world.
The Book of Mormon has a number of doctrinal discussions on subjects such as the fall of Adam and Eve, the nature of the Christian atonement, eschatology, agency, priesthood authority, redemption from physical and spiritual death, the nature and conduct of baptism, the age of accountability, the purpose and practice of communion, personalized revelation, economic justice, the anthropomorphic and personal nature of God, the nature of spirits and angels, and the organization of the latter day church. The pivotal event of the book is an appearance of Jesus Christ in the Americas shortly after his resurrection.
Origin
According to Smith's account and the book's narrative, the Book was originally engraved in otherwise unknown characters on golden plates by ancient prophets; the last prophet to contribute to the book, Moroni, had buried it in what is present-day Manchester, New York and then appeared in a vision to Smith in 1827, revealing the location of the plates and instructing him to translate the plates into English. A different view is that Smith authored the Book, drawing on material and ideas from his contemporary 19th-century environment, rather than translating an ancient record.
Conceptual emergence
According to Joseph Smith, in 1823, when he was seventeen <!-- do not edit age, JS was 17 at time of Moroni visit, see refs for clarification -->years old, an angel of God named Moroni appeared to him and said that a collection of ancient writings was buried in a nearby hill in present-day Wayne County, New York, engraved on golden plates by ancient prophets. The writings were said to describe a people whom God had led from Jerusalem to the Western hemisphere 600 years before Jesus's birth. Smith said this vision occurred on the evening of September 21, 1823, and that on the following day, via divine guidance, he located the burial location of the plates on this hill and was instructed by Moroni to meet him at the same hill on September 22 of the following year to receive further instructions, which repeated annually until 1827. Smith told his entire immediate family about this angelic encounter by the next night, and his brother William reported that the family "believed all he [Joseph Smith] said" about the angel and plates.'s description of receiving the golden plates from the angel Moroni.|225x225px]]
Smith and his family reminisced that as part of what Smith believed was angelic instruction, Moroni provided Smith with a "brief sketch" of the "origin, progress, civilization, laws, governments... righteousness and iniquity" of the "aboriginal inhabitants of the country" (referring to the Nephites and Lamanites who figure in the Book of Mormon's primary narrative). Smith sometimes shared what he said he had learned through such angelic encounters with his family as well.
In Smith's account, Moroni allowed him, accompanied by his wife Emma Hale Smith, to take the plates on September 22, 1827, four years after his initial visit to the hill, and directed him to translate them into English. Smith said the angel Moroni strictly instructed him to not let anyone else see the plates without divine permission. Neighbors, some of whom had collaborated with Smith in earlier treasure-hunting enterprises, tried several times to steal the plates from Smith while he and his family guarded them. Dictation
As Smith and contemporaries reported, the English manuscript of the Book of Mormon was produced as scribes wrote down Smith's dictation in multiple sessions between 1828 and 1829. The dictation of the extant Book of Mormon was completed in 1829 in between 53 and 74 working days.
Descriptions of the way in which Smith dictated the Book of Mormon vary. Smith himself called the Book of Mormon a translated work, but in public he generally described the process itself only in vague terms, saying he translated by a miraculous gift from God. According to some accounts from his family and friends at the time, early on, Smith copied characters off the plates as part of a process of learning to translate an initial corpus. For the majority of the process, Smith dictated the text by voicing strings of words which a scribe would write down; after the scribe confirmed they had finished writing, Smith would continue.
Smith, his first scribe Martin Harris & his wife Emma all claimed that Joseph dictated by translating the ancient text through the use of the Urim and Thummim that accompanied the plates, prepared by the Lord for the purpose of translating. This "Urim and Thummim," after the biblical divination stones, also called "Nephite interpreters" were described as two clear seer stones which Smith said he could look through in order to translate, bound together by a metal rim and attached to a breastplate.
Other accounts say that Smith used a seer stone he already possessed placed inside of a hat to darken the area around the stone.
Beginning around 1832, both the interpreters and Smith's own seer stone were at times referred to as the "Urim and Thummim", and Smith sometimes used the term interchangeably with "spectacles". Emma Smith's and David Whitmer's accounts describe Smith using the interpreters while dictating for Martin Harris's scribing and switching to only using his seer stone(s) in subsequent translation. Religious studies scholar Grant Hardy summarizes Smith's known dictation process as follows: "Smith looked at a seer stone placed in his hat and then dictated the text of the Book of Mormon to scribes". Early on, Smith sometimes separated himself from his scribe with a blanket between them, as he did while Martin Harris, a neighbor, scribed his dictation in 1828. At other points in the process, such as when Oliver Cowdery or Emma Smith scribed, the plates were left covered up but in the open. During some dictation sessions the plates were entirely absent.In 1828, while scribing for Smith, Harris, at the prompting of his wife Lucy Harris, repeatedly asked Smith to loan him the manuscript pages of the dictation thus far. Smith reluctantly acceded to Harris's requests. Within weeks, Harris lost the manuscript, which was most likely stolen by a member of his extended family. After the loss, Smith recorded that he lost the ability to translate and that Moroni had taken back the plates to be returned only after Smith repented. Smith later stated that God allowed him to resume translation, but directed that he begin where he left off (in what is now called the Book of Mosiah), without retranslating what had been in the lost manuscript.
Smith recommenced some Book of Mormon dictation between September 1828 and April 1829 with his wife Emma Smith scribing with occasional help from his brother Samuel Smith, though transcription accomplished was limited. In April 1829, Oliver Cowdery met Smith and, believing Smith's account of the plates, began scribing for Smith in what became a "burst of rapid-fire translation". In May, Joseph and Emma Smith along with Cowdery moved in with the Whitmer family, sympathetic neighbors, in an effort to avoid interruptions as they proceeded with producing the manuscript.
While living with the Whitmers, Smith said he received permission to allow eleven specific others to see the uncovered golden plates and, in some cases, handle them. Their written testimonies are known as the Testimony of Three Witnesses, who described seeing the plates in a visionary encounter with an angel, and the Testimony of Eight Witnesses, who described handling the plates as displayed by Smith. Statements signed by them have been published in most editions of the Book of Mormon. In addition to Smith and these eleven, several others described encountering the plates by holding or moving them wrapped in cloth, although without seeing the plates themselves. Their accounts of the plates' appearance tend to describe a golden-colored compilation of thin metal sheets (the "plates") bound together by wires in the shape of a book.
The manuscript was completed in June 1829. Smith said he returned the plates to Moroni upon the publication of the book.
Views on composition
to print the first 5,000 copies of the Book of Mormon]]Multiple theories of naturalistic composition have been proposed.
Most adherents of the Latter Day Saint movement consider the Book of Mormon an authentic historical record, translated by Smith from actual ancient plates through divine revelation. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), the largest Latter Day Saint denomination, maintains this as its official position.
Methods
The Book of Mormon as a written text is the transcription of what scholars Grant Hardy and William L. Davis call an "extended oral performance", one which Davis considers "comparable in length and magnitude to the classic oral epics, such as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey". and Smith's followers and those close to him insisted he lacked the writing and narrative skills necessary to consciously produce a text like the Book of Mormon. Some naturalistic interpretations have therefore compared Smith's dictation to automatic writing arising from the subconscious. Inspirations Early observers, presuming Smith incapable of writing something as long or as complex as the Book of Mormon, often searched for a possible source he might have plagiarized. In the nineteenth century, a popular hypothesis was that Smith collaborated with Sidney Rigdon to plagiarize an unpublished manuscript written by Solomon Spalding and turn into the Book of Mormon. Historians have considered the Spalding manuscript source hypothesis debunked since 1945, when Fawn M. Brodie thoroughly disproved it in her critical biography of Smith.
Historians since the early twentieth century have suggested Smith was inspired by View of the Hebrews, an 1823 book which propounded the Hebraic Indian theory, since both associate American Indians with ancient Israel and describe clashes between two dualistically opposed civilizations (View as speculation about American Indian history and the Book of Mormon as its narrative). Whether or not View influenced the Book of Mormon is the subject of debate. A pseudo-anthropological treatise, View presented allegedly empirical evidence in support of its hypothesis. The Book of Mormon is written as a narrative, and Christian themes predominate rather than supposedly Indigenous parallels. Additionally, while View supposes that Indigenous American peoples descended from the Ten Lost Tribes, the Book of Mormon actively rejects the hypothesis; the peoples in its narrative have an "ancient Hebrew" origin but do not descend from the lost tribes. The book ultimately heavily revises, rather than borrows, the Hebraic Indian theory.
The Book of Mormon may creatively reconfigure, without plagiarizing, parts of the popular 1678 Christian allegory ''Pilgrim's Progress written by John Bunyan.'' For example, the martyr narrative of Abinadi in the Book of Mormon shares a complex matrix of descriptive language with Faithful's martyr narrative in Progress. Some other Book of Mormon narratives, such as the dream Lehi has in the book's opening, also resemble creative reworkings of Progress story arcs as well as elements of other works by Bunyan, such as The Holy War and Grace Abounding.
Historical scholarship also suggests it is plausible for Smith to have produced the Book of Mormon himself, based on his knowledge of the Bible and enabled by a democratizing religious culture.Content<br />(Image from the U.S. Library of Congress Rare Book and Special Collections Division)]]PresentationThe style of the Book of Mormon's English text resembles that of the King James Version of the Bible. Novelist Jane Barnes considered the book "difficult to read", and according to religious studies scholar Grant Hardy, the language is an "awkward, repetitious form of English" with a "nonmainstream literary aesthetic". Narratively and structurally, the book is complex, with multiple arcs that diverge and converge in the story while contributing to the book's overarching plot and themes. Historian Daniel Walker Howe concluded in his own appraisal that the Book of Mormon "is a powerful epic written on a grand scale" and "should rank among the great achievements of American literature".
The Book of Mormon presents its text through multiple narrators explicitly identified as figures within the book's own narrative. Narrators describe reading, redacting, writing, and exchanging records. The book also embeds sermons, given by figures from the narrative, throughout the text, and these internal orations make up just over 40 percent of the Book of Mormon. Periodically, the book's primary narrators reflexively describe themselves creating the book in a move that is "almost postmodern" in its self-consciousness. Historian Laurie Maffly-Kipp explains that "the mechanics of editing and transmitting thereby become an important feature of the text". Barnes calls the Book of Mormon a "scripture about writing and its influence in a post-modern world of texts" and "a statement about different voices, and possibly the problem of voice, in sacred literature".
Organization
The Book of Mormon is organized as a compilation of smaller books, each named after its main named narrator or a prominent leader, beginning with the First Book of Nephi (1 Nephi) and ending with the Book of Moroni.
The book's sequence is primarily chronological based on the narrative content of the book. Exceptions include the Words of Mormon and the Book of Ether. The Words of Mormon contains editorial commentary by Mormon. The Book of Ether is presented as the narrative of an earlier group of people who had come to the American continent before the immigration described in 1 Nephi. First Nephi through Omni are written in first-person narrative, as are Mormon and Moroni. The remainder of the Book of Mormon is written in third-person historical narrative, said to be compiled and abridged by Mormon (with Moroni abridging the Book of Ether and writing the latter part of Mormon and the Book of Moroni).
Most modern editions of the book have been divided into chapters and verses. Most editions of the book also contain supplementary material, including the "Testimony of Three Witnesses" and the "Testimony of Eight Witnesses" which appeared in the original 1830 edition and every official Latter-day Saint edition thereafter.
Narrative
The books from First Nephi to Omni are described as being from "the small plates of Nephi". This account begins in ancient Jerusalem around 600 BC, telling the story of a man named Lehi, his family, and several others as they are led by God from Jerusalem shortly before the fall of that city to the Babylonians. The book describes their journey across the Arabian peninsula, and then to a "promised land", presumably an unspecified location in the Americas, by ship. These books recount the group's dealings from approximately 600 BC to about 130 BC, during which time the community grows and splits into two main groups, called Nephites and Lamanites, that frequently war with each other throughout the rest of the narrative.
Following this section is the Words of Mormon, a small book that introduces Mormon, the principal narrator for the remainder of the text. The narration describes the proceeding content (Book of Mosiah through to chapter 7 of the internal Book of Mormon) as being Mormon's abridgment of "the large plates of Nephi", existing records that detailed the people's history up to Mormon's own life. Part of this portion is the Book of Third Nephi, which describes a visit by Jesus to the people of the Book of Mormon sometime after his resurrection and ascension; historian John Turner calls this episode "the climax of the entire scripture". After this visit, the Nephites and Lamanites unite in a harmonious, peaceful society which endures for several generations before breaking into warring factions again, and in this conflict the Nephites are destroyed while the Lamanites emerge victorious. In the narrative, Mormon, a Nephite, lives during this period of war, and he dies before finishing his book. His son Moroni takes over as narrator, describing himself taking his father's record into his charge and finishing its writing.
Before the very end of the book, Moroni describes making an abridgment (called the Book of Ether) of a record from a much earlier people. There is a subsequent subplot describing a group of families who God leads away from the Tower of Babel after it falls. Led by a man named Jared and his brother, described as a prophet of God, these Jaredites travel to the "promised land" and establish a society there. After successive violent reversals between rival monarchs and faction, their society collapses around the time that Lehi's family arrive in the promised land further south.
The narrative returns to Moroni's present (Book of Moroni) in which he transcribes a few short documents, meditates on and addresses the book's audience, finishes the record, and buries the plates upon which they are narrated to be inscribed upon, before implicitly dying as his father did, in what allegedly would have been the early 400s AD.
Teachings
Jesus
On its title page, the Book of Mormon describes its central purpose as being the "convincing of the Jew and Gentile that Jesus is the Christ, the Eternal God, manifesting himself unto all nations." Although much of the Book of Mormon's internal chronology takes place prior to the birth of Jesus, prophets in the book frequently see him in vision and preach about him, and the people in the narrative worship Jesus as "pre-Christian Christians." For example, the book's first narrator Nephi describes having a vision of the birth, ministry, and death of Jesus, said to have taken place nearly 600 years prior to Jesus' birth. Late in the book, a narrator refers to converted peoples as "children of Christ". By depicting ancient prophets and peoples as familiar with Jesus as a Savior, the Book of Mormon universalizes Christian salvation as being accessible across all time and places. By implying that even more ancient peoples were familiar with Jesus Christ, the book presents a "polygenist Christian history" in which Christianity has multiple origins. During this ministry, he reiterates many teachings from the New Testament, re-emphasizes salvific baptism, and introduces the ritual consumption of bread and wine "in remembrance of [his] body", a teaching that became the basis for modern Latter-day Saints' "memorialist" view of their sacrament ordinance (analogous to communion). Jesus's ministry in the Book of Mormon resembles his portrayal in the Gospel of John, as Jesus similarly teaches without parables and preaches faith and obedience as a central message.
Barnes argues that the Book of Mormon depicts Jesus as a "revolutionary new character" different from that of the New Testament in a portrayal that is "constantly, subtly revising the Christian tradition". According to historian John Turner, the Book of Mormon's depiction provides "a twist" on Christian trinitarianism, as Jesus in the Book of Mormon is distinct from God the Father—as he prays to God during a post-resurrection visit with the Nephites—while also emphasizing that Jesus and God have "divine unity," with other parts of the book calling Jesus "the Father and the Son". Beliefs among the churches of the Latter Day Saint movement range between social trinitarianism (such as among Latter-day Saints) and traditional trinitarianism (such as in Community of Christ).
Plan of salvation
The Christian concept of God's plan of salvation for humanity is a frequently recurring theme of the Book of Mormon. While the Bible does not directly outline a plan of salvation, the Book of Mormon explicitly refers to the concept thirty times, using a variety of terms such as plan of salvation, plan of happiness, and plan of redemption. The Book of Mormon's plan of salvation doctrine describes life as a probationary time for people to learn the gospel of Christ through revelation given to prophets and have the opportunity to choose whether or not to obey God. Jesus' atonement then makes repentance possible, enabling the righteous to enter a heavenly state after a final judgment.
Although most of Christianity traditionally considers the fall of man a negative development for humanity, the Book of Mormon instead portrays the fall as a foreordained step in God's plan of salvation, necessary to securing human agency, eventual righteousness, This positive interpretation of the Adam and Eve story contributes to the Book of Mormon's emphasis "on the importance of human freedom and responsibility" to choose salvation. In the Book of Mormon, figures petition God for revelatory answers to doctrinal questions and ecclesiastical crises as well as for inspiration to guide hunts, military campaigns, and sociopolitical decisions. The Book of Mormon depicts revelation as an active and sometimes laborious experience. For example, the Book of Mormon's Brother of Jared learns to act not merely as a petitioner with questions but moreover as an interlocutor with "a specific proposal" for God to consider as part of a guided process of miraculous assistance. Apocalyptic reversal and Indigenous or nonwhite liberation The Book of Mormon's "eschatological content" lends to a "theology of Native and/or nonwhite liberation", in the words of American studies scholar Jared Hickman. The Book of Mormon's narrative content includes prophecies describing how although Gentiles (generally interpreted as being whites of European descent) would conquer the Indigenous residents of the Americas (imagined in the Book of Mormon as being a remnant of descendants of the Lamanites), this conquest would only precede the Native Americans' revival and resurgence as a God-empowered people. The Book of Mormon narrative's prophecies envision a Christian eschaton in which Indigenous people are destined to rise up as the true leaders of the continent, manifesting in a new utopia to be called "Zion". White Gentiles would have an opportunity to repent of their sins and join themselves to the Indigenous remnant, but if white Gentile society fails to do so, the Book of Mormon's content foretells a future "apocalyptic reversal" in which Native Americans will destroy white American society and replace it with a godly, Zionic society. This prophecy commanding whites to repent and become supporters of American Indians even bears "special authority as an utterance of Jesus" Christ himself during a messianic appearance at the book's climax.
The Book of Mormon was also significant in the early movement as a sign, proving Joseph Smith's claimed prophetic calling, signalling the "restoration of all things", and ending what was believed to have been an apostasy from true Christianity. Early Latter Day Saints tended to interpret the Book of Mormon through a millenarian lens and consequently believed the book portended Christ's imminent Second Coming. And during the movement's first years, observers identified converts with the new scripture they propounded, nicknaming them "Mormons".
Early Mormons also cultivated their own individual relationships with the Book of Mormon. Reading the book became an ordinary habit for some, and some would reference passages by page number in correspondence with friends and family. Historian Janiece Johnson explains that early converts' "depth of Book of Mormon usage is illustrated most thoroughly through intertextuality—the pervasive echoes, allusions, and expansions on the Book of Mormon text that appear in the early converts' own writings." Early Latter Day Saints alluded to Book of Mormon narratives, incorporated Book of Mormon turns of phrase into their writing styles, and even gave their children Book of Mormon names. Nevertheless, in 1841 Joseph Smith characterized the Book of Mormon as "the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of [the] religion". Although Smith quoted the book infrequently, he accepted the Book of Mormon narrative world as his own.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) accepts the Book of Mormon as one of the four sacred texts in its scriptural canon called the standard works. Church leaders and publications have "strongly affirm[ed]" Smith's claims of the book's significance to the faith. According to the church's "Articles of Faith"—a document written by Joseph Smith in 1842 and canonized by the church as scripture in 1880—members "believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly," and they "believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God," without qualification.<!-- The specific difference between the statements on the Bible and the Book of Mormon is noted by John G. Turner in The Mormon Jesus, page 46. --> In their evangelism, Latter-day Saint leaders and missionaries have long emphasized the book's place in a causal chain which held that if the Book of Mormon was "verifiably true revelation of God," then it justified Smith's claims to prophetic authority to restore the New Testament church.
Latter-day Saints have also long believed the Book of Mormon's contents confirm and fulfill biblical prophecies. For example, "many Latter-day Saints" consider the biblical patriarch Jacob's description of his son Joseph as "a fruitful bough... whose branches run over a wall" a prophecy of Lehi's posterity—described as descendants of Joseph—overflowing into the New World. Latter-day Saints also believe the Bible prophesies of the Book of Mormon as an additional testament to God's dealings with humanity.
In the 1980s, the church placed greater emphasis on the Book of Mormon as a central text of the faith. In 1982, it added the subtitle "Another Testament of Jesus Christ" to its official editions of the Book of Mormon. Ezra Taft Benson, the church's thirteenth president (1985–1994), especially emphasized the Book of Mormon. Referencing Smith's 1832 revelation, Benson said the church remained under condemnation for treating the Book of Mormon lightly.
Since the late 1980s, Latter-day Saint leaders have encouraged church members to read from the Book of Mormon daily, and in the twenty-first century, many Latter-day Saints use the book in private devotions and family worship. Literary scholar Terryl Givens observes that for Latter-day Saints, the Book of Mormon is "the principal scriptural focus", a "cultural touchstone, and "absolutely central" to worship, including in weekly services, Sunday School, youth seminaries, and more.
Approximately 90 to 95% of all Book of Mormon printings have been affiliated with the church. As of October 2020, it has published more than 192 million copies of the Book of Mormon.
Community of Christ
The Community of Christ (formerly the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints or RLDS Church) views the Book of Mormon as scripture which provides an additional witness of Jesus Christ in support of the Bible. The Community of Christ publishes two versions of the book. The first is the Authorized Edition, first published by the then-RLDS Church in 1908, whose text is based on comparing the original printer's manuscript and the 1837 Second Edition (or "Kirtland Edition") of the Book of Mormon. Its content is similar to the Latter-day Saint edition of the Book of Mormon, but the versification is different. The Community of Christ also publishes a "New Authorized Version" (also called a "reader's edition"), first released in 1966, which attempts to modernize the language of the text by removing archaisms and standardizing punctuation.
Use of the Book of Mormon varies among Community of Christ membership. The church describes it as scripture and includes references to the Book of Mormon in its official lectionary. In 2010, representatives told the National Council of Churches that "the Book of Mormon is in our DNA". The book remains a symbol of the denomination's belief in continuing revelation from God. Nevertheless, its usage in North American congregations declined between the mid-twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Outside these regions, where there are tens of thousands of members,
During this time, the Community of Christ moved away from emphasizing the Book of Mormon as an authentic record of a historical past. By the late-twentieth century, church president W. Grant McMurray made open the possibility the book was nonhistorical. McMurray reiterated this ambivalence in 2001, reflecting, "The proper use of the Book of Mormon as sacred scripture has been under wide discussion in the 1970s and beyond, in part because of long-standing questions about its historical authenticity and in part because of perceived theological inadequacies, including matters of race and ethnicity." When a resolution was submitted at the 2007 Community of Christ World Conference to "reaffirm the Book of Mormon as a divinely inspired record", church president Stephen M. Veazey ruled it out-of-order. He stated, "while the Church affirms the Book of Mormon as scripture, and makes it available for study and use in various languages, we do not attempt to mandate the degree of belief or use. This position is in keeping with our longstanding tradition that belief in the Book of Mormon is not to be used as a test of fellowship or membership in the church."
Nahua-Mexican Latter-day Saint Margarito Bautista believed the Book of Mormon told an Indigenous history of Mexico before European contact, and he identified himself as a "descendant of Father Lehi", a prophet in the Book of Mormon. Bautista believed the Book of Mormon revealed that Indigenous Mexicans were a chosen remnant of biblical Israel and therefore had a sacred destiny to someday lead the church spiritually and the world politically. To promote this belief, he wrote a theological treatise synthesizing Mexican nationalism and Book of Mormon content, published in 1935. Anglo-American LDS Church leadership suppressed the book and eventually excommunicated Bautista, and he went on to found a new Mormon denomination. Officially named El Reino de Dios en su Plenitud, the denomination continues to exist in Colonial Industrial, Ozumba, Mexico as a church with several hundred members who call themselves Mormons.Historicity
Mainstream views
Mainstream archaeological, historical, and scientific communities do not consider the Book of Mormon an ancient record of actual historical events. Principally, the content of the Book of Mormon does not correlate with archaeological, genetic, or linguistic evidence about the past of the Americas or ancient Near East.Archaeology
There is no accepted correlation between locations described in the Book of Mormon and known American archaeological sites. Additionally, the Book of Mormon's narrative refers to the presence of animals, plants, metals, and technologies of which archaeological and scientific studies have found little or no evidence in post-Pleistocene, pre-Columbian America. Such anachronistic references include crops such as barley, wheat, and silk; livestock like cattle, donkeys, horses, oxen, and sheep; and metals and technology such as brass, steel, the wheel, and chariots.
Mesoamerica is the preferred setting for the Book of Mormon among many apologists who advocate a limited geography model of Book of Mormon events. However, there is no evidence accepted by non-Mormons in Mesoamerican societies of cultural influence from anything described in the Book of Mormon.Genetics
Until the late-twentieth century, most adherents of the Latter Day Saint movement who affirmed Book of Mormon historicity believed the people described in the Book of Mormon text were the exclusive ancestors of all Indigenous peoples in the Americas. DNA evidence proved that to be impossible, as no DNA evidence links any Native American group to ancestry from the ancient Near East as a belief in Book of Mormon peoples as the exclusive ancestors of Indigenous Americans would require. Instead, detailed genetic research indicates that Indigenous Americans' ancestry traces back to Asia, and reveals numerous details about the movements and settlements of ancient Americans which are either lacking in, or contradicted by, the Book of Mormon narrative.Linguistics and intertextuality
There are no widely accepted linguistic connections between any Native American languages and Near Eastern languages, and "the diversity of Native American languages could not have developed from a single origin in the time frame" that would be necessary to validate a hemispheric view of Book of Mormon historicity. The Book of Mormon states it was written in a language called "Reformed Egyptian", clashing with Book of Mormon peoples' purported origin as the descendants of a family from the Kingdom of Judah, where inhabitants would have communicated in Aramaic, not Egyptian. There are no known examples of "Reformed Egyptian".
The Book of Mormon also includes excerpts from and demonstrates intertextuality with portions of the biblical Book of Isaiah whose widely accepted periods of creation postdate the alleged departure of Lehi's family from Jerusalem circa 600 BCE. No Latter-day Saint arguments for a unified Isaiah or criticisms of the Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah understandings have matched the extent of scholarship supporting later datings for authorship.Latter Day Saint viewsMost adherents of the Latter Day Saint movement consider the Book of Mormon to be historically authentic and to describe events that genuinely took place in the ancient Americas. Within the Latter Day Saint movement there are several individuals and apologetic organizations, most of whom are or which are composed of lay Latter-day Saints, that seek to answer challenges to or advocate for Book of Mormon historicity. For example, in response to linguistics and genetics rendering long-popular hemispheric models of Book of Mormon geography impossible, Linguistically, the diversity of Native American languages that exists could not have developed in the time frame required by Lehi's arrivants being the sole ancestors of Indigenous peoples in the Americas. Genetically, DNA evidence links the Indigenous peoples of the Americas to Asia.}} many apologists posit Book of Mormon peoples could have dwelled in a limited geographical region while Indigenous peoples of other descents occupied the rest of the Americas. To account for anachronisms, apologists often suggest Smith's translation assigned familiar terms to unfamiliar ideas. In the context of a miraculously translated Book of Mormon, supporters affirm that anachronistic intertextuality may also have miraculous explanations.
Some apologists strive to identify parallels between the Book of Mormon and biblical antiquity, such as the presence of several complex chiasmi resembling a literary form used in ancient Hebrew poetry and in the Old Testament. Others attempt to identify parallels between Mesoamerican archaeological sites and locations described in the Book of Mormon, such as John L. Sorenson, according to whom the Santa Rosa archaeological site resembles the city of Zarahemla in the Book of Mormon. When mainstream, non-Mormon scholars examine alleged parallels between the Book of Mormon and the ancient world, however, scholars typically deem them "chance based upon only superficial similarities" or "parallelomania", the result of having predetermined ideas about the subject.
Despite the popularity and influence among Latter-day Saints of literature propounding Book of Mormon historicity, not all Mormons who affirm Book of Mormon historicity are universally persuaded by apologetic work. Some claim historicity more modestly, such as Richard Bushman's statement that "I read the Book of Mormon as informed Christians read the Bible. As I read, I know the arguments against the book's historicity, but I can't help feeling that the words are true and the events happened. I believe it in the face of many questions."
Some denominations and adherents of the Latter Day Saint movement consider the Book of Mormon a work of inspired fiction akin to pseudepigrapha or biblical midrash that constitutes scripture by revealing true doctrine about God, similar to a common interpretation of the biblical Book of Job. Many in Community of Christ hold this view, and the leadership takes no official position on Book of Mormon historicity; among lay members, views vary. Some Latter-day Saints consider the Book of Mormon fictional, although this view is marginal in the denomination at large.
Beliefs about geographical setting
Related to the work's historicity is consideration of where its events are claimed to have occurred if historical. The LDS Church—the largest denomination in the Latter Day Saint movement—affirms the book as literally historical but does not make a formal claim of where precisely its events took place. Throughout much of the 19th and 20th centuries, Joseph Smith and others in the Latter Day Saint movement claimed that the book's events occurred broadly throughout North and South America. and in the twenty-first century it is the most popular belief about Book of Mormon geography among those who believe it is historical. In 2006, the LDS Church revised its introduction to LDS editions of the Book of Mormon, which previously read that Lamanites were "the principal ancestors of the American Indians", to read that they are "among the ancestors of the American Indians". A movement among Latter-day Saints called Heartlanders believes that the Book of Mormon took place specifically within what is presently the United States.
Historical context
American Indian origins
Contact with the Indigenous peoples of the Americas prompted intellectual and theological controversy among many Europeans and European Americans who wondered how biblical narratives of world history could account for hitherto unrecognized Indigenous societies. From the seventeenth century through the early nineteenth, numerous European and American writers proposed that ancient Jews, perhaps through the Lost Ten Tribes, were the ancestors of Native Americans. One of the first books to suggest that Native Americans descended from Jews was written by Jewish-Dutch rabbi and scholar Manasseh ben Israel in 1650. Such curiosity and speculation about Indigenous origins persisted in the United States into the antebellum period when the Book of Mormon was published, as archaeologist Stephen Williams explains that "relating the American Indians to the Lost Tribes of Israel was supported by many" at the time of the book's production and publication. Although the Book of Mormon did not explicitly identify Native Americans as descendants of the diasporic Israelites in its narrative, nineteenth-century readers consistently drew that conclusion and considered the book theological support for believing American Indians were of Israelite descent.
European descended settlers took note of earthworks left behind by the Mound Builder cultures and had some difficulty believing that Native Americans, denigrated in racist colonial worldviews and whose numbers had been greatly reduced over the previous centuries, could have produced them. A common theory was that a more "civilized" and "advanced" people had built them, but were overrun and destroyed by a more savage, numerous group. Some Book of Mormon content resembles this "mound-builder" genre pervasive in the nineteenth century. Historian Curtis Dahl wrote, "Undoubtedly the most famous and certainly the most influential of all Mound-Builder literature is the Book of Mormon (1830). Whether one wishes to accept it as divinely inspired or the work of Joseph Smith, it fits exactly into the tradition." Historian Richard Bushman argues the Book of Mormon does not comfortably fit the Mound Builder genre because contemporaneous writings that speculated about Native origins "were explicit about recognizable Indian practices"}} whereas the "Book of Mormon deposited its people on some unknown shore—not even definitely identified as America—and had them live out their history" without including tropes that Euro-Americans stereotyped as Indigenous.
Critique of the United States
The Book of Mormon can be read as a critique of the United States during Smith's lifetime. Historian of religion Nathan O. Hatch called the Book of Mormon "a document of profound social protest", and historian Bushman "found the book thundering no to the state of the world in Joseph Smith's time." In the Jacksonian era of antebellum America, class inequality was a major concern as fiscal downturns and the economy's transition from guild-based artisanship to private business sharpened economic inequality, and poll taxes in New York limited access to the vote, and the culture of civil discourse and mores surrounding liberty allowed social elites to ignore and delegitimize populist participation in public discourse. Against the backdrop of these trends, the Book of Mormon condemned upper class wealth as elitist, and it criticized social norms around public discourse that silenced critique of the country.
Manuscripts
figure David Whitmer)]]
) where much of the manuscript of the Book of Mormon was written]]
Joseph Smith dictated the Book of Mormon to several scribes over a period of 13 months, resulting in three manuscripts. Upon examination of pertinent historical records, the book appears to have been dictated over the course of 57 to 63 days within the 13-month period.
The 116 lost pages contained the first portion of the Book of Lehi; it was lost after Smith loaned the original, uncopied manuscript to Martin Harris.
Only 28 percent of the original manuscript now survives, including a remarkable find of fragments from 58 pages in 1991. The majority of what remains of the original manuscript is now kept in the LDS Church's archives. It is at this point that initial copyediting of the Book of Mormon was completed. Observations of the original manuscript show little evidence of corrections to the text. On September 20, 2017, the LDS Church purchased the manuscript from the Community of Christ at a reported price of $35million. The printer's manuscript is now the earliest surviving complete copy of the Book of Mormon. The manuscript was imaged in 1923 and has been made available for viewing online.
Critical comparisons between surviving portions of the manuscripts show an average of two to three changes per page from the original manuscript to the printer's manuscript. In 1895, Whitmer's grandson George Schweich inherited the manuscript. By 1903, Schweich had mortgaged the manuscript for $1,800 and, needing to raise at least that sum, sold a collection including 72 percent of the book of the original printer's manuscript (John Whitmer's manuscript history, parts of Joseph Smith's translation of the Bible, manuscript copies of several revelations, and a piece of paper containing copied Book of Mormon characters) to the RLDS Church (now the Community of Christ) for $2,450, with $2,300 of this amount for the printer's manuscript.
In 2015, this remaining portion was published by the Church Historian's Press in its Joseph Smith Papers series, in Volume Three of "Revelations and Translations"; and, in 2017, the church bought the printer's manuscript for .Editions Chapter and verse notation systems The original 1830 publication had no verses (breaking the text into paragraphs instead). The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' (LDS Church) 1852 edition numbered the paragraphs. New introductions, chapter summaries, and footnotes. 1920 edition errors corrected based on original manuscript and 1840 edition. Updated in a revised edition in 2013.
| [https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/title-page?lang=eng link]
|-
| Community of Christ
| 1966
| "Revised Authorized Version", based on 1908 Authorized Version, 1837 edition and original manuscript. Omits numerous repetitive "it came to pass" phrases.
|
|-
| The Church of Jesus Christ (Bickertonite)
| 2001
| Compiled by a committee of Apostles. It uses the chapter and verse designations from the 1879 LDS edition.
|
|-
| Church of Christ with the Elijah Message
| 1957
| The Record of the Nephites, "Restored Palmyra Edition". 1830 text with the 1879 LDS edition's chapters and verses.
| [http://www.elijahmessage.net/Nephite_Record.html link]
|-
| Church of Christ (Temple Lot)
| 1990
| Based on 1908 RLDS edition, 1830 edition, printer's manuscript, and corrections by church leaders.
| [https://web.archive.org/web/20131021174453/http://www.churchofchrist-tl.org/PDFs/Downloads/Web%201990%20BOOK%20OF%20MORMON.pdf link]
|-
|Fellowships of the remnants
|2019
|Based on Joseph Smith's last personally-updated 1840 version, with revisions per Denver Snuffer Jr. Distributed jointly with the New Testament, in a volume called the "New Covenants".
|[http://scriptures.info/scriptures/nc link]
|}
Other editions
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Publisher
! Year
! Titles and notes
! Link
|-
| Herald Heritage
| 1970
| Facsimile of the 1830 edition.
|
|-
|Macmillan
|1992
|Encyclopedia of Mormonism. The Encyclopedia<nowiki/>'s fifth volume includes the full text of the Book of Mormon, as well as the Doctrine and Covenants and Pearl of Great Price. There are brief introductions but no footnotes or indices (an index to the Encyclopedia is found in its fourth volume). The Encyclopedia, including the volume containing the Book of Mormon, is no longer in print.
|
|-
| Zarahemla Research Foundation
| 1999
| The Book of Mormon: Restored Covenant Edition. Text from Original and Printer's Manuscripts, in poetic layout.
| [http://www.restoredcovenant.org/RCE.asp?CATRCE link]
|-
| Bookcraft
| 1999
| The Book of Mormon for Latter-day Saint Families. Large print with visuals and explanatory notes.
|
|-
| University of Illinois Press
| 2003
| ''The Book of Mormon: A Reader's Edition. The text of the 1920 LDS edition reformatted into paragraphs and poetic stanzas and accompanied by some footnotes.
| [https://books.google.com/books?idwbSqttrggZIC&pgPP1 link]
|-
| Doubleday
| 2004
| The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ. Text from the LDS edition without footnotes. A second edition was printed in 2006.
|link
|-
|Signature Books
|2008
|The Reader's Book of Mormon. Text from the 1830 edition with its original paragraphing and without versification. Published in seven volumes, each introduced with a personal essay on the portion of the Book of Mormon contained.
|
|-
| Penguin Books
| 2008
| The Book of Mormon. Penguin Classics series. Paperback with 1840 text,
| [https://books.google.com/books?id680cn0KpjVMC&pgPP1 link]
|-
|The Olive Leaf Foundation
|2017
|A New Approach To Studying The Book Of Mormon. The complete text of the 1981 edition organized in paragraphs and poetic stanzas, annotated with marginal notes, and divided into event-based chaptering.
|[http://www.studythescriptures.com/bookofmormon.html link]
|-
| Neal A. Maxwell Institute
| 2018
| The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ, Maxwell Institute Study Edition. Text from the church's 1981 and 2013 editions reformatted into paragraphs and poetic stanzas. Selected textual variants discovered in the Book of Mormon Critical Text Project appear in footnotes.
|
|-
| Digital Legend Press
| 2018
| Annotated Edition of the Book of Mormon. Text from the 1920 edition footnoted and organized in paragraphs.
|
|}
Historic editions
The following editions no longer in publication marked major developments in the text or reader's helps printed in the Book of Mormon.
{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Publisher
!Year
!Titles and notes
!Link
|-
| E. B. Grandin
| 1830
| "First edition" in Palmyra. Based on printer's manuscript copied from original manuscript.
| [https://archive.org/stream/bookofmormonacco1830smit#page/n3/mode/2up link]
|-
| Pratt and Goodson
| 1837
| "Second edition" in Kirtland. Revision of first edition, using the printer's manuscript with emendations and grammatical corrections.
|[https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/book-of-mormon-1841/5 link]
|-
|Joseph Smith Jr.
|1842
|"Fourth American edition" in Nauvoo. A reprint of the 1840 edition. [https://www.wordsofeternal.life/1842-bofm-facsimiles.html Facsimiles of an original 1842 edition.]
|
|-
| Franklin D. Richards
| 1852
| "Third European edition". Edited by Richards. Introduced primitive verses (numbered paragraphs).
| [https://archive.org/stream/bookofmormonanac027933mbp#page/n3/mode/2up link]
|}
Non-English translations
The Latter-day Saints version of the Book of Mormon has been translated into 83 languages and selections have been translated into an additional 25 languages. In 2001, the LDS Church reported that all or part of the Book of Mormon was available in the native language of 99 percent of Latter-day Saints and 87 percent of the world's total population.
Translations into languages without a tradition of writing (e.g., Kaqchikel, Tzotzil) have been published as audio recordings and as transliterations with Latin characters. Translations into American Sign Language are available as video recordings.
Typically, translators are Latter-day Saints who are employed by the church and translate the text from the original English. Each manuscript is reviewed several times before it is approved and published.
In 1998, the church stopped translating selections from the Book of Mormon and announced that instead each new translation it approves will be a full edition. The nonprofit Book of Mormon Art Catalog documents the existence of at least 2,500 visual depictions of Book of Mormon content. According to art historian Jenny Champoux, early artwork of the Book of Mormon relied on European iconography; eventually, a distinctive "Latter-day Saint style" developed. How Rare a Possession (1987) and The Testaments of One Fold and One Shepherd (2000). Depictions of Book of Mormon narratives in films not officially commissioned by the church (sometimes colloquially known as Mormon cinema) include The Book of Mormon Movie, Vol. 1: The Journey (2003) and Passage to Zarahemla (2007).
In "one of the most complex uses of Mormonism in cinema," Alfred Hitchcock's film Family Plot portrays a funeral service in which a priest (apparently non-Mormon, by his appearance) reads Second Nephi [https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/2-ne/9.20-27?#p19 9:20–27], a passage describing Jesus Christ having victory over death. Its London production won the Olivier Award for best musical. The musical is not principally about Book of Mormon content and tells an original story about Latter-day Saint missionaries in the twenty-first century.
In 2019, the church began producing a series of live-action adaptations of various stories within the Book of Mormon, titled Book of Mormon Videos, which it distributed on its website and YouTube channel.
See also
* Journal of Book of Mormon Studies
* List of Gospels
* Studies of the Book of Mormon
* List of Book of Mormon places
* Pre-Columbian transoceanic contact theories
* Book of Mormon Videos
References
Footnotes
Citations
General and cited sources
*
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* .
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Further reading
*
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* One volume in six parts.
* One volume in six parts. Republished online by the Interpreter Foundation in 2014.
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External links
* [https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/title-page?lang=eng Book of Mormon] (the current official edition of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints)
* Project Gutenberg has the full text of the Book of Mormon in various formats (LDS chapters and numbering)
* [https://web.archive.org/web/19991014042741/http://www.centerplace.org/hs/bofm/ RLDS 1908 Book of Mormon] (RLDS chapters and numbering)
* [https://www.loc.gov/item/49034953/ The Book of Mormon; An Account Written By the Hand of Mormon Upon Plates Taken From the Plates of Nephi.] From the Collections at the Library of Congress
* [https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printers-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-august-1829-circa-january-1830/1 Photographs and transcription of the printer's manuscript of the Book of Mormon] by the Joseph Smith Papers
* [https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/book-of-mormon-1830/7 Photocopies and transcription of the 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon] by the Joseph Smith Papers
* [https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/book-of-mormon-1840/7 Photographs and transcription of the 1840 of the Book of Mormon] by the Joseph Smith Papers
*
* [https://bookofmormonartcatalog.org/ Book of Mormon Art Catalog] database of known works of visual art depicting Book of Mormon content
Category:1830 non-fiction books
Category:1830 in Christianity
Category:19th-century Christian texts
Category:American non-fiction books
Category:Standard works
Category:Works by Joseph Smith
Category:Works in the style of the King James Version
Category:Channelled texts | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Mormon | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.165170 |
3979 | Baptists | Baptists are a denomination of Protestant Christianity distinguished by baptizing only professing Christian believers (believer's baptism) and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul competency (the responsibility and accountability of every person before God), sola fide (salvation by faith alone), sola scriptura (the Bible is the sole infallible authority, as the rule of faith and practice) and congregationalist church government. Baptists recognize generally two sacraments: baptism and communion.
Diverse from their beginning, those identifying as Baptists today may differ widely from one another in what they believe, how they worship, their attitudes toward other Christians, and their understanding of what is important in Christian discipleship. Baptist missionaries have spread various Baptist churches to every continent. The Baptists spread across England, where the General Baptists considered Christ's atonement to extend to all people, while the Particular Baptists believed that it extended only to the elect. Thomas Helwys formulated a distinctively Baptist request that the church and the state be kept separate in matters of law, so that individuals might have freedom of religion. Helwys died in prison as a consequence of the religious conflict with English Dissenters under James I.Origins
Baptist historian Bruce Gourley outlines four main views of Baptist origins:
# the modern scholarly consensus that the movement traces its origin to the 17th century via the English Separatists,
# the view that it was an outgrowth of the Anabaptist movement of believer's baptism begun in 1525 on the European continent,
# the perpetuity view which assumes that the Baptist faith and practice has existed since the time of Christ, and
# the successionist view, which argues that Baptist churches actually existed in an unbroken chain since the time of Christ. Some people prior to the reformation acknowledge the existence of Baptists and their separation from the church.
English separatist view
led the first Baptist church in Amsterdam in 1609.]]
Modern Baptist churches trace their history to the English Separatist movement in the 17th century, over a century after the foundation of the Church of England during the Protestant Reformation. Adherents to this position consider the influence of Anabaptists upon early Baptists to be minimal.
During the Reformation, the Church of England (Anglicans) separated from the Roman Catholic Church. There were some Christians who were not content with the achievements of the mainstream Protestant Reformation. There also were Christians who were disappointed that the Church of England had not made corrections of what some considered to be errors and abuses. Of those most critical of the church's direction, some chose to stay and try to make constructive changes from within the Anglican Church. They became known as "Puritans" and are described by Gourley as cousins of the English Separatists. Others decided they must leave the established church because of their dissatisfaction and became known as the Separatists.
Baptist churches have their origins in a movement started by John Smyth and Thomas Helwys in Amsterdam. Because they shared beliefs with the Congregationalists, they went into exile in 1607 with other believers who held the same positions. They believe that the Bible is to be the only guide and that the believer's baptism is what the scriptures require. In 1609, the year considered to be the foundation of the movement, they baptized believers and founded the first Baptist church.
In 1609, while still there, Smyth wrote a tract titled "The Character of the Beast". In it he expressed two propositions: first, infants are not to be baptized; and second, "Antichristians converted are to be admitted into the true Church by baptism."
Shortly thereafter, Smyth left the group.
Helwys took over the leadership, leading the church back to England in 1611, and he published the first Baptist confession of faith "A Declaration of Faith of English People" in 1611. He founded the first General Baptist Church in Spitalfields, east London, in 1612.
Another milestone in the early development of Baptist doctrine was in 1638 with John Spilsbury, a Calvinist minister who helped to promote the strict practice of believer's baptism by immersion (as opposed to affusion or aspersion). According to this view, the General Baptists shared similarities with Dutch Waterlander Mennonites (one of many Anabaptist groups) including believer's baptism only, religious liberty, separation of church and state, and Arminian views of salvation, predestination and original sin.
It is certain that the early Baptist church led by Smyth had contacts with the Anabaptists; however it is debated if these influences found their way into the English General Baptists. Representatives of this theory include A.C. Underwood and William R. Estep. Gourley writes that among some contemporary Baptist scholars who emphasize the faith of the community over soul liberty, the Anabaptist influence theory is making a comeback.
However, the relations between Baptists and Anabaptists were early strained. In 1624, the five existing Baptist churches of London issued a condemnation of the Anabaptists. Furthermore, the original group associated with Smyth (popularly believed to be the first Baptists) broke with the Waterlander Mennonite Anabaptists after a brief period of association in the Netherlands.Perpetuity and succession view
Traditional Baptist historians write from the perspective that Baptists had existed since the time of Christ. Proponents of the Baptist successionist or perpetuity view consider the Baptist movement to have existed independently from Roman Catholicism and prior to the Protestant Reformation. This view has been characterized as "apologetic and polemical" and "without consideration of a critical, scientific methodology".
The perpetuity view is often identified with The Trail of Blood, a booklet of five lectures by James Milton Carroll published in 1931. as well as Jesse Mercer, the namesake of Mercer University. In 1898 William Whitsitt was pressured to resign his presidency of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary for denying Baptist successionism.
Baptist origins in the United Kingdom
In 1612 Helwys established a Baptist congregation in London, consisting of congregants from Smyth's church. A number of other Baptist churches sprang up, and they became known as the General Baptists. The Particular Baptists were established when a group of Calvinist Separatists adopted believers' Baptism. The Particular Baptists consisted of seven churches by 1644 and had created a confession of faith called the First London Confession of Faith.Baptist origins in North America
located in Providence, Rhode Island]]
Both Roger Williams and John Clarke are variously credited as founding the earliest Baptist church in North America. In 1639 Williams established a Baptist church in Providence, Rhode Island, and Clarke began a Baptist church in Newport, Rhode Island. According to a Baptist historian who has researched the matter extensively, "There is much debate over the centuries as to whether the Providence or Newport church deserved the place of 'first' Baptist congregation in America. Exact records for both congregations are lacking."
The First Great Awakening energized the Baptist movement, and the Baptist community experienced spectacular growth. Baptists became the largest Christian community in many southern states, including among the enslaved Black population. Two major groups of Baptists formed the basis of the churches in the Maritimes. These were referred to as Regular Baptist (Calvinistic in their doctrine) and Free Will Baptists (Arminian in their doctrine). The split created the Southern Baptist Convention, while the northern congregations formed their own umbrella organization now called the American Baptist Churches USA (ABC-USA). In 2015, Baptists in the U.S. number 50 million people and constitute roughly one-third of American Protestants.Baptist origins in Ukraine
The Baptist churches in Ukraine were preceded by the German Anabaptist and Mennonite communities, who had been living in southern Ukraine since the 16th century, and who practiced adult believer's baptism. The first Baptist baptism (adult baptism by full immersion) in Ukraine took place in 1864 on the river Inhul in the Yelizavetgrad region (now Kropyvnytskyi region), in a German settlement. In 1867, the first Baptist communities were organized in that area. From there, the Baptist movement spread across the south of Ukraine and then to other regions as well.
One of the first Baptist communities was registered in Kyiv in 1907, and in 1908 the First All-Russian Convention of Baptists was held there, as Ukraine was still controlled by the Russian Empire. The All-Russian Union of Baptists was established in Yekaterinoslav (now Dnipro) in southern Ukraine. At the end of the 19th century, there were between 100,000 and 300,000 Baptists in Ukraine. An independent All-Ukrainian Baptist Union of Ukraine was established during the brief period of Ukraine's independence in early 20th-century and once again after the fall of the Soviet Union, the largest of which is currently known as the Evangelical Baptist Union of Ukraine.
Baptist churches
), member of the Cameroon Baptist Convention]]
in Oxford, affiliated with the Baptist Union of Great Britain.]]
Some Baptist church congregations choose to be independent of larger church organizations (Independent Baptist). Other Baptist churches choose to be part of an international or national Baptist Christian denomination or association while still adhering to a congregationalist polity. This cooperative relationship allows the development of common organizations, for mission and societal purposes, such as humanitarian aid, schools, theological institutes and hospitals.
The majority of Baptist churches are part of national denominations (or 'associations' or 'cooperative groups'), as well as the Baptist World Alliance (BWA), formed in 1905 by 24 Baptist denominations from various countries. The BWA's goals include caring for the needy, leading in world evangelism and defending human rights and religious freedom.
Missionary organizations
Missionary organizations favored the development of the movement on all continents. The BMS World Mission was founded in 1792 at Kettering, England. In United States, International Ministries was founded in 1814, and the International Mission Board was founded in 1845.
Membership
Membership policies vary due to the autonomy of churches, but generally an individual becomes a member of a church through believer's baptism (which is a public profession of faith in Jesus, followed by immersion baptism). Most Baptists do not believe that baptism is a requirement for salvation but rather a public expression of inner repentance and faith.
In 2010, an estimated 100 million Christians identified as Baptist or belonging to a Baptist-type church. In 2020, according to the researcher Sébastien Fath of the CNRS, the Baptist movement has around 170 million believers in the world. According to a census released in 2024, the BWA includes 266 participating fellowships in 134 countries, with 178,000 churches and 51 million baptized members. These statistics may not be fully representative, however, since some churches in the United States have dual or triple national Baptist affiliation, causing a church and its members to be counted possibly by more than one Baptist association, if these associations are members of the BWA.
Among the censuses carried out by individual Baptist associations in 2023, those which claimed the most members on each continent were:
{|class="wikitable col3right"
!Region!!Name!!Churches!!Members!!Ref.
|-
| rowspan2|North America|| Southern Baptist Convention||style"text-align:right"|46,906||style="text-align:right"| 12,982,090||
|-
|National Baptist Convention, USA|| style"text-align:right"|21,145 ||8,415,100|| Each church has a particular confession of faith and a common confession of faith if it is a member of an association of churches. It is based on believers' Church doctrine. Baptists, like other Christians, are defined by school of thought—some of it common to all orthodox and evangelical groups, and a portion of it distinctive to Baptists. Through the years, different Baptist groups have issued confessions of faith—without considering them to be creeds—to express their particular doctrinal distinctions in comparison to other Christians as well as in comparison to other Baptists. Baptist denominations are traditionally seen as belonging to two parties, General Baptists who uphold Arminian theology, and Particular Baptists who uphold Reformed theology (Calvinism). Most Baptists are evangelical in doctrine, but their beliefs may vary due to the congregational governance system that gives autonomy to individual local Baptist churches. Historically, Baptists have played a key role in encouraging religious freedom and the doctrine of separation of church and state.
Shared doctrines would include beliefs about one God; the virgin birth of Jesus; miracles; substitutionary atonement for sins through the death, burial, and bodily resurrection of Jesus; the Trinity; the need for salvation (through belief in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, his death and resurrection); grace; the Kingdom of God; last things (eschatology) (Jesus Christ will return personally and visibly in glory to Earth; the dead will be raised; and Christ will judge everyone in righteousness); and evangelism and missions.
Most Baptists hold that no church or ecclesiastical organization has inherent authority over a Baptist church. Churches can properly relate to each other under this polity only through voluntary cooperation, never by any sort of coercion. Furthermore, this Baptist polity calls for freedom from governmental control. Exceptions to this local form of local governance include a few churches that submit to the leadership of a body of elders, as well as the Episcopal Baptists who have an Episcopal system.
Baptists generally believe in the literal Second Coming of Christ. Beliefs among Baptists regarding the "end times" include amillennialism, both dispensational and historic premillennialism, with views such as postmillennialism and preterism receiving some support.
Some additional distinctive Baptist principles held by many Baptists:
Beliefs that vary among Baptists
of the Bible of 1611]]
Since there is no hierarchical authority and each Baptist church is autonomous, there is no official set of Baptist theological beliefs. These differences exist among associations and even among churches within the associations. Some doctrinal issues on which there is widespread difference among Baptists are:
* Eschatology
* Arminianism versus Calvinism (General Baptists uphold Arminian theology while Particular Baptists teach Calvinist theology).
* How the Bible should be interpreted (hermeneutics)
* The extent to which missionary boards should be used to support missionaries
* The extent to which non-members may participate in the Lord's Supper services
* Which translation of Scripture to use (e.g., King James Only movement)
* Dispensationalism versus Covenant theology
* The role of women in marriage
* The ordination of women as deacons or pastors.
* Attitudes to and involvement in the ecumenical movement.
* The role of repentance and perseverance in salvation (Lordship salvation controversy).
* How to distinguish the persons of the trinity (social trinitarianism and classical trinitarianism).
Excommunication may be used as a last resort by some denominations and churches for members who do not want to repent of beliefs or behavior at odds with the confession of faith of the community. When an entire congregation is excluded, it is often called disfellowship.
Types of Baptists
General Baptists
General Baptists are Baptists who hold to the view of unlimited atonement, believing that God died for every human being and not just the elect. These Baptists are generally closer to Arminian theology, and the Free Will Baptists belong to this grouping.
The General Baptists also emerged from English Separatists, who contended that the Church of England was a false church, from which one should separate from completely. Particular Baptists The Particular Baptists or Reformed Baptists are Baptists who hold to the Calvinistic view of salvation. Depending on the denomination, Calvinistic Baptists adhere to varying degrees of Reformed theology, ranging from simply embracing the Five Points of Calvinism, to accepting a modified form of federalism; all Calvinistic Baptists reject the classical Reformed teaching on infant baptism. While the Reformed Baptist confessions affirm views of the nature of baptism similar to those of the classical Reformed, they reject infants as the proper subjects of baptism.
In distinction to the General Baptists who emphasized separation from the Church of England, the Particular Baptists sought more ecumenism. Primitive Baptists Primitive Baptists are a type of Baptists who adhere to some type of Calvinistic beliefs, who came out of the controversy among Baptists on the use of mission boards, tract societies and temperamence societies. Primitive Baptists reject some elements of classical Reformed theology, such as infant baptism, and avoid the term "Calvinist". They are still Calvinist in the sense of holding strongly to the Five Points of Calvinism and they explicitly reject Arminianism. They are also characterized by "intense conservatism".
Independent Baptists
Independent Baptists are Baptists who arose from local Baptist congregations whose members were concerned about the doctrines of theological liberalism in national Baptist conventions. Independent Baptists are primarily fundamentalist, and although they may differ on multiple issues such as soteriology, dress standards, music, the practice of communion among others, they are homogenous on issues such as opposition to homosexuality, ordination of women, the charismatic movement, evolution and abortion.
New Independent Baptists
During the 21st century, the New Independent Fundamental Baptist movement was founded out of the Independent Baptist movement by Steven Anderson. However, this movement has been heavily criticized by Independent Baptists due to many doctrinal differences. Some former New IFB pastors have also charged the association of being a cult.
Seventh Day Baptists
Seventh Day Baptists are Baptists who practice Sabbatarianism. However, it is not certain when Seventh Day Baptists took denominational form, and they do not claim an unbroken succession of church organization from before the Reformation. Landmark Baptists Landmark Baptists are a Baptist movement which originated in the 19th century in United States, with leaders such as J. R. Graves, J. M. Pendleton and A. C. Dayton, although they denied being a new movement, but a continuation of the old-fashioned Baptists. Landmark Baptists believe that the term "church" should be reserved for Baptist churches exclusively, arguing that groups such as Methodists or Presbyterians are not churches at all, but only religious societies. They believe that Baptists share an unbroken line of succession from the early church.Worship
at City Church in São José dos Campos, affiliated to the Brazilian Baptist Convention, 2017]]
Ao Baptist Church, affiliated with the Nagaland Baptist Church Council (India)]]
In Baptist churches, worship service is part of the life of the church and includes praise, worship, of prayers to God, a sermon based on the Bible, offering, and periodically the Lord's Supper. Some churches have services with traditional Christian music, others with contemporary Christian music, and some offer both in separate services. In many churches, there are services adapted for children, even teenagers. Prayer meetings are also held during the week.
The architecture is generally sober, and the Latin cross is one of the only spiritual symbols that can usually be seen on the building of a Baptist church and that identifies the place where it belongs.
Education
Baptist churches established elementary and secondary schools, Bible colleges, colleges and universities as early as the 1680s in England, before continuing in various countries. In 2006, the International Association of Baptist Colleges and Universities was founded in the United States. In 2023, it had 42 member universities.
Sexuality
, Baptist Convention of Nicaragua, 2011]]
Many churches promote virginity pledges to young Baptist Christians, who are invited to engage in a public ceremony of sexual abstinence until Christian marriage. This pact is often symbolized by a purity ring. Programs like True Love Waits, founded in 1993 by the Southern Baptist Convention have been developed to support the commitments.
Most Baptist associations around the world believe only in marriage between a man and a woman. Some Baptist associations do not have official beliefs about marriage in a confession of faith and invoke congregationalism to leave the choice to each church to decide. This is the case of American Baptist Churches USA, Progressive National Baptist Convention (USA), Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (USA), National Baptist Convention, USA and the Baptist Union of Great Britain. Some Baptist associations support same-sex marriage. This is the case of the Alliance of Baptists (USA), the Canadian Association for Baptist Freedoms, the Aliança de Batistas do Brasil, the Fraternidad de Iglesias Bautistas de Cuba, and the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists (international).
Controversies
Baptists have faced many controversies in their 400-year history, controversies of the level of crises. Baptist historian Walter Shurden says the word crisis comes from the Greek word meaning 'to decide.' Shurden writes that contrary to the presumed negative view of crises, some controversies that reach a crisis level may actually be "positive and highly productive." He claims that even schism, though never ideal, has often produced positive results. In his opinion, crises among Baptists each have become decision moments that shaped their future.Missions crisisEarly in the 19th century, the rise of the modern missions movement, and the backlash against it, led to widespread and bitter controversy among the American Baptists. During this era, the American Baptists were split between missionary and anti-missionary. A substantial secession of Baptists went into the movement led by Alexander Campbell to return to a more fundamental church.Slavery crisisUnited States
in Atlanta (Georgia), affiliated with the Progressive National Baptist Convention]]
Leading up to the American Civil War, Baptists became embroiled in the controversy over slavery in the United States. Whereas in the First Great Awakening, Methodist and Baptist preachers had opposed slavery and urged manumission, over the decades they made more of an accommodation with the institution. They worked with slaveholders in the South to urge a paternalistic institution. Both denominations made direct appeals to slaves and free Blacks for conversion. The Baptists particularly allowed them active roles in congregations. By the mid-19th century, northern Baptists tended to oppose slavery. As tensions increased, in 1844 the Home Mission Society refused to appoint a slaveholder as a missionary who had been proposed by Georgia. It noted that missionaries could not take servants with them, and also that the board did not want to appear to condone slavery.
In 1845, a group of churches in favor of slavery and in disagreement with the abolitionism of the Triennial Convention (now American Baptist Churches USA) left to form the Southern Baptist Convention. They believed that the Bible sanctions slavery, and that it was acceptable for Christians to own slaves. They believed slavery was a human institution which Baptist teaching could make less harsh. By this time, many planters were part of Baptist congregations, and some of the denomination's prominent preachers, such as Basil Manly Sr., president of the University of Alabama, were also planters who owned slaves.
As early as the late 18th century, Black Baptists began to organize separate churches, associations and mission agencies. Blacks set up some independent Baptist congregations in the South before the Civil War. White Baptist associations maintained some oversight of these churches.
In the postwar years, freedmen quickly left the white congregations and associations, setting up their own churches. In 1866, the Consolidated American Baptist Convention, formed from Black Baptists of the South and West, helped southern associations set up Black state conventions, which they did in Alabama, Arkansas, Virginia, North Carolina, and Kentucky. In 1880, Black state conventions united in the national Foreign Mission Convention to support Black Baptist missionary work. Two other national Black conventions were formed, and in 1895 they united as the National Baptist Convention. This organization later went through its own changes, spinning off other conventions. It is the largest Black religious organization and the second-largest Baptist organization in the world. Baptists are numerically most dominant in the Southeast. In 2007, the Pew Research Center's Religious Landscape Survey found that 45% of all African Americans identify with Baptist denominations, with the vast majority of those being within the historically Black tradition.
, a Baptist minister and civil rights leader, at the 1963 civil rights march on Washington, D.C. The Civil Rights movement divided various Baptists in the U.S., as slavery had more than a century earlier.]]
In the American South, the interpretation of the Civil War, abolition of slavery and postwar period has differed sharply by race since those years. Americans have often interpreted great events in religious terms. Historian Wilson Fallin contrasts the interpretation of Civil War and Reconstruction in White versus Black memory by analyzing Baptist sermons documented in Alabama. They quickly organized their own congregations and developed their own regional and state associations and, by the end of the 19th century, a national convention.
White preachers in Alabama after Reconstruction expressed the view that:
Black preachers interpreted the Civil War, Emancipation and Reconstruction as "God's gift of freedom." They had a gospel of liberation, having long identified with the Book of Exodus from slavery in the Old Testament. They took opportunities to exercise their independence, to worship in their own way, to affirm their worth and dignity, and to proclaim the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. Most of all, they quickly formed their own churches, associations, and conventions to operate freely without white supervision. These institutions offered self-help and racial uplift, a place to develop and use leadership, and places for proclamation of the gospel of liberation. As a result, Black preachers said that God would protect and help him and God's people; God would be their rock in a stormy land.
The Southern Baptist Convention supported white supremacy and its results: disenfranchising most Blacks and many poor whites at the turn of the 20th century by raising barriers to voter registration, and passage of racial segregation laws that enforced the system of Jim Crow. Its members largely resisted the civil rights movement in the South, which sought to enforce their constitutional rights for public access and voting; and enforcement of midcentury federal civil rights laws.
In 1995, the Southern Baptist Convention passed a resolution that recognized the failure of their ancestors to protect the civil rights of African Americans. More than 20,000 Southern Baptists registered for the meeting in Atlanta. The resolution declared that messengers, as SBC delegates are called, "unwaveringly denounce racism, in all its forms, as deplorable sin" and "lament and repudiate historic acts of evil such as slavery from which we continue to reap a bitter harvest." It offered an apology to all African Americans for "condoning and/or perpetuating individual and systemic racism in our lifetime" and repentance for "racism of which we have been guilty, whether consciously or unconsciously." Although Southern Baptists have condemned racism in the past, this was the first time the convention, predominantly White since the Reconstruction era, had specifically addressed the issue of slavery.
The statement sought forgiveness "from our African-American brothers and sisters" and pledged to "eradicate racism in all its forms from Southern Baptist life and ministry." In 1995, about 500,000 members of the 15.6-million-member denomination were African Americans and another 300,000 were ethnic minorities. The resolution marked the denomination's first formal acknowledgment that racism played a role in its founding.
Caribbean islands
Elsewhere in the Americas, in the Caribbean in particular, Baptist missionaries and members took an active role in the anti-slavery movement. In Jamaica, for example, William Knibb, a prominent British Baptist missionary, worked toward the emancipation of slaves in the British West Indies (which took place in full in 1838). Knibb supported the creation of "Free Villages" and sought funding from English Baptists to buy land for freedmen to cultivate; the Free Villages were envisioned as rural communities to be centered around a Baptist church where emancipated slaves could farm their own land. Thomas Burchell, missionary minister in Montego Bay, was active in this movement, gaining funds from Baptists in England to buy land for what became known as Burchell Free Village.
Prior to emancipation, Baptist deacon Samuel Sharpe, who served with Burchell, organized a general strike of slaves seeking better conditions. It developed into a major rebellion of as many as 60,000 slaves, which became known as the Christmas Rebellion or the Baptist War. It was put down by government troops within two weeks. During and after the rebellion, an estimated 200 slaves were killed outright, with more than 300 judicially executed later by prosecution in the courts, sometimes for minor offenses.
Baptists were active after emancipation in promoting the education of former slaves; for example, Jamaica's Calabar High School, named after the port of Calabar in Nigeria, was founded by Baptist missionaries. At the same time, during and after slavery, slaves and free Blacks formed their own Spiritual Baptist movements—breakaway spiritual movements which theology often expressed resistance to oppression.
Landmark crisis
Southern Baptist Landmarkism sought to reset the ecclesiastical separation which had characterized the old Baptist churches, in an era when inter-denominational union meetings were the order of the day. James Robinson Graves was an influential Baptist of the 19th century and the primary leader of this movement. While some Landmarkers eventually separated from the Southern Baptist Convention, the movement continued to influence the Convention into the 20th and 21st centuries.Modernist crisis
later in life]]
The rise of theological modernism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries also greatly affected Baptists. The Landmark movement has been described as a reaction among Southern Baptists in the United States against incipient modernism. In England, Charles Spurgeon fought against modernistic views of the Scripture in the Downgrade Controversy and severed his church from the Baptist Union as a result.
The Northern Baptist Convention in the United States had internal conflict over modernism in the early 20th century, ultimately embracing it. Two new conservative associations of congregations that separated from the convention were founded as a result: the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches in 1933 and the Conservative Baptist Association of America in 1947.
Following similar conflicts over modernism, the Southern Baptist Convention adhered to conservative theology as its official position. In the late 20th century, Southern Baptists who disagreed with this direction founded two new groups: the liberal Alliance of Baptists in 1987 and the more moderate Cooperative Baptist Fellowship in 1991. Originally both schisms continued to identify as Southern Baptist, but over time they "became permanent new families of Baptists."
In 2018, Baptist theologian Russell D. Moore criticized some Baptists in the United States for their moralism emphasizing strongly the condemnation of certain personal sins, but silent on the social injustices that afflict entire populations, such as racism. In 2020, the North American Baptist Fellowship, a region of the Baptist World Alliance, officially made a commitment to social justice and spoke out against institutionalized discrimination in the American justice system. In 2022, the Baptist World Alliance adopted a resolution encouraging Baptist churches and associations that have historically contributed to the sin of slavery to engage in restorative justice.
See also
* List of Baptist denominations
* List of Baptist World Alliance National Fellowships
* List of Baptists
References
Bibliography
*
* .
* .
*
*
* Kidd, Thomas S. and Barry Hankins, Baptists in America: A History (2015)
* , comprehensive international History.
* .
* .
Further reading
* Bebbington, David. Baptists through the Centuries: A History of a Global People (Baylor University Press, 2010) emphasis on the United States and Europe; the last two chapters are on the global context.
* Brackney, William H. A Genetic History of Baptist Thought: With Special Reference to Baptists in Britain and North America (Mercer University Press, 2004), focus on confessions of faith, hymns, theologians, and academics.
* Brackney, William H. ed., Historical Dictionary of the Baptists (2nd ed. Scarecrow, 2009).
* Cathcart, William, ed. The Baptist Encyclopedia (2 vols. 1883). [https://archive.org/stream/baptistencyclope02cathuoft#page/n7/mode/2up online]
* Gavins, Raymond. The Perils and Prospects of Southern Black Leadership: Gordon Blaine Hancock, 1884–1970. Duke University Press, 1977.
* Harrison, Paul M. Authority and Power in the Free Church Tradition: A Social Case Study of the American Baptist Convention Princeton University Press, 1959.
* Harvey, Paul. Redeeming the South: Religious Cultures and Racial Identities among Southern Baptists, 1865–1925 University of North Carolina Press, 1997.
* Heyrman, Christine Leigh. Southern Cross: The Beginnings of the Bible Belt (1997).
* Isaac, Rhy. "Evangelical Revolt: The Nature of the Baptists' Challenge to the Traditional Order in Virginia, 1765 to 1775", William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., XXXI (July 1974), 345–368.
* .
*Kidd, Thomas S., Barry Hankins, Oxford University Press, 2015
* Leonard, Bill J. Baptists in America (Columbia University Press, 2005).
*
* Pitts, Walter F. Old Ship of Zion: The Afro-Baptist Ritual in the African Diaspora Oxford University Press, 1996.
* Rawlyk, George. Champions of the Truth: Fundamentalism, Modernism, and the Maritime Baptists (1990), Canada.
* Spangler, Jewel L. "Becoming Baptists: Conversion in Colonial and Early National Virginia" Journal of Southern History. Volume: 67. Issue: 2. 2001. pp. 243+
* Stringer, Phil. The Faithful Baptist Witness, Landmark Baptist Press, 1998.
* Underwood, A. C. A History of the English Baptists. London: Kingsgate Press, 1947.
* Whitley, William Thomas A Baptist Bibliography: being a register of the chief materials for Baptist history, whether in manuscript or in print, preserved in Great Britain, Ireland, and the Colonies. 2 vols. London: Kingsgate Press, 1916–1922 (reissued) Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1984
*
* Wills, Gregory A. Democratic Religion: Freedom, Authority, and Church Discipline in the Baptist South, 1785–1900, Oxford.
Primary sources
* McBeth, H. Leon, ed. A Sourcebook for Baptist Heritage (1990), primary sources for Baptist history.
* McKinion, Steven A., ed. Life and Practice in the Early Church: A Documentary Reader (2001)
* McGlothlin, W. J., ed. Baptist Confessions of Faith. Philadelphia: The American Baptist Publication Society, 1911.
External links
*
*
* [https://www.churchfathers.org/infant-baptism/ Early Church Fathers on Baptism]
* [http://www.oxfordbibliographiesonline.com/view/document/obo-9780199730414/obo-9780199730414-0192.xml?rskeynvgEkL&result14 Oxford bibliographies: "Baptists" (2015) by Janet Moore Lindman]
* [https://archives.isl.lib.in.us/repositories/2/resources/298 Baptist church history collection], Rare Books and Manuscripts, Indiana State Library
Category:Christian terminology | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baptists | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.247884 |
3981 | Blackjack | Black Jack}}
Blackjack (formerly black jack or vingt-un) is a casino banking game. It is the most widely played casino banking game in the world. It uses decks of 52 cards and descends from a global family of casino banking games known as "twenty-one". This family of card games also includes the European games vingt-et-un and pontoon, and the Russian game . The game is a comparing card game where players compete against the dealer, rather than each other.History
Blackjack's immediate precursor was the English version of twenty-one called vingt-un, a game of unknown provenance. The first written reference is found in a book by the Spanish author Miguel de Cervantes. Cervantes was a gambler, and the protagonists of his "Rinconete y Cortadillo", from Novelas Ejemplares, are card cheats in Seville. They are proficient at cheating at veintiuno (Spanish for "twenty-one") and state that the object of the game is to reach 21 points without going over and that the ace values 1 or 11. The game is played with the Spanish baraja deck.
"Rinconete y Cortadillo" was written between 1601 and 1602, implying that veintiuno was played in Castile since the beginning of the 17th century or earlier. Later references to this game are found in France and Spain.
The first record of the game in France occurs in 1888 and in Britain during the 1770s and 1780s, but the first rules appeared in Britain in 1800 under the name of vingt-un. Twenty-one, still known then as vingt-un, appeared in the United States in the early 1800s. The first American rules were an 1825 reprint of the 1800 English rules. English vingt-un later developed into an American variant in its own right which was renamed "blackjack" around 1899.
According to popular myth, when vingt-un was introduced into the United States (in the early 1800s, during the First World War, or in the 1930s, depending on the source), gambling houses offered bonus payouts to stimulate players' interests. One such bonus was a ten-to-one payout if the player's hand consisted of the ace of spades and a black jack (either the jack of clubs or the jack of spades). This hand was called a "blackjack", and the name stuck even after the ten-to-one bonus was withdrawn.
French card historian Thierry Depaulis debunks this story, showing that prospectors during the Klondike Gold Rush (1896–99) gave the name "blackjack" to the game of American vingt-un, the bonus being the usual ace and any 10-point card. Since blackjack also refers to the mineral zincblende, which was often associated with gold or silver deposits, he suggests that the mineral name was transferred by prospectors to the top bonus hand. He could not find any historical evidence for a special bonus for having the combination of an ace and a black jack.
In September 1956, Roger Baldwin, Wilbert Cantey, Herbert Maisel, and James McDermott published a paper titled "The Optimum Strategy in Blackjack" in the Journal of the American Statistical Association, the first mathematically sound optimal blackjack strategy. This paper became the foundation of future efforts to beat blackjack. Ed Thorp used Baldwin's hand calculations to verify the basic strategy and later published (in 1963) Beat the Dealer.
Rules of play at casinos
The object of the game is to win money by creating card totals higher than those of the dealer's hand but not exceeding 21, or by stopping at a total in the hope that the dealer will bust. Number cards count as their number, the jack, queen, and king ("face cards" or "pictures") count as 10, and aces count as either 1 or 11 depending on whether or not counting it as 11 would cause a bust. If a player exceeds 21 points, they bust and automatically lose. A total of 21 on the starting two cards is called a "blackjack" or "natural," and is the strongest hand.
At a blackjack table, the dealer faces five to nine playing positions from behind a semicircular table. Between one and eight standard 52-card decks are shuffled together. To start each round, players place bets in the "betting box" at each position. In jurisdictions allowing back betting, up to three players can be at each position. The player whose bet is at the front of the betting box controls the position, and the dealer consults the controlling player for playing decisions; the other bettors "play behind". A player can usually bet in one or multiple boxes at a single table, but in many U.S. casinos, players are limited to playing one to three positions at a table.
The dealer deals from their left ("first base") to their far right ("third base"). Each box gets an initial hand of two cards. The dealer's hand gets its first card face-up. In "hole card" games, the dealer also gets a second card face-down (the hole card), and if the first card is a 10-A, the dealer will peek at the hole card to see whether they have a blackjack. If they do, they reveal it immediately, the hand ends, and the dealer takes all wagers whose hands are not also a blackjack. Hole card games are sometimes played on tables with a small mirror or electronic sensor used to peek securely at the hole card. In European casinos, "no hole card" games are prevalent; the dealer's second card is not drawn until all the players have played their hands.
Dealers deal the cards from one or two handheld decks, from a dealer's shoe or from a shuffling machine. One card is dealt to each wagered-on position clockwise from the dealer's left, followed by one card to the dealer, followed by an additional card to each of the positions in play, followed by the dealer's hole card if applicable. The players' initial cards may be dealt face-up or face-down (more common in single and double-deck games).
Once all the hands are dealt, play begins with the player to the left of the dealer and proceeds clockwise.
Player decisions
On the initial two cards, the player has up to five options: "hit", "stand", "double down", "split", or "surrender". Once a hand has more than two cards, hitting and standing are the only options available. Each option has a corresponding hand signal.
* Hit: Take another card.
: Signal: Scrape cards against the table (in handheld games); tap the table with a finger or wave a hand toward the body (in games dealt face-up).
* Stand: Take no more cards; also known as "stand pat", "sit", "stick", or "stay".
: Signal: Slide cards under chips face-down (in handheld games); wave hand horizontally (in games dealt face-up).
* Double down: Increase the initial bet by 100% and take exactly one more card. The additional bet is placed next to the original bet. Some games permit the player to increase the bet by amounts smaller than 100%, which is known as "double for less". Non-controlling players may or may not double their wager, but they still only take one card.
: Signal: Place additional chips beside the original bet outside the betting box and point with one finger.
* Split: Create two hands from a starting hand where both cards are the same value. Each new hand gets a second card resulting in two starting hands. This requires an additional bet on the second hand. The two hands are played out independently, and the wager on each hand is won or lost independently. In the case of cards worth 10 points, some casinos only allow splitting when the cards rank the same. For example, 10-10 could be split, but K-10 could not. Doubling and re-splitting after splitting may be restricted. A 10-valued card and an ace resulting from a split usually isn't considered a blackjack. Hitting split aces is often not allowed. Non-controlling players can opt to put up a second bet or not. If they do not, they only get paid or lose on one of the two post-split hands.
: Signal: Place additional chips next to the original bet outside the betting box and point with two fingers spread into a V formation.
* Surrender: Forfeit half the bet and end the hand immediately. This option is only available at some tables in some casinos, and is not allowed after splitting.
: Signal: Using the index finger, draw a horizontal line behind the bet. Surrender can also be announced verbally.
In handheld games, a player must reveal their cards if they have a blackjack, bust, or wish to double down, split, or surrender.
Hand signals help the "eye in the sky" make a video recording of the table, which resolves disputes and identifies dealer mistakes. It is also used to protect the casino against dealers who steal chips or players who cheat. Recordings can also identify advantage players. When a player's hand signal disagrees with their words, the hand signal takes precedence.
After the players have finished playing, the dealer's hand is resolved by drawing cards until the hand achieves a total of 17 or higher. If the dealer has a total of 17 including an ace valued as 11 (a "soft 17"), some games require the dealer to stand while other games require the dealer to hit. The dealer never doubles, splits, or surrenders. If the dealer busts, all players who haven't busted win. If the dealer does not bust, each remaining bet wins if its hand is higher than the dealer's and loses if it is lower. In the case of a tie ("push" or "standoff"), bets are returned without adjustment. A blackjack beats any hand that is not a blackjack, even one with a value of 21.
A player blackjack wins immediately unless the dealer also has one, in which case the hand is a push. If the dealer is dealt blackjack, all players who do not have a blackjack lose.
Wins are paid out at even money, except for player blackjacks, which are traditionally paid out at 3 to 2 odds. Some tables today pay blackjacks at less than 3:2.
Insurance
If the dealer shows an ace, an "insurance" bet is allowed. Insurance is a side bet that the dealer has a blackjack. The dealer asks for insurance bets before the first player plays. Insurance bets of up to half the player's current bet are placed on the "insurance bar" above the player's cards. If the dealer has a blackjack, insurance pays 2 to 1. In most casinos, the dealer looks at the down card and pays off or takes the insurance bet immediately. In other casinos, the payoff waits until the end of the play.
In face-down games, if a player has more than one hand, they can look at all their hands before deciding. This is the only condition where a player can look at multiple hands.
Players with blackjack can also take insurance. When this happens, it is called 'even money,' as the player is giving up their 3:2 payout for a 1:1 payout when taking insurance with a blackjack, under the condition that they still get paid if the dealer also has a blackjack.
Insurance bets lose money in the long run. The dealer has a blackjack less than one-third of the time. In some games, players can also take insurance when a 10-valued card shows, but the dealer has an ace in the hole less than one-tenth of the time.
The insurance bet is susceptible to advantage play. It is advantageous to make an insurance bet whenever the hole card has more than a one in three chance of being a ten. Card counting techniques can identify such situations.
Rule variations and effects on house edge
Note: Where changes in the house edge due to changes in the rules are stated in percentage terms, the difference is usually stated here in percentage points, not the percentage change. For example, if an edge of 10% is reduced to 9%, it is reduced by one percentage point, not reduced by ten percent.
Blackjack rules are generally set by regulations that establish permissible rule variations at the casino's discretion. Blackjack comes with a "house edge"; the casino's statistical advantage is built into the game. Most of the house's edge comes from the fact that the player loses when both the player and dealer bust. Blackjack players using basic strategy lose on average less than 1% of their action over the long run, giving blackjack one of the lowest edges in the casino. The house edge for games where blackjack pays 6 to 5 instead of 3 to 2 increases by about 1.4%. Player deviations from basic strategy also increase the house edge.
;Dealer hits soft 17
Each game has a rule about whether the dealer must hit or stand on soft 17, which is generally printed on the table surface. The variation where the dealer must hit soft 17 is abbreviated "H17" in blackjack literature, with "S17" used for the stand-on-soft-17 variation. Substituting an "H17" rule with an "S17" rule in a game benefits the player, decreasing the house edge by about 0.2%.
;Number of decks
All other things equal, using fewer decks decreases the house edge. This is due to a combination of an increased probability of blackjack (which generally pays 3:2 for the player), an increased probability of the dealer busting, and doubling down being more beneficial for the player in a game with fewer decks.
Casinos generally compensate by tightening other rules in games with fewer decks, to preserve the house edge or discourage play altogether. When offering single-deck blackjack games, casinos are more likely to disallow doubling on soft hands or after splitting, restrict resplitting, require higher minimum bets, or pay the player less than 3:2 for a winning blackjack.
The following table illustrates the mathematical effect on the house edge of the number of decks, by considering games with various deck counts under the following ruleset: double after split allowed, resplit to four hands allowed, no hitting split aces, no surrendering, double on any two cards, original bets only lost on dealer blackjack, dealer hits soft 17, and cut-card used. The increase in house edge per unit increase in the number of decks is most dramatic when comparing the single-deck game to the two-deck game, and becomes progressively smaller as more decks are added.
{| class="wikitable"
! Number of decks !! House advantage
|-
| Single deck || 0.17%
|-
| Double deck || 0.46%
|-
| Four decks || 0.60%
|-
| Six decks || 0.64%
|-
| Eight decks || 0.66%
|}
;Late/early surrender:
Surrender, for those games that allow it, is usually not permitted against a dealer blackjack; if the dealer's first card is an ace or ten, the hole card is checked to make sure there is no blackjack before surrender is offered. This rule protocol is consequently known as "late" surrender. The alternative, "early" surrender, gives the player the option to surrender before the dealer checks for blackjack, or in a no hole card game. Early surrender is much more favorable to the player than late surrender.
For late surrender, however, while it is tempting to opt for surrender on any hand which will probably lose, the correct strategy is to only surrender on the very worst hands, because having even a one-in-four chance of winning the full bet is better than losing half the bet and pushing the other half, as entailed by surrendering.
;Resplitting:
If the cards of a post-split hand have the same value, most games allow the player to split again, or "resplit". The player places a further wager, and the dealer separates the new pair dealing a further card to each as before. Some games allow unlimited resplitting, while others may limit it to a certain number of hands, such as four hands (for example, "resplit to 4").
;Hit/resplit split aces:
After splitting aces, the common rule is that only one card will be dealt to each ace; the player cannot split, double, or take another hit on either hand. Rule variants include allowing resplitting aces or allowing the player to hit split aces. Games allowing aces to be resplit are not uncommon, but those allowing the player to hit split aces are extremely rare. Allowing the player to hit hands resulting from split aces reduces the house edge by about 0.13%; allowing resplitting of aces reduces the house edge by about 0.03%. Note that a ten-value card dealt on a split ace (or vice versa) will not be counted as a blackjack but as a soft 21.
;No double after split:
After a split, most games allow doubling down on the new two-card hands. Disallowing doubling after a split increases the house edge by about 0.12%.
;Double on 9/10/11 or 10/11 only:
Under the "Reno rule", doubling down is only permitted on hard totals of 9, 10, or 11 (under a similar European rule, only 10 or 11). The basic strategy would otherwise call for some doubling down with hard 9 and soft 13–18, and advanced players can identify situations where doubling on soft 19–20 and hard 8, 7, and even 6 is advantageous. The Reno rule prevents the player from taking advantage of double-down in these situations and thereby increases the player's expected loss. The Reno rule increases the house edge by around 0.1%, and its European version by around 0.2%.
;No hole card and OBO:
In most non-U.S. casinos, a "no hole card" game is played, meaning that the dealer does not draw nor consult their second card until after all players have finished making decisions. With no hole card, it is rarely the correct basic strategy to double or split against a dealer ten or ace, since a dealer blackjack will result in the loss of the split and double bets; the only exception is with a pair of aces against a dealer 10, where it is still correct to split. In all other cases, a stand, hit, or surrender is called for. For instance, when holding 11 against a dealer 10, the correct strategy is to double in a hole card game (where the player knows the dealer's second card is not an ace), but to hit in a no-hole card game. The no-hole-card rule adds approximately 0.11% to the house edge.
The "original bets only" rule variation appearing in certain no hole card games states that if the player's hand loses to a dealer blackjack, only the mandatory initial bet ("original") is forfeited, and all optional bets, meaning doubles and splits, are pushed. "Original bets only" is also known by the acronym OBO; it has the same effect on basic strategy and the house edge as reverting to a hole card game.
;Altered payout for a winning blackjack:
In many casinos, a blackjack pays only 6:5 or even 1:1 instead of the usual 3:2. This is most common at tables with lower table minimums. Although this payoff was originally limited to single-deck games, it has spread to double-deck and shoe games. Among common rule variations in the U.S., these altered payouts for blackjack are the most damaging to the player, causing the greatest increase in house edge. Since blackjack occurs in approximately 4.8% of hands, the 1:1 game increases the house edge by 2.3%, while the 6:5 game adds 1.4% to the house edge. Video blackjack machines generally pay a 1:1 payout for a blackjack.
;Dealer wins ties:
The rule that bets on tied hands are lost rather than pushed is catastrophic to the player. Though rarely used in standard blackjack, it is sometimes seen in "blackjack-like" games, such as in some charity casinos.
Blackjack strategy
Basic strategy
Each blackjack game has a basic strategy, the optimal method of playing any hand. When using basic strategy, the long-term house advantage (the expected loss of the player) is minimized.
An example of a basic strategy is shown in the table below, which applies to a game with the following specifications:
* Four to eight decks
* The dealer hits on a soft 17
* A double is allowed after a split
* Only original bets are lost on dealer blackjack
{| border"1" class"wikitable" style="text-align:center;margin:1em auto;"
|-
! rowspan="2" | Player hand
! colspan="10" | Dealer's face-up card
|-
| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6
| 7
| 8
| 9
| 10
| A
|-
! colspan="11" | Hard totals (excluding pairs)
|-
! 18–21
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
|-
! 17
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:white; color:black" | Us
|-
! 16
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:white; color:black" | Uh
| style="background:white; color:black" | Uh
| style="background:white; color:black" | Uh
|-
! 15
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:white; color:black" | Uh
| style="background:white; color:black" | Uh
|-
! 13–14
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 12
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 11
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
|-
! 10
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 9
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 5–8
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! colspan="11" | Soft totals
|-
|
| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6
| 7
| 8
| 9
| 10
| A
|-
! A,9
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
|-
! A,8
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Ds
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
|-
! A,7
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Ds
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Ds
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Ds
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Ds
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Ds
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! A,6
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! A,4–A,5
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! A,2–A,3
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! A,A
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! colspan="11" | Pairs
|-
|
| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6
| 7
| 8
| 9
| 10
| A
|-
! A, A
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
|-
! 10,10
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
|-
! 9,9
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
| style="background:red; color:black" | S
|-
! 8,8
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:white; color:black" | Usp
|-
! 7,7
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 6,6
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 5,5
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:cyan; color:black" | Dh
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 4,4
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|-
! 2,2–3,3
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:yellow; color:black" | SP
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
| style="background:lime; color:black" | H
|}
Key:
:<span style"background:red; color:black">S</span> Stand
:<span style"background:lime; color:black">H</span> Hit
:<span style"background:cyan; color:black">Dh</span> Double (if not allowed, then hit)
:<span style"background:cyan; color:black">Ds</span> Double (if not allowed, then stand)
:<span style"background:yellow; color:black">SP</span> Split
:<span style"background:white; color:black">Uh</span> Surrender (if not allowed, then hit)
:<span style"background:white; color:black">Us</span> Surrender (if not allowed, then stand)
:<span style"background:white; color:black">Usp</span> Surrender (if not allowed, then split)
Most basic strategy decisions are the same for all blackjack games. Rule variations call for changes in only a few situations. For example, to use the table above on a game with the stand-on-soft-17 rule (which favors the player, and is typically found only at higher-limit tables today) only 6 cells would need to be changed: hit on 11 vs. A, hit on 15 vs. A, stand on 17 vs. A, stand on A,7 vs. 2, stand on A,8 vs. 6, and split on 8,8 vs. A. Regardless of the specific rule variations, taking insurance or "even money" is never the correct play under a basic strategy.Composition-dependent strategyThe basic strategy is based on a player's point total and the dealer's visible card. Players can sometimes improve on this decision by considering the composition of their hand, not just the point total. For example, players should ordinarily stand when holding 12 against a dealer 4. But in a single deck game, players should hit if their 12 consists of a 10 and a 2. The presence of a 10 in the player's hand has two consequences:
* It makes the player's 12 a worse hand to stand on (since the only way to avoid losing is for the dealer to go bust, which is less likely if there are fewer 10s left in the shoe).
* It makes hitting safer, since the only way of going bust is to draw a 10, and this is less likely with a 10 already in the hand.
Even when basic and composition-dependent strategies lead to different actions, the difference in expected reward is small, and it becomes smaller with more decks. Using a composition-dependent strategy rather than a basic strategy in a single-deck game reduces the house edge by 4 in 10,000, which falls to 3 in 100,000 for a six-deck game.Advantage play
Blackjack has been a high-profile target for advantage players since the 1960s. Advantage play attempts to win more using skills such as memory, computation, and observation. While these techniques are legal, they can give players a mathematical edge in the game, making advantage players unwanted customers for casinos. Advantage play can lead to ejection or blacklisting. Some advantageous play techniques in blackjack include:
Card counting
During the course of a blackjack shoe, the dealer exposes the dealt cards. Players can infer from their accounting of the exposed cards which cards remain. These inferences can be used in the following ways:
* Players can make larger bets when they have an advantage. For example, the players can increase the starting bet if many aces and tens are left in the deck, in the hope of hitting a blackjack.
* Players can deviate from basic strategy according to the composition of their undealt cards. For example, with many tens left in the deck, players might double down in more situations since there is a better chance of getting a good hand.
A card counting system assigns a point score to each card rank (e.g., 1 point for 2–6, 0 points for 7–9, and −1 point for 10–A). When a card is exposed, a counter adds the score of that card to a running total, the 'count'. A card counter uses this count to make betting and playing decisions. The count starts at 0 for a freshly shuffled deck for "balanced" counting systems. Unbalanced counts are often started at a value that depends on the number of decks used in the game.
Blackjack's house edge is usually around 0.5–1% when players use basic strategy. Card counting can give the player an edge of up to about 2%.
Card counting works best when a few cards remain. This makes single-deck games better for counters. As a result, casinos are more likely to insist that players do not reveal their cards to one another in single-deck games. In games with more decks, casinos limit penetration by ending the shoe and reshuffling when one or more decks remain undealt. Casinos also sometimes use a shuffling machine to reintroduce the cards whenever a deck has been played.
Card counting is legal, The use of external devices to assist in card counting is illegal in Nevada.
Shuffle tracking
Another advantage play technique, mainly applicable in multi-deck games, involves tracking groups of cards (also known as slugs, clumps, or packs) through the shuffle and then playing and betting according to when those cards come into play from a new shoe. Shuffle tracking requires excellent eyesight and powers of visual estimation but is harder to detect; shuffle trackers' actions are largely unrelated to the composition of the cards in the shoe.
Arnold Snyder's articles in Blackjack Forum magazine brought shuffle tracking to the general public. His book, ''The Shuffle Tracker's Cookbook'', mathematically analyzed the player edge available from shuffle tracking based on the actual size of the tracked slug. Jerry L. Patterson also developed and published a shuffle-tracking method for tracking favorable clumps of cards and cutting them into play and tracking unfavorable clumps of cards and cutting them out of play.Identifying concealed cardsThe player can also gain an advantage by identifying cards from distinctive wear markings on their backs, or by hole carding (observing during the dealing process the front of a card dealt face-down). These methods are generally legal although their status in particular jurisdictions may vary.Side betsMany blackjack tables offer side bets on various outcomes including:
*Player hand and dealer's up card total 19, 20, or 21 ("Lucky Lucky")
*Player initial hand is a pair ("Perfect pairs")
*Player initial hand is suited, and connected, or a suited K-Q ("Royal match")
*Player initial hand plus dealer's card makes a flush, straight, or three-of-a-kind poker hand ("21+3")
*Player initial hand totals 20 ("Lucky Ladies")
*Dealer upcard is in between the value of the player's two cards ("In Bet")
*First card drawn to the dealer will result in a dealer bust ("Bust It!")
*One or both of the player's cards is the same as the dealer's card ("Match the Dealer")
The side wager is typically placed in a designated area next to the box for the main wager. A player wishing to wager on a side bet usually must place a wager on blackjack. Some games require that the blackjack wager should equal or exceed any side bet wager. A non-controlling player of a blackjack hand is usually permitted to place a side bet regardless of whether the controlling player does so.
The house edge for side bets is generally higher than for the blackjack game itself. Nonetheless, side bets can be susceptible to card counting. A side count designed specifically for a particular side bet can improve the player's edge. Only a few side bets, like "Insurance" and "Lucky Ladies", correlate well with the high-low counting system and offer a sufficient win rate to justify the effort of advantage play.
In team play, it is common for team members to be dedicated to only counting a side bet using a specialized count.
Video blackjack
]]
Some casinos, as well as general betting outlets, provide blackjack among a selection of casino-style games at electronic consoles. Video blackjack game rules are generally more favorable to the house; e.g., paying out only even money for winning blackjacks. Video and online blackjack games generally deal each round from a fresh shoe (i.e., use an RNG for each deal), rendering card counting ineffective in most situations.
Variants and related games
Blackjack is a member of the family of traditional card games played recreationally worldwide. Most of these games have not been adapted for casino play. Furthermore, the casino game development industry actively produces blackjack variants, most of which are ultimately not adopted by casinos. The following are the most prominent and established variants in casinos.
*Spanish 21 provides players with liberal rules, such as doubling down any number of cards (with the option to "rescue", or surrender only one wager to the house), payout bonuses for five or more card 21s, 6–7–8 21s, 7–7–7 21s, late surrender, and player blackjacks and player 21s always winning. The trade-off is having no 10s in the deck, although the jacks, queens, and kings are still there. An unlicensed version of Spanish 21 played without a hole card is found in Australian casinos under the name "pontoon".
*21st-century blackjack (or Vegas-style blackjack) is found in California card rooms. In variations, a player bust does not always result in an automatic loss; depending on the casino, the player can still push if the dealer also busts. The dealer has to bust with a higher total, though.
*Double exposure blackjack deals the first two cards of the dealer's hand face up. Blackjacks pay even money, and players lose on ties. Also, players can neither buy insurance nor surrender.
*Double attack blackjack has liberal blackjack rules and the option of increasing one's wager after seeing the dealer's up card. This game is dealt from a Spanish shoe, and blackjacks only pay even money.
*Blackjack switch is played over two hands, and the second card can be switched between hands. For example, if the player is dealt 10–6 and 5–10, then the player can switch two cards to make hands of 10–10 and 6–5. Natural blackjacks are paid 1:1 instead of the standard 3:2, and a dealer 22 is a push.
*Super Fun 21 allows a player to split a hand up to four times. If the player has six cards totaling 20, they automatically win. Wins are paid 1:1.
*In New Years 31, the card limit is 31 instead of 21, with 14 beating 30. Additionally, the players have to bet on themselves and if they want to bet on other players depending on the starting card. Then, the only player action per round after that is either a hit or pass. Passing results in the dealer continuing to the next player.
Examples of local traditional and recreational related games include French vingt-et-un ('twenty-one') and German Siebzehn und Vier ('seventeen and four'). Neither game allows splitting. An ace counts only eleven, but two aces count as a blackjack. It is mostly played in private circles and barracks. The popular British member of the vingt-un family is called "pontoon", the name being probably a corruption of vingt-et-un.
Blackjack Hall of Fame
In 2002, professional gamblers worldwide were invited to nominate great blackjack players for admission into the Blackjack Hall of Fame. Seven members were inducted in 2002, with new people inducted every year after. The Hall of Fame is at the Barona Casino in San Diego. Members include Edward O. Thorp, author of the 1960s book Beat the Dealer; Ken Uston, who popularized the concept of team play; Arnold Snyder, author and editor of the Blackjack Forum trade journal; and Stanford Wong, author and popularizer of "Wonging".
Notes
References Further reading General literature *
* }}
*
* Parlett, David (1990). A History of Card Games, OUP, Oxford.
Blackjack literature
* Beat the Dealer: A Winning Strategy for the Game of Twenty-One, Edward O. Thorp, 1966,
* Blackbelt in Blackjack, Arnold Snyder, 1998 (1980),
* Blackjack and the Law, I. Nelson Rose and Robert A. Loeb, 1998,
* ''Blackjack: A Winner's Handbook, Jerry L. Patterson, 2001, (1978),
* Encyclopedia of Casino Twenty-One, Michael Dalton, 2016, (1993),
* Ken Uston on Blackjack, Ken Uston, 1986,
* Knock-Out Blackjack, Olaf Vancura and Ken Fuchs, 1998,
* Million Dollar Blackjack, Ken Uston, 1994 (1981),
* Playing Blackjack as a Business, Lawrence Revere, 1998 (1971),
* Professional Blackjack, Stanford Wong, 1994 (1975),
* The Blackjack Life, Nathaniel Tilton, 2012,
* The Theory of Blackjack, Peter Griffin, 1996 (1979),
* The World's Greatest Blackjack Book, Lance Humble and Carl Cooper, 1980,
Mathematics of blackjack
* Luck, Logic, and White Lies: The Mathematics of Games, Jörg Bewersdorff, 2004, , , 121–134, online supplement: [http://bewersdorff-online.de/black-jack/ Blackjack calculator (JavaScript)]
* The Doctrine of Chances. Probabilistic Aspects of Gambling, Stewart Ethier, 2010, , , 643–687
* The Theory of Gambling and Statistical Logic'', Richard A. Epstein, 2009 (1967), , , 265–286
Category:Banking games
Category:American gambling games | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackjack | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.289140 |
3982 | Bicarbonate | | ImageClass1 = skin-invert
| ImageSize1 = 121
| ImageName1 = Skeletal formula of bicarbonate with the explicit hydrogen added
| ImageFile2 = Bicarbonate-ion-3D-balls.png
| ImageFile2_Ref =
| ImageSize2 = 121
| ImageName2 = Ball and stick model of bicarbonate
|IUPACName=Hydrogencarbonate
| SystematicName Hydroxidodioxidocarbonate(1−)
| OtherNames .
Bicarbonate serves a crucial biochemical role in the physiological pH buffering system.
The term "bicarbonate" was coined in 1814 by the English chemist William Hyde Wollaston. The name lives on as a trivial name.
Chemical properties
The bicarbonate ion (hydrogencarbonate ion) is an anion with the empirical formula and a molecular mass of 61.01 daltons; it consists of one central carbon atom surrounded by three oxygen atoms in a trigonal planar arrangement, with a hydrogen atom attached to one of the oxygens. It is isoelectronic with nitric acid . The bicarbonate ion carries a negative one formal charge and is an amphiprotic species which has both acidic and basic properties. It is both the conjugate base of carbonic acid ; and the conjugate acid of , the carbonate ion, as shown by these equilibrium reactions:
: + 2 H<sub>2</sub>O + H<sub>2</sub>O + OH<sup>−</sup> H<sub>2</sub>CO<sub>3</sub> + 2 OH<sup>−</sup>
:H<sub>2</sub>CO<sub>3</sub> + 2 H<sub>2</sub>O + H<sub>3</sub>O<sup>+</sup> + H<sub>2</sub>O + 2 H<sub>3</sub>O<sup>+</sup>.
A bicarbonate salt forms when a positively charged ion attaches to the negatively charged oxygen atoms of the ion, forming an ionic compound. Many bicarbonates are soluble in water at standard temperature and pressure; in particular, sodium bicarbonate contributes to total dissolved solids, a common parameter for assessing water quality.Physiological role
to form H<sub>2</sub>CO<sub>3</sub>, which is in equilibrium with the cation H<sup>+</sup> and anion HCO<sub>3</sub><sup>−</sup>. It is then carried to the lung, where the reverse reaction occurs and CO<sub>2</sub> gas is released. In the kidney (left), cells (green) lining the proximal tubule conserve bicarbonate by transporting it from the glomerular filtrate in the lumen (yellow) of the nephron back into the blood (red). The exact stoichiometry in the kidney is omitted for simplicity.]]
Bicarbonate () is a vital component of the pH buffering system
Additionally, bicarbonate plays a key role in the digestive system. It raises the internal pH of the stomach, after highly acidic digestive juices have finished in their digestion of food. Bicarbonate also acts to regulate pH in the small intestine. It is released from the pancreas in response to the hormone secretin to neutralize the acidic chyme entering the duodenum from the stomach.
Bicarbonate in the environment
Bicarbonate is the dominant form of dissolved inorganic carbon in sea water, and in most fresh waters. As such it is an important sink in the carbon cycle.
Some plants like Chara utilize carbonate and produce calcium carbonate (CaCO<sub>3</sub>) as a result of biological metabolism.
In freshwater ecology, strong photosynthetic activity by freshwater plants in daylight releases gaseous oxygen into the water and at the same time produces bicarbonate ions. These shift the pH upward until in certain circumstances the degree of alkalinity can become toxic to some organisms or can make other chemical constituents such as ammonia toxic. In darkness, when no photosynthesis occurs, respiration processes release carbon dioxide, and no new bicarbonate ions are produced, resulting in a rapid fall in pH.
The flow of bicarbonate ions from rocks weathered by the carbonic acid in rainwater is an important part of the carbon cycle.
Other uses
The most common salt of the bicarbonate ion is sodium bicarbonate, NaHCO<sub>3</sub>, which is commonly known as baking soda. When heated or exposed to an acid such as acetic acid (vinegar), sodium bicarbonate releases carbon dioxide. This is used as a leavening agent in baking.
Ammonium bicarbonate is used in the manufacturing of some cookies, crackers, and biscuits.DiagnosticsIn diagnostic medicine, the blood value of bicarbonate is one of several indicators of the state of acid–base physiology in the body. It is measured, along with chloride, potassium, and sodium, to assess electrolyte levels in an electrolyte panel test (which has Current Procedural Terminology, CPT, code 80051).
The parameter standard bicarbonate concentration (SBC<sub>e</sub>) is the bicarbonate concentration in the blood at a P<sub>a</sub>CO<sub>2</sub> of , full oxygen saturation and 36 °C.
, comparing blood content of bicarbonate (shown in blue at right) with other constituents.]]
Bicarbonate compounds
* Sodium bicarbonate
* Potassium bicarbonate
* Caesium bicarbonate
* Magnesium bicarbonate
* Calcium bicarbonate
* Ammonium bicarbonate
* Carbonic acid
See also
* Carbon dioxide
* Carbonate
* Carbonic anhydrase
* Hard water
* Arterial blood gas test
* Henderson-Hasselbach equation
References
External links
*
Category:Amphoteric compounds
Category:Carbon oxyanions
Bicarbonates | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicarbonate | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.299166 |
3984 | Bernie Federko | | birth_place = Foam Lake, Saskatchewan, Canada
| career_start = 1976
| career_end = 1990
| halloffame = 2002
}}
Bernard Allan Federko (born May 12, 1956) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey centre who played fourteen seasons in the National Hockey League from 1976 through 1990.
Playing career
Federko began playing hockey at a young age in his home town of Foam Lake, Saskatchewan. He was captain of the 1971 Bantam provincial champions. He also played Senior hockey with the local Foam Lake Flyers of the Fishing Lake Hockey League, winning the league scoring title as a bantam-aged player. Federko continued his career with the Saskatoon Blades of the WHL where he set and still holds the team record for assists. He played three seasons with the Blades, and in his final year with the club he led the league in assists and points in both the regular season and playoffs. Federko was drafted 7th overall by the St. Louis Blues in the 1976 NHL Amateur Draft. He started the next season with the Kansas City Blues of the Central Hockey League and was leading the league in points when he was called up mid-season to play 31 games with St. Louis. He scored three hat tricks in those 31 games. In the 1978–79 NHL season, Federko developed into a bona fide star, as he scored 95 points.
Federko scored 100 points in a season four times, and was a consistent and underrated performer for the Blues. Federko scored at least 90 points in seven of the eight seasons between 1978 and 1986, and became the first player in NHL history to record at least 50 assists in 10 consecutive seasons. However, in an era when Wayne Gretzky was scoring 200 points a season, Federko never got the attention many felt he deserved. In 1986, in a poll conducted by GOAL magazine, he was named the most overlooked talent in hockey. His General Manager Ron Caron said he was "A great playmaker. He makes the average or above average player look like a star at times. He's such an unselfish player."
On March 19, 1988, Federko became the 22nd NHL player to record 1000 career points. After he had a poor season as a captain in 1988–89, he was traded to the Detroit Red Wings with Tony McKegney for future Blues star Adam Oates, and Paul MacLean. In Detroit, Federko re-united with former Blues head coach Jacques Demers, but he had to play behind Steve Yzerman and did not get his desired ice time. After his lowest point output since his rookie season, Federko decided to retire after the 1989–90 season, having played exactly 1,000 NHL games with his final game on April 1, 1990.
Post-NHL career
Less than a year after retiring as a player, the Blues retired number 24 in his honour on March 16, 1991. Federko was eventually inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2002, the first Hall of Famer to earn his credentials primarily as a Blue.
Currently, Federko is a television colour commentator and studio analyst for Bally Sports Midwest during Blues broadcasts. He was the head coach/general manager of the St. Louis Vipers roller hockey team of the Roller Hockey International for the 1993 and 1994 seasons.Career statisticsRegular season and playoffs{| border"0" cellpadding"1" cellspacing"0" style="text-align:center; width:60em"
|- bgcolor="#e0e0e0"
! colspan"3" bgcolor"#ffffff"|
! rowspan"100" bgcolor"#ffffff"|
! colspan="5"|Regular season
! rowspan"100" bgcolor"#ffffff"|
! colspan="5"|Playoffs
|- bgcolor="#e0e0e0"
! Season
! Team
! League
! GP !! G !! A !! Pts !! PIM
! GP !! G !! A !! Pts !! PIM
|-
| 1973–74
| Saskatoon Blades
| WCHL
| 68 || 22 || 28 || 50 || 19
| 6 || 0 || 0 || 0 || 2
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1974–75
| Saskatoon Blades
| WCHL
| 66 || 39 || 68 || 107 || 30
| 17 || 15 || 7 || 22 || 8
|-
| 1975–76
| Saskatoon Blades
| WCHL
| 72 || 72 || 115 || 187 || 106
| 20 || 18 || 27 || 45 || 8
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1976–77
| Kansas City Blues
| CHL
| 42 || 30 || 39 || 69 || 41
| — || — || — || — || —
|-
| 1976–77
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 31 || 14 || 9 || 23 || 15
| 4 || 1 || 1 || 2 || 2
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1977–78
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 72 || 17 || 24 || 41 || 27
| — || — || — || — || —
|-
| 1978–79
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 74 || 31 || 64 || 95 || 14
| — || — || — || — || —
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1979–80
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 79 || 38 || 56 || 94 || 24
| 3 || 1 || 0 || 1 || 2
|-
| 1980–81
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 78 || 31 || 73 || 104 || 47
| 11 || 8 || 10 || 18 || 2
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1981–82
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 74 || 30 || 62 || 92 || 70
| 10 || 3 || 15 || 18 || 10
|-
| 1982–83
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 75 || 24 || 60 || 84 || 24
| 4 || 2 || 3 || 5 || 0
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1983–84
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 79 || 41 || 66 || 107 || 43
| 11 || 4 || 4 || 8 || 10
|-
| 1984–85
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 76 || 30 || 73 || 103 || 27
| 3 || 0 || 2 || 2 || 4
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1985–86
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 80 || 34 || 68 || 102 || 34
| 19 || 7 || 14 || 21 || 17
|-
| 1986–87
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 64 || 20 || 52 || 72 || 32
| 6 || 3 || 3 || 6 || 18
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1987–88
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 79 || 20 || 69 || 89 || 52
| 10 || 2 || 6 || 8 || 18
|-
| 1988–89
| St. Louis Blues
| NHL
| 66 || 22 || 45 || 67 || 54
| 10 || 4 || 8 || 12 || 0
|- bgcolor="#f0f0f0"
| 1989–90
| Detroit Red Wings
| NHL
| 73 || 17 || 40 || 57 || 24
| — || — || — || — || —
|- bgcolor="#e0e0e0"
! colspan="3" | NHL totals
! 1,000 !! 369 !! 761 !! 1,130 !! 487
! 91 !! 35 !! 66 !! 101 !! 83
|}
Awards
*Bob Brownridge Memorial Trophy (WCHL leading scorer) - 1976
*Named to the WCHL First All-Star Team (1976)
*Named WCHL MVP (1976)
*Named to the CHL Second All-Star Team (1977)
*Won Ken McKenzie Trophy as CHL Rookie of the Year (1977)
*Played in the NHL All-Star Game (1980, 1981)
*Named NHL Player of the Week (For week ending December 3, 1984)
Records
* St. Louis Blues team record for career games played (927)
* St. Louis Blues team record for career assists (721)
* St. Louis Blues team record for career points (1073)
* Shares St. Louis Blues team record for assists in one game (5 on February 27, 1988)
* St. Louis Blues team record for career playoff assists (66)
* First NHL player to get 50 assists in 10 consecutive seasons.
See also
* Hockey Hall of Fame
* List of NHL players with 1,000 points
* List of NHL players with 1,000 games played
* List of NHL players with 100-point seasons
* List of NHL statistical leaders
References
Citations
General references
*
External links
*
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060324105749/http://www.stlouisblues.com/history/retired/retired_ferderko.html St. Louis Blues Website]
Category:1956 births
Category:Living people
Category:Canadian ice hockey centres
Category:Canadian people of Ukrainian descent
Category:Detroit Red Wings players
Category:Canadian expatriate ice hockey players in the United States
Category:Edmonton Oilers (WHA) draft picks
Category:Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Category:Ice hockey people from Saskatchewan
Category:Kansas City Blues (ice hockey) players
Category:National Hockey League broadcasters
Category:NHL first-round draft picks
Category:National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Category:Saskatoon Blades players
Category:St. Louis Blues announcers
Category:St. Louis Blues draft picks
Category:St. Louis Blues players
Category:World Hockey Association first round draft picks
Category:20th-century Canadian sportsmen | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernie_Federko | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.314504 |
3985 | Buffalo, New York | Buffalo § United States}}
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| subdivision_name3 = Buffalo–Niagara Falls
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| subdivision_name4 = Erie
| government_type = Strong mayor-council
| governing_body = Buffalo Common Council
| leader_title = Mayor
| leader_name = Christopher Scanlon (D) (acting)
| leader_title1 = Deputy Mayor
| leader_name1 = Brian Gould (D)
| leader_title2 = State Senators
| leader_name2 = April McCants-Baskin & Sean Ryan (D)
| leader_title3 = Assemblymembers
| leader_name3 = William Conrad III (D), Crystal Peoples-Stokes (D), Patrick Burke (D), Patrick Chludzinski (R), & Jon Rivera (D)
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| leader_name4 = Tim Kennedy (D)
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Buffalo is a city in the U.S. state of New York and the county seat of Erie County. It lies in Western New York at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River on the Canadian border. With a population of 278,349 according to the 2020 census, Buffalo is the second-most populous city in New York State after New York City, and the 81st-most populous city in the U.S. Buffalo is the primary city of the Buffalo–Niagara Falls metropolitan area, which had an estimated population of 1.1 million in 2020, making it the 49th-largest metro area in the U.S.
Before the 17th century, the region was inhabited by nomadic Paleo-Indians who were succeeded by the Neutral, Erie, and Iroquois nations. In the early 17th century, the French began to explore the region. In the 18th century, Iroquois land surrounding Buffalo Creek was ceded through the Holland Land Purchase, and a small village was established at its headwaters. In 1825, after its harbor was improved, Buffalo was selected as the terminus of the Erie Canal, which led to its incorporation in 1832. The canal stimulated its growth as the primary inland port between the Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean. Transshipment made Buffalo the world's largest grain port of that era. After the coming of railroads greatly reduced the canal's importance, the city became the second-largest railway hub (after Chicago). During the mid-19th century, Buffalo transitioned to manufacturing, which came to be dominated by steel production. Later, deindustrialization and the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway saw the city's economy decline and diversify. It developed its service industries, such as health care, retail, tourism, logistics, and education, while retaining some manufacturing. In 2019, the gross domestic product of the Buffalo–Niagara Falls MSA was $53 billion (~$}} in ).
The city's cultural landmarks include the oldest urban parks system in the United States, the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, the Buffalo History Museum, the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Shea's Performing Arts Center, the Buffalo Museum of Science, and several annual festivals. Its educational institutions include the University at Buffalo, Buffalo State University, Canisius University, and D'Youville University. Buffalo is also known for its winter weather, Buffalo wings, and two major-league sports teams: the National Football League's Buffalo Bills and the National Hockey League's Buffalo Sabres.
History
Pre-Columbian era to European exploration
territory ]]
Before the arrival of Europeans, nomadic Paleo-Indians inhabited the western New York region from the 8th millennium BCE. The Woodland period began around 1000 BC, marked by the rise of the Iroquois Confederacy and the spread of its tribes throughout the state. Seventeenth-century Jesuit missionaries were the first Europeans to visit the area. During the Beaver Wars in the mid-17th century the Senecas conquered the Erie and Neutrals in the region. Native Americans did not settle along Buffalo Creek permanently until 1780, when displaced Senecas were relocated from Fort Niagara. The Seneca town of , meaning “Between the basswoods,” was historically located on Buffalo Creek, and continues to be used as the Seneca name for the modern city of Buffalo.
Louis Hennepin and Sieur de La Salle explored the upper Niagara and Ontario regions in the late 1670s. In 1679, La Salle's ship, Le Griffon, became the first to sail above Niagara Falls near Cayuga Creek. Baron de Lahontan visited the site of Buffalo in 1687.
New York and Massachusetts were vying for the territory which included Buffalo, and Massachusetts had the right to purchase all but a one-mile-(1600-meter)-wide portion of land. The rights to the Massachusetts territories were sold to Robert Morris in 1791. Despite objections from Seneca chief Red Jacket, Morris brokered a deal between fellow chief Cornplanter and the Dutch dummy corporation Holland Land Company. The Holland Land Purchase gave the Senecas three reservations, and the Holland Land Company received for about thirty-three cents per acre. As a result of the war, in which the Iroquois sided with the British Army, Iroquois territory was gradually reduced in the late 1700s by European settlers through successive statewide treaties which included the Treaty of Fort Stanwix (1784) and the First Treaty of Buffalo Creek (1788). The Iroquois were moved onto reservations, including Buffalo Creek. By the end of the 18th century, only of reservations remained.
After the Treaty of Big Tree removed Iroquois title to lands west of the Genesee River in 1797, Joseph Ellicott surveyed land at the mouth of Buffalo Creek. In the middle of the village was an intersection of eight streets at present-day Niagara Square. Originally named New Amsterdam, its name was soon changed to Buffalo.
Erie Canal, grain and commerce
The village of Buffalo was named for Buffalo Creek.
British forces burned Buffalo and the northwestern village of Black Rock in 1813. The battle and subsequent fire was in response to the destruction of Niagara-on-the-Lake by American forces and other skirmishes during the War of 1812. During the 1830s, businessman Benjamin Rathbun significantly expanded its business district. The city doubled in size from 1845 to 1855. Almost two-thirds of the city's population was foreign-born, largely a mix of unskilled (or educated) Irish and German Catholics.
Fugitive slaves made their way north to Buffalo during the 1840s. Buffalo was a terminus of the Underground Railroad, with many free Black people crossing the Niagara River to Fort Erie, Ontario; others remained in Buffalo. During this time, Buffalo's port continued to develop. Passenger and commercial traffic expanded, leading to the creation of feeder canals and the expansion of the city's harbor. Buffalo was the transshipment hub of the Great Lakes, and weather, maritime and political events in other Great Lakes cities had a direct impact on the city's economy. During this time, Buffalo controlled one-quarter of all shipping traffic on Lake Erie. Unionization began to take hold in the late 19th century, highlighted by the Great Railroad Strike of 1877 and 1892 Buffalo switchmen's strike.
<span class"anchor" id"Steel, challenges and modern era"></span>Steel, challenges, and the modern era
At the start of the 20th century, Buffalo was the world's leading grain port and a national flour-milling hub. At the exposition, President William McKinley was assassinated by anarchist Leon Czolgosz. When McKinley died, Theodore Roosevelt was sworn in at the Wilcox Mansion in Buffalo.
Attorney John Milburn and local industrialists convinced the Lackawanna Iron and Steel Company to relocate from Scranton, Pennsylvania to the town of West Seneca in 1904. Employment was competitive, with many Eastern Europeans and Scrantonians vying for jobs. The Great Depression saw severe unemployment, especially among the working class. New Deal relief programs operated in full force, and the city became a stronghold of labor unions and the Democratic Party.
During World War II, Buffalo regained its manufacturing strength as military contracts enabled the city to manufacture steel, chemicals, aircraft, trucks and ammunition.
The St. Lawrence Seaway was proposed in the 19th century as a faster shipping route to Europe, and later as part of a bi-national hydroelectric project with Canada. Downsizing of the steel mills was attributed to the threat of higher wages and unionization efforts.
Geography
Topography
and Niagara Frontier; Buffalo is at the lower right.|alt=A satellite photo shows two bodies of water and two peninsulas from space]]
Buffalo is on the eastern end of Lake Erie opposite Fort Erie, Ontario. It is at the head of the Niagara River, which flows north over Niagara Falls into Lake Ontario.
The Buffalo metropolitan area is on the Erie/Ontario Lake Plain of the Eastern Great Lakes Lowlands, a narrow plain extending east to Utica, New York. The Southtowns are hillier, leading to the Cattaraugus Hills in the Appalachian Upland. Several types of shale, limestone and lagerstätten are prevalent in Buffalo and its surrounding area, lining their stream beds.
According to Fox Weather, Buffalo is one of the top five snowiest large cities in the country, receiving, on average, 95 inches of snow annually.
Although the city has not experienced any recent or significant earthquakes, Buffalo is in the Southern Great Lakes Seismic Zone (part of the Great Lakes tectonic zone). Buffalo has four channels within its boundaries: the Niagara River, Buffalo River (and Creek), Scajaquada Creek, and the Black Rock Canal, adjacent to the Niagara River. The city's Bureau of Forestry maintains a database of over seventy thousand trees.
According to the United States Census Bureau, Buffalo has an area of ; is land, and the rest is water. Downtown Buffalo landmarks include Louis Sullivan's Guaranty Building, an early skyscraper; the Ellicott Square Building, once one of the largest of its kind in the world; the Art Deco Buffalo City Hall and the McKinley Monument, and the Electric Tower. Beyond downtown, the Buffalo Central Terminal was built in the Broadway-Fillmore neighborhood in 1929; the Richardson Olmsted Complex, built in 1881, was an insane asylum until its closure in the 1970s. Urban renewal from the 1950s to the 1970s spawned the Brutalist-style Buffalo City Court Building and Seneca One Tower, the city's tallest building. In the city's Parkside neighborhood, the Darwin D. Martin House was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in his Prairie School style.
Since 2016, Washington DC real estate developer Douglas Jemal has been acquiring, and redeveloping, iconic properties throughout the city.
Neighborhoods
]]
According to Mark Goldman, the city has a "tradition of separate and independent settlements". Main Street divides Buffalo's east and west sides, and the west side was fully developed earlier.
Several neighborhoods in Buffalo have had increased investment since the 1990s, beginning with the Elmwood Village. The 2002 redevelopment of the Larkin Terminal Warehouse led to the creation of Larkinville, home to several mixed-use projects and anchored by corporate offices. Downtown Buffalo and its central business district (CBD) had a 10.6-percent increase in residents from 2010 to 2017, as over 1,061 housing units became available; the Seneca One Tower was redeveloped in 2020. Other revitalized areas include Chandler Street, in the Grant-Amherst neighborhood, and Hertel Avenue in Parkside.
The Buffalo Common Council adopted its Green Code in 2017, replacing zoning regulations which were over sixty years old. Its emphasis on regulations promoting pedestrian safety and mixed land use received an award at the 2019 Congress for the New Urbanism conference.Climate
<!-- Duplicated by {Buffalo, New York weatherbox}} below. -->
Buffalo has a humid continental climate (Köppen: Dfa), and temperatures have been warming with the rest of the US. Lake-effect snow is characteristic of Buffalo winters, with snow bands (producing intense snowfall in the city and surrounding area) depending on wind direction off Lake Erie. However, Buffalo is rarely the snowiest city in the state. The Blizzard of 1977 resulted from a combination of high winds and snow which accumulated on land and on the frozen Lake Erie. Although snow does not typically impair the city's operation, it can cause significant damage in autumn (as the October 2006 storm did). In November 2014 (called "Snowvember"), the region had a record-breaking storm which produced over of snow. Buffalo's lowest recorded temperature was , which occurred twice: on February 9, 1934, and February 2, 1961. Rainfall is moderate, typically falling at night, and cooler lake temperatures hinder storm development in July. August is usually rainier and muggier, as the warmer lake loses its temperature-controlling ability.!! 2010!! 1990!! 1970
}}
Several hundred Seneca, Tuscarora and other Iroquois tribal peoples were the primary residents of the Buffalo area before 1800, concentrated along Buffalo Creek. After the Revolutionary War, settlers from New England and eastern New York began to move into the area.
From the 1830s to the 1850s, they were joined by Irish and German immigrants from Europe, both peasants and working class, who settled in enclaves on the city's south and east sides.
During the 1830s, Buffalo residents were generally intolerant of the small groups of Black Americans who began settling on the city's East Side. However, the effects of redlining, steering, social inequality, blockbusting, white flight
During the 1940s and 1950s, Puerto Rican migrants arrived en masse, also seeking industrial jobs, settling on the East Side and moving westward. In the 21st century, Buffalo is classified as a majority minority city, with a plurality of residents who are Black and Latino.
Buffalo has experienced effects of urban decay since the 1970s, and also saw population loss to the suburbs and Sun Belt states, and experienced job losses from deindustrialization. The city's population peaked at 580,132 in 1950, when Buffalo was the 15th-largest city in the United Statesdown from the eighth-largest city in 1900, after its growth rate slowed during the 1920s. Buffalo finally saw a population gain of 6.5% in the 2020 census, reversing a decades long trend of population decline. The city has 278,349 residents as of the 2020 census, making it the 76th-most populous city in the United States. During the early 2000s, most immigrants came from Canada and Yemen; this shifted in the 2010s to Burmese (Karen) refugees and Bangladeshi immigrants. A 2018 report noted that over fifty city blocks on Buffalo's East Side lacked adequate access to a supermarket. According to the Partnership for the Public Good, educational achievement in the city is lower than in the surrounding area; city residents are almost twice as likely as adults in the metropolitan area to lack a high-school diploma.
Religion
]]
During the early 19th century, Presbyterian missionaries tried to convert the Seneca people on the Buffalo Creek Reservation to Christianity. Initially resistant, some tribal members set aside their traditions and practices to form their own sect.
A Jewish community began developing in the city with immigrants from the mid-1800s; about one thousand German and Lithuanian Jews settled in Buffalo before 1880. Buffalo's first synagogue, Temple Beth El, was established in 1847. The city's Temple Beth Zion is the region's largest synagogue.
With changing demographics and an increased number of refugees from other areas on the city's East Side, Islam and Buddhism have expanded their presence. In this area, new residents have converted empty churches into mosques and Buddhist temples. Hinduism maintains a small, active presence in the area, including the town of Amherst.
A 2016 American Bible Society survey reported that Buffalo is the fifth-least "Bible-minded" city in the United States; 13 percent of its residents associate with the Bible.Economy
{|class"wikitable" style"float:left; font-size:90%; text-align:center; margin:1em;"
|+Top private-sector Buffalo area employers, 2020<br /><small>Source: Invest Buffalo Niagara</small>
|-
!Rank !! Employer !! Employees
|-
| 1||Kaleida Health||8,359
|-
| 2||Catholic Health||7,623
|-
| 3||M&T Bank||7,400
|-
| 4||Tops Friendly Markets||5,374
|-
| 5||Seneca Gaming Corp.||3,402
|-
| 6||Roswell Park Cancer Institute||3,328
|-
| 7||GEICO||3,250
|-
| 8||Wegmans||3,102
|-
| 9||HSBC Bank USA||3,000
|-
| 10||General Motors||2,981
|}
<!-- , the headquarters of M&T Bank.]] -->
The Erie Canal was the impetus for Buffalo's economic growth as a transshipment hub for grain and other agricultural products headed east from the Midwest. Later, manufacturing of steel and automotive parts became central to the city's economy. Despite the loss of large-scale manufacturing, some manufacturing of metals, chemicals, machinery, food products, and electronics remains in the region. In 2019, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis valued the gross domestic product (GDP) of the Buffalo–Niagara Falls MSA at $53 billion (~$}} in ).
The civic sector is a major source of employment in the Buffalo area, and includes public, non-profit, healthcare and educational institutions. New York State, with over 19,000 employees, is the region's largest employer. In the private sector, top employers include the Kaleida Health and Catholic Health hospital networks and M&T Bank, the sole Fortune 500 company headquartered in the city. Most have been the top employers in the region for several decades. Buffalo is home to the headquarters of Rich Products, Delaware North and New Era Cap Company; the aerospace manufacturer Moog Inc. and toy maker Fisher-Price are based in nearby East Aurora. National Fuel Gas and Life Storage are headquartered in Williamsville, New York.
Buffalo weathered the Great Recession of 2006–09 well in comparison with other U.S. cities, exemplified by increased home prices during this time. The region's economy began to improve in the early 2010s, adding over 25,000 jobs from 2009 to 2017. The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, however, increased the local unemployment rate to 7.5 percent by December 2020. The local unemployment rate had been 4.2 percent in 2019, higher than the national average of 3.5 percent.
Culture
Performing arts and music
]]
Buffalo is home to over 20 theater companies, with many centered in the downtown Theatre District. Shea's Performing Arts Center is the city's largest theater. Designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany and built in 1926, the theater presents Broadway musicals and concerts. Shakespeare in Delaware Park has been held outdoors every summer since 1976.
Stand-up comedy can be found throughout the city and is anchored by Helium Comedy Club, which hosts both local talent and national touring acts.
The Nickel City Opera (also known as NC Opera Buffalo and NCO) is an opera company based in Buffalo. It was founded in 2004 by Valerian Ruminski. and operated between 2009 and 2024. The Nickel City Opera|NCO has collaborated with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, has commissioned an opera and staged operatic works. Matthias Manasi was music director of Nickel City Opera from 2017 to 2021, his predecessor Michael Ching was music director of NCO from 2012 to 2017.
Shea's Performing Arts Center was designed by the well-known Chicago firm Rapp and Rapp. The opera house was modeled in the style of European operahouses and decorated in a combination of French and Spanish Baroque and Rococo styles. The interior design was designed by the designer and artist Louis Comfort Tiffany, and many of its elements are still there today. Originally there were nearly 4,000 seats, but in the 1930s the number of seats was reduced to the current number of 3,019 seats last but not least to increase the place for the orchestra by increasing the size of the orchestra pit.
]]
The Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra was formed in 1935 and performs at Kleinhans Music Hall, whose acoustics have been praised. Although the orchestra nearly disbanded during the late 1990s due to a lack of funding, philanthropic contributions and state aid stabilized it. Under the direction of JoAnn Falletta, the orchestra has received a number of Grammy Award nominations and won the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition in 2009.
KeyBank Center draws national music acts year-round. Sahlen Field hosts the annual WYRK Taste of Country music festival every summer with national country music acts. Canalside regularly hosts outdoor summer concerts, a tradition that spun off from the defunct Thursday at the Square concert series.
Rick James was born and raised in Buffalo and later lived on a ranch in the nearby Town of Aurora. James formed his Stone City Band in Buffalo, and had national appeal with several crossover singles in the R&B, disco and funk genres in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Around the same time, the jazz fusion band Spyro Gyra and jazz saxophonist Grover Washington Jr. also got their start in the city.
The Goo Goo Dolls, an alternative rock group which formed in 1986, had 19 top-ten singles.<!-- and received RIAA Platinum certification for their live concert album, recorded in front on 60,000 fans in Niagara Square during a torrential downpour. --> Singer-songwriter and activist Ani DiFranco has released over 20 folk and indie rock albums on Righteous Babe Records, her Buffalo-based label.
Underground hip-hop acts in the city partner with Buffalo-based Griselda Records, whose artists include Westside Gunn, Conway the Machine, and Benny the Butcher, who all occasionally refer to Buffalo culture in their lyrics. Cuisine
and blue cheese]]
The city's cuisine encompasses a variety of cultures and ethnicities. In 2015, the National Geographic Society ranked Buffalo third on its "World's Top Ten Food Cities" list. Teressa Bellissimo first prepared Buffalo wings (seasoned chicken wings) at the Anchor Bar in 1964. The Anchor Bar has a crosstown rivalry with Duff's Famous Wings, but Buffalo wings are served at many bars and restaurants throughout the city (some with unique cooking styles and flavor profiles). Buffalo wings are traditionally served with blue cheese dressing and celery.
The Buffalo area has over 600 pizzerias, estimated at more per capita than New York City. Several craft breweries began opening in the 1990s, and the city's last call is 4 am. Other mainstays of Buffalo cuisine include beef on weck, butter lambs, kielbasa, pierogi, sponge candy, chicken finger subs (including the stinger - a version that also includes steak), and the fish fry (popular any time of year, but especially during Lent). With an influx of refugees and other immigrants to Buffalo, its number of ethnic restaurants (including the West Side Bazaar kitchen incubator) has increased. Some restaurants use food trucks to serve customers, and nearly fifty food trucks appeared at Larkin Square in 2019. The Albright–Knox Art Gallery is a modern and contemporary art museum with a collection of more than 8,000 works, of which only two percent are on display. With a donation from Jeffrey Gundlach, a three-story addition designed by the Dutch architectural firm OMA opened June 2023 . Across the street, the Burchfield Penney Art Center contains paintings by Charles E. Burchfield and is operated by Buffalo State College. Buffalo is home to the Freedom Wall, a 2017 art installation commemorating civil-rights activists throughout history. Near both museums is the Buffalo History Museum, featuring artwork, literature and exhibits related to the city's history and major events, and the Buffalo Museum of Science is on the city's East Side.
Canalside, Buffalo's historic business district and harbor, attracts more than 1.5 million visitors annually. It includes the Explore & More Children's Museum, the Buffalo and Erie County Naval & Military Park, LECOM Harborcenter, and a number of shops and restaurants. A restored 1924 carousel (now solar-powered) and a replica boathouse were added to Canalside in 2021. Other city attractions include the Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site, the Michigan Street Baptist Church, Buffalo RiverWorks, Seneca Buffalo Creek Casino, Buffalo Transportation Pierce-Arrow Museum, and the Nash House Museum.
The National Buffalo Wing Festival is held every Labor Day at Sahlen Field. Since 2002, it has served over 4.8 million Buffalo wings and has had a total attendance of 865,000. The Taste of Buffalo is a two-day food festival held in July at Niagara Square, attracting 450,000 visitors annually. Other events include the Allentown Art Festival, the Polish-American Dyngus Day, the Elmwood Avenue Festival of the Arts, Juneteenth in Martin Luther King Jr. Park, the World's Largest Disco in October and Friendship Festival in summer, which celebrates Canada-US relations. The Sabres, an expansion team in 1970, share KeyBank Center with the Buffalo Bandits of the National Lacrosse League. The Bandits are the most decorated of the city's professional teams, with six championships. The Bills, Sabres and Bandits are owned by Pegula Sports and Entertainment.
Several colleges and universities in the area field intercollegiate sports teams; the Buffalo Bulls and the Canisius Golden Griffins compete in NCAA Division I. The Bulls have 16 varsity sports in the Mid-American Conference (MAC); the Golden Griffins field 15 teams in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC), with the men's hockey team part of the Atlantic Hockey Association (AHA). The Bulls participate in the Football Bowl Subdivision, the highest level of college football. Buffalo's minor-league teams include the Buffalo Bisons (Triple-A baseball), who play at Sahlen Field, and the Buffalo eXtreme (American Basketball Association), who play at XGen Elite Sports Complex in West Seneca.
Parks and recreation
]]
Frederick Law Olmsted described Buffalo as being "the best planned city [...] in the United States, if not the world". With encouragement from city stakeholders, he and Calvert Vaux augmented the city's grid plan by drawing inspiration from Paris and introducing landscape architecture with aspects of the countryside. Olmsted's work in Buffalo inspired similar efforts in cities such as San Francisco, Chicago, and Boston.
<!-- Delaware Park landscape view -->
The city's Division of Parks and Recreation manages over 180 parks and facilities, seven recreational centers, twenty-one pools and splash pads, and three ice rinks. The Delaware Park features the Buffalo Zoo, Hoyt Lake, a golf course, and playing fields. Buffalo collaborated with its sister city Kanazawa to create the park's Japanese Garden in 1970, where cherry blossoms bloom in the spring. Opening in 1976, Tifft Nature Preserve in South Buffalo is on of remediated industrial land. The preserve is an Important Bird Area, including a meadow with trails for hiking and cross-country skiing, marshland and fishing. The Olmsted-designed Cazenovia and South Parks, the latter home to the Buffalo and Erie County Botanical Gardens, are also in South Buffalo. According to the Trust for Public Land, Buffalo's 2022 ParkScore ranking had high marks for access to parks, with 89 percent of city residents living within a ten-minute walk from a park. The city ranked lower in acreage, however; nine percent of city land is devoted to parks, compared with the national median of about fifteen percent.
's Central Wharf]]
Efforts to convert Buffalo's former industrial waterfront into recreational space have attracted national attention, with some writers comparing its appeal to that of Niagara Falls. Redevelopment of the waterfront began in the early 2000s, with the reconstruction of historically aligned canals on the site of the former Buffalo Memorial Auditorium. Placemaking initiatives would lead to the area's popularity, rather than permanent buildings and attractions. Under Mayor Byron Brown, Canalside was cited by the Brookings Institution as an example of waterfront revitalization for other U.S. cities to follow. Summer events have included paddle-boating and fitness classes, and the frozen canals permit ice skating, curling, and ice cycling in winter. The park's Gallagher Beach, the city's only public beach, has prohibited swimming due to high bacteria levels and other environmental concerns.
The Shoreline Trail passes through Buffalo near the Outer Harbor, Centennial Park, and the Black Rock Canal. The North Buffalo–Tonawanda rail trail begins in Shoshone Park, near the LaSalle metro station in North Buffalo.Government
Chamber, Buffalo City Hall]]
Buffalo has a Strong mayor–council government. As the chief executive of city government, the mayor oversees the heads of the city's departments, participates in ceremonies, boards and commissions, and is as the liaison between the city and local cultural institutions. Some agencies, including utilities, urban renewal and public housing, are state- and federally-funded public benefit-corporations semi-independent of city government. Christopher Scanlon has served as acting mayor since 2024, following the resignation of Byron Brown. No Republican has been mayor of Buffalo since Chester A. Kowal in 1965.
With its nine districts, the Buffalo Common Council enacts laws, levies taxes, and approves mayoral appointees and the city budget. Bryan Bollman has been the Common Council president since 2024. Generally reflecting the city's electorate, all nine councilmen are members of the Democratic Party. Buffalo is the Erie County seat, and is within five of the county's eleven legislative districts.
The city is part of the Eighth Judicial District. Court cases handled at the city level include misdemeanors, violations, housing matters, and claims under $15,000; more severe cases are handled at the county level. Buffalo is represented by members of the New York State Assembly and New York State Senate. At the federal level, the city takes up most of and has been represented by Democrat Tim Kennedy since 2024.
Federal offices in the city include the Buffalo District of the United States Army Corps of Engineers' Great Lakes and Ohio River Division, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the United States District Court for the Western District of New York.
In 2020, the city spent $519 million (~$}} in ) on the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. The city in 2024 is hampered with a severe budget deficit attributed to the Byron Brown administration.
<span class"anchor" id"Public safety and crime"></span>Public safety
|homicide = 47
|forcible_rape = 121
|robbery = 802
|burglary = 1,609
|larceny_theft = 6,008
|motor_vehicle_theft = 678
|property_crime = 8,295
|source_name = Buffalo City Police Department
|notes = Arson data not provided; 2019 est. population: 255,244
}}
Buffalo is served by the Buffalo Police Department. The police commissioner is Byron Lockwood, who was appointed by Mayor Byron Brown in 2018. Although some criminal activity in the city remains higher than the national average, total crimes have decreased since the 1990s; one reason may be the gun buyback program implemented by the Brown administration in the mid-2000s. In 2018, city police began wearing 300 body cameras. A 2021 Partnership for the Public Good report noted that the BPD, which had a 2020–21 budget of about $145.7 million, had an above-average police-to-citizen ratio of 28.9 officers per 10,000 residents in 2020higher than peer cities Minneapolis and Toledo, Ohio. The force had a roster of 740 officers during the year, about two-thirds of whom handled emergency requests, road patrol and other non-office assignments. and a 2020 protest-shoving incident.
The Buffalo Fire Department and American Medical Response (AMR) handle fire-protection and emergency medical services (EMS) calls in the city. The fire department has about 710 firefighters and thirty-five stations, including twenty-three engine companies and twelve ladder companies. The department also operates the Edward M. Cotter, considered the world's oldest active fireboat.
With vacant and abandoned homes prone to arson, squatting, prostitution and other criminal activities, the fire and police department's resources were overburdened before the 2010s. Buffalo ranked second nationwide to St. Louis for vacant homes per capita in 2007, and the city began a five-year program to demolish five thousand vacant, damaged and abandoned homes. On May 14, 2022, there was a mass shooting in a Tops supermarket on the East Side of Buffalo where 13 victims were shot in a racially motivated attack by a white supremacist who was not a Buffalo native. Ten victims, all of whom were black, were murdered and three were injured.
Media
'' headquarters]]
Buffalo's major daily newspaper is The Buffalo News. Established in 1880 as the Buffalo Evening News, the newspaper is estimated to have a daily circulation of 35,000 (down from a high of 310,000). The newspaper announced a pending sale of its building in February 2023, and the relocation of its printing operations to Cleveland, Ohio. Other newspapers in the Buffalo area include the Black-focused Buffalo Criterion and Challenger Community News, The Record of Buffalo State University, The Spectrum of the University at Buffalo, and Buffalo Business First. Investigative Post is an online watchdog news organization founded by former Buffalo News reporter and Pulitzer nominee Jim Heaney.
Eighteen radio stations are licensed in Buffalo, including an FM station at Buffalo State College. Over ninety FM and AM radio signals can be received throughout the city. Eight full-power television outlets serve the city. Major commercial stations include WGRZ 2 (NBC), WIVB-TV 4 (CBS) and its sister station WNLO 23 (CW O&O), WKBW-TV 7 (ABC), and WUTV 29 (Fox, received in parts of Southern Ontario) and its sister station WNYO-TV 49 (MyNetworkTV). Buffalo's public television station is WNED-TV 17 (PBS); WNED has reported that most of the station's members live in the Greater Toronto Area. According to Nielsen Media Research, the Buffalo television market was the 51st largest in the United States .
Movies shooting significant footage in Buffalo include Hide in Plain Sight (1980), Tuck Everlasting (1981), The Savages (2007), Marshall (2016), The First Purge (2018), The True Adventures of Wolfboy (2019) and A Quiet Place Part II (2021). Although higher Buffalo production costs led to some films being finished elsewhere, tax credits and other economic incentives have enabled new film studios and production facilities to open. In 2021, several studio projects were in the planning stages.Education Primary and secondary education
]]
The Buffalo Public Schools have about thirty-four thousand students enrolled in their primary and secondary schools. The district administers about sixty public schools, including thirty-six primary schools, five middle high schools, fourteen high schools and three alternative schools, with a total of about 3,500 teachers. Its board of education, authorized by the state, has nine elected members who select the superintendent and oversee the budget, curriculum, personnel, and facilities. In 2020, the graduation rate was seventy-six percent. The public City Honors School was ranked the top high school in the city and 178th nationwide by U.S. News & World Report in 2021. There are twenty charter schools in Buffalo, with some oversight by the district. The city has over a dozen private schools, including Bishop Timon – St. Jude High School, Canisius High School, Mount Mercy Academy, and Nardin Academy—all Roman Catholic, and Darul Uloom Al-Madania and Universal School of Buffalo (both Islamic schools); nonsectarian options include Buffalo Seminary and the Nichols School.
Colleges and universities
]]
Founded by Millard Fillmore, the University at Buffalo (UB) is one of the State University of New York's two flagship universities and the state's largest public university. A Research I university, over 32,000 undergraduate, graduate and professional students attend its thirteen schools and colleges. Two of UB's three campuses (the South and Downtown Campuses) are in the city, but most university functions take place at the large North Campus in Amherst. In 2020, U.S. News & World Report ranked UB the 34th-best public university and 88th in national universities. Buffalo State College, founded as a normal school, is one of SUNY's thirteen comprehensive colleges. The city's four-year private institutions include Canisius University, D'Youville University, Trocaire College, and Villa Maria College. SUNY Erie, the county's two-year public higher-education institution, and the for-profit Bryant & Stratton College have small downtown campuses.
Libraries
Established in 1835, Buffalo's main library is the Central Library of the Buffalo & Erie County Public Library system. Rebuilt in 1964, it contains an auditorium, the original manuscript of the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (donated by Mark Twain), and a collection of about two million books. Its Grosvenor Room maintains a special-collections listing of nearly five hundred thousand resources for researchers. A pocket park funded by Southwest Airlines opened in 2020, and brought landscaping improvements and seating to Lafayette Square. The system's free library cards are valid at the city's eight branch libraries and at member libraries throughout Erie County.InfrastructureHealthcare
]]
Nine hospitals are operated in the city: Oishei Children's Hospital and Buffalo General Medical Center by Kaleida Health, Mercy Hospital and Sisters of Charity Hospital (Catholic Health), Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, the county-run Erie County Medical Center (ECMC), Buffalo VA Medical Center, BryLin (Psychiatric) Hospital and the state-operated Buffalo Psychiatric Center. John R. Oishei Children's Hospital, built in 2017, is adjacent to Buffalo General Medical Center on the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus north of downtown; its Gates Vascular Institute specializes in acute stroke recovery. The medical campus includes the University at Buffalo Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, the Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute and Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, ranked the 14th-best cancer-treatment center in the United States by U.S. News & World Report.
Transportation
electric bus in Elmwood Village]]
Growth and changing transportation needs altered Buffalo's grid plan, which was developed by Joseph Ellicott in 1804. His plan laid out streets like the spokes of a wheel, naming them after Dutch landowners and Native American tribes. City streets expanded outward, denser in the west and spreading out east of Main Street. Buffalo is a port of entry with Canada; the Peace Bridge crosses the Niagara River and links the Niagara Thruway (I-190) and Queen Elizabeth Way. I-190, NY 5 and NY 33 are the primary expressways serving the city, carrying a total of over 245,000 vehicles daily. NY 5 carries traffic to the Southtowns, and NY 33 carries traffic to the eastern suburbs and the Buffalo Airport. The east-west Scajacquada Expressway (NY 198) bisects Delaware Park, connecting I-190 with the Kensington Expressway (NY 33) on the city's East Side to form a partial beltway around the city center. The Scajacquada and Kensington Expressways and the Buffalo Skyway (NY 5) have been targeted for redesign or removal. Other major highways include US 62 on the city's East Side; NY 354 and a portion of NY 130, both east–west routes; and NY 265, NY 266 and NY 384, all north–south routes on the city's West Side. Buffalo has a higher-than-average percentage of households without a car: 30 percent in 2015, decreasing to 28.2 percent in 2016; the 2016 national average was 8.7 percent. Buffalo averaged 1.03 cars per household in 2016, compared to the national average of 1.8.
]]
The Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority (NFTA) operates the region's public transit, including its airport, light-rail system, buses, and harbors. The NFTA operates 323 buses on 61 lines throughout Western New York. Buffalo Metro Rail is a line which runs from Canalside to the University Heights district. The line's downtown section, south of the Fountain Plaza station, runs at grade and is free of charge. The Buffalo area ranks twenty-third nationwide in transit ridership, with thirty trips per capita per year. Expansions have been proposed since Buffalo Metro Rail's inception in the 1980s, with the latest plan (in the late 2010s) reaching the town of Amherst. Buffalo Niagara International Airport in Cheektowaga has daily scheduled flights by domestic, charter and regional carriers. The airport handled nearly five million passengers in 2019. It received a J.D. Power award in 2018 for customer satisfaction at a mid-sized airport, and underwent a $50 million expansion in 2020–21. The airport, light rail, small-boat harbor and buses are monitored by the NFTA's transit police.
]]
Buffalo has an Amtrak intercity train station, Buffalo–Exchange Street station, which was rebuilt in 2020. The city's eastern suburbs are served by Amtrak's Buffalo–Depew station in Depew, which was built in 1979. Buffalo was a major stop on through routes between Chicago and New York City through the lower Ontario Peninsula; trains stopped at Buffalo Central Terminal, which operated from 1929 to 1979. Intercity buses depart and arrive from the NFTA's Metropolitan Transportation Center on Ellicott Street.
Since Buffalo adopted a complete streets policy in 2008, efforts have been made to accommodate cyclists and pedestrians into new infrastructure projects. Improved corridors have bike lanes, and Niagara Street received separate bike lanes in 2020. Walk Score gave Buffalo a "somewhat walkable" rating of 68 out of 100, with Allentown and downtown considered more walkable than other areas of the city.
Utilities
]]
Buffalo's water system is operated by Veolia Water, and water treatment begins at the Colonel Francis G. Ward Pumping Station. When it opened in 1915, the station's capacity was second only to Paris. Wastewater is treated by the Buffalo Sewer Authority, its coverage extending to the eastern suburbs. National Grid and New York State Electric & Gas (NYSEG) provide electricity, and National Fuel Gas provides natural gas. The city's primary telecommunications provider is Spectrum;
The city's Department of Public Works manages Buffalo's snow and trash removal and street cleaning. Snow removal generally operates from November 15 to April 1. A snow emergency is declared by the National Weather Service after a snowstorm, and the city's roads, major sidewalks and bridges are cleared by over seventy snowplows within 24 hours. Rock salt is the principal agent for preventing snow accumulation and melting ice. Snow removal may coincide with driving bans and parking restrictions. The area along the Outer Harbor is the most dangerous driving area during a snowstorm;
To prevent ice jams which may impact hydroelectric plants in Niagara Falls, the New York Power Authority and Ontario Power Generation began installing an ice boom annually in 1964. The boom's installation date is temperature-dependent, and it is removed on April 1 unless there is more than of ice remaining on eastern Lake Erie. It stretches from the outer breakwall at the Buffalo Outer Harbor to the Canadian shore near Fort Erie. Originally made of wood, the boom now consists of steel pontoons.
<span class"anchor" id"Notable people"></span>Notable residents
Sister cities
Buffalo has eighteen sister cities:
* Aboadze, Ghana
* Baní, Dominican Republic
* Bursa, Turkey
* Cape Coast, Ghana (1976)
* Changzhou, China (2011)
* Dortmund, Germany (1972)
* Drohobych, Ukraine (2000)
* Horlivka, Ukraine (2007)
* Kanazawa, Japan (1962)
* Kiryat Gat, Israel (1977)
* Lille, France (1989)
* Rzeszów, Poland (1975)
* Saint Ann, Jamaica (2007)
* Siena, Italy (1961)
* Torremaggiore, Italy (2004)
* Wolverhampton, United Kingdom
* Yıldırım, Turkey (2010) <!--not with whole Bursa-->
See also
* Architecture of Buffalo, New York
* Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo
* Buffalo crime family
* Buffalo wing
* History of Buffalo, New York
* Index of New York (state)–related articles
* Inland Northern American English
* List of City of Buffalo landmarks and historic districts
* List of mayors of Buffalo, New York
* List of people from Buffalo, New York
* List of routes of City of Buffalo streetcars
* National Register of Historic Places listings in Buffalo, New York
* Sports in Buffalo
* Politics and government of Buffalo, New York
* Timeline of Buffalo, New York
* USS Buffalo, 4 ships
Explanatory notes
References
Further reading
* Holli, Melvin G., and Jones, Peter d'A., eds. Biographical Dictionary of American Mayors, 1820-1980 (Greenwood Press, 1981) short scholarly biographies each of the city's mayors 1820 to 1980. [https://archive.org/details/biographicaldict0000unse_r8s1 online]; see index at pp. 406–411 for list.
*
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External links
*
* NYPL Digital Gallery, [http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/dgkeysearchresult.cfm?wordBuffalo%20%28N%2EY%2E%29&s3¬word&f2 Media related to Buffalo]
* Library of Congress, Prints & Photos Division: [https://www.loc.gov/pictures/search/?q=buffalo%20new%20york Historical images related to Buffalo]
* [https://video.wned.org/show/wned-tv-documentaries/specials/ WNED Documentaries and Specials]: Historical and cultural programming related to Buffalo from Buffalo–Toronto Public Media
*
* [https://www.zipdatamaps.com/en/us/zip-maps/ny/city/borders/buffalo-zip-code-map Buffalo NY ZIP Code Map]
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Category:1801 establishments in New York (state)
Category:Cities in Erie County, New York
Category:Cities in New York (state)
Category:County seats in New York (state)
Category:Erie Canal
Category:Inland port cities and towns of the United States
Category:New York State Heritage Areas
Category:Populated places established in 1801
Category:New York (state) populated places on Lake Erie
Category:Western New York | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo,_New_York | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.469479 |
3986 | Benjamin Franklin | | image = Joseph Siffrein Duplessis - Benjamin Franklin - Google Art Project.jpg
| caption = Portrait by Joseph Duplessis, 1785
| office = 6th President of Pennsylvania
| vicepresident =
| term_start = October 18, 1785
| term_end = November 5, 1788
| predecessor = John Dickinson
| successor = Thomas Mifflin
| office1 = United States Minister to Sweden
| appointer1 = Congress of the Confederation
| term_start1 = September 28, 1782
| term_end1 = April 3, 1783
| predecessor1 = Position established
| successor1 = Jonathan Russell
| office2 = United States Minister to France
| appointer2 = Continental Congress
| term_start2 = March 23, 1779
| term_end2 = May 17, 1785
| predecessor2 = Position established
| successor2 = Thomas Jefferson
| order3 = 1st
| office3 = United States Postmaster General
| term_start3 = July 26, 1775
| term_end3 = November 7, 1776
| predecessor3 = Position established
| successor3 = Richard Bache
| office4 = Delegate from Pennsylvania to the Second Continental Congress
| term_start4 = May 1775
| term_end4 = October 1776
| office5 = Postmaster General of British America
| term_start5 = August 10, 1753
| term_end5 = January 31, 1774
| predecessor5 = Position established
| successor5 = Vacant
| office6 = Speaker of the Pennsylvania Assembly
| term_start6 = May 1764
| term_end6 = October 1764
| predecessor6 = Isaac Norris
| successor6 = Isaac Norris
| order7 = 1st
| office7 = President of the University of Pennsylvania
| term_start7 = 1749
| term_end7 = 1754
| successor7 = William Smith
| predecessor7 | birth_date
| birth_place = Boston, Massachusetts Bay, English America
| death_date =
| death_place = Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
| resting_place = Christ Church Burial Ground, Philadelphia
| party = Independent
| spouse
| children =
| parents =
| signature = Benjamin Franklin Signature.svg
| education = Boston Latin School
}}
Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and political philosopher. Among the most influential intellectuals of his time, Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States; a drafter and signer of the Declaration of Independence; and the first postmaster general.
Born in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, Franklin became a successful newspaper editor and printer in Philadelphia, the leading city in the colonies, publishing The Pennsylvania Gazette at age 23. He became wealthy publishing this and ''Poor Richard's Almanack, which he wrote under the pseudonym "Richard Saunders". After 1767, he was associated with the Pennsylvania Chronicle'', a newspaper known for its revolutionary sentiments and criticisms of the policies of the British Parliament and the Crown. He pioneered and was the first president of the Academy and College of Philadelphia, which opened in 1751 and later became the University of Pennsylvania. He organized and was the first secretary of the American Philosophical Society and was elected its president in 1769. He was appointed deputy postmaster-general for the British colonies in 1753, which enabled him to set up the first national communications network.
Franklin was active in community affairs and colonial and state politics, as well as national and international affairs. He became a hero in America when, as an agent in London for several colonies, he spearheaded the repeal of the unpopular Stamp Act by the British Parliament. An accomplished diplomat, he was widely admired as the first U.S. ambassador to France and was a major figure in the development of positive FrancoAmerican relations. His efforts proved vital in securing French aid for the American Revolution. From 1785 to 1788, he served as President of Pennsylvania. At some points in his life, he owned slaves and ran "for sale" ads for slaves in his newspaper, but by the late 1750s, he began arguing against slavery, became an active abolitionist, and promoted the education and integration of African Americans into U.S. society.
As a scientist, Franklin's studies of electricity made him a major figure in the American Enlightenment and the history of physics. He also charted and named the Gulf Stream current. His numerous important inventions include the lightning rod, bifocals, glass harmonica and the Franklin stove. He founded many civic organizations, including the Library Company, Philadelphia's first fire department, and the University of Pennsylvania.
Franklin earned the title of "The First American" for his early and indefatigable campaigning for colonial unity. He was the only person to sign the Declaration of Independence, Treaty of Paris, peace with Britain and the Constitution. Foundational in defining the American ethos, Franklin has been called "the most accomplished American of his age and the most influential in inventing the type of society America would become".
Franklin's life and legacy of scientific and political achievement, and his status as one of America's most influential Founding Fathers, have seen him honored for more than two centuries after his death on the $100 bill and in the names of warships, many towns and counties, educational institutions and corporations, as well as in numerous cultural references and a portrait in the Oval Office. His more than 30,000 letters and documents have been collected in The Papers of Benjamin Franklin. Anne Robert Jacques Turgot said of him: "Eripuit fulmen cœlo, mox sceptra tyrannis" ("He snatched lightning from the sky and the scepter from tyrants").AncestryBenjamin Franklin's father, Josiah Franklin, was a tallow chandler, soaper, and candlemaker. Josiah Franklin was born at Ecton, Northamptonshire, England, on December 23, 1657, the son of Thomas Franklin, a blacksmith and farmer, and his wife, Jane White. Benjamin's father and all four of his grandparents were born in England.
Josiah Franklin had a total of seventeen children with his two wives. He married his first wife, Anne Child, in about 1677 in Ecton and emigrated with her to Boston in 1683; they had three children before emigration and four after. Following her death, Josiah married Abiah Folger on July 9, 1689, in the Old South Meeting House by Reverend Samuel Willard, and had ten children with her. Benjamin, their eighth child, was Josiah Franklin's fifteenth child overall, and his tenth and final son.
Benjamin Franklin's mother, Abiah, was born in Nantucket, Massachusetts Bay Colony, on August 15, 1667, to Peter Folger, a miller and schoolteacher, and his wife, Mary Morrell Folger, a former indentured servant. Mary Folger came from a Puritan family that was among the first Pilgrims to flee to Massachusetts for religious freedom, sailing for Boston in 1635 after King Charles I of England had begun persecuting Puritans. Her father Peter was "the sort of rebel destined to transform colonial America." As clerk of the court, he was arrested on February 10, 1676, and jailed on February 19 for his inability to pay bail. He spent over a year and a half in jail.
Early life and education
Boston
Franklin was born on Milk Street in Boston, Province of Massachusetts Bay on January 17, 1706, and baptized at the Old South Meeting House in Boston. As a child growing up along the Charles River, Franklin recalled that he was "generally the leader among the boys."
Franklin's father wanted him to attend school with the clergy but only had enough money to send him to school for two years. He attended Boston Latin School but did not graduate; he continued his education through voracious reading. Although "his parents talked of the church as a career" for Franklin, his schooling ended when he was ten. He worked for his father for a time, and at 12 he became an apprentice to his brother James, a printer, who taught him the printing trade. When Benjamin was 15, James founded The New-England Courant, which was the third newspaper founded in Boston.
When denied the chance to write a letter to the paper for publication, Franklin adopted the pseudonym of "Silence Dogood," a middle-aged widow. Mrs. Dogood's letters were published and became a subject of conversation around town. Neither James nor the Courant readers were aware of the ruse, and James was unhappy with Benjamin when he discovered the popular correspondent was his younger brother. Franklin was an advocate of free speech from an early age. When his brother was jailed for three weeks in 1722 for publishing material unflattering to the governor, young Franklin took over the newspaper and had Mrs. Dogood proclaim, quoting ''Cato's Letters'', "Without freedom of thought there can be no such thing as wisdom and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech." Franklin left his apprenticeship without his brother's permission, and in so doing became a fugitive.
Moves to Philadelphia and London
At age 17, Franklin ran away to Philadelphia, seeking a new start in a new city. When he first arrived, he worked in several printing shops there, but he was not satisfied by the immediate prospects in any of these jobs. After a few months, while working in one printing house, Pennsylvania governor Sir William Keith convinced him to go to London, ostensibly to acquire the equipment necessary for establishing another newspaper in Philadelphia. Discovering that Keith's promises of backing a newspaper were empty, he worked as a typesetter in a printer's shop in what is today the Lady Chapel of Church of St Bartholomew-the-Great in the Smithfield area of London, which had at that time been deconsecrated. He returned to Philadelphia in 1726 with the help of Thomas Denham, an English merchant who had emigrated but returned to England, and who employed Franklin as a clerk, shopkeeper, and bookkeeper in his business.Junto and libraryIn 1727, at age 21, Franklin formed the Junto, a group of "like minded aspiring artisans and tradesmen who hoped to improve themselves while they improved their community." The Junto was a discussion group for issues of the day; it subsequently gave rise to many organizations in Philadelphia. The Junto was modeled after English coffeehouses that Franklin knew well and which had become the center of the spread of Enlightenment ideas in Britain.
Reading was a great pastime of the Junto, but books were rare and expensive. The members created a library, initially assembled from their own books, after Franklin wrote:
This did not suffice, however. Franklin conceived the idea of a subscription library, which would pool the funds of the members to buy books for all to read. This was the birth of the Library Company of Philadelphia, whose charter he composed in 1731.
Newspaperman
in a painting published by the Detroit Publishing Company in ]]
Upon Denham's death, Franklin returned to his former trade. In 1728, he set up a printing house in partnership with Hugh Meredith; the following year he became the publisher of The Pennsylvania Gazette, a newspaper in Philadelphia. The Gazette gave Franklin a forum for agitation about a variety of local reforms and initiatives through printed essays and observations. Over time, his commentary, and his adroit cultivation of a positive image as an industrious and intellectual young man, earned him a great deal of social respect. But even after he achieved fame as a scientist and statesman, he habitually signed his letters with the unpretentious 'B. Franklin, Printer.' Franklin also printed Moravian religious books in German. He often visited Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, staying at the Moravian Sun Inn. In a 1751 pamphlet on demographic growth and its implications for the Thirteen Colonies, he called the Pennsylvania Germans "Palatine Boors" who could never acquire the "Complexion" of Anglo-American settlers and referred to "Blacks and Tawneys" as weakening the social structure of the colonies. Although he apparently reconsidered shortly thereafter, and the phrases were omitted from all later printings of the pamphlet, his views may have played a role in his political defeat in 1764.
According to Ralph Frasca, Franklin promoted the printing press as a device to instruct colonial Americans in moral virtue. Frasca argues he saw this as a service to God, because he understood moral virtue in terms of actions, thus, doing good provides a service to God. Despite his own moral lapses, Franklin saw himself as uniquely qualified to instruct Americans in morality. He tried to influence American moral life through the construction of a printing network based on a chain of partnerships from the Carolinas to New England. He thereby invented the first newspaper chain. It was more than a business venture, for like many publishers he believed that the press had a public-service duty.
When he established himself in Philadelphia, shortly before 1730, the town boasted two "wretched little" news sheets, Andrew Bradford's The American Weekly Mercury and Samuel Keimer's Universal Instructor in all Arts and Sciences, and Pennsylvania Gazette. This instruction in all arts and sciences consisted of weekly extracts from ''Chambers's Universal Dictionary. Franklin quickly did away with all of this when he took over the Instructor and made it The Pennsylvania Gazette. The Gazette'' soon became his characteristic organ, which he freely used for satire, for the play of his wit, even for sheer excess of mischief or of fun. From the first, he had a way of adapting his models to his own uses. The series of essays called "The Busy-Body," which he wrote for Bradford's American Mercury in 1729, followed the general Addisonian form, already modified to suit homelier conditions. The thrifty Patience, in her busy little shop, complaining of the useless visitors who waste her valuable time, is related to the women who address Mr. Spectator. The Busy-Body himself is a true Censor Morum, as Isaac Bickerstaff had been in the Tatler. And a number of the fictitious characters, Ridentius, Eugenius, Cato, and Cretico, represent traditional 18th-century classicism. Even this Franklin could use for contemporary satire, since Cretico, the "sowre Philosopher," is evidently a portrait of his rival, Samuel Keimer.
Franklin had mixed success in his plan to establish an inter-colonial network of newspapers that would produce a profit for him and disseminate virtue. Over the years he sponsored two dozen printers in Pennsylvania, South Carolina, New York, Connecticut, and even the Caribbean. By 1753, eight of the fifteen English language newspapers in the colonies were published by him or his partners. He began in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1731. After his second editor died, the widow, Elizabeth Timothy, took over and made it a success. She was one of the colonial era's first woman printers. For three decades Franklin maintained a close business relationship with her and her son Peter Timothy, who took over the South Carolina Gazette in 1746. The Gazette was impartial in political debates, while creating the opportunity for public debate, which encouraged others to challenge authority. Timothy avoided blandness and crude bias and, after 1765, increasingly took a patriotic stand in the growing crisis with Great Britain. Franklin's Connecticut Gazette (1755–68), however, proved unsuccessful. As the Revolution approached, political strife slowly tore his network apart.FreemasonryIn 1730 or 1731, Franklin was initiated into the local Masonic lodge. He became a grand master in 1734, indicating his rapid rise to prominence in Pennsylvania. The same year, he edited and published the first Masonic book in the Americas, a reprint of James Anderson's Constitutions of the Free-Masons. He was the secretary of St. John's Lodge in Philadelphia from 1735 to 1738.
Franklin remained a Freemason for the rest of his life.
Common-law marriage to Deborah Read
| image2 = Sarah Franklin Bache1793.jpg
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| alt2 | caption2 Sarah Franklin Bache (1743–1808), the daughter of Franklin and Deborah Read
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At age 17 in 1723, Franklin proposed to 15-year-old Deborah Read while a boarder in the Read home. At that time, Deborah's mother was wary of allowing her young daughter to marry Franklin, who was on his way to London at Governor Keith's request, and also because of his financial instability. Her own husband had recently died, and she declined Franklin's request to marry her daughter.
Franklin returned in 1726 and resumed his courtship of Deborah.}}
Deborah's fear of the sea meant that she never accompanied Franklin on any of his extended trips to Europe; another possible reason why they spent much time apart is that he may have blamed her for possibly preventing their son Francis from being inoculated against the disease that subsequently killed him. Deborah wrote to him in November 1769, saying she was ill due to "dissatisfied distress" from his prolonged absence, but he did not return until his business was done. Deborah Read Franklin died of a stroke on December 14, 1774, while Franklin was on an extended mission to Great Britain; he returned in 1775.William Franklin
(1730–1813), Franklin's son, whose mother was unknown, was born out of wedlock on February 22, 1730]]
In 1730, 24-year-old Franklin publicly acknowledged his illegitimate son William and raised him in his household. William was born on February 22, 1730, but his mother's identity is unknown. He was educated in Philadelphia and beginning at about age 30 studied law in London in the early 1760s. William himself fathered an illegitimate son, William Temple Franklin, born on the same day and month: February 22, 1760. The boy's mother was never identified, and he was placed in foster care. In 1762, the elder William Franklin married Elizabeth Downes, daughter of a planter from Barbados, in London. In 1763, he was appointed as the last royal governor of New Jersey.
A Loyalist to the king, William Franklin saw his relations with father Benjamin eventually break down over their differences about the American Revolutionary War, as Benjamin Franklin could never accept William's position. Deposed in 1776 by the revolutionary government of New Jersey, William was placed under house arrest at his home in Perth Amboy for six months. After the Declaration of Independence, he was formally taken into custody by order of the Provincial Congress of New Jersey, an entity which he refused to recognize, regarding it as an "illegal assembly." He was incarcerated in Connecticut for two years, in Wallingford and Middletown, and, after being caught surreptitiously engaging Americans into supporting the Loyalist cause, was held in solitary confinement at Litchfield for eight months. When finally released in a prisoner exchange in 1778, he moved to New York City, which was occupied by the British at the time.
While in New York City, he became leader of the Board of Associated Loyalists, a quasi-military organization chartered by King George III and headquartered in New York City. They initiated guerrilla forays into New Jersey, southern Connecticut, and New York counties north of the city. When British troops evacuated from New York, William Franklin left with them and sailed to England. He settled in London, never to return to North America. In the preliminary peace talks in 1782 with Britain, "... Benjamin Franklin insisted that loyalists who had borne arms against the United States would be excluded from this plea (that they be given a general pardon). He was undoubtedly thinking of William Franklin."
Success as an author
In 1732, Franklin began to publish the noted ''Poor Richard's Almanack'' (with content both original and borrowed) under the pseudonym Richard Saunders, on which much of his popular reputation is based. He frequently wrote under pseudonyms. The first issue published was for the upcoming year, 1733. He had developed a distinct, signature style that was plain, pragmatic and had a sly, soft but self-deprecating tone with declarative sentences. Although it was no secret that he was the author, his Richard Saunders character repeatedly denied it. "Poor Richard's Proverbs," adages from this almanac, such as "A penny saved is twopence dear" (often misquoted as "A penny saved is a penny earned") and "Fish and visitors stink in three days," remain common quotations in the modern world. Wisdom in folk society meant the ability to provide an apt adage for any occasion, and his readers became well prepared. He sold about ten thousand copies per year—it became an institution. In 1741, Franklin began publishing The General Magazine and Historical Chronicle for all the British Plantations in America. He used the heraldic badge of the Prince of Wales as the cover illustration.
Franklin wrote a letter, "Advice to a Friend on Choosing a Mistress," dated June 25, 1745, in which he gives advice to a young man about channeling sexual urges. Due to its licentious nature, it was not published in collections of his papers during the 19th century. Federal court rulings from the mid-to-late 20th century cited the document as a reason for overturning obscenity laws and against censorship.Public lifeEarly steps in Pennsylvaniawidely believed to be the earliest known painting of Franklin]]
'', a 1754 political cartoon by Franklin, urged the colonies to join the Seven Years' War in the French and Indian War; the cartoon was later resurrected, serving as an iconic symbol in support of the American Revolution.]]
in Philadelphia, one of the first hospitals in the United States, depicted in this 1755 engraving by William Strickland.]]
]]
]]
In 1736, Franklin created the Union Fire Company, one of the first volunteer firefighting companies in America. In the same year, he printed a new currency for New Jersey based on innovative anti-counterfeiting techniques he had devised. Throughout his career, he was an advocate for paper money, publishing A Modest Enquiry into the Nature and Necessity of a Paper Currency in 1729, and his printer printed money. He was influential in the more restrained and thus successful monetary experiments in the Middle Colonies, which stopped deflation without causing excessive inflation. In 1766, he made a case for paper money to the British House of Commons.
As he matured, Franklin began to concern himself more with public affairs. In 1743, he first devised a scheme for the Academy, Charity School, and College of Philadelphia; however, the person he had in mind to run the academy, Rev. Richard Peters, refused and Franklin put his ideas away until 1749 when he printed his own pamphlet, Proposals Relating to the Education of Youth in Pensilvania. He was appointed president of the Academy on November 13, 1749; the academy and the charity school opened in 1751.
In 1743, he founded the American Philosophical Society to help scientific men discuss their discoveries and theories. He began the electrical research that, along with other scientific inquiries, would occupy him for the rest of his life, in between bouts of politics and moneymaking.
In 1747, Franklin (already a very wealthy man) retired from printing and went into other businesses. He formed a partnership with his foreman, David Hall, which provided Franklin with half of the shop's profits for 18 years. This lucrative business arrangement provided leisure time for study, and in a few years he had made many new discoveries.
Franklin became involved in Philadelphia politics and rapidly progressed. In October 1748, he was selected as a councilman; in June 1749, he became a justice of the peace for Philadelphia; and in 1751, he was elected to the Pennsylvania Assembly. On August 10, 1753, he was appointed deputy postmaster-general of British North America. His service in domestic politics included reforming the postal system, with mail sent out every week. In 1752, Franklin organized the Philadelphia Contributionship, the Colonies' first homeowner's insurance company.
Between 1750 and 1753, the "educational triumvirate" of Franklin, Samuel Johnson of Stratford, Connecticut, and schoolteacher William Smith built on Franklin's initial scheme and created what Bishop James Madison, president of the College of William & Mary, called a "new-model" plan or style of American college. Franklin solicited, printed in 1752, and promoted an American textbook of moral philosophy by Samuel Johnson, titled Elementa Philosophica, to be taught in the new colleges. In June 1753, Johnson, Franklin, and Smith met in Stratford. They decided the new-model college would focus on the professions, with classes taught in English instead of Latin, have subject matter experts as professors instead of one tutor leading a class for four years, and there would be no religious test for admission. Johnson went on to found King's College (now Columbia University) in New York City in 1754, while Franklin hired Smith as provost of the College of Philadelphia, which opened in 1755. At its first commencement, on May 17, 1757, seven men graduated; six with a Bachelor of Arts and one with a Master of Arts. It was later merged with the University of the State of Pennsylvania to become the University of Pennsylvania. The college was to become influential in guiding the founding documents of the United States: in the Continental Congress, for example, over one-third of the college-affiliated men who contributed to the Declaration of Independence between September 4, 1774, and July 4, 1776, were affiliated with the college.
In 1754, he headed the Pennsylvania delegation to the Albany Congress. This meeting of several colonies had been requested by the Board of Trade in England to improve relations with the Indians and defense against the French. Franklin proposed a broad Plan of Union for the colonies. While the plan was not adopted, elements of it found their way into the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution.
In 1753, Harvard University and Yale awarded him honorary master of arts degrees. In 1756, he was awarded an honorary Master of Arts degree from the College of William & Mary. Later in 1756, Franklin organized the Pennsylvania Militia. He used Tun Tavern as a gathering place to recruit a regiment of soldiers to go into battle against the Native American uprisings that beset the American colonies. Postmaster
<!--The 'Franklin on U.S. postage' section links to this section/image file. -->
e stamp, issued in 1847 in honor of Franklin]]
the authority to travel as needed to investigate and inspect postal routes and protect the mail.]]
Well known as a printer and publisher, Franklin was appointed postmaster of Philadelphia in 1737, holding the office until 1753, when he and publisher William Hunter were named deputy postmasters–general of British North America, the first to hold the office. (Joint appointments were standard at the time, for political reasons.) He was responsible for the British colonies from Pennsylvania north and east, as far as the island of Newfoundland. A post office for local and outgoing mail had been established in Halifax, Nova Scotia, by local stationer Benjamin Leigh, on April 23, 1754, but service was irregular. Franklin opened the first post office to offer regular, monthly mail in Halifax on December 9, 1755. Meantime, Hunter became postal administrator in Williamsburg, Virginia, and oversaw areas south of Annapolis, Maryland. Franklin reorganized the service's accounting system and improved speed of delivery between Philadelphia, New York, and Boston. By 1761, efficiencies led to the first profits for the colonial post office.
When the lands of New France were ceded to the British under the Treaty of Paris in 1763, the British province of Quebec was created among them, and Franklin saw mail service expanded between Montreal, Trois-Rivières, Quebec City, and New York. For the greater part of his appointment, he lived in England (from 1757 to 1762, and again from 1764 to 1774)—about three-quarters of his term. Eventually, his sympathies for the rebel cause in the American Revolution led to his dismissal on January 31, 1774.
On July 26, 1775, the Second Continental Congress established the United States Post Office and named Franklin as the first United States postmaster general. He had been a postmaster for decades and was a natural choice for the position. He had just returned from England and was appointed chairman of a Committee of Investigation to establish a postal system. The report of the committee, providing for the appointment of a postmaster general for the 13 American colonies, was considered by the Continental Congress on July 25 and 26. On July 26, 1775, Franklin was appointed postmaster general, the first appointed under the Continental Congress. His apprentice, William Goddard, felt that his ideas were mostly responsible for shaping the postal system and that the appointment should have gone to him, but he graciously conceded it to Franklin, 36 years his senior. The newly established postal system became the United States Post Office, a system that continues to operate today.
Political work
in 1764]]
in later years, depicted in a portrait by David Martin that is now on display in the White House]]
In 1757, he was sent to England by the Pennsylvania Assembly as a colonial agent to protest against the political influence of the Penn family, the proprietors of the colony. He remained there for five years, striving to end the proprietors' prerogative to overturn legislation from the elected Assembly and their exemption from paying taxes on their land. His lack of influential allies in Whitehall led to the failure of this mission.
At this time, many members of the Pennsylvania Assembly were feuding with William Penn's heirs, who controlled the colony as proprietors. After his return to the colony, Franklin led the "anti-proprietary party" in the struggle against the Penn family and was elected Speaker of the Pennsylvania House in May 1764. His call for a change from proprietary to royal government was a rare political miscalculation, however: Pennsylvanians worried that such a move would endanger their political and religious freedoms. Because of these fears and because of political attacks on his character, Franklin lost his seat in the October 1764 Assembly elections. The anti-proprietary party dispatched him to England again to continue the struggle against the Penn family proprietorship. During this trip, events drastically changed the nature of his mission.
In London, Franklin opposed the 1765 Stamp Act. Unable to prevent its passage, he made another political miscalculation and recommended a friend to the post of stamp distributor for Pennsylvania. Pennsylvanians were outraged, believing that he had supported the measure all along, and threatened to destroy his home in Philadelphia. Franklin soon learned of the extent of colonial resistance to the Stamp Act, and he testified during the House of Commons proceedings that led to its repeal. With this, Franklin suddenly emerged as the leading spokesman for American interests in England. He wrote popular essays on behalf of the colonies. Georgia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts also appointed him as their agent to the Crown. During his stays there, he developed a close friendship with his landlady, Margaret Stevenson, and her circle of friends and relations, in particular, her daughter Mary, who was more often known as Polly. The house is now a museum known as the Benjamin Franklin House. Whilst in London, Franklin became involved in radical politics. He belonged to a gentlemen's club (which he called "the honest Whigs"), which held stated meetings, and included members such as Richard Price, the minister of Newington Green Unitarian Church who ignited the Revolution controversy, and Andrew Kippis.Scientific workIn 1756, Franklin had become a member of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures & Commerce (now the Royal Society of Arts), which had been founded in 1754. After his return to the United States in 1775, he became the Society's Corresponding Member, continuing a close connection. The Royal Society of Arts instituted a Benjamin Franklin Medal in 1956 to commemorate the 250th anniversary of his birth and the 200th anniversary of his membership of the RSA.
The study of natural philosophy (referred today as science in general) drew him into overlapping circles of acquaintance. Franklin was, for example, a corresponding member of the Lunar Society of Birmingham. In 1759, the University of St Andrews awarded him an honorary doctorate in recognition of his accomplishments. In October 1759, he was granted Freedom of the Borough of St Andrews. He was also awarded an honorary doctorate by Oxford University in 1762. Because of these honors, he was often addressed as " Franklin."
Return to London and Travels in Europe
From the mid-1750s to the mid-1770s, Franklin returned to England and spent much of his time in London., using the city as a base from which to travel. In 1771, he made short journeys through different parts of England, staying with Joseph Priestley at Leeds, Thomas Percival at Manchester and Erasmus Darwin at Lichfield. In Scotland, he spent five days with Lord Kames near Stirling and stayed for three weeks with David Hume in Edinburgh. In 1759, he visited Edinburgh with his son and later reported that he considered his six weeks in Scotland "six weeks of the densest happiness I have met with in any part of my life."
In Ireland, he stayed with Lord Hillsborough. Franklin noted of him that "all the plausible behaviour I have described is meant only, by patting and stroking the horse, to make him more patient, while the reins are drawn tighter, and the spurs set deeper into his sides." In Dublin, Franklin was invited to sit with the members of the Irish Parliament rather than in the gallery. He was the first American to receive this honor.
Franklin spent two months in German lands in 1766, but his connections to the country stretched across a lifetime. He declared a debt of gratitude to German scientist Otto von Guericke for his early studies of electricity. Franklin also co-authored the first treaty of friendship between Prussia and America in 1785. In September 1767, he visited Paris with his usual traveling partner, Sir John Pringle, 1st Baronet. News of his electrical discoveries was widespread in France. His reputation meant that he was introduced to many influential scientists and politicians, and also to King Louis XV.
In 1772, Franklin obtained private letters of Thomas Hutchinson and Andrew Oliver, governor and lieutenant governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, proving that they had encouraged the Crown to crack down on Bostonians. Franklin sent them to North America, where they escalated tensions. The letters were finally leaked to the public in the Boston Gazette in mid-June 1773, causing a political firestorm in Massachusetts and raising significant questions in England. The British began to regard him as the fomenter of serious trouble. Hopes for a peaceful solution ended as he was systematically ridiculed and humiliated by Solicitor-General Alexander Wedderburn, before the Privy Council on January 29, 1774. He returned to Philadelphia in March 1775, and abandoned his accommodationist stance.
In 1773, Franklin published two of his most celebrated pro-American satirical essays: "Rules by Which a Great Empire May Be Reduced to a Small One," and "An Edict by the King of Prussia." Agent for British and Hellfire Club membership Franklin is known to have occasionally attended the Hellfire Club's meetings during 1758 as a non-member during his time in England. However, some authors and historians would argue he was in fact a British spy. As there are no records left (having been burned in 1774), many of these members are just assumed or linked by letters sent to each other. One early proponent that Franklin was a member of the Hellfire Club and a double agent is the historian Donald McCormick, who has a history of making controversial claims.Coming of revolutionIn 1763, soon after Franklin returned to Pennsylvania from England for the first time, the western frontier was engulfed in a bitter war known as Pontiac's Rebellion. The Paxton Boys, a group of settlers convinced that the Pennsylvania government was not doing enough to protect them from American Indian raids, murdered a group of peaceful Susquehannock Indians and marched on Philadelphia. Franklin helped to organize a local militia to defend the capital against the mob. He met with the Paxton leaders and persuaded them to disperse. Franklin wrote a scathing attack against the racial prejudice of the Paxton Boys. "If an Indian injures me," he asked, "does it follow that I may revenge that injury on all Indians?"
He provided an early response to British surveillance through his own network of counter-surveillance and manipulation. "He waged a public relations campaign, secured secret aid, played a role in privateering expeditions, and churned out effective and inflammatory propaganda."Declaration of Independence's portrait of the Committee of Five presenting their draft of the Declaration to the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia]]
By the time Franklin arrived in Philadelphia on May 5, 1775, after his second mission to Great Britain, the American Revolution had begun at the Battles of Lexington and Concord the previous month, on April 19, 1775. The New England militia had forced the main British army to remain inside Boston. The Pennsylvania Assembly unanimously chose Franklin as their delegate to the Second Continental Congress. In June 1776, he was appointed a member of the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence. Although he was temporarily disabled by gout and unable to attend most meetings of the committee, he made several "small but important" changes to the draft sent to him by Thomas Jefferson.
At the signing, he is quoted as having replied to a comment by John Hancock that they must all hang together, saying, "Yes, we must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately."
Ambassador to France (1776–1785)
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hat, charmed the French with what they perceived as his rustic New World genius." (He snatched the lightning from the skies and the scepter from the tyrants.) Historian Friedrich Christoph Schlosser remarked at the time, with ample hyperbole, that "Such was the number of portraits, busts and medallions of him in circulation before he left Paris, that he would have been recognized from them by any adult citizen in any part of the civilized world." – }}]]
to engrave the medallion Libertas Americana, which was minted in Paris in 1783.]]
On October 26, 1776, Franklin was dispatched to France as commissioner for the United States. He took with him as secretary his 16-year-old grandson, William Temple Franklin. They lived in a home in the Parisian suburb of Passy, donated by Jacques-Donatien Le Ray de Chaumont, who supported the United States. Franklin remained in France until 1785. He conducted the affairs of his country toward the French nation with great success, which included securing a critical military alliance in 1778 and signing the 1783 Treaty of Paris.
Among his associates in France was Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, comte de Mirabeau—a French Revolutionary writer, orator and statesman who in 1791 was elected president of the National Assembly. In July 1784, Franklin met with Mirabeau and contributed anonymous materials that the Frenchman used in his first signed work: ''Considerations sur l'ordre de Cincinnatus''. The publication was critical of the Society of the Cincinnati, established in the United States. Franklin and Mirabeau thought of it as a "noble order," inconsistent with the egalitarian ideals of the new republic.
During his stay in France, he was active as a Freemason, serving as venerable master of the lodge Les Neuf Sœurs from 1779 until 1781. In 1784, when Franz Mesmer began to publicize his theory of "animal magnetism" which was considered offensive by many, Louis XVI appointed a commission to investigate it. These included the chemist Antoine Lavoisier, the physician Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, the astronomer Jean Sylvain Bailly, and Franklin. In doing so, the committee concluded, through blind trials that mesmerism only seemed to work when the subjects expected it, which discredited mesmerism and became the first major demonstration of the placebo effect, which was described at that time as "imagination." In 1781, he was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Franklin's advocacy for religious tolerance in France contributed to arguments made by French philosophers and politicians that resulted in Louis XVI's signing of the Edict of Versailles in November 1787. This edict effectively nullified the Edict of Fontainebleau, which had denied non-Catholics civil status and the right to openly practice their faith.
Franklin also served as American minister to Sweden, although he never visited that country. He negotiated a treaty that was signed in April 1783. On August 27, 1783, in Paris, he witnessed the world's first hydrogen balloon flight. Le Globe, created by professor Jacques Charles and Les Frères Robert, was watched by a vast crowd as it rose from the Champ de Mars (now the site of the Eiffel Tower). Franklin became so enthusiastic that he subscribed financially to the next project to build a manned hydrogen balloon. On December 1, 1783, Franklin was seated in the special enclosure for honored guests it took off from the Jardin des Tuileries, piloted by Charles and Nicolas-Louis Robert. Walter Isaacson describes a chess game between Franklin and the Duchess of Bourbon, "who made a move that inadvertently exposed her king. Ignoring the rules of the game, he promptly captured it. 'Ah,' said the duchess, 'we do not take Kings so.' Replied Franklin in a famous quip: 'We do in America.'"Return to North America
]]
witnesses Gouverneur Morris sign the Constitution with Franklin seen behind Morris, in John Henry Hintermeister's 1925 portrait, Foundation of the American Government]]
When he returned home in 1785, Franklin occupied a position second only to that of George Washington as the champion of American independence. Le Ray honored him with a commissioned portrait painted by Joseph Duplessis, which now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. After his return, Franklin became an abolitionist and freed his two slaves. He eventually became president of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society.
He also served as a delegate to the Convention. It was primarily an honorary position and he seldom engaged in debate.
According to James McHenry, Elizabeth Willing Powel asked Franklin what kind of government they had wrought. He replied: "A republic, madam, if you can keep it."
Death
in Philadelphia]]
Franklin suffered from obesity throughout his middle age and elder years, which resulted in multiple health problems, particularly gout, which worsened as he aged. In poor health during the signing of the U.S. Constitution in 1787, he was rarely seen in public from then until his death.
Franklin died from pleuritic attack at his home in Philadelphia on April 17, 1790. He was aged 84 at the time of his death. His last words were reportedly, "a dying man can do nothing easy," to his daughter after she suggested that he change position in bed and lie on his side so he could breathe more easily. Franklin's death is described in the book The Life of Benjamin Franklin, quoting from the account of John Paul Jones:
Approximately 20,000 people attended Franklin's funeral after which he was interred in Christ Church Burial Ground in Philadelphia. Upon learning of his death, the Constitutional Assembly in Revolutionary France entered into a state of mourning for a period of three days, and memorial services were conducted in honor of Franklin throughout the country.
In 1728, aged 22, Franklin wrote what he hoped would be his own epitaph:
Franklin's actual grave, however, as he specified in his final will, simply reads "Benjamin and Deborah Franklin."
Inventions and scientific inquiries
Franklin was a prodigious inventor. Among his many creations were the lightning rod, Franklin stove, bifocal glasses and the flexible urinary catheter. He never patented his inventions; in his autobiography he wrote, "... as we enjoy great advantages from the inventions of others, we should be glad of an opportunity to serve others by any invention of ours; and this we should do freely and generously."Electricity, light
'', a portrait by Benjamin West now on display at the Philadelphia Museum of Art]]
Franklin was, along with his contemporary Leonhard Euler, the only major scientist who supported Christiaan Huygens's wave theory of light, which was basically ignored by the rest of the scientific community. In the 18th century, Isaac Newton's corpuscular theory was held to be true; it took Thomas Young's well-known slit experiment in 1803 to persuade most scientists to believe Huygens's theory.
Franklin started exploring the phenomenon of electricity in the 1740s, after he met the itinerant lecturer Archibald Spencer, who used static electricity in his demonstrations. He proposed that "vitreous" and "resinous" electricity were not different types of "electrical fluid" (as electricity was called then), but the same "fluid" under different pressures. (The same proposal was made independently that same year by William Watson.) He was the first to label them as positive and negative respectively, which replaced the then current distinction made between 'vitreous' and 'resinous' electricity, and he was the first to discover the principle of conservation of charge. In 1748, he constructed a multiple plate capacitor, that he called an "electrical battery" (not a true battery like Volta's pile) by placing eleven panes of glass sandwiched between lead plates, suspended with silk cords and connected by wires.
In pursuit of more pragmatic uses for electricity, remarking in spring 1749 that he felt "chagrin'd a little" that his experiments had heretofore resulted in "Nothing in this Way of Use to Mankind," Franklin planned a practical demonstration. He proposed a dinner party where a turkey was to be killed via electric shock and roasted on an electrical spit. Franklin recounted that in the process of one of these experiments, he was shocked by a pair of Leyden jars, resulting in numbness in his arms that persisted for one evening, noting "I am Ashamed to have been Guilty of so Notorious a Blunder."
Franklin briefly investigated electrotherapy, including the use of the electric bath. This work led to the field becoming widely known. In recognition of his work with electricity, he received the Royal Society's Copley Medal in 1753, and in 1756, he became one of the few 18th-century Americans elected a fellow of the Society. The CGS unit of electric charge has been named after him: one franklin (Fr) is equal to one statcoulomb.
Franklin advised Harvard University in its acquisition of new electrical laboratory apparatus after the complete loss of its original collection, in a fire that destroyed the original Harvard Hall in 1764. The collection he assembled later became part of the Harvard Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments, now on public display in its Science Center.Kite experiment and lightning rod
by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, ]]
Franklin published a proposal for an experiment to prove that lightning is electricity by flying a kite in a storm. On May 10, 1752, Thomas-François Dalibard of France conducted Franklin's experiment using a iron rod instead of a kite, and he extracted electrical sparks from a cloud. On June 15, 1752, Franklin may possibly have conducted his well-known kite experiment in Philadelphia, successfully extracting sparks from a cloud. He described the experiment in his newspaper, The Pennsylvania Gazette, on October 19, 1752, without mentioning that he himself had performed it. This account was read to the Royal Society on December 21 and printed as such in the Philosophical Transactions. Joseph Priestley published an account with additional details in his 1767 History and Present Status of Electricity. Franklin was careful to stand on an insulator, keeping dry under a roof to avoid the danger of electric shock. Others, such as Georg Wilhelm Richmann in Russia, were indeed electrocuted in performing lightning experiments during the months immediately following his experiment.
In his writings, Franklin indicates that he was aware of the dangers and offered alternative ways to demonstrate that lightning was electrical, as shown by his use of the concept of electrical ground. He did not perform this experiment in the way that is often pictured in popular literature, flying the kite and waiting to be struck by lightning, as it would have been dangerous. Instead he used the kite to collect some electric charge from a storm cloud, showing that lightning was electrical.}}
Franklin's electrical experiments led to his invention of the lightning rod. He said that conductors with a sharp rather than a smooth point could discharge silently and at a far greater distance. He surmised that this could help protect buildings from lightning by attaching "upright Rods of Iron, made sharp as a Needle and gilt to prevent Rusting, and from the Foot of those Rods a Wire down the outside of the Building into the Ground; ... Would not these pointed Rods probably draw the Electrical Fire silently out of a Cloud before it came nigh enough to strike, and thereby secure us from that most sudden and terrible Mischief!" Following a series of experiments on Franklin's own house, lightning rods were installed on the Academy of Philadelphia (later the University of Pennsylvania) and the Pennsylvania State House (later Independence Hall) in 1752.
Though Franklin is famously associated with kites from his lightning experiments, he has also been noted by many for using kites to pull humans and ships across waterways. George Pocock in the book A Treatise on The Aeropleustic Art, or Navigation in the Air, by means of Kites, or Buoyant Sails noted being inspired by Benjamin Franklin's traction of his body by kite power across a waterway. Thermodynamics Franklin noted a principle of refrigeration by observing that on a very hot day, he stayed cooler in a wet shirt in a breeze than he did in a dry one. To understand this phenomenon more clearly, he conducted experiments. In 1758 on a warm day in Cambridge, England, he and fellow scientist John Hadley experimented by continually wetting the ball of a mercury thermometer with ether and using bellows to evaporate the ether. With each subsequent evaporation, the thermometer read a lower temperature, eventually reaching . Another thermometer showed that the room temperature was constant at . In his letter Cooling by Evaporation, Franklin noted that, "One may see the possibility of freezing a man to death on a warm summer's day."
In 1761, Franklin wrote a letter to Mary Stevenson describing his experiments on the relationship between color and heat absorption. He found that darker color clothes got hotter when exposed to sunlight than lighter color clothes, an early demonstration of black body thermal radiation. One experiment he performed consisted of placing square pieces of cloth of various color out in the snow on a sunny day. He waited some time and then measured that the black pieces sank furthest into the snow of all the colors, indicating that they got the hottest and melted the most snow.
According to Michael Faraday, Franklin's experiments on the non-conduction of ice are worth mentioning, although the law of the general effect of liquefaction on electrolytes is not attributed to Franklin. However, as reported in 1836 by Franklin's great-grandson Alexander Dallas Bache of the University of Pennsylvania, the law of the effect of heat on the conduction of bodies otherwise non-conductors, for example, glass, could be attributed to Franklin. Franklin wrote, "... A certain quantity of heat will make some bodies good conductors, that will not otherwise conduct ..." and again, "... And water, though naturally a good conductor, will not conduct well when frozen into ice."Oceanography and hydrodynamicsAs deputy postmaster, Franklin became interested in North Atlantic Ocean circulation patterns. While in England in 1768, he heard a complaint from the Colonial Board of Customs. British packet ships carrying mail had taken several weeks longer to reach New York than it took an average merchant ship to reach Newport, Rhode Island. The merchantmen had a longer and more complex voyage because they left from London, while the packets left from Falmouth in Cornwall. Franklin put the question to his cousin Timothy Folger, a Nantucket whaler captain, who told him that merchant ships routinely avoided a strong eastbound mid-ocean current. The mail packet captains sailed dead into it, thus fighting an adverse current of . Franklin worked with Folger and other experienced ship captains, learning enough to chart the current and name it the Gulf Stream, by which it is still known today.
Franklin published his Gulf Stream chart in 1770 in England, where it was ignored. Subsequent versions were printed in France in 1778 and the U.S. in 1786. The British original edition of the chart had been so thoroughly ignored that everyone assumed it was lost forever until Phil Richardson, a Woods Hole oceanographer and Gulf Stream expert, discovered it in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris in 1980. This find received front-page coverage in The New York Times. It took many years for British sea captains to adopt Franklin's advice on navigating the current; once they did, they were able to trim two weeks from their sailing time. In 1853, the oceanographer and cartographer Matthew Fontaine Maury noted that while Franklin charted and codified the Gulf Stream, he did not discover it:
An aging Franklin accumulated all his oceanographic findings in Maritime Observations, published by the Philosophical Society's transactions in 1786. It contained ideas for sea anchors, catamaran hulls, watertight compartments, shipboard lightning rods and a soup bowl designed to stay stable in stormy weather.
While traveling on a ship, Franklin had observed that the wake of a ship was diminished when the cooks scuttled their greasy water. He studied the effects on a large pond in Clapham Common, London. "I fetched out a cruet of oil and dropt a little of it on the water ... though not more than a teaspoon full, produced an instant calm over a space of several yards square." He later used the trick to "calm the waters" by carrying "a little oil in the hollow joint of [his] cane."
Meteorology
On October 21, 1743, according to the popular myth, a storm moving from the southwest denied Franklin the opportunity of witnessing a lunar eclipse. He was said to have noted that the prevailing winds were actually from the northeast, contrary to what he had expected. In correspondence with his brother, he learned that the same storm had not reached Boston until after the eclipse, despite the fact that Boston is to the northeast of Philadelphia. He deduced that storms do not always travel in the direction of the prevailing wind, a concept that greatly influenced meteorology. After the Icelandic volcanic eruption of Laki in 1783, and the subsequent harsh European winter of 1784, Franklin made observations on the causal nature of these two seemingly separate events. He wrote about them in a lecture series.Population studiesFranklin had a major influence on the emerging science of demography or population studies. In the 1730s and 1740s, he began taking notes on population growth, finding that the American population had the fastest growth rate on Earth. Emphasizing that population growth depended on food supplies, he emphasized the abundance of food and available farmland in America. He calculated that America's population was doubling every 20 years and would surpass that of England in a century. In 1751, he drafted Observations concerning the Increase of Mankind, Peopling of Countries, etc. Four years later, it was anonymously printed in Boston and was quickly reproduced in Britain, where it influenced the economist Adam Smith and later the demographer Thomas Malthus, who credited Franklin for discovering a rule of population growth. Franklin's predictions on how British mercantilism was unsustainable alarmed British leaders who did not want to be surpassed by the colonies, so they became more willing to impose restrictions on the colonial economy.
Kammen (1990) and Drake (2011) say Franklin's Observations concerning the Increase of Mankind (1755) stands alongside Ezra Stiles' "Discourse on Christian Union" (1760) as the leading works of 18th-century Anglo-American demography; Drake credits Franklin's "wide readership and prophetic insight." Franklin was also a pioneer in the study of slave demography, as shown in his 1755 essay. In his capacity as a farmer, he wrote at least one critique about the negative consequences of price controls, trade restrictions, and subsidy of the poor. This is succinctly preserved in his letter to the London Chronicle published November 29, 1766, titled "On the Price of Corn, and Management of the poor."Decision-makingIn a 1772 letter to Joseph Priestley, Franklin laid out the earliest known description of the Pro & Con list, a common decision-making technique, now sometimes called a decisional balance sheet:
The motion gained almost no support and was never brought to a vote.
Franklin was an enthusiastic admirer of the evangelical minister George Whitefield during the First Great Awakening. He did not himself subscribe to Whitefield's theology, but he admired Whitefield for exhorting people to worship God through good works. He published all of Whitefield's sermons and journals, thereby earning a lot of money and boosting the Great Awakening.
When he stopped attending church, Franklin wrote in his autobiography:
Franklin retained a lifelong commitment to the non-religious Puritan virtues and political values he had grown up with, and through his civic work and publishing, he succeeded in passing these values into the American culture permanently. He had a "passion for virtue." These Puritan values included his devotion to egalitarianism, education, industry, thrift, honesty, temperance, charity and community spirit. Thomas Kidd states, "As an adult, Franklin touted ethical responsibility, industriousness, and benevolence, even as he jettisoned Christian orthodoxy."
The classical authors read in the Enlightenment period taught an abstract ideal of republican government based on hierarchical social orders of king, aristocracy and commoners. It was widely believed that English liberties relied on their balance of power, but also hierarchal deference to the privileged class. "Puritanism ... and the epidemic evangelism of the mid-eighteenth century, had created challenges to the traditional notions of social stratification" Franklin, steeped in Puritanism and an enthusiastic supporter of the evangelical movement, rejected the salvation dogma but embraced the radical notion of egalitarian democracy.
Franklin's commitment to teach these values was itself something he gained from his Puritan upbringing, with its stress on "inculcating virtue and character in themselves and their communities." These Puritan values and the desire to pass them on, were one of his quintessentially American characteristics and helped shape the character of the nation. Max Weber considered Franklin's ethical writings a culmination of the Protestant ethic, which ethic created the social conditions necessary for the birth of capitalism.
One of his characteristics was his respect, tolerance and promotion of all churches. Referring to his experience in Philadelphia, he wrote in his autobiography, "new Places of worship were continually wanted, and generally erected by voluntary Contribution, my Mite for such purpose, whatever might be the Sect, was never refused." The evangelical revivalists who were active mid-century, such as Whitefield, were the greatest advocates of religious freedom, "claiming liberty of conscience to be an 'inalienable right of every rational creature. Whitefield's supporters in Philadelphia, including Franklin, erected "a large, new hall, that ... could provide a pulpit to anyone of any belief." Franklin's rejection of dogma and doctrine and his stress on the God of ethics and morality and civic virtue made him the "prophet of tolerance." While he was living in London in 1774, he was present at the birth of British Unitarianism, attending the inaugural session of the Essex Street Chapel, at which Theophilus Lindsey drew together the first avowedly Unitarian congregation in England; this was somewhat politically risky and pushed religious tolerance to new boundaries, as a denial of the doctrine of the Trinity was illegal until the 1813 Act.
Although his parents had intended for him a career in the church, declaring, "I soon became a thorough Deist." He rejected Christian dogma in a 1725 pamphlet A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain, which he later saw as an embarrassment, while simultaneously asserting that God is "all wise, all good, all powerful." Ralph Frasca contends that in his later life he can be considered a non-denominational Christian, although he did not believe Christ was divine.
In a major scholarly study of his religion, Thomas Kidd argues that Franklin believed that true religiosity was a matter of personal morality and civic virtue. Kidd says Franklin maintained his lifelong resistance to orthodox Christianity while arriving finally at a "doctrineless, moralized Christianity." According to David Morgan, Franklin was a proponent of "generic religion." He prayed to "Powerful Goodness" and referred to God as "the infinite." John Adams noted that he was a mirror in which people saw their own religion: "The Catholics thought him almost a Catholic. The Church of England claimed him as one of them. The Presbyterians thought him half a Presbyterian, and the Friends believed him a wet Quaker." Adams himself decided that Franklin best fit among the "Atheists, Deists, and Libertines." Whatever else Franklin was, concludes Morgan, "he was a true champion of generic religion." In a letter to Richard Price, Franklin states that he believes religion should support itself without help from the government, claiming, "When a Religion is good, I conceive that it will support itself; and, when it cannot support itself, and God does not take care to support, so that its Professors are oblig'd to call for the help of the Civil Power, it is a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one."
In 1790, just about a month before he died, Franklin wrote a letter to Ezra Stiles, president of Yale University, who had asked him his views on religion:
Thirteen Virtues
in New York City]]
Franklin sought to cultivate his character by a plan of 13 virtues, which he developed at age 20 (in 1726) and continued to practice in some form for the rest of his life. His autobiography lists his 13 virtues as:
# Temperance. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
# Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
# Order. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
# Resolution. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
# Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.
# Industry. Lose no time; be always employ'd in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
# Sincerity. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
# Justice. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
# Moderation. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
# Cleanliness. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation.
# Tranquility. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
# Chastity. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation.
# Humility. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.
Franklin did not try to work on them all at once. Instead, he worked on only one each week "leaving all others to their ordinary chance." While he did not adhere completely to the enumerated virtues, and by his own admission he fell short of them many times, he believed the attempt made him a better man, contributing greatly to his success and happiness, which is why in his autobiography, he devoted more pages to this plan than to any other single point and wrote, "I hope, therefore, that some of my descendants may follow the example and reap the benefit."
Slavery
Franklin's views and practices concerning slavery evolved over the course of his life. In his early years, Franklin owned seven slaves, including two men who worked in his household and his shop, but in his later years became an adherent of abolition. A revenue stream for his newspaper was paid ads for the sale of slaves and for the capture of runaway slaves and Franklin allowed the sale of slaves in his general store. He later became an outspoken critic of slavery. In 1758, he advocated the opening of a school for the education of black slaves in Philadelphia. He took two slaves to England with him, Peter and King. King escaped with a woman to live in the outskirts of London, and by 1758 he was working for a household in Suffolk. After returning from England in 1762, Franklin became more abolitionist in nature, attacking American slavery. In the wake of Somerset v Stewart, he voiced frustration at British abolitionists:
Franklin refused to publicly debate the issue of slavery at the 1787 Constitutional Convention.
At the time of the American founding, there were about half a million slaves in the United States, mostly in the five southernmost states, where they made up 40% of the population. Many of the leading American founderssuch as Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and James Madisonowned slaves, but many others did not. Benjamin Franklin thought that slavery was "an atrocious debasement of human nature" and "a source of serious evils." In 1787, Franklin and Benjamin Rush helped write a new constitution for the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery, and that same year Franklin became president of the organization. In 1790, Quakers from New York and Pennsylvania presented their petition for abolition to Congress. Their argument against slavery was backed by the Pennsylvania Abolitionist Society.
In his later years, as Congress was forced to deal with the issue of slavery, Franklin wrote several essays that stressed the importance of the abolition of slavery and of the integration of African Americans into American society. These writings included:
* "An Address to the Public" (1789)
* "A Plan for Improving the Condition of the Free Blacks" (1789)
* "Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim on the Slave Trade" (1790)
Vegetarianism
Franklin became a vegetarian when he was a teenager apprenticing at a print shop, after coming upon a book by the early vegetarian advocate Thomas Tryon. In addition, he would have also been familiar with the moral arguments espoused by prominent vegetarian Quakers in the colonial-era Province of Pennsylvania, including Benjamin Lay and John Woolman. His reasons for vegetarianism were based on health, ethics, and economy:
Franklin also declared the consumption of fish to be "unprovoked murder." Despite his convictions, he began to eat fish after being tempted by fried cod on a boat sailing from Boston, justifying the eating of animals by observing that the fish's stomach contained other fish. Nonetheless, he recognized the faulty ethics in this argument and would continue to be a vegetarian on and off. He was "excited" by tofu, which he learned of from the writings of a Spanish missionary to Southeast Asia, Domingo Fernández Navarrete. Franklin sent a sample of soybeans to prominent American botanist John Bartram and had previously written to British diplomat and Chinese trade expert James Flint inquiring as to how tofu was made, with their correspondence believed to be the first documented use of the word "tofu" in the English language.
Franklin's "Second Reply to Vindex Patriae," a 1766 letter advocating self-sufficiency and less dependence on England, lists various examples of the bounty of American agricultural products, and does not mention meat.
View on inoculation
The concept of preventing smallpox by variolation was introduced to colonial America by an African slave named Onesimus via his owner Cotton Mather in the early eighteenth century, but the procedure was not immediately accepted. James Franklin's newspaper carried articles in 1721 that vigorously denounced the concept.
However, by 1736 Benjamin Franklin was known as a supporter of the procedure. Therefore, when four-year-old "Franky" died of smallpox, opponents of the procedure circulated rumors that the child had been inoculated, and that this was the cause of his subsequent death. When Franklin became aware of this gossip, he placed a notice in the Pennsylvania Gazette, stating: "I do hereby sincerely declare, that he was not inoculated, but receiv'd the Distemper in the common Way of Infection ... I intended to have my Child inoculated." The child had a bad case of flux diarrhea, and his parents had waited for him to get well before having him inoculated. Franklin wrote in his Autobiography: "In 1736 I lost one of my sons, a fine boy of four years old, by the small-pox, taken in the common way. I long regretted bitterly, and still regret that I had not given it to him by inoculation. This I mention for the sake of parents who omit that operation, on the supposition that they should never forgive themselves if a child died under it; my example showing that the regret may be the same either way, and that, therefore, the safer should be chosen."
Interests and activities
Musical endeavors
]]
Franklin is known to have played the violin, the harp, and the guitar. He also composed music, which included a string quartet in early classical style. While he was in London, he developed a much-improved version of the glass harmonica, in which the glasses rotate on a shaft, with the player's fingers held steady, instead of the other way around. He worked with the London glassblower Charles James to create it, and instruments based on his mechanical version soon found their way to other parts of Europe. Joseph Haydn, a fan of Franklin's enlightened ideas, had a glass harmonica in his instrument collection. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed for Franklin's glass harmonica, as did Beethoven. Gaetano Donizetti used the instrument in the accompaniment to Amelia's aria "Par che mi dica ancora" in the tragic opera Il castello di Kenilworth (1821), as did Camille Saint-Saëns in his 1886 The Carnival of the Animals. Richard Strauss calls for the glass harmonica in his 1917 Die Frau ohne Schatten, His essay on "The Morals of Chess" in Columbian Magazine in December 1786 is the second known writing on chess in America. He and a friend used chess as a means of learning the Italian language, which both were studying; the winner of each game between them had the right to assign a task, such as parts of the Italian grammar to be learned by heart, to be performed by the loser before their next meeting.
Franklin was able to play chess more frequently against stronger opposition during his many years as a civil servant and diplomat in England, where the game was far better established than in America. He was able to improve his playing standard by facing more experienced players during this period. He regularly attended Old Slaughter's Coffee House in London for chess and socializing, making many important personal contacts. While in Paris, both as a visitor and later as ambassador, he visited the famous Café de la Régence, which France's strongest players made their regular meeting place. No records of his games have survived, so it is not possible to ascertain his playing strength in modern terms.
Franklin was inducted into the U.S. Chess Hall of Fame in 1999.
Legacy
</small>
| designation1_free2name = Marker Text
| designation1_free2value = Printer, author, inventor, diplomat, philanthropist, statesman, and scientist. The eighteenth century's most illustrious Pennsylvanian built a house in Franklin Court starting in 1763, and here he lived the last five years of his life.
| designation1_free3name | designation1_free3value
}}
Bequest
, in Philadelphia]]
Franklin bequeathed £1,000 (about $4,400 at the time, or about $125,000 in 2021 dollars) each to the cities of Boston and Philadelphia, in trust to gather interest for 200 years. The trust began in 1785 when the French mathematician Charles-Joseph Mathon de la Cour, who admired Franklin greatly, wrote a friendly parody of Franklin's ''Poor Richard's Almanack called Fortunate Richard. The main character leaves a smallish amount of money in his will, five lots of 100 livres, to collect interest over one, two, three, four or five full centuries, with the resulting astronomical sums to be spent on impossibly elaborate utopian projects. Franklin, who was 79 years old at the time, wrote thanking him for a great idea and telling him that he had decided to leave a bequest of 1,000 pounds each to his native Boston and his adopted Philadelphia.
By 1990, more than $2,000,000 (~$}} in ) had accumulated in Franklin's Philadelphia trust, which had loaned the money to local residents. From 1940 to 1990, the money was used mostly for mortgage loans. When the trust came due, Philadelphia decided to spend it on scholarships for local high school students. Franklin's Boston trust fund accumulated almost $5,000,000 during that same time; at the end of its first 100 years a portion was allocated to help establish a trade school that became the Franklin Institute of Boston, and the entire fund was later dedicated to supporting this institute.
In 1787, a group of prominent ministers in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, proposed the foundation of a new college named in Franklin's honor. Franklin donated £200 towards the development of Franklin College (now called Franklin & Marshall College).
Likeness and image
in Philadelphia]]
As the only person to have signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, Treaty of Alliance with France in 1778, Treaty of Paris in 1783, and U.S. Constitution in 1787, Franklin is considered one of the leading Founding Fathers of the United States. His pervasive influence in the early history of the nation has led to his being jocularly called "the only president of the United States who was never president of the United States."
Franklin's likeness is ubiquitous. Since 1914, it has adorned American $100 bills. From 1948 to 1963, Franklin's portrait was on the half-dollar. He has appeared on a $50 bill and on several varieties of the $100 bill from 1914 and 1918. Franklin also appears on the $1,000 Series EE savings bond.
On April 12, 1976, as part of a bicentennial celebration, Congress dedicated a tall marble statue in Philadelphia's Franklin Institute as the Benjamin Franklin National Memorial. Vice President Nelson Rockefeller presided over the dedication ceremony. Many of Franklin's personal possessions are on display at the institute. In London, his house at 36 Craven Street, which is the only surviving former residence of Franklin, was first marked with a blue plaque and has since been opened to the public as the Benjamin Franklin House. In 1998, workmen restoring the building dug up the remains of six children and four adults hidden below the home. A total of 15 bodies have been recovered. The Friends of Benjamin Franklin House (the organization responsible for the restoration) note that the bones were likely placed there by William Hewson, who lived in the house for two years and who had built a small anatomy school at the back of the house. They note that while Franklin likely knew what Hewson was doing, he probably did not participate in any dissections because he was much more of a physicist than a medical man.
He has been honored on U.S. postage stamps many times. The image of Franklin, the first postmaster general of the United States, occurs on the face of U.S. postage more than any other American save that of George Washington. He appeared on the first U.S. postage stamp issued in 1847. From 1908 through 1923, the U.S. Post Office issued a series of postage stamps commonly referred to as the Washington–Franklin Issues, in which Washington and Franklin were depicted many times over a 14-year period, the longest run of any one series in U.S. postal history. However, he only appears on a few commemorative stamps. Some of the finest portrayals of Franklin on record can be found on the engravings inscribed on the face of U.S. postage.<ref name"Scotts" />
since 1914.}}]]
See also
* Benjamin Franklin in popular culture
* Bibliography of early American publishers and printers
* Founders Online, database of Franklin's papers
* Franklin's electrostatic machine
* Fugio Cent, 1787 coin designed by Franklin
* List of early American publishers and printers
* List of opponents of slavery
* List of richest Americans in history
* The Papers of Benjamin Franklin
Notes
References
Bibliography
Biographies
* Becker, Carl Lotus. "Benjamin Franklin", Dictionary of American Biography (1931) – vol 3, with links [http://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/franklin.htm#becker online]
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* 1739 | placePhiladelphia | year2005 | isbn978-0-8122-3854-9 | publisherUniversity of Pennsylvania}}
* 1747 | year2005 | placePhiladelphia | publisherUniversity of Pennsylvania Press | isbn978-0-8122-3855-6 }}
* 1757 | year2008 | publisherUniversity of Pennsylvania Press | isbn=978-0-8122-4121-1}}
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* Wood, Gordon. "Benjamin Franklin" Encyclopedia Britannica (2021) [https://web.archive.org/web/20210702062014/https://www.britannica.com/biography/Benjamin-Franklin online]
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Scholarly studies
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* ProQuest Dissertations, 3461038.
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** [http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/sgml/moa-idx?notisid=ABP2287-0058-201 "Franklin as Politician and Diplomatist"] in The Century (October 1899) v. 57 pp. 881–899. By Paul Leicester Ford.
** [http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/sgml/moa-idx?notisid=ABP2287-0057-169 "Franklin as Printer and Publisher"] in The Century (April 1899) v. 57 pp. 803–818.
** [http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/sgml/moa-idx?notisid=ABP2287-0058-172 "Franklin as Scientist"] in The Century (September 1899) v.57 pp. 750–763. By Paul Leicester Ford.
* Frasca, Ralph. "Benjamin Franklin's Printing Network and the Stamp Act." Pennsylvania History 71.4 (2004): 403–419 [https://journals.psu.edu/index.php/phj/article/download/25899/25668 online] .
* Frasca, Ralph. ''Benjamin Franklin's printing network: disseminating virtue in early America'' (U of Missouri Press, 2006) [https://www.amazon.com/Benjamin-Franklins-Printing-Network-Disseminating/dp/0826216145/ excerpt].
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* ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 9999293.
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* Kidd, Thomas S. Benjamin Franklin: The Religious Life of a Founding Father (Yale UP, 2017) [https://www.amazon.com/Benjamin-Franklin-Religious-Founding-Father/dp/0300217498/ excerpt]
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* ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 3357482.
* ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 9021252.
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* Walters, Kerry S. Benjamin Franklin and His Gods. (1999). 213 pp. Takes position midway between D H Lawrence's brutal 1930 denunciation of Franklin's religion as nothing more than a bourgeois commercialism tricked out in shallow utilitarian moralisms and Owen Aldridge's sympathetic 1967 treatment of the dynamism and protean character of Franklin's "polytheistic" religion.
* Historiography*
* Waldstreicher, David, ed. A Companion to Benjamin Franklin (2011), 25 essays by scholars emphasizing how historians have handled Franklin. [https://www.questia.com/library/120084135/a-companion-to-benjamin-franklin online edition]
Primary sources
* "A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain."
* "Experiments and Observations on Electricity." (1751)
* "Fart Proudly: Writings of Benjamin Franklin You Never Read in School." Carl Japikse, Ed. Frog Ltd.; Reprint ed. 2003.
* "Heroes of America Benjamin Franklin."
* "On Marriage."
* "Satires and Bagatelles."
* Autobiography, Poor Richard, & Later Writings (J.A. Leo Lemay, ed.) (Library of America, 1987 one-volume, 2005 two-volume)
* Benjamin Franklin Reader edited by Walter Isaacson (2003)
* ''[https://archive.org/details/benjaminfranklin0000fran_o8e8 Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography]'' edited by J.A. Leo Lemay and P.M. Zall, (Norton Critical Editions, 1986); 390 pp. text, contemporary documents and 20th century analysis
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* Houston, Alan, ed. Franklin: The Autobiography and other Writings on Politics, Economics, and Virtue. Cambridge University Press, 2004. 371 pp.
* Ketcham, Ralph, ed. The Political Thought of Benjamin Franklin. (1965, reprinted 2003). 459 pp.
* Lass, Hilda, ed. [https://archive.org/details/thefabulousamericanfranklin The Fabulous American: A Benjamin Franklin Almanac]. (1964). 222 pp.
* Woody, Thomas, ed. Educational views of Benjamin Franklin (1931) [https://archive.org/details/educationalviews0000fran/page/n6/mode/1uponline]
* Leonard Labaree, and others., eds., [https://web.archive.org/web/20060214030435/http://www.yale.edu/franklinpapers/index.html The Papers of Benjamin Franklin], 39 vols. to date (1959–2008), definitive edition, through 1783. This massive collection of BF's writings, and letters to him, is available in large academic libraries. It is most useful for detailed research on specific topics. [http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/ The complete text of all the documents are online and searchable]; .
* Poor Richard Improved by Benjamin Franklin (1751)
* Silence Dogood, The Busy-Body, & Early Writings (J.A. Leo Lemay, ed.) (Library of America, 1987 one-volume, 2005 two-volume)
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100928051438/http://www.yale.edu/franklinpapers/indexintro.html The Papers of Benjamin Franklin] online, Sponsored by The American Philosophical Society and Yale University
* The Way to Wealth. Applewood Books; 1986.
* Writings (Franklin)|Writings.
For young readers
* Asimov, Isaac. The Kite That Won the Revolution, a biography for children that focuses on Franklin's scientific and diplomatic contributions.
* Fleming, Candace. ''Ben Franklin's Almanac: Being a True Account of the Good Gentleman's Life. Atheneum/Anne Schwart, 2003, 128 pp. .
* Miller, Brandon. Benjamin Franklin, American Genius: His Life and Ideas with 21 Activities (For Kids series) 2009 Chicago Review Press
External links
* [http://www.compadre.org/psrc/Franklin/ Benjamin Franklin and Electrostatics] experiments and Franklin's electrical writings from Wright Center for Science Education
* [http://hdl.library.upenn.edu/1017/d/ead/upenn_rbml_MsColl900 Benjamin Franklin Papers, Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts, University of Pennsylvania.]
* [http://www.abc.net.au/rn/ockhamsrazor/stories/2006/1814928.htm Franklin's impact on medicine] – talk by medical historian, Dr. Jim Leavesley celebrating the 300th anniversary of Franklin's birth on ''Okham's Razor'' ABC Radio National – December 2006
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v4iKz2F0kC2U Video with sheet music] of Benjamin Franklin's string quartetBiographical and guides*
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20030704024551/http://www.time.com/time/2003/franklin/bffranklin.html "Special Report: Citizen Ben's Greatest Virtues"] Time
* [http://www.c-span.org/video/?163159-1/writings-benjamin-franklin "Writings of Benjamin Franklin"] from C-SPAN's American Writers: A Journey Through History
* Afsai, Shai (2019). "[https://brill.com/view/journals/rrj/22/2/article-p228_5.xml Benjamin Franklin's Influence on Mussar Thought and Practice: a Chronicle of Misapprehension]." Review of Rabbinic Judaism 22, 2: 228–276.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120502102128/http://www.english.udel.edu/lemay/franklin/ Benjamin Franklin: A Documentary History] by J.A. Leo Lemay
* [https://www.pbs.org/benfranklin/ Benjamin Franklin: An extraordinary life] PBS
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20131102055511/http://history.state.gov/milestones/1776-1783/BFranklin Benjamin Franklin: First American Diplomat, 1776–1785] US State Department
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* [https://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/franklin/franklin.html Finding Franklin: A Resource Guide] Library of Congress
* [http://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/franklin.htm Guide to Benjamin Franklin] By a history professor at the University of Illinois.
* [http://www.librarything.com/profile/BenjaminFranklin Online edition of Franklin's personal library]
* [http://www.ushistory.org/franklin/ The Electric Benjamin Franklin] ushistory.org
Online writings
* [https://archive.org/details/SilenceDogood_201306 "A Silence Dogood Sampler" – Selections from Franklin's Silence Dogood writings]
* [http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/Franklin%20Abridged/index.html Abridgement of the Book of Common Prayer (1773), by Benjamin Franklin and Francis Dashwood], transcribed by Richard Mammana
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20090821230120/http://sln.fi.edu/franklin/family/lastwill.html Franklin's Last Will & Testament] Transcription.
* [https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/franklin-home.html Library of Congress web resource: Benjamin Franklin ... In His Own Words]
* [http://www.bartleby.com/people/FranklinB.html Online Works by Franklin]
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* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100928051438/http://www.yale.edu/franklinpapers/indexintro.html Yale edition of complete works], the standard scholarly edition
** [https://founders.archives.gov/about/Franklin Online, searchable edition]
Autobiography
* The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin at Project Gutenberg
* [http://librivox.org/the-autobigraphy-of-benjamin-franklin-ed-by-frank-woodworth-pine/ The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin] LibriVox recording
In the arts
* [http://www.benfranklin300.com/ Benjamin Franklin 300 (1706–2006)] Official web site of the Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary.
* The [http://www.hsp.org/files/findingaid215franklin.pdf Historical Society of Pennsylvania Collection of Benjamin Franklin Papers], including correspondence, government documents, writings and a copy of his will, are available for research use at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
}}
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3989 | Banach space | In mathematics, more specifically in functional analysis, a Banach space (, ) is a complete normed vector space. Thus, a Banach space is a vector space with a metric that allows the computation of vector length and distance between vectors and is complete in the sense that a Cauchy sequence of vectors always converges to a well-defined limit that is within the space.
Banach spaces are named after the Polish mathematician Stefan Banach, who introduced this concept and studied it systematically in 1920–1922 along with Hans Hahn and Eduard Helly.
Maurice René Fréchet was the first to use the term "Banach space" and Banach in turn then coined the term "Fréchet space".
Banach spaces originally grew out of the study of function spaces by Hilbert, Fréchet, and Riesz earlier in the century. Banach spaces play a central role in functional analysis. In other areas of analysis, the spaces under study are often Banach spaces.
Definition
A Banach space is a complete normed space <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|).</math>
A normed space is a pair
<math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|)</math> consisting of a vector space <math>X</math> over a scalar field <math>\mathbb{K}</math> (where <math>\mathbb{K}</math> is commonly <math>\Reals</math> or <math>\Complex</math>) together with a distinguished
norm <math>\|{\cdot}\| : X \to \Reals.</math> Like all norms, this norm induces a translation invariant
distance function, called the canonical or (norm) induced metric, defined for all vectors <math>x, y \in X</math> by
<math displayblock>d(x, y) : \|y - x\| = \|x - y\|.</math>
This makes <math>X</math> into a metric space <math>(X, d).</math>
A sequence <math>x_1, x_2, \ldots</math> is called or or {{nowrap|<math>\|{\cdot}\|</math>-Cauchy}} if for every real <math>r > 0,</math> there exists some index <math>N</math> such that
<math displayblock>d(x_n, x_m) \|x_n - x_m\| < r</math>
whenever <math>m</math> and <math>n</math> are greater than <math>N.</math>
The normed space <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|)</math> is called a Banach space and the canonical metric <math>d</math> is called a complete metric if <math>(X, d)</math> is a complete metric space, which by definition means for every Cauchy sequence <math>x_1, x_2, \ldots</math> in <math>(X, d),</math> there exists some <math>x \in X</math> such that
<math displayblock>\lim_{n \to \infty} x_n x \; \text{ in } (X, d),</math>
where because <math>\|x_n - x\| = d(x_n, x),</math> this sequence's convergence to <math>x</math> can equivalently be expressed as
<math displayblock>\lim_{n \to \infty} \|x_n - x\| 0 \; \text{ in } \Reals.</math>
The norm <math>\|{\cdot}\|</math> of a normed space <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|)</math> is called a if <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|)</math> is a Banach space.
L-semi-inner product
For any normed space <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|),</math> there exists an L-semi-inner product <math>\langle\cdot, \cdot\rangle</math> on <math>X</math> such that <math displayinline>\|x\| \sqrt{\langle x, x \rangle}</math> for all <math>x \in X.</math> In general, there may be infinitely many L-semi-inner products that satisfy this condition. L-semi-inner products are a generalization of inner products, which are what fundamentally distinguish Hilbert spaces from all other Banach spaces. This shows that all normed spaces (and hence all Banach spaces) can be considered as being generalizations of (pre-)Hilbert spaces.
Characterization in terms of series
The vector space structure allows one to relate the behavior of Cauchy sequences to that of converging series of vectors.
A normed space <math>X</math> is a Banach space if and only if each absolutely convergent series in <math>X</math> converges to a value that lies within <math>X,</math> symbolically
<math displayblock>\sum_{n1}^{\infty} \|v_n\| < \infty \implies \sum_{n1}^{\infty} v_n\text{ converges in } X.</math>Topology
The canonical metric <math>d</math> of a normed space <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|)</math> induces the usual metric topology <math>\tau_d</math> on <math>X,</math> which is referred to as the canonical or norm induced topology.
Every normed space is automatically assumed to carry this Hausdorff topology, unless indicated otherwise.
With this topology, every Banach space is a Baire space, although there exist normed spaces that are Baire but not Banach. The norm <math>\|{\cdot}\| : X \to \Reals</math> is always a continuous function with respect to the topology that it induces.
The open and closed balls of radius <math>r > 0</math> centered at a point <math>x \in X</math> are, respectively, the sets
<math displayblock>B_r(x) : \{z \in X \mid \|z - x\| < r\} \qquad \text{ and } \qquad C_r(x) := \{z \in X \mid \|z - x\| \leq r\}.</math>
Any such ball is a convex and bounded subset of <math>X,</math> but a compact ball/neighborhood exists if and only if <math>X</math> is finite-dimensional.
In particular, no infinite–dimensional normed space can be locally compact or have the Heine–Borel property.
If <math>x_0</math> is a vector and <math>s \neq 0</math> is a scalar, then
<math displayblock>x_0 + s\,B_r(x) B_{|s| r}(x_0 + s x) \qquad \text{ and } \qquad x_0 + s\,C_r(x) = C_{|s| r}(x_0 + s x).</math>
Using <math>s 1</math> shows that the norm-induced topology is translation invariant, which means that for any <math>x \in X</math> and <math>S \subseteq X,</math> the subset <math>S</math> is open (respectively, closed) in <math>X</math> if and only if its translation <math>x + S : \{x + s \mid s \in S\}</math> is open (respectively, closed).
Consequently, the norm induced topology is completely determined by any neighbourhood basis at the origin. Some common neighborhood bases at the origin include
<math display=block>\{B_r(0) \mid r > 0\}, \qquad \{C_r(0) \mid r > 0\}, \qquad \{B_{r_n}(0) \mid n \in \N\}, \qquad \text{ and } \qquad \{C_{r_n}(0) \mid n \in \N\},</math>
where <math>r_1, r_2, \ldots</math> can be any sequence of positive real numbers that converges to <math>0</math> in <math>\R</math> (common choices are <math>r_n :\tfrac{1}{n}</math> or <math>r_n : 1/2^n</math>).
So, for example, any open subset <math>U</math> of <math>X</math> can be written as a union
<math displayblock>U \bigcup_{x \in I} B_{r_x}(x) \bigcup_{x \in I} x + B_{r_x}(0) \bigcup_{x \in I} x + r_x\,B_1(0)</math>
indexed by some subset <math>I \subseteq U,</math> where each <math>r_x</math> may be chosen from the aforementioned sequence <math>r_1, r_2, \ldots.</math> (The open balls can also be replaced with closed balls, although the indexing set <math>I</math> and radii <math>r_x</math> may then also need to be replaced).
Additionally, <math>I</math> can always be chosen to be countable if <math>X</math> is a , which by definition means that <math>X</math> contains some countable dense subset.
Homeomorphism classes of separable Banach spaces
All finite–dimensional normed spaces are separable Banach spaces and any two Banach spaces of the same finite dimension are linearly homeomorphic.
Every separable infinite–dimensional Hilbert space is linearly isometrically isomorphic to the separable Hilbert sequence space <math>\ell^2(\N)</math> with its usual norm <math>\|{\cdot}\|_2.</math>
The Anderson–Kadec theorem states that every infinite–dimensional separable Fréchet space is homeomorphic to the product space <math displayinline>\prod_{i \in \N} \Reals</math> of countably many copies of <math>\Reals</math> (this homeomorphism need not be a linear map).
Thus all infinite–dimensional separable Fréchet spaces are homeomorphic to each other (or said differently, their topology is unique up to a homeomorphism). <!-- and so as with finite–dimensional spaces, any two separable Fréchet spaces (of any dimensions) are homeomorphic if and only if they have the same dimension.-->
Since every Banach space is a Fréchet space, this is also true of all infinite–dimensional separable Banach spaces, including <math>\ell^2(\N).</math>
In fact, <math>\ell^2(\N)</math> is even homeomorphic to its own unit <math>\{x \in \ell^2(\N) \mid \|x\|_2 = 1\},</math> which stands in sharp contrast to finite–dimensional spaces (the Euclidean plane <math>\Reals^2</math> is not homeomorphic to the unit circle, for instance).
This pattern in homeomorphism classes extends to generalizations of metrizable (locally Euclidean) topological manifolds known as , which are metric spaces that are around every point, locally homeomorphic to some open subset of a given Banach space (metric Hilbert manifolds and metric Fréchet manifolds are defined similarly).
For example, every open subset <math>U</math> of a Banach space <math>X</math> is canonically a metric Banach manifold modeled on <math>X</math> since the inclusion map <math>U \to X</math> is an open local homeomorphism.
Using Hilbert space microbundles, David Henderson showed in 1969 that every metric manifold modeled on a separable infinite–dimensional Banach (or Fréchet) space can be topologically embedded as an subset of <math>\ell^2(\N)</math> and, consequently, also admits a unique smooth structure making it into a <math>C^\infty</math> Hilbert manifold.Compact and convex subsetsThere is a compact subset <math>S</math> of <math>\ell^2(\N)</math> whose convex hull <math>\operatorname{co}(S)</math> is closed and thus also compact.
However, like in all Banach spaces, the convex hull <math>\overline{\operatorname{co}} S</math> of this (and every other) compact subset will be compact. In a normed space that is not complete then it is in general guaranteed that <math>\overline{\operatorname{co}} S</math> will be compact whenever <math>S</math> is; an example this happens if and only if there exist real numbers <math>c,C > 0</math> such that <math display=inline>c\,q(x) \leq p(x) \leq C\,q(x)</math> for all <math>x \in X.</math> If <math>p</math> and <math>q</math> are two equivalent norms on a vector space <math>X</math> then <math>(X, p)</math> is a Banach space if and only if <math>(X, q)</math> is a Banach space.
See this footnote for an example of a continuous norm on a Banach space that is equivalent to that Banach space's given norm.
Complete norms vs complete metrics
A metric <math>D</math> on a vector space <math>X</math> is induced by a norm on <math>X</math> if and only if <math>D</math> is translation invariant for an example). In contrast, a theorem of Klee, which also applies to all metrizable topological vector spaces, implies that if there exists complete metric <math>D</math> on <math>X</math> that induces the norm topology <math>\tau</math> on <math>X,</math> then <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|)</math> is a Banach space.
A Fréchet space is a locally convex topological vector space whose topology is induced by some translation-invariant complete metric.
Every Banach space is a Fréchet space but not conversely; indeed, there even exist Fréchet spaces on which no norm is a continuous function (such as the space of real sequences <math displayinline>\R^{\N} \prod_{i \in \N} \R</math> with the product topology).
However, the topology of every Fréchet space is induced by some countable family of real-valued (necessarily continuous) maps called seminorms, which are generalizations of norms.
It is even possible for a Fréchet space to have a topology that is induced by a countable family of (such norms would necessarily be continuous)
but to not be a Banach/normable space because its topology can not be defined by any norm.
An example of such a space is the Fréchet space <math>C^{\infty}(K),</math> whose definition can be found in the article on spaces of test functions and distributions.
Complete norms vs complete topological vector spaces
There is another notion of completeness besides metric completeness and that is the notion of a complete topological vector space (TVS) or TVS-completeness, which uses the theory of uniform spaces.
Specifically, the notion of TVS-completeness uses a unique translation-invariant uniformity, called the canonical uniformity, that depends on vector subtraction and the topology <math>\tau</math> that the vector space is endowed with, and so in particular, this notion of TVS completeness is independent of whatever norm induced the topology <math>\tau</math> (and even applies to TVSs that are even metrizable).
Every Banach space is a complete TVS. Moreover, a normed space is a Banach space (that is, its norm-induced metric is complete) if and only if it is complete as a topological vector space.
If <math>(X, \tau)</math> is a metrizable topological vector space (such as any norm induced topology, for example), then <math>(X, \tau)</math> is a complete TVS if and only if it is a complete TVS, meaning that it is enough to check that every Cauchy in <math>(X, \tau)</math> converges in <math>(X, \tau)</math> to some point of <math>X</math> (that is, there is no need to consider the more general notion of arbitrary Cauchy nets).
If <math>(X, \tau)</math> is a topological vector space whose topology is induced by (possibly unknown) norm (such spaces are called ), then <math>(X, \tau)</math> is a complete topological vector space if and only if <math>X</math> may be assigned a norm <math>\|{\cdot}\|</math> that induces on <math>X</math> the topology <math>\tau</math> and also makes <math>(X, \|{\cdot}\|)</math> into a Banach space.
A Hausdorff locally convex topological vector space <math>X</math> is normable if and only if its strong dual space <math>X'_b</math> is normable, in which case <math>X'_b</math> is a Banach space (<math>X'_b</math> denotes the strong dual space of <math>X,</math> whose topology is a generalization of the dual norm-induced topology on the continuous dual space <math>X'</math>; see this footnote for more details).
If <math>X</math> is a metrizable locally convex TVS, then <math>X</math> is normable if and only if <math>X'_b</math> is a Fréchet–Urysohn space.
This shows that in the category of locally convex TVSs, Banach spaces are exactly those complete spaces that are both metrizable and have metrizable strong dual spaces.
Completions
Every normed space can be isometrically embedded onto a dense vector subspace of a Banach space, where this Banach space is called a completion of the normed space. This Hausdorff completion is unique up to isometric isomorphism.
More precisely, for every normed space <math>X,</math> there exists a Banach space <math>Y</math> and a mapping <math>T : X \to Y</math> such that <math>T</math> is an isometric mapping and <math>T(X)</math> is dense in <math>Y.</math> If <math>Z</math> is another Banach space such that there is an isometric isomorphism from <math>X</math> onto a dense subset of <math>Z,</math> then <math>Z</math> is isometrically isomorphic to <math>Y.</math>
The Banach space <math>Y</math> is the Hausdorff completion of the normed space <math>X.</math> The underlying metric space for <math>Y</math> is the same as the metric completion of <math>X,</math> with the vector space operations extended from <math>X</math> to <math>Y.</math> The completion of <math>X</math> is sometimes denoted by <math>\widehat{X}.</math>
General theory
Linear operators, isomorphisms
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If <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are normed spaces over the same ground field <math>\mathbb{K},</math> the set of all continuous <math>\mathbb{K}</math>-linear maps <math>T : X \to Y</math> is denoted by <math>B(X, Y).</math> In infinite-dimensional spaces, not all linear maps are continuous. A linear mapping from a normed space <math>X</math> to another normed space is continuous if and only if it is bounded on the closed unit ball of <math>X.</math> Thus, the vector space <math>B(X, Y)</math> can be given the operator norm
<math displayblock>\|T\| \sup \{\|Tx\|_Y \mid x\in X,\ \|x\|_X \leq 1\}.</math>
For <math>Y</math> a Banach space, the space <math>B(X, Y)</math> is a Banach space with respect to this norm. In categorical contexts, it is sometimes convenient to restrict the function space between two Banach spaces to only the short maps; in that case the space <math>B(X,Y)</math> reappears as a natural bifunctor.
If <math>X</math> is a Banach space, the space <math>B(X) = B(X, X)</math> forms a unital Banach algebra; the multiplication operation is given by the composition of linear maps.
If <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are normed spaces, they are isomorphic normed spaces if there exists a linear bijection <math>T : X \to Y</math> such that <math>T</math> and its inverse <math>T^{-1}</math> are continuous. If one of the two spaces <math>X</math> or <math>Y</math> is complete (or reflexive, separable, etc.) then so is the other space. Two normed spaces <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are isometrically isomorphic if in addition, <math>T</math> is an isometry, that is, <math>\|T(x)\| \|x\|</math> for every <math>x</math> in <math>X.</math> The Banach–Mazur distance <math>d(X, Y)</math> between two isomorphic but not isometric spaces <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> gives a measure of how much the two spaces <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> differ.Continuous and bounded linear functions and seminorms
Every continuous linear operator is a bounded linear operator and if dealing only with normed spaces then the converse is also true. That is, a linear operator between two normed spaces is bounded if and only if it is a continuous function. So in particular, because the scalar field (which is <math>\R</math> or <math>\Complex</math>) is a normed space, a linear functional on a normed space is a bounded linear functional if and only if it is a continuous linear functional. This allows for continuity-related results (like those below) to be applied to Banach spaces. Although boundedness is the same as continuity for linear maps between normed spaces, the term "bounded" is more commonly used when dealing primarily with Banach spaces.
If <math>f : X \to \R</math> is a subadditive function (such as a norm, a sublinear function, or real linear functional), then <math>f</math> is continuous at the origin if and only if <math>f</math> is uniformly continuous on all of <math>X</math>; and if in addition <math>f(0) 0</math> then <math>f</math> is continuous if and only if its absolute value <math>|f| : X \to [0, \infty)</math> is continuous, which happens if and only if <math>\{x \in X \mid |f(x)| < 1\}</math> is an open subset of <math>X.</math>
And very importantly for applying the Hahn–Banach theorem, a linear functional <math>f</math> is continuous if and only if this is true of its real part <math>\operatorname{Re} f</math> and moreover, <math>\|\operatorname{Re} f\| = \|f\|</math> and the real part <math>\operatorname{Re} f</math> completely determines <math>f,</math> which is why the Hahn–Banach theorem is often stated only for real linear functionals.
Also, a linear functional <math>f</math> on <math>X</math> is continuous if and only if the seminorm <math>|f|</math> is continuous, which happens if and only if there exists a continuous seminorm <math>p : X \to \R</math> such that <math>|f| \leq p</math>; this last statement involving the linear functional <math>f</math> and seminorm <math>p</math> is encountered in many versions of the Hahn–Banach theorem.
Basic notions
The Cartesian product <math>X \times Y</math> of two normed spaces is not canonically equipped with a norm. However, several equivalent norms are commonly used, such as
<math displayblock>\|(x, y)\|_1 \|x\| + \|y\|, \qquad \|(x, y)\|_\infty = \max(\|x\|, \|y\|)</math>
which correspond (respectively) to the coproduct and product in the category of Banach spaces and short maps (discussed above). The quotient map from <math>X</math> onto <math>X / M,</math> sending <math>x \in X</math> to its class <math>x + M,</math> is linear, onto, and of norm <math>1,</math> except when <math>M X,</math> in which case the quotient is the null space.
The closed linear subspace <math>M</math> of <math>X</math> is said to be a complemented subspace of <math>X</math> if <math>M</math> is the range of a surjective bounded linear projection <math>P : X \to M.</math> In this case, the space <math>X</math> is isomorphic to the direct sum of <math>M</math> and <math>\ker P,</math> the kernel of the projection <math>P.</math>
Suppose that <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are Banach spaces and that <math>T \in B(X, Y).</math> There exists a canonical factorization of <math>T</math> as of Banach spaces include: the Lp spaces <math>L^p</math> and their special cases, the sequence spaces <math>\ell^p</math> that consist of scalar sequences indexed by natural numbers <math>\N</math>; among them, the space <math>\ell^1</math> of absolutely summable sequences and the space <math>\ell^2</math> of square summable sequences; the space <math>c_0</math> of sequences tending to zero and the space <math>\ell^{\infty}</math> of bounded sequences; the space <math>C(K)</math> of continuous scalar functions on a compact Hausdorff space <math>K,</math> equipped with the max norm,
<math displayblock>\|f\|_{C(K)} \max \{ |f(x)| \mid x \in K \}, \quad f \in C(K).</math>
According to the Banach–Mazur theorem, every Banach space is isometrically isomorphic to a subspace of some <math>C(K).</math> For every separable Banach space <math>X,</math> there is a closed subspace <math>M</math> of <math>\ell^1</math> such that <math>X := \ell^1 / M.</math>
Any Hilbert space serves as an example of a Banach space. A Hilbert space <math>H</math> on <math>\mathbb{K} = \Reals, \Complex</math> is complete for a norm of the form
<math displayblock>\|x\|_H \sqrt{\langle x, x \rangle},</math>
where
<math display=block>\langle \cdot, \cdot \rangle : H \times H \to \mathbb{K}</math>
is the inner product, linear in its first argument that satisfies the following:
<math display=block>\begin{align}
\langle y, x \rangle &= \overline{\langle x, y \rangle}, \quad \text{ for all } x, y \in H \\
\langle x, x \rangle & \geq 0, \quad \text{ for all } x \in H \\
\langle x,x \rangle 0 \text{ if and only if } x & 0.
\end{align}</math>
For example, the space <math>L^2</math> is a Hilbert space.
The Hardy spaces, the Sobolev spaces are examples of Banach spaces that are related to <math>L^p</math> spaces and have additional structure. They are important in different branches of analysis, Harmonic analysis and Partial differential equations among others.
Banach algebras
A Banach algebra is a Banach space <math>A</math> over <math>\mathbb{K} \R</math> or <math>\Complex,</math> together with a structure of algebra over <math>\mathbb{K}</math>, such that the product map <math>A \times A \ni (a, b) \mapsto ab \in A</math> is continuous. An equivalent norm on <math>A</math> can be found so that <math>\|ab\| \leq \|a\| \|b\|</math> for all <math>a, b \in A.</math>Examples
* The Banach space <math>C(K)</math> with the pointwise product, is a Banach algebra.
* The disk algebra <math>A(\mathbf{D})</math> consists of functions holomorphic in the open unit disk <math>D \subseteq \Complex</math> and continuous on its closure: <math>\overline{\mathbf{D}}.</math> Equipped with the max norm on <math>\overline{\mathbf{D}},</math> the disk algebra <math>A(\mathbf{D})</math> is a closed subalgebra of <math>C\left(\overline{\mathbf{D}}\right).</math>
* The Wiener algebra <math>A(\mathbf{T})</math> is the algebra of functions on the unit circle <math>\mathbf{T}</math> with absolutely convergent Fourier series. Via the map associating a function on <math>\mathbf{T}</math> to the sequence of its Fourier coefficients, this algebra is isomorphic to the Banach algebra <math>\ell^1(Z),</math> where the product is the convolution of sequences.
* For every Banach space <math>X,</math> the space <math>B(X)</math> of bounded linear operators on <math>X,</math> with the composition of maps as product, is a Banach algebra.
* A C*-algebra is a complex Banach algebra <math>A</math> with an antilinear involution <math>a \mapsto a^*</math> such that <math>\|a^* a\| \|a\|^2.</math> The space <math>B(H)</math> of bounded linear operators on a Hilbert space <math>H</math> is a fundamental example of C*-algebra. The Gelfand–Naimark theorem states that every C*-algebra is isometrically isomorphic to a C*-subalgebra of some <math>B(H).</math> The space <math>C(K)</math> of complex continuous functions on a compact Hausdorff space <math>K</math> is an example of commutative C*-algebra, where the involution associates to every function <math>f</math> its complex conjugate <math>\overline{f}.</math>Dual space
If <math>X</math> is a normed space and <math>\mathbb{K}</math> the underlying field (either the reals or the complex numbers), the continuous dual space is the space of continuous linear maps from <math>X</math> into <math>\mathbb{K},</math> or continuous linear functionals.
The notation for the continuous dual is <math>X' = B(X, \mathbb{K})</math> in this article.
Since <math>\mathbb{K}</math> is a Banach space (using the absolute value as norm), the dual <math>X'</math> is a Banach space, for every normed space <math>X.</math> The Dixmier–Ng theorem characterizes the dual spaces of Banach spaces.
The main tool for proving the existence of continuous linear functionals is the Hahn–Banach theorem.
{{math theorem|nameHahn–Banach theorem|math_statementLet <math>X</math> be a vector space over the field <math>\mathbb{K} = \R, \Complex.</math> Let further
* <math>Y \subseteq X</math> be a linear subspace,
* <math>p : X \to \R</math> be a sublinear function and
* <math>f : Y \to \mathbb{K}</math> be a linear functional so that <math>\operatorname{Re}(f(y)) \leq p(y)</math> for all <math>y \in Y.</math>
Then, there exists a linear functional <math>F : X \to \mathbb{K}</math> so that <math displayblock>F\big\vert_Y f, \quad \text{ and } \quad \text{ for all } x \in X, \ \ \operatorname{Re}(F(x)) \leq p(x).</math>}}
In particular, every continuous linear functional on a subspace of a normed space can be continuously extended to the whole space, without increasing the norm of the functional.
An important special case is the following: for every vector <math>x</math> in a normed space <math>X,</math> there exists a continuous linear functional <math>f</math> on <math>X</math> such that
<math displayblock>f(x) \|x\|_X, \quad \|f\|_{X'} \leq 1.</math>
When <math>x</math> is not equal to the <math>\mathbf{0}</math> vector, the functional <math>f</math> must have norm one, and is called a norming functional for <math>x.</math>
The Hahn–Banach separation theorem states that two disjoint non-empty convex sets in a real Banach space, one of them open, can be separated by a closed affine hyperplane.
The open convex set lies strictly on one side of the hyperplane, the second convex set lies on the other side but may touch the hyperplane.
A subset <math>S</math> in a Banach space <math>X</math> is total if the linear span of <math>S</math> is dense in <math>X.</math> The subset <math>S</math> is total in <math>X</math> if and only if the only continuous linear functional that vanishes on <math>S</math> is the <math>\mathbf{0}</math> functional: this equivalence follows from the Hahn–Banach theorem.
If <math>X</math> is the direct sum of two closed linear subspaces <math>M</math> and <math>N,</math> then the dual <math>X'</math> of <math>X</math> is isomorphic to the direct sum of the duals of <math>M</math> and <math>N.</math>
If <math>M</math> is a closed linear subspace in <math>X,</math> one can associate the <math>M</math> in the dual,
<math displayblock>M^{\bot} \{ x' \in X \mid x'(m) = 0 \text{ for all } m \in M \}.</math>
The orthogonal <math>M^{\bot}</math> is a closed linear subspace of the dual. The dual of <math>M</math> is isometrically isomorphic to <math>X' / M^{\bot}.</math>
The dual of <math>X / M</math> is isometrically isomorphic to <math>M^{\bot}.</math>
The dual of a separable Banach space need not be separable, but:
When <math>X'</math> is separable, the above criterion for totality can be used for proving the existence of a countable total subset in <math>X.</math>
Weak topologies
The weak topology on a Banach space <math>X</math> is the coarsest topology on <math>X</math> for which all elements <math>x'</math> in the continuous dual space <math>X'</math> are continuous.
The norm topology is therefore finer than the weak topology.
It follows from the Hahn–Banach separation theorem that the weak topology is Hausdorff, and that a norm-closed convex subset of a Banach space is also weakly closed.
A norm-continuous linear map between two Banach spaces <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> is also weakly continuous, that is, continuous from the weak topology of <math>X</math> to that of <math>Y.</math>
If <math>X</math> is infinite-dimensional, there exist linear maps which are not continuous. The space <math>X^*</math> of all linear maps from <math>X</math> to the underlying field <math>\mathbb{K}</math> (this space <math>X^*</math> is called the algebraic dual space, to distinguish it from <math>X'</math> also induces a topology on <math>X</math> which is finer than the weak topology, and much less used in functional analysis.
On a dual space <math>X',</math> there is a topology weaker than the weak topology of <math>X',</math> called the weak* topology.
It is the coarsest topology on <math>X'</math> for which all evaluation maps <math>x' \in X' \mapsto x'(x),</math> where <math>x</math> ranges over <math>X,</math> are continuous.
Its importance comes from the Banach–Alaoglu theorem.
{{math theorem|nameBanach–Alaoglu theorem|math_statementLet <math>X</math> be a normed vector space. Then the closed unit ball <math>B = \{x \in X \mid \|x\| \leq 1\}</math> of the dual space is compact in the weak* topology.}}
The Banach–Alaoglu theorem can be proved using Tychonoff's theorem about infinite products of compact Hausdorff spaces.
When <math>X</math> is separable, the unit ball <math>B'</math> of the dual is a metrizable compact in the weak* topology.Examples of dual spacesThe dual of <math>c_0</math> is isometrically isomorphic to <math>\ell^1</math>: for every bounded linear functional <math>f</math> on <math>c_0,</math> there is a unique element <math>y \{y_n\} \in \ell^1</math> such that
<math displayblock>f(x) \sum_{n \in \N} x_n y_n, \qquad x \{x_n\} \in c_0, \ \ \text{and} \ \ \|f\|_{(c_0)'} \|y\|_{\ell_1}. </math>
The dual of <math>\ell^1</math> is isometrically isomorphic to <math>\ell^{\infty}</math>.
The dual of Lebesgue space <math>L^p([0, 1])</math> is isometrically isomorphic to <math>L^q([0, 1])</math> when <math>1 \leq p < \infty</math> and <math>\frac{1}{p} + \frac{1}{q} = 1.</math>
For every vector <math>y</math> in a Hilbert space <math>H,</math> the mapping
<math displayblock>x \in H \to f_y(x) \langle x, y \rangle</math>
defines a continuous linear functional <math>f_y</math> on <math>H.</math>The Riesz representation theorem states that every continuous linear functional on <math>H</math> is of the form <math>f_y</math> for a uniquely defined vector <math>y</math> in <math>H.</math>
The mapping <math>y \in H \to f_y</math> is an antilinear isometric bijection from <math>H</math> onto its dual <math>H'.</math>
When the scalars are real, this map is an isometric isomorphism.
When <math>K</math> is a compact Hausdorff topological space, the dual <math>M(K)</math> of <math>C(K)</math> is the space of Radon measures in the sense of Bourbaki.
The subset <math>P(K)</math> of <math>M(K)</math> consisting of non-negative measures of mass 1 (probability measures) is a convex w*-closed subset of the unit ball of <math>M(K).</math>
The extreme points of <math>P(K)</math> are the Dirac measures on <math>K.</math>
The set of Dirac measures on <math>K,</math> equipped with the w*-topology, is homeomorphic to <math>K.</math>
The result has been extended by Amir and Cambern to the case when the multiplicative Banach–Mazur distance between <math>C(K)</math> and <math>C(L)</math> is <math>< 2.</math>
The theorem is no longer true when the distance is <math> 2.</math>
In the commutative Banach algebra <math>C(K),</math> the maximal ideals are precisely kernels of Dirac measures on <math>K,</math>
<math displayblock>I_x \ker \delta_x \{f \in C(K) \mid f(x) 0\}, \quad x \in K.</math>
More generally, by the Gelfand–Mazur theorem, the maximal ideals of a unital commutative Banach algebra can be identified with its characters—not merely as sets but as topological spaces: the former with the hull-kernel topology and the latter with the w*-topology.
In this identification, the maximal ideal space can be viewed as a w*-compact subset of the unit ball in the dual <math>A'.</math>
Not every unital commutative Banach algebra is of the form <math>C(K)</math> for some compact Hausdorff space <math>K.</math> However, this statement holds if one places <math>C(K)</math> in the smaller category of commutative C*-algebras.
Gelfand's representation theorem for commutative C*-algebras states that every commutative unital C*-algebra <math>A</math> is isometrically isomorphic to a <math>C(K)</math> space.
The Hausdorff compact space <math>K</math> here is again the maximal ideal space, also called the spectrum of <math>A</math> in the C*-algebra context.
Bidual
If <math>X</math> is a normed space, the (continuous) dual <math>X''</math> of the dual <math>X'</math> is called the or of <math>X.</math>
For every normed space <math>X,</math> there is a natural map,
<math display="block>\begin{cases}
F_X\colon X \to X'' \\
F_X(x) (f) = f(x) & \text{ for all } x \in X, \text{ and for all } f \in X'
\end{cases}</math>
This defines <math>F_X(x)</math> as a continuous linear functional on <math>X',</math> that is, an element of <math>X.</math> The map <math>F_X \colon x \to F_X(x)</math> is a linear map from <math>X</math> to <math>X.</math>
As a consequence of the existence of a norming functional <math>f</math> for every <math>x \in X,</math> this map <math>F_X</math> is isometric, thus injective.
For example, the dual of <math>X = c_0</math> is identified with <math>\ell^1,</math> and the dual of <math>\ell^1</math> is identified with <math>\ell^{\infty},</math> the space of bounded scalar sequences.
Under these identifications, <math>F_X</math> is the inclusion map from <math>c_0</math> to <math>\ell^{\infty}.</math> It is indeed isometric, but not onto.
If <math>F_X</math> is surjective, then the normed space <math>X</math> is called reflexive (see below).
Being the dual of a normed space, the bidual <math>X</math> is complete, therefore, every reflexive normed space is a Banach space.
Using the isometric embedding <math>F_X,</math> it is customary to consider a normed space <math>X</math> as a subset of its bidual.
When <math>X</math> is a Banach space, it is viewed as a closed linear subspace of <math>X.</math> If <math>X</math> is not reflexive, the unit ball of <math>X</math> is a proper subset of the unit ball of <math>X.</math>
The Goldstine theorem states that the unit ball of a normed space is weakly*-dense in the unit ball of the bidual.
In other words, for every <math>x</math> in the bidual, there exists a net <math>(x_i)_{i \in I}</math> in <math>X</math> so that
<math display"block>\sup_{i \in I} \|x_i\| \leq \|x\|, \ \ x(f) \lim_i f(x_i), \quad f \in X'.</math>
The net may be replaced by a weakly*-convergent sequence when the dual <math>X'</math> is separable.
On the other hand, elements of the bidual of <math>\ell^1</math> that are not in <math>\ell^1</math> cannot be weak*-limit of in <math>\ell^1,</math> since <math>\ell^1</math> is weakly sequentially complete.
Banach's theorems
Here are the main general results about Banach spaces that go back to the time of Banach's book () and are related to the Baire category theorem.
According to this theorem, a complete metric space (such as a Banach space, a Fréchet space or an F-space) cannot be equal to a union of countably many closed subsets with empty interiors.
Therefore, a Banach space cannot be the union of countably many closed subspaces, unless it is already equal to one of them; a Banach space with a countable Hamel basis is finite-dimensional.
{{math theorem|nameBanach–Steinhaus Theorem|math_statementLet <math>X</math> be a Banach space and <math>Y</math> be a normed vector space. Suppose that <math>F</math> is a collection of continuous linear operators from <math>X</math> to <math>Y.</math> The uniform boundedness principle states that if for all <math>x</math> in <math>X</math> we have <math>\sup_{T \in F} \|T(x)\|_Y < \infty,</math> then <math>\sup_{T \in F} \|T\|_Y < \infty.</math>}}
The Banach–Steinhaus theorem is not limited to Banach spaces.
It can be extended for example to the case where <math>X</math> is a Fréchet space, provided the conclusion is modified as follows: under the same hypothesis, there exists a neighborhood <math>U</math> of <math>\mathbf{0}</math> in <math>X</math> such that all <math>T</math> in <math>F</math> are uniformly bounded on <math>U,</math>
<math display=block>\sup_{T \in F} \sup_{x \in U} \; \|T(x)\|_Y < \infty.</math>
This result is a direct consequence of the preceding Banach isomorphism theorem and of the canonical factorization of bounded linear maps.
This is another consequence of Banach's isomorphism theorem, applied to the continuous bijection from <math>M_1 \oplus \cdots \oplus M_n</math> onto <math>X</math> sending <math>m_1, \cdots, m_n</math> to the sum <math>m_1 + \cdots + m_n.</math>
Reflexivity
The normed space <math>X</math> is called reflexive when the natural map
<math displayblock>\begin{cases} F_X : X \to X'' \\ F_X(x) (f) f(x) & \text{ for all } x \in X, \text{ and for all } f \in X'\end{cases}</math>
is surjective. Reflexive normed spaces are Banach spaces.
This is a consequence of the Hahn–Banach theorem.
Further, by the open mapping theorem, if there is a bounded linear operator from the Banach space <math>X</math> onto the Banach space <math>Y,</math> then <math>Y</math> is reflexive.
Indeed, if the dual <math>Y'</math> of a Banach space <math>Y</math> is separable, then <math>Y</math> is separable.
If <math>X</math> is reflexive and separable, then the dual of <math>X'</math> is separable, so <math>X'</math> is separable.
Hilbert spaces are reflexive. The <math>L^p</math> spaces are reflexive when <math>1 < p < \infty.</math> More generally, uniformly convex spaces are reflexive, by the Milman–Pettis theorem.
The spaces <math>c_0, \ell^1, L^1([0, 1]), C([0, 1])</math> are not reflexive.
In these examples of non-reflexive spaces <math>X,</math> the bidual <math>X</math> is "much larger" than <math>X.</math>
Namely, under the natural isometric embedding of <math>X</math> into <math>X</math> given by the Hahn–Banach theorem, the quotient <math>X / X</math> is infinite-dimensional, and even nonseparable.
However, Robert C. James has constructed an example of a non-reflexive space, usually called "the James space" and denoted by <math>J,</math> such that the quotient <math>J / J</math> is one-dimensional.
Furthermore, this space <math>J</math> is isometrically isomorphic to its bidual.
When <math>X</math> is reflexive, it follows that all closed and bounded convex subsets of <math>X</math> are weakly compact.
In a Hilbert space <math>H,</math> the weak compactness of the unit ball is very often used in the following way: every bounded sequence in <math>H</math> has weakly convergent subsequences.
Weak compactness of the unit ball provides a tool for finding solutions in reflexive spaces to certain optimization problems.
For example, every convex continuous function on the unit ball <math>B</math> of a reflexive space attains its minimum at some point in <math>B.</math>
As a special case of the preceding result, when <math>X</math> is a reflexive space over <math>\R,</math> every continuous linear functional <math>f</math> in <math>X'</math> attains its maximum <math>\|f\|</math> on the unit ball of <math>X.</math>
The following theorem of Robert C. James provides a converse statement.
The theorem can be extended to give a characterization of weakly compact convex sets.
On every non-reflexive Banach space <math>X,</math> there exist continuous linear functionals that are not norm-attaining.
However, the Bishop–Phelps theorem states that norm-attaining functionals are norm dense in the dual <math>X'</math> of <math>X.</math>Weak convergences of sequences
A sequence <math>\{x_n\}</math> in a Banach space <math>X</math> is weakly convergent to a vector <math>x \in X</math> if <math>\{f(x_n)\}</math> converges to <math>f(x)</math> for every continuous linear functional <math>f</math> in the dual <math>X'.</math> The sequence <math>\{x_n\}</math> is a weakly Cauchy sequence if <math>\{f(x_n)\}</math> converges to a scalar limit <math>L(f)</math> for every <math>f</math> in <math>X'.</math>
A sequence <math>\{f_n\}</math> in the dual <math>X'</math> is weakly* convergent to a functional <math>f \in X'</math> if <math>f_n(x)</math> converges to <math>f(x)</math> for every <math>x</math> in <math>X.</math>
Weakly Cauchy sequences, weakly convergent and weakly* convergent sequences are norm bounded, as a consequence of the Banach–Steinhaus theorem.
When the sequence <math>\{x_n\}</math> in <math>X</math> is a weakly Cauchy sequence, the limit <math>L</math> above defines a bounded linear functional on the dual <math>X',</math> that is, an element <math>L</math> of the bidual of <math>X,</math> and <math>L</math> is the limit of <math>\{x_n\}</math> in the weak*-topology of the bidual.
The Banach space <math>X</math> is weakly sequentially complete if every weakly Cauchy sequence is weakly convergent in <math>X.</math>
It follows from the preceding discussion that reflexive spaces are weakly sequentially complete.
An orthonormal sequence in a Hilbert space is a simple example of a weakly convergent sequence, with limit equal to the <math>\mathbf{0}</math> vector.
The unit vector basis of <math>\ell^p</math> for <math>1 < p < \infty,</math> or of <math>c_0,</math> is another example of a weakly null sequence, that is, a sequence that converges weakly to <math>\mathbf{0}.</math>
For every weakly null sequence in a Banach space, there exists a sequence of convex combinations of vectors from the given sequence that is norm-converging to <math>\mathbf{0}.</math>
The unit vector basis of <math>\ell^1</math> is not weakly Cauchy.
Weakly Cauchy sequences in <math>\ell^1</math> are weakly convergent, since <math>L^1</math>-spaces are weakly sequentially complete.
Actually, weakly convergent sequences in <math>\ell^1</math> are norm convergent. This means that <math>\ell^1</math> satisfies Schur's property.
Results involving the basis
Weakly Cauchy sequences and the <math>\ell^1</math> basis are the opposite cases of the dichotomy established in the following deep result of H. P. Rosenthal.
{{math theorem| name Theorem | math_statement Let <math>\{x_n\}_{n \in \N}</math> be a bounded sequence in a Banach space. Either <math>\{x_n\}_{n \in \N}</math> has a weakly Cauchy subsequence, or it admits a subsequence equivalent to the standard unit vector basis of <math>\ell^1.</math>}}
A complement to this result is due to Odell and Rosenthal (1975).
{{math theorem| name Theorem | math_statement = Let <math>X</math> be a separable Banach space. The following are equivalent:
*The space <math>X</math> does not contain a closed subspace isomorphic to <math>\ell^1.</math>
*Every element of the bidual <math>X</math> is the weak*-limit of a sequence <math>\{x_n\}</math> in <math>X.</math>}}
By the Goldstine theorem, every element of the unit ball <math>B</math> of <math>X</math> is weak*-limit of a net in the unit ball of <math>X.</math> When <math>X</math> does not contain <math>\ell^1,</math> every element of <math>B</math> is weak*-limit of a in the unit ball of <math>X.</math>
When the Banach space <math>X</math> is separable, the unit ball of the dual <math>X',</math> equipped with the weak*-topology, is a metrizable compact space <math>K,</math>Sequences, weak and weak* compactnessWhen <math>X</math> is separable, the unit ball of the dual is weak*-compact by the Banach–Alaoglu theorem and metrizable for the weak* topology, If the dual <math>X'</math> is separable, the weak topology of the unit ball of <math>X</math> is metrizable.
This applies in particular to separable reflexive Banach spaces.
Although the weak topology of the unit ball is not metrizable in general, one can characterize weak compactness using sequences.
{{math theorem| name Eberlein–Šmulian theorem | math_statement A set <math>A</math> in a Banach space is relatively weakly compact if and only if every sequence <math>\{a_n\}</math> in <math>A</math> has a weakly convergent subsequence.}}
A Banach space <math>X</math> is reflexive if and only if each bounded sequence in <math>X</math> has a weakly convergent subsequence.
A weakly compact subset <math>A</math> in <math>\ell^1</math> is norm-compact. Indeed, every sequence in <math>A</math> has weakly convergent subsequences by Eberlein–Šmulian, that are norm convergent by the Schur property of <math>\ell^1.</math>
Type and cotype
A way to classify Banach spaces is through the probabilistic notion of type and cotype, these two measure how far a Banach space is from a Hilbert space.
Schauder bases
A Schauder basis in a Banach space <math>X</math> is a sequence <math>\{e_n\}_{n \geq 0}</math> of vectors in <math>X</math> with the property that for every vector <math>x \in X,</math> there exist defined scalars <math>\{x_n\}_{n \geq 0}</math> depending on <math>x,</math> such that
<math displayblock>x \sum_{n0}^{\infty} x_n e_n, \quad \textit{i.e.,} \quad x \lim_n P_n(x), \ P_n(x) :\sum_{k0}^n x_k e_k.</math>
Banach spaces with a Schauder basis are necessarily separable, because the countable set of finite linear combinations with rational coefficients (say) is dense.
It follows from the Banach–Steinhaus theorem that the linear mappings <math>\{P_n\}</math> are uniformly bounded by some constant <math>C.</math>
Let <math>\{e_n^*\}</math> denote the coordinate functionals which assign to every <math>x</math> in <math>X</math> the coordinate <math>x_n</math> of <math>x</math> in the above expansion.
They are called biorthogonal functionals. When the basis vectors have norm <math>1,</math> the coordinate functionals <math>\{e_n^*\}</math> have norm <math>{}\leq 2 C</math> in the dual of <math>X.</math>
Most classical separable spaces have explicit bases.
The Haar system <math>\{h_n\}</math> is a basis for <math>L^p([0, 1])</math> when <math>1 \leq p < \infty.</math>
The trigonometric system is a basis in <math>L^p(\mathbf{T})</math> when <math>1 < p < \infty.</math>
The Schauder system is a basis in the space <math>C([0, 1]).</math>
The question of whether the disk algebra <math>A(\mathbf{D})</math> has a basis remained open for more than forty years, until Bočkarev showed in 1974 that <math>A(\mathbf{D})</math> admits a basis constructed from the Franklin system.
Since every vector <math>x</math> in a Banach space <math>X</math> with a basis is the limit of <math>P_n(x),</math> with <math>P_n</math> of finite rank and uniformly bounded, the space <math>X</math> satisfies the bounded approximation property.
The first example by Enflo of a space failing the approximation property was at the same time the first example of a separable Banach space without a Schauder basis.
Robert C. James characterized reflexivity in Banach spaces with a basis: the space <math>X</math> with a Schauder basis is reflexive if and only if the basis is both shrinking and boundedly complete.
In this case, the biorthogonal functionals form a basis of the dual of <math>X.</math>
Tensor product
Let <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> be two <math>\mathbb{K}</math>-vector spaces. The tensor product <math>X \otimes Y</math> of <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> is a <math>\mathbb{K}</math>-vector space <math>Z</math> with a bilinear mapping <math>T : X \times Y \to Z</math> which has the following universal property:
:If <math>T_1 : X \times Y \to Z_1</math> is any bilinear mapping into a <math>\mathbb{K}</math>-vector space <math>Z_1,</math> then there exists a unique linear mapping <math>f : Z \to Z_1</math> such that <math>T_1 = f \circ T.</math>
The image under <math>T</math> of a couple <math>(x, y)</math> in <math>X \times Y</math> is denoted by <math>x \otimes y,</math> and called a simple tensor.
Every element <math>z</math> in <math>X \otimes Y</math> is a finite sum of such simple tensors.
There are various norms that can be placed on the tensor product of the underlying vector spaces, amongst others the projective cross norm and injective cross norm introduced by A. Grothendieck in 1955.
In general, the tensor product of complete spaces is not complete again. When working with Banach spaces, it is customary to say that the projective tensor product of two Banach spaces <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> is the <math>X \widehat{\otimes}_\pi Y</math> of the algebraic tensor product <math>X \otimes Y</math> equipped with the projective tensor norm, and similarly for the injective tensor product <math>X \widehat{\otimes}_\varepsilon Y.</math>
Grothendieck proved in particular that
<math display=block>\begin{align}
C(K) \widehat{\otimes}_\varepsilon Y &\simeq C(K, Y), \\
L^1([0, 1]) \widehat{\otimes}_\pi Y &\simeq L^1([0, 1], Y),
\end{align}</math>
where <math>K</math> is a compact Hausdorff space, <math>C(K, Y)</math> the Banach space of continuous functions from <math>K</math> to <math>Y</math> and <math>L^1([0, 1], Y)</math> the space of Bochner-measurable and integrable functions from <math>[0, 1]</math> to <math>Y,</math> and where the isomorphisms are isometric.
The two isomorphisms above are the respective extensions of the map sending the tensor <math>f \otimes y</math> to the vector-valued function <math>s \in K \to f(s) y \in Y.</math>
Tensor products and the approximation property
Let <math>X</math> be a Banach space. The tensor product <math>X' \widehat \otimes_\varepsilon X</math> is identified isometrically with the closure in <math>B(X)</math> of the set of finite rank operators.
When <math>X</math> has the approximation property, this closure coincides with the space of compact operators on <math>X.</math>
For every Banach space <math>Y,</math> there is a natural norm <math>1</math> linear map
<math display=block>Y \widehat\otimes_\pi X \to Y \widehat\otimes_\varepsilon X</math>
obtained by extending the identity map of the algebraic tensor product. Grothendieck related the approximation problem to the question of whether this map is one-to-one when <math>Y</math> is the dual of <math>X.</math>
Precisely, for every Banach space <math>X,</math> the map
<math display=block>X' \widehat \otimes_\pi X \ \longrightarrow X' \widehat \otimes_\varepsilon X</math>
is one-to-one if and only if <math>X</math> has the approximation property.
Grothendieck conjectured that <math>X \widehat{\otimes}_\pi Y</math> and <math>X \widehat{\otimes}_\varepsilon Y</math> must be different whenever <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are infinite-dimensional Banach spaces.
This was disproved by Gilles Pisier in 1983.
Pisier constructed an infinite-dimensional Banach space <math>X</math> such that <math>X \widehat{\otimes}_\pi X</math> and <math>X \widehat{\otimes}_\varepsilon X</math> are equal. Furthermore, just as Enflo's example, this space <math>X</math> is a "hand-made" space that fails to have the approximation property. On the other hand, Szankowski proved that the classical space <math>B(\ell^2)</math> does not have the approximation property.
Some classification results
Characterizations of Hilbert space among Banach spaces
A necessary and sufficient condition for the norm of a Banach space <math>X</math> to be associated to an inner product is the parallelogram identity:
It follows, for example, that the Lebesgue space <math>L^p([0, 1])</math> is a Hilbert space only when <math>p = 2.</math>
If this identity is satisfied, the associated inner product is given by the polarization identity. In the case of real scalars, this gives:
<math displayblock>\langle x, y\rangle \tfrac{1}{4}(\|x+y\|^2 - \|x-y\|^2).</math>
For complex scalars, defining the inner product so as to be <math>\Complex</math>-linear in <math>x,</math> antilinear in <math>y,</math> the polarization identity gives:
<math displayblock>\langle x,y\rangle \tfrac{1}{4}\left(\|x+y\|^2 - \|x-y\|^2 + i(\|x+iy\|^2 - \|x-iy\|^2)\right).</math>
To see that the parallelogram law is sufficient, one observes in the real case that <math>\langle x, y \rangle</math> is symmetric, and in the complex case, that it satisfies the Hermitian symmetry property and <math>\langle i x, y \rangle = i \langle x, y \rangle.</math> The parallelogram law implies that <math>\langle x, y \rangle</math> is additive in <math>x.</math>
It follows that it is linear over the rationals, thus linear by continuity.
Several characterizations of spaces isomorphic (rather than isometric) to Hilbert spaces are available.
The parallelogram law can be extended to more than two vectors, and weakened by the introduction of a two-sided inequality with a constant <math>c \geq 1</math>: Kwapień proved that if
<math displayblock>c^{-2} \sum_{k1}^n \|x_k\|^2 \leq \operatorname{Ave}_{\pm} \left\|\sum_{k1}^n \pm x_k\right\|^2 \leq c^2 \sum_{k1}^n \|x_k\|^2</math>
for every integer <math>n</math> and all families of vectors <math>\{x_1, \ldots, x_n\} \subseteq X,</math> then the Banach space <math>X</math> is isomorphic to a Hilbert space.
Here, <math>\operatorname{Ave}_{\pm}</math> denotes the average over the <math>2^n</math> possible choices of signs <math>\pm 1.</math>
In the same article, Kwapień proved that the validity of a Banach-valued Parseval's theorem for the Fourier transform characterizes Banach spaces isomorphic to Hilbert spaces.
Lindenstrauss and Tzafriri proved that a Banach space in which every closed linear subspace is complemented (that is, is the range of a bounded linear projection) is isomorphic to a Hilbert space. The proof rests upon Dvoretzky's theorem about Euclidean sections of high-dimensional centrally symmetric convex bodies. In other words, Dvoretzky's theorem states that for every integer <math>n,</math> any finite-dimensional normed space, with dimension sufficiently large compared to <math>n,</math> contains subspaces nearly isometric to the <math>n</math>-dimensional Euclidean space.
The next result gives the solution of the so-called . An infinite-dimensional Banach space <math>X</math> is said to be homogeneous if it is isomorphic to all its infinite-dimensional closed subspaces. A Banach space isomorphic to <math>\ell^2</math> is homogeneous, and Banach asked for the converse.
An infinite-dimensional Banach space is hereditarily indecomposable when no subspace of it can be isomorphic to the direct sum of two infinite-dimensional Banach spaces.
The Gowers dichotomy theorem
If <math>X</math> is homogeneous, it must therefore have an unconditional basis. It follows then from the partial solution obtained by Komorowski and Tomczak–Jaegermann, for spaces with an unconditional basis, that <math>X</math> is isomorphic to <math>\ell^2.</math>Metric classification
If <math>T : X \to Y</math> is an isometry from the Banach space <math>X</math> onto the Banach space <math>Y</math> (where both <math>X</math> and <math>Y</math> are vector spaces over <math>\R</math>), then the Mazur–Ulam theorem states that <math>T</math> must be an affine transformation.
In particular, if <math>T(0_X) 0_Y,</math> this is <math>T</math> maps the zero of <math>X</math> to the zero of <math>Y,</math> then <math>T</math> must be linear. This result implies that the metric in Banach spaces, and more generally in normed spaces, completely captures their linear structure.Topological classification
Finite dimensional Banach spaces are homeomorphic as topological spaces, if and only if they have the same dimension as real vector spaces.
Anderson–Kadec theorem (1965–66) proves that any two infinite-dimensional separable Banach spaces are homeomorphic as topological spaces. Kadec's theorem was extended by Torunczyk, who proved that any two Banach spaces are homeomorphic if and only if they have the same density character, the minimum cardinality of a dense subset.
Spaces of continuous functions
When two compact Hausdorff spaces <math>K_1</math> and <math>K_2</math> are homeomorphic, the Banach spaces <math>C(K_1)</math> and <math>C(K_2)</math> are isometric. Conversely, when <math>K_1</math> is not homeomorphic to <math>K_2,</math> the (multiplicative) Banach–Mazur distance between <math>C(K_1)</math> and <math>C(K_2)</math> must be greater than or equal to <math>2,</math> see above the results by Amir and Cambern.
Although uncountable compact metric spaces can have different homeomorphy types, one has the following result due to Milutin:
The situation is different for countably infinite compact Hausdorff spaces.
Every countably infinite compact <math>K</math> is homeomorphic to some closed interval of ordinal numbers
<math displayblock>\langle 1, \alpha \rangle \{ \gamma \mid 1 \leq \gamma \leq \alpha\}</math>
equipped with the order topology, where <math>\alpha</math> is a countably infinite ordinal.
The Banach space <math>C(K)</math> is then isometric to . When <math>\alpha, \beta</math> are two countably infinite ordinals, and assuming <math>\alpha \leq \beta,</math> the spaces and are isomorphic if and only if .
For example, the Banach spaces
<math display=block>C(\langle 1, \omega\rangle), \ C(\langle 1, \omega^{\omega} \rangle), \ C(\langle 1, \omega^{\omega^2}\rangle), \ C(\langle 1, \omega^{\omega^3} \rangle), \cdots, C(\langle 1, \omega^{\omega^\omega} \rangle), \cdots</math>
are mutually non-isomorphic.
Examples
Derivatives
Several concepts of a derivative may be defined on a Banach space. See the articles on the Fréchet derivative and the Gateaux derivative for details.
The Fréchet derivative allows for an extension of the concept of a total derivative to Banach spaces. The Gateaux derivative allows for an extension of a directional derivative to locally convex topological vector spaces.
Fréchet differentiability is a stronger condition than Gateaux differentiability.
The quasi-derivative is another generalization of directional derivative that implies a stronger condition than Gateaux differentiability, but a weaker condition than Fréchet differentiability.
Generalizations
Several important spaces in functional analysis, for instance the space of all infinitely often differentiable functions <math>\R \to \R,</math> or the space of all distributions on <math>\R,</math> are complete but are not normed vector spaces and hence not Banach spaces.
In Fréchet spaces one still has a complete metric, while LF-spaces are complete uniform vector spaces arising as limits of Fréchet spaces.
See also
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category:Functional analysis
Category:Science and technology in Poland
Category:Topological vector spaces | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banach_space | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.689725 |
3992 | Bram Stoker | | pseudonym = Bram Stoker
| birth_name = Abraham Stoker
| birth_date
| birth_place = Clontarf, Dublin, Ireland
| death_date
| death_place = Pimlico, London, England
| occupation = Novelist, personal assistant, business manager
| language = English
| nationality = Irish
| alma_mater = Trinity College, Dublin (BA, MA)
| period = Victorian era, Edwardian era
| genre = Gothic fiction, romantic fiction
| movement = Dark romanticism
| notableworks = Dracula (1897)
| spouse =
| children = 1
| signature = Bram Stoker signature.svg
| website =
}}
Abraham Stoker (8 November 1847 – 20 April 1912), popularly known as Bram Stoker, was an Irish author who wrote the 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula. The book is widely considered a milestone in Vampire fiction, and one of the most famous works of English literature. The character of Count Dracula ranks among the most iconic fictional figures of the entire Victorian era, and led to countless adaptations of the character for films, movies, plays, comics, and stage performances.
During his life, he was better known as the personal assistant of the actor Sir Henry Irving and business manager of the West End's Lyceum Theatre, which Irving owned. Stoker was also a distant relative of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the author of the detective Sherlock Holmes series. The two novelists regularly collaborated in writing other novels, such as The Fate of Fenella in 1892.
In his early years, Stoker worked as a theatre critic for an Irish newspaper and wrote stories as well as commentaries. He also enjoyed travelling, particularly to Cruden Bay in Scotland where he set two of his novels and drew inspiration for writing Dracula. He died on 20 April 1912 due to locomotor ataxia and was cremated in north London. Since his death, his magnum opus Dracula has become one of the best-selling works of vampire literature, and a classic of the genre.
Early life
Stoker was born on 8 November 1847 at 15 Marino Crescent, Clontarf, in Dublin, Ireland.<!-- Note, as location has led to multiple edits: The location was, and is, in the Civil Parish of Clontarf. Clontarf extends to the east side of Malahide Road and borders Marino. Fairview is further west commencing just after Marino Mart.--> The park adjacent to the house is now known as Bram Stoker Park. His parents were Abraham Stoker (1799–1876), an Anglo-Irishman from Dublin and Charlotte Mathilda Blake Thornley (1818–1901), of English and Irish descent, who was raised in County Sligo. Stoker was the third of seven children, the eldest of whom was Sir Thornley Stoker, 1st Baronet. Abraham and Charlotte were members of the Church of Ireland Parish of Clontarf and attended the parish church with their children, who were baptised there. Abraham was a senior civil servant.
Stoker was bedridden with an unknown illness until he started school at the age of seven when he made a complete recovery. Of this time, Stoker wrote, "I was naturally thoughtful, and the leisure of long illness gave opportunity for many thoughts which were fruitful according to their kind in later years." He was privately educated at Bective House school run by the Reverend William Woods.
After his recovery, he grew up without further serious illnesses, even excelling as an athlete at Trinity College, Dublin, which he attended from 1864 to 1870. He graduated with a BA in 1870 and paid to receive his MA in 1875. Though he later in life recalled graduating "with honours in mathematics", this appears to have been a mistake. He was named University Athlete, participating in multiple sports, including playing rugby for Dublin University. He was auditor of the College Historical Society (the Hist) and president of the University Philosophical Society (he remains the only student in Trinity's history to hold both positions), where his first paper was on Sensationalism in Fiction and Society.
Early career
, Dublin]]
Stoker became interested in the theatre while a student through his friend Dr. Maunsell. While working for the Irish Civil Service, he became the theatre critic for the Dublin Evening Mail, which was co-owned by Sheridan Le Fanu, an author of Gothic tales. Theatre critics were held in low esteem at the time, but Stoker attracted notice by the quality of his reviews. In December 1876, he gave a favourable review of Henry Irving's Hamlet at the Theatre Royal in Dublin. Irving invited Stoker for dinner at the Shelbourne Hotel where he was staying, and they became friends. Stoker also wrote stories, and "Crystal Cup" was published by the London Society in 1872, followed by "The Chain of Destiny" in four parts in The Shamrock. In 1876, while a civil servant in Dublin, Stoker wrote the non-fiction book The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland (published 1879), which remained a standard work. Stoker had known Wilde from his student days, having proposed him for membership of the university's Philosophical Society while he was president. Wilde was upset at Florence's decision, but Stoker later resumed the acquaintanceship, and, after Wilde's fall, visited him on the Continent.
The Stokers moved to London, where Stoker became acting manager and then business manager of Irving's Lyceum Theatre in the West End, a post he held for 27 years. On 31 December 1879, Bram and Florence's only child was born, a son whom they christened Irving Noel Thornley Stoker. The collaboration with Henry Irving was important for Stoker and through him, he became involved in London's high society, where he met James Abbott McNeill Whistler and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (to whom he was distantly related). Working for Irving, the most famous actor of his time, and managing one of the most successful theatres in London made Stoker a notable if busy man. He was dedicated to Irving and his memoirs show he idolised him. In London, Stoker also met Hall Caine, who became one of his closest friends – he dedicated Dracula to him.
In the course of Irving's tours, Stoker travelled the world, although he never visited Eastern Europe, a setting for his most famous novel. Stoker enjoyed the United States, where Irving was popular. With Irving, he was invited twice to the White House and knew William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. Stoker set two of his novels in America and used Americans as characters, the most notable being Quincey Morris. He also met one of his literary idols, Walt Whitman, having written to him in 1872 an extraordinary letter that some have interpreted as the expression of a deeply-suppressed homosexuality. Bram Stoker in Cruden Bay
, Cruden Bay. The early chapters of Dracula were written in Cruden Bay, and Slains Castle possibly provided visual inspiration for Bram Stoker during the writing phase.]]
Stoker was a regular visitor to Cruden Bay in Scotland between 1892 and 1910. His month-long holidays to the Aberdeenshire coastal village provided a large portion of available time for writing his books. Two novels were set in Cruden Bay: ''The Watter's Mou' (1895) and The Mystery of the Sea (1902). He started writing Dracula there in 1895 while in residence at the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel. The guest book with his signatures from 1894 and 1895 still survives. The nearby Slains Castle (also known as New Slains Castle) is linked with Bram Stoker and plausibly provided the visual palette for the descriptions of Castle Dracula during the writing phase. A distinctive room in Slains Castle, the octagonal hall, matches the description of the octagonal room in Castle Dracula.Writings
, North Yorkshire, the English coastal town frequented by Stoker, and where Count Dracula comes ashore in Dracula]]
Stoker visited the English coastal town of Whitby in 1890, and that visit was said to be part of the inspiration for Dracula, staying at a guesthouse in West Cliff at 6 Royal Crescent, doing his research at the public library at 7 Pier Road (now Quayside Fish and Chips''). Count Dracula comes ashore at Whitby, and in the shape of a black dog runs up the 199 steps to the graveyard of St Mary's Church in the shadow of the Whitby Abbey ruins. Stoker began writing novels while working as manager for Irving and secretary and director of London's Lyceum Theatre, beginning with ''The Snake's Pass in 1890 and Dracula in 1897. During this period, he was part of the literary staff of The Daily Telegraph in London, and he wrote other fiction, including the horror novels The Lady of the Shroud (1909) and The Lair of the White Worm (1911). However this claim has been challenged by many including Elizabeth Miller, a professor who, since 1990, has had as her major field of research and writing Dracula, and its author, sources, and influences. She has stated, "The only comment about the subject matter of the talk was that Vambery 'spoke loudly against Russian aggression.'" There had been nothing in their conversations about the "tales of the terrible Dracula" that are supposed to have "inspired Stoker to equate his vampire-protagonist with the long-dead tyrant." At any rate, by this time, Stoker's novel was well underway, and he was already using the name Dracula for his vampire. Stoker then spent several years researching Central and East European folklore and mythological stories of vampires.
The 1972 book In Search of Dracula by Radu Florescu and Raymond McNally claimed that the Count in Stoker's novel was based on Vlad III Dracula. However, according to Elizabeth Miller, Stoker borrowed only the name and "scraps of miscellaneous information" about Romanian history; further, there are no comments about Vlad III in the author's working notes.
Dracula is an epistolary novel, written as a collection of realistic but completely fictional diary entries, telegrams, letters, ship's logs, and newspaper clippings, all of which added a level of detailed realism to the story, a skill which Stoker had developed as a newspaper writer. At the time of its publication, Dracula was considered a "straightforward horror novel" based on imaginary creations of supernatural life. They are classified alongside other works of popular fiction, such as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which also used the myth-making and story-telling method of having multiple narrators telling the same tale from different perspectives. According to historian Jules Zanger, this leads the reader to the assumption that "they can't all be lying".
The original 541-page typescript of Dracula was believed to have been lost until it was found in a barn in northwestern Pennsylvania in the early 1980s. It consisted of typed sheets with many emendations, and handwritten on the title page was "THE UN-DEAD." The author's name was shown at the bottom as Bram Stoker. Author Robert Latham remarked: "the most famous horror novel ever published, its title changed at the last minute". The typescript was purchased by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen.
Stoker's inspirations for the story, in addition to Whitby, may have included a visit to Slains Castle in Aberdeenshire, a visit to the crypts of St. Michan's Church in Dublin, and the novella Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu.
Stoker's original research notes for the novel are kept by the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia. A facsimile edition of the notes was created by Elizabeth Miller and Robert Eighteen-Bisang in 1998.
Stoker at the London Library
Stoker was a member of the London Library and conducted much of the research for Dracula there. In 2018, the Library discovered some of the books that Stoker used for his research, complete with notes and marginalia.
Death
]]
After suffering a number of strokes, Stoker died at No. 26 St George's Square, London on 20 April 1912. Some biographers attribute the cause of death to overwork, others to tertiary syphilis. His death certificate listed the cause of death as "Locomotor ataxia 6 months", presumed to be a reference to syphilis. He was cremated, and his ashes were placed in a display urn at Golders Green Crematorium in north London. The ashes of Irving Noel Stoker, the author's son, were added to his father's urn following his death in 1961. The original plan had been to keep his parents' ashes together, but after Florence Stoker's death, her ashes were scattered at the Gardens of Rest. His ashes are still stored in Golders Green Crematorium today.Beliefs and philosophyStoker was raised a Protestant in the Church of Ireland. He was a strong supporter of the Liberal Party and took a keen interest in Irish affairs.
Stoker believed in progress and took a keen interest in science and science-based medicine. Some of Stoker's novels represent early examples of science fiction, such as The Lady of the Shroud (1909). He had a writer's interest in the occult, notably mesmerism, but despised fraud and believed in the superiority of the scientific method over superstition. Stoker counted among his friends J. W. Brodie-Innis, a member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and hired member Pamela Colman Smith as an artist for the Lyceum Theatre, but no evidence suggests that Stoker ever joined the Order himself.
Like Irving, who was an active Freemason, Stoker also became a member of the order, "initiated into Freemasonry in Buckingham and Chandos Lodge No. 1150 in February 1883, passed in April of that same year, and raised to the degree of Master Mason on 20 June 1883." Stoker however was not a particular active Freemason, spent only six years as an active member, and did not take part in any Masonic activities during his time in London.
Posthumous
The short story collection ''Dracula's Guest and Other Weird Stories'' was published in 1914 by Stoker's widow, Florence Stoker, who was also his literary executrix. The first film adaptation of Dracula was F. W. Murnau's Nosferatu, released in 1922, with Max Schreck starring as Count Orlok. Florence Stoker eventually sued the filmmakers and was represented by the attorneys of the British Incorporated Society of Authors. Her chief legal complaint was that she had neither been asked for permission for the adaptation nor paid any royalty. The case dragged on for some years, with Mrs. Stoker demanding the destruction of the negative and all prints of the film. The suit was finally resolved in the widow's favour in July 1925. A single print of the film survived, however, and it has become well known. The first authorised film version of Dracula did not come about until almost a decade later when Universal Studios released Tod Browning's Dracula starring Bela Lugosi.
Dacre Stoker
Canadian writer Dacre Stoker, a great-grandnephew of Bram Stoker, decided to write "a sequel that bore the Stoker name" to "reestablish creative control over" the original novel, with encouragement from screenwriter Ian Holt, because of the Stokers' frustrating history with ''Dracula's copyright. In 2009, Dracula: The Un-Dead'' was released, written by Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt. Both writers "based [their work] on Bram Stoker's own handwritten notes for characters and plot threads excised from the original edition" along with their own research for the sequel. This also marked Dacre Stoker's writing debut.
In spring 2012, Dacre Stoker in collaboration with Elizabeth Miller presented the "lost" Dublin Journal written by Bram Stoker, which had been kept by his great-grandson Noel Dobbs. Stoker's diary entries shed a light on the issues that concerned him before his London years. A remark about a boy who caught flies in a bottle might be a clue for the later development of the Renfield character in Dracula.
Commemorations
On 8 November 2012, Stoker was honoured with a Google Doodle on Google's homepage commemorating the 165th anniversary of his birth.
An annual festival takes place in Dublin, the birthplace of Bram Stoker, in honour of his literary achievements. The Dublin City Council Bram Stoker Festival encompasses spectacles, literary events, film, family-friendly activities and outdoor events, and takes place every October Bank Holiday Weekend in Dublin. The festival is supported by the Bram Stoker Estate and is funded by Dublin City Council.
Bibliography
Novels
* The Primrose Path (1875)
* The Chain of Destiny (novella) (1875)
* ''The Snake's Pass (1890)
* The Watter's Mou' (novella) (1895)
* The Shoulder of Shasta (1895)
* Dracula (1897)
* Miss Betty (1898)
* The Mystery of the Sea (1902)
* The Jewel of Seven Stars (1903, revised 1912)
* The Man (1905); issued also as The Gates of Life
* Lady Athlyne (1908)
* The Lady of the Shroud (1909)
* The Lair of the White Worm (1911, posthumously abridged 1925); issued also as The Garden of Evil
Short story collections
* Under the Sunset (1881) – eight fairy tales for children
* Snowbound: The Record of a Theatrical Touring Party (1908)
* Dracula's Guest and Other Weird Stories (1914)
Uncollected stories
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! scope="col" | Title
! scope="col" | Date of earliest appearance
! scope="col" | Earliest appearance
! scope="col" | Notes
|-
|"The Crystal Cup"
|September 1872
|London Society (London)
|
|-
|"Buried Treasures"
|13 March 1875 and 20 March 1875
|The Shamrock (Dublin)
|
|-
|"The Chain of Destiny"
|1 May 1875 and 22 May 1875
|The Shamrock (Dublin)
|
|-
|"Our New House"
|23 November 1885
|The Theatre Annual (London)
|
|-
|"The Dualitists; or, The Death Doom of the Double Born"
|November 1886
|The Theatre Annual (London)
|
|-
|"The Gombeen Man"
|1890
|The People (London)
|Chapter 3 of The Snake's Pass
|-
|"Gibbet Hill"
|17 December 1890
|Daily Express (Dublin)
|
|-
|"The Night of the Shifting Bog"
|January 1891
|Current Literature: A Magazine of Record and Review, Vol. VI, No. 1. (New York)
|Chapter 17 of The Snake's Pass
|-
|"Lord Castleton Explains"
|30 January 1892
|The Gentlewoman: The Illustrated Weekly Journal for Gentlewomen (London)
|Chapter 10 of The Fate of Fenella (Hutchinson, 1892)
|-
|"Old Hoggen: A Mystery"
|15 January 1893
|Boston Herald
|
|-
|"The Man from Shorrox"
|February 1894
|The Pall Mall Magazine (London)
|
|-
|"When the Sky Rains Gold"
|26 August and 2 September 1894
|Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper (London)
|
|-
|"The Red Stockade"
|September 1894
|The Cosmopolitan: An Illustrated Monthly Magazine'' (London)
|
|-
|"At the Watter's Mou': Between Duty and Love"
|November 1895
|Current Literature: A Magazine of Record and Review, Vol. XVIII, No. 5. (New York)
|Part of Chapter 2 of ''The Watter's Mou'
|-
|"Bengal Roses"
|17 and 24 July 1898
|Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper
|
|-
|"A Baby Passenger"
|9 February 1899
|Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper
|Alternate version of "Chin Music", from Snowbound
|-
|"A Young Widow"
|26 March 1899
|Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper
|
|-
|"A Yellow Duster"
|7 May 1899
|Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper
|
|-
|"Lucky Escapes of Sir Henry Irving"
|1 May 1900
|The St. Paul Globe
|
|-
|"The Seer"
|1902
|The Mystery of the Sea (New York: Doubleday, Page & Co.)
|Chapters 1 and 2 of The Mystery of the Sea
|-
|"The Bridal of Death"
|1903
|The Jewel of the Seven Stars (London: William Heinemann)
|Alternate ending to The Jewel of Seven Stars''
|-
|"A Widower's Grief"
|October 1906
|Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving (London: William Heinemann)
|Part of Chapter 39 of Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving
|-
|"To the Rescue"
|22 April 1908
|The Westminster Gazette
|
|-
|"The 'Eroes of the Thames"
|October 1908
|The Royal Magazine (London)
|
|-
|"What They Confessed: A Low Comedian's Story"
|27 December 1908
|''Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper
|Alternate version of "In Fear of Death", from Snowbound
|-
|"The Way of Peace"
|December 1909
|Everybody's Story Magazine (London)
|
|-
|"Greater Love"
|October 1914
|The London Magazine (London)
|
|}
Non-fiction
* The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland (1879)
* A Glimpse of America (1886)
* Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving (1906)
* Famous Impostors (1910)
* Great Ghost Stories (1998) (Compiled by Peter Glassman, Illustrated by Barry Moser)
* Bram Stoker's Notes for Dracula: A Facsimile Edition (2008) Bram Stoker Annotated and Transcribed by Robert Eighteen-Bisang and Elizabeth Miller, Foreword by Michael Barsanti. Jefferson, NC & London: McFarland.
Articles
* "Recollections of the Late W. G. Wills", The Graphic, 19 December 1891
* "The Art of Ellen Terry", The Playgoer, October 1901
* [https://archive.org/stream/twentiethcentury63londuoft#page/734/mode/2up "The Question of a National Theatre"], The Nineteenth Century and After,'' Vol. LXIII, January/June 1908
* [https://archive.org/stream/worldswork01pagegoog#page/n188/mode/2up "Mr. De Morgan's Habits of Work"], ''The World's Work, Vol. XVI, May/October 1908
* [https://archive.org/stream/twentiethcentury64londuoft#page/478/mode/2up "The Censorship of Fiction"], The Nineteenth Century and After, Vol. LXIV, July/December 1908
* [https://archive.org/stream/twentiethcentury66londuoft#page/974/mode/2up "The Censorship of Stage Plays"], The Nineteenth Century and After, Vol. LXVI, July/December 1909
* [https://archive.org/stream/twentiethcentury69londuoft#page/902/mode/2up "Irving and Stage Lightning"], The Nineteenth Century and After, Vol. LXIX, January/June 1911
Critical works on Stoker
* William Hughes, Beyond Dracula: Bram Stoker's Fiction and Its Cultural Context (Palgrave, 2000)
* Belford, Barbara. Bram Stoker: A Biography of the Author of Dracula. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1996.
* Hopkins, Lisa. Bram Stoker: A Literary Life. Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.
* Murray, Paul. From the Shadow of Dracula: A Life of Bram Stoker (London: Jonathan Cape, 2004)
* Senf, Carol. Science and Social Science in Bram Stoker's Fiction (Greenwood, 2002).
* Senf, Carol. Dracula: Between Tradition and Modernism (Twayne, 1998).
* Senf, Carol A. Bram Stoker (University of Wales Press, 2010).
* Shepherd, Mike. When Brave Men Shudder: the Scottish origins of Dracula (Wild Wolf Publishing, 2018).
* Skal, David J. Something in the Blood: The Untold Story of Bram Stoker'' (Liveright, 2016)
References
External links
*
*
*
*
* [https://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A588233 h2g2 article on Bram Stoker]
*
* Archival material at
*
*
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Category:Irish travel writers | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Stoker | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.718115 |
3993 | Billion (disambiguation) | Billion is a name for a large number. It may refer specifically to:
1,000,000,000 (, one thousand million), the short scale definition
1,000,000,000,000 (, one million million), the long scale definition
Billion may also refer to:
Film and TV
Billions (TV series), a Showtime series
Billions (film), a 1920 silent comedy
Mr. Billion, a 1977 film by Jonathan Kaplan
Music
"Billion", a song by Cardiacs from Sing to God, 1996
"Billions" (song), a song by Caroline Polachek from Desire, I Want to Turn Into You, 2023
"Billions", a song by Russell Dickerson from Yours, 2017
Other
Billion (company), a Taiwanese modem manufacturer
Jack Billion (1939–2023), American politician
See also
Long and short scales
Names of large numbers
Billion laughs, an XML parser vulnerability
Golden billion, a Russian term for the wealthy people of the developed world
Billionaire (disambiguation)
Billon (disambiguation)
BN (disambiguation) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billion_(disambiguation) | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.720092 |
3995 | Contract bridge | minutes per deal
| random_chance = Very low to moderate (depending on variant played)
| skills = tactics, communication, memory, probability
| footnotes =
}}
Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck. In its basic format, it is played by four players in two competing partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table. square or a similarly-sized round table allowing each player to reach to the center of the table during the play of the cards. In online computer play, players from anywhere in the world sit at a virtual table.}} Millions of people play bridge worldwide in clubs, tournaments, online and with friends at home, making it one of the world's most popular card games, particularly among seniors. The World Bridge Federation (WBF) is the governing body for international competitive bridge, with numerous other bodies governing it at the regional level.
The game consists of a number of , is one player's holding of 13 cards; a is the four hands in one allocation of 52 cards; a board is a term more applicable to duplicate bridge and refers to a deal.}} each progressing through four phases. The cards are to the players; then the players call (or bid) in an seeking to take the , specifying how many tricks the partnership receiving the contract (the declaring side) needs to take to receive points for the deal. During the auction, partners use their bids to exchange information about their hands, including overall strength and distribution of the suits; no other means of conveying or implying any information is permitted. The cards are then played, the trying to fulfill the contract, and the trying to stop the declaring side from achieving its goal. The deal is scored based on the number of tricks taken, the contract, and various other factors which depend to some extent on the variation of the game being played.
Rubber bridge is the most popular variation for casual play, but most club and tournament play involves some variant of duplicate bridge, where the cards are not re-dealt on each occasion, but the same deal is played by two or more sets of players (or "tables") to enable comparative scoring.
History and etymology
Bridge is a member of the family of trick-taking games and is a derivative of whist, which had become the dominant such game and enjoyed a loyal following for centuries. The idea of a trick-taking, 52-card game has its first documented origins in Italy and France. The French physician and author Rabelais (1493–1553) mentions a game called "La Triomphe" in one of his works, and Juan Luis Vives's Linguae latinae exercitio (Exercise in the Latin language) of 1539 features a dialogue on card games in which the characters play 'Triumphus hispanicus' (Spanish Triumph).
Bridge departed from whist with the creation of "Biritch" in the 19th century and evolved through the late 19th and early 20th centuries to form the present game. The first known rule book for bridge, dated 1886, is Biritch, or Russian Whist written by John Collinson, an English financier working in Ottoman Constantinople. It and his subsequent letter to The Saturday Review, dated 28 May 1906, document the origin of Biritch as being the Russian community in Constantinople. The word biritch is thought to be a transliteration of the Russian word (бирчий, бирич), an occupation of a diplomatic clerk or an announcer.
Biritch had many significant bridge-like developments: dealer chose the trump suit, or nominated his partner to do so; there was a call of "no trumps" (biritch); dealer's partner's hand became dummy; points were scored above and below the line; game was 3NT, 4 and 5 (although 8 club odd tricks and 15 spade odd tricks were needed); the score could be doubled and redoubled; and there were slam bonuses. It also has some features in common with solo whist. This game, and variants of it known as "bridge" and "bridge whist", became popular in the United States and the United Kingdom in the 1890s despite the long-established dominance of whist.
The modern game of contract bridge was the result of innovations to the scoring of auction bridge by Harold Stirling Vanderbilt and others. The most significant change was that only the tricks contracted for were scored below the line toward game or a slam bonus, a change that resulted in bidding becoming much more challenging and interesting. Also new was the concept of "vulnerability", which made sacrifices to protect the lead in a rubber more expensive. The various scores were adjusted to produce a more balanced and interesting game. Vanderbilt set out his rules in 1925, and within a few years contract bridge had so supplanted other forms of the game that "bridge" became synonymous with "contract bridge".
The form of bridge mostly played in clubs, tournaments and online is duplicate bridge. The number of people who play contract bridge has declined since its peak in the 1940s, when a survey found it was played in 44% of US households. The game is still widely played, especially amongst retirees, and in 2005 the ACBL estimated there were 25 million players in the US. Gameplay Overview Bridge is a four-player partnership trick-taking game with thirteen tricks per deal. The dominant variations of the game are rubber bridge, which is more common in social play; and duplicate bridge, which enables comparative scoring in tournament play. Each player is dealt thirteen cards from a standard 52-card deck. A starts when a player leads (i.e., plays the first card). The leader to the first trick is determined by the auction; the leader to each subsequent trick is the player who won the preceding trick. Each player, in clockwise order, plays one card on the trick. Players must play a card of the same suit as the original card led, unless they have none (said to be "void"), in which case they may play any card. East "follows suit" with K, South with J and West with 7. In a no-trump game, East wins the trick, having played the highest spade. If diamonds or hearts are trumps, South or West respectively win.]]
The rank of the cards played determines which player wins the trick. Within each suit, the ace is ranked highest followed by the king, queen and jack and then the ten through to the two. In a deal in which the auction has determined that there is no trump suit, the trick is won by the highest-ranked card of the suit led; cards of suits other than that led cannot win. In a deal with a trump suit, cards of that suit are superior in rank to any of the cards of any other suit. If one or more players plays a trump to a trick when void in the suit led, the highest-ranked trump wins. For example, if the trump suit is spades and a player is void in the suit led and plays a spade card, they win the trick if no other player plays a higher spade. If a card of the trump suit is led, the usual rule for trick-taking applies and the highest-ranked card of that suit wins. To illustrate this, the simpler partnership trick-taking game of spades has a similar mechanism: the usual trick-taking rules apply with the trump suit being spades, but in the beginning of the game, players bid or estimate how many tricks they can win, and the number of tricks bid by both players in a partnership are added. If a partnership takes at least that many tricks, they receive points for the round; otherwise, they lose penalty points.
Bridge extends the concept of bidding into an , in which partnerships compete to win a , specifying both how many tricks they will need to take in order to receive points and the trump suit (or no trump, meaning that there will be no trump suit). Players take turns to call in a clockwise order: each player in turn either passes, doubleswhich increases the penalties for not making the contract specified by the opposing partnership's last bid, but also increases the reward for making itor redoubles, or states a contract that their partnership will adopt, which must be higher than the previous highest bid (if any). Eventually, the player who bid the highest contractwhich is determined by the contract's level as well as the trump suit or no trumpwins the contract for their partnership.
In the example auction below, the east–west pair secures the contract of 6; the auction concludes when there have been three successive passes. Note that six tricks are added to stated contract values, so the six-level contract is a contract of twelve tricks. In practice, estimating a good contract without information about one's partner's hand is difficult, so there exist many bidding systems assigning meanings to bids, with common ones including Standard American, Acol, and 2/1 game forcing. Contrast with Spades, where players only have to bid their own hand.
After the contract is decided and the first lead is made, the declarer's partner (dummy) lays their cards face up on the table, and the declarer plays the dummy's cards as well as their own. The opposing partnership is called the , and their goal is to stop the declarer from fulfilling his contract. Once all the cards have been played, the deal is scored: if the declaring side makes their contract, they receive points based on the level of the contract, with some trump suits being worth more points than others and no trump being worth even more, as well as bonus points for any . If the declarer fails to fulfill the contract, the defenders receive points depending on the declaring side's undertricks (the number of tricks short of the contract) and whether the contract was doubled or redoubled. All that is needed in basic games are the cards and a method of keeping score, but there is often other equipment on the table, such as a board containing the cards to be played (in duplicate bridge), bidding boxes, or screens.
with cards}}]]
In rubber bridge each player draws a card at the start of the game; the player who draws the highest card deals first. The second highest card becomes the dealer's partner and takes the chair on the opposite side of the table. They play against the other two. Normally, rubber bridge is played with two packs of cards and whilst one pack is being dealt, the dealer's partner shuffles the other pack. After shuffling the pack is placed on the right ready for the next dealer. Before dealing, the next dealer passes the cards to the previous dealer who cuts them.
In duplicate bridge the cards are pre-dealt, either by hand or by a computerized dealing machine, in order to allow for competitive scoring. Once dealt, the cards are placed in a device called a "board", having slots designated for each player's cardinal direction seating position. After a deal has been played, players return their cards to the appropriate slot in the board, ready to be played by the next table.
Auction
{| class"wikitable floatright" style"width:220px; border:1px"
|- style="font-size:90%"
| valign"top" halign"center"|
{| class"wikitable" style"margin-left:0px; margin-right:0px; width:218px; border:0.5px"
|-
!West||North||East||South
|- style="text-align:center; font-size:120%;"
|+
|- style="text-align:center; font-size:120%;"
| || ||1||1
|- style="text-align:center; font-size:120%;"
|1||2||2||3
|- style="text-align:center; font-size:120%;"
|4||Pass||4NT||Pass
|- style="text-align:center; font-size:120%;"
|5||Pass||6||Pass
|- style="text-align:center; font-size:120%;"
|Pass||Pass || ||
|} East-West and North–South compete for the contract. East-West prevail, specifying the trump suit (spades) and the minimum number of tricks beyond six which they must win, six.
|}
The dealer opens the auction and can make the first call, and the auction proceeds clockwise. When it is their turn to call, a player may passbut can enter into the bidding lateror bid a contract, specifying the level of their contract and either the trump suit or no trump (the denomination), provided that it is higher than the last bid by any player, including their partner. All bids promise to take a number of tricks in excess of six, so a bid must be between one (seven tricks) and seven (thirteen tricks). A bid is higher than another bid if either the level is greater (e.g., 2 over 1NT) or the denomination is higher at the same level, with the order being in ascending (or alphabetical) order: , , , , and NT (no trump) (e.g., 3 over 3). Calls may be made orally or with a bidding box.
If the last bid was by the opposing partnership, one may also the opponents' bid, increasing the penalties for undertricks, but also increasing the reward for making the contract. Doubling does not carry to future bids by the opponents unless future bids are doubled again. A player on the opposing partnership being doubled may also , which increases the penalties and rewards further. Players may not see their partner's hand during the auction, only their own. There exist many bidding conventions that assign agreed meanings to various calls to assist players in reaching an optimal contract (or obstruct the opponents).
The auction ends when, after a player bids, doubles, or redoubles, every other player has passed, in which case the action proceeds to the play; or every player has passed and no bid has been made, in which case the round is considered to be "passed out" and not played. The player left to the declarer leads to the first trick. Dummy then lays his or her cards face-up on the table, organized in columns by suit. Play proceeds clockwise, with each player required to follow suit if possible. Tricks are won by the highest trump, or if there were none played, the highest card of the led suit. The player who won the previous trick leads to the next trick. The declarer has control of the dummy's cards and tells his partner which card to play at dummy's turn. There also exist conventions that communicate further information between defenders about their hands during the play. or in duplicate games, play ceases and the tournament director is called to adjudicate the hand.
Scoring
At the end of the hand, points are awarded to the declaring side if they make the contract, or else to the defenders. Partnerships can be , increasing the rewards for making the contract, but also increasing the penalties for undertricks. In rubber bridge, if a side has won 100 contract points, they have won a and are vulnerable for the remaining rounds, but in duplicate bridge, vulnerability is predetermined based on the number of each board.
If the declaring side makes their contract, they receive points for , or tricks bid and made in excess of six. In both rubber and duplicate bridge, the declaring side is awarded 20 points per odd trick for a contract in clubs or diamonds, and 30 points per odd trick for a contract in hearts or spades. For a contract in notrump, the declaring side is awarded 40 points for the first odd trick and 30 points for the remaining odd tricks. Contract points are doubled or quadrupled if the contract is respectively doubled or redoubled.
In rubber bridge, a partnership wins one game once it has accumulated 100 contract points; excess contract points do not carry over to the next game. A partnership that wins two games wins the rubber, receiving a bonus of 500 points if the opponents have won a game, and 700 points if they have not.
Overtricks score the same number of points per odd trick, although their doubled and redoubled values differ. Bonuses vary between the two bridge variations both in score and in type (for example, rubber bridge awards a bonus for holding a certain combination of high cards),
Duplicate
The official rules of duplicate bridge are promulgated by the WBF as "The Laws of Duplicate Bridge 2017". The Laws Committee of the WBF, composed of world experts, updates the Laws every 10 years; it also issues a Laws Commentary advising on interpretations it has rendered.
In addition to the basic rules of play, there are many additional rules covering playing conditions and the rectification of irregularities, which are primarily for use by tournament directors who act as referees and have overall control of procedures during competitions. But various details of procedure are left to the discretion of the zonal bridge organisation for tournaments under their aegis and some (for example, the choice of movement) to the sponsoring organisation (for example, the club).
Some zonal organisations of the WBF also publish editions of the Laws. For example, the American Contract Bridge League (ACBL) publishes the Laws of Duplicate Bridge and additional documentation for club and tournament directors.
Rubber
There are no universally accepted rules for rubber bridge, but some zonal organisations have published their own. An example for those wishing to abide by a published standard is The Laws of Rubber Bridge as published by the American Contract Bridge League.
The majority of rules mirror those of duplicate bridge in the bidding and play and differ primarily in procedures for dealing and scoring.
Online
In 2001, the WBF promulgated a set of laws for online play.
Tournaments
Bridge is a game of skill played with randomly dealt cards, which makes it also a game of chance, or more exactly, a tactical game with inbuilt randomness, imperfect knowledge and restricted communication. The chance element is in the deal of the cards; in duplicate bridge some of the chance element is eliminated by comparing results of multiple pairs in identical situations. This is achievable when there are eight or more players, sitting at two or more tables, and the deals from each table are preserved and passed to the next table, thereby duplicating them for the other table(s) of players. At the end of a session, the scores for each deal are compared, and the most points are awarded to the players doing the best with each particular deal. This measures relative skill (but still with an element of luck) because each pair or team is being judged only on the ability to bid with, and play, the same cards as other players.
Duplicate bridge is played in clubs and tournaments, which can gather as many as several hundred players. Duplicate bridge is a mind sport, and its popularity gradually became comparable to that of chess, with which it is often compared for its complexity and the mental skills required for high-level competition. Bridge and chess are the only "mind sports" recognized by the International Olympic Committee, although they were not found eligible for the main Olympic program. In October 2017 the British High Court ruled against the English Bridge Union, finding that Bridge is not a sport under a definition of sport as involving physical activity, but did not rule on the "broad, somewhat philosophical question" as to whether or not bridge is a sport.
The basic premise of duplicate bridge had previously been used for whist matches as early as 1857. Initially, bridge was not thought to be suitable for duplicate competition; it was not until the 1920s that (auction) bridge tournaments became popular.
In 1925 when contract bridge first evolved, bridge tournaments were becoming popular, but the rules were somewhat in flux, and several different organizing bodies were involved in tournament sponsorship: the American Bridge League (formerly the American Auction Bridge League, which changed its name in 1929), the American Whist League, and the United States Bridge Association. In 1937, the first officially recognized world championship was held in Budapest. In 1958, the World Bridge Federation (WBF) was founded to promote bridge worldwide, coordinate periodic revision to the Laws (each ten years, next in 2027) and conduct world championships.Bidding boxes and screens
containing all the possible calls a player can make in the auction]]
In tournaments, "bidding boxes" are frequently used, as noted above. These avoid the possibility of players at other tables hearing any spoken bids. The bidding cards are laid out in sequence as the auction progresses. Although it is not a formal rule, many clubs adopt a protocol that the bidding cards stay revealed until the first playing card is tabled, after which point the bidding cards are put away. Bidding pads are an alternative to bidding boxes. A bidding pad is a block of 100mm square tear-off sheets. Players write their bids on the top sheet. When the first trick is complete the sheet is torn off and discarded.
In top national and international events, "bidding screens" are used. These are placed diagonally across the table, preventing partners from seeing each other during the game; often the screen is removed after the auction is complete.
Strategy
Bidding
Much of the complexity in bridge arises from the difficulty of arriving at a good final contract in the auction (or deciding to let the opponents declare the contract). This is a difficult problem: the two players in a partnership must try to communicate enough information about their hands to arrive at a makeable contract, but the information they can exchange is restricted – information may be passed only by the calls made and later by the cards played, not by other means; in addition, the agreed-upon meaning of each call and play must be available to the opponents.
Since a partnership that has freedom to bid gradually at leisure can exchange more information, and since a partnership that can interfere with the opponents' bidding (as by raising the bidding level rapidly) can cause difficulties for their opponents, bidding systems are both informational and strategic. It is this mixture of information exchange and evaluation, deduction, and tactics that is at the heart of bidding in bridge.
A number of basic rules of thumb in bridge bidding and play are summarized as bridge maxims.
Systems and conventions
A bidding system is a set of partnership agreements on the meanings of bids. A partnership's bidding system is usually made up of a core system, modified and complemented by specific conventions (optional customizations incorporated into the main system for handling specific bidding situations) which are pre-chosen between the partners prior to play. The line between a well-known convention and a part of a system is not always clear-cut: some bidding systems include specified conventions by default. Bidding systems can be divided into mainly natural systems such as Acol and Standard American, and mainly artificial systems such as the Precision Club and Polish Club.
Calls are usually considered to be either natural or conventional (artificial). A natural call carries a meaning that reflects the call; a natural bid intuitively showing hand or suit strength based on the level or suit of the bid, and a natural double expressing that the player believes that the opposing partnership will not make their contract. By contrast, a conventional (artificial) call offers and/or asks for information by means of pre-agreed coded interpretations, in which some calls convey very specific information or requests that are not part of the natural meaning of the call. Thus in response to 4NT, a 'natural' bid of 5 would state a preference towards a diamond suit or a desire to play in five diamonds, whereas if the partners have agreed to use the common Blackwood convention, a bid of 5 in the same situation would say nothing about the diamond suit, but would tell the partner that the hand in question contains exactly one ace.
Conventions are valuable in bridge because of the need to pass information beyond a simple like or dislike of a particular suit, and because the limited bidding space can be used more efficiently by adopting a conventional (artificial) meaning for a given call where a natural meaning has less utility, because the information it conveys is not valuable or because the desire to convey that information arises only rarely. The conventional meaning conveys more useful (or more frequently useful) information. There are a very large number of conventions from which players can choose; many books have been written detailing bidding conventions. Well-known conventions include Stayman (to ask the opening 1NT bidder to show any four-card major suit), Jacoby transfers (a request by (usually) the weak hand for the partner to bid a particular suit first, and therefore to become the declarer), and the Blackwood convention (to ask for information on the number of aces and kings held, used in slam bidding situations).
The term preempt refers to a high-level tactical bid by a weak hand, relying upon a very long suit rather than high cards for tricks. Preemptive bids serve a double purpose – they allow players to indicate they are bidding on the basis of a long suit in an otherwise weak hand, which is important information to share, and they also consume substantial bidding space which prevents a possibly strong opposing pair from exchanging information on their cards. Several systems include the use of opening bids or other early bids with weak hands including long (usually six to eight card) suits at the 2, 3 or even 4 or 5 levels as preempts.
Basic natural systems
As a rule, a natural suit bid indicates a holding of at least four (or more, depending on the situation and the system) cards in that suit as an opening bid, or a lesser number when supporting partner; a natural NT bid indicates a balanced hand.
Most systems use a count of high card points as the basic evaluation of the strength of a hand, refining this by reference to shape and distribution if appropriate. In the most commonly used point count system, aces are counted as 4 points, kings as 3, queens as 2, and jacks as 1 point; therefore, the deck contains 40 points. In addition, the distribution of the cards in a hand into suits may also contribute to the strength of a hand and be counted as distribution points. A better than average hand, containing 12 or 13 points, is usually considered sufficient to open the bidding, i.e., to make the first bid in the auction. A combination of two such hands (i.e., 25 or 26 points shared between partners) is often sufficient for a partnership to bid, and generally to make, game in a major suit or notrump (more are usually needed for a minor suit game, as the level is higher).
In natural systems, a 1NT opening bid usually reflects a hand that has a relatively balanced shape (usually between two and four (or less often five) cards in each suit) and a sharply limited number of high card points, usually somewhere between 12 and 18 – the most common ranges use a span of exactly three points (for example, 12–14, 15–17 or 16–18), but some systems use a four-point range, usually 15–18.
Opening bids of three or higher are preemptive bids, i.e., bids made with weak hands that especially favor a particular suit, opened at a high level in order to define the hand's value quickly and to frustrate the opposition. For example, a hand of would be a candidate for an opening bid of 3, designed to make it difficult for the opposing team to bid and find their optimum contract even if they have the bulk of the points. This hand is nearly valueless unless spades are trumps but it contains good enough spades that the penalty for being set should not be higher than the value of an opponent game. The high card weakness makes it likely that the opponents have enough strength to make game themselves.
Openings at the 2 level are either unusually strong (2NT, natural, and 2, artificial) or preemptive, depending on the system. Unusually strong bids communicate an especially high number of points (normally 20 or more) or a high trick-taking potential (normally 8 or more). Also 2 as the strongest (by HCP and by DP+HCP) has become more common, perhaps especially at websites that offer duplicate bridge. Here the 2 opening is used for either hands with a good 6-card suit or longer (max one losing card) and a total of 18 HCP up to 23 total points – or "NT", like 2NT but with 22–23 HCP. Whilst the 2 opening bid takes care of all hands with 24 points (HCP or with distribution points included) with the only exception of "Gambling 3NT".
Opening bids at the one level are made with hands containing 12–13 points or more and which are not suitable for one of the preceding bids. Using Standard American with 5-card majors, opening hearts or spades usually promises a 5-card suit. Partnerships who agree to play 5-card majors open a minor suit with 4-card majors and then bid their major suit at the next opportunity. This means that an opening bid of 1 or 1 will sometimes be made with only 3 cards in that suit.
Doubles are sometimes given conventional meanings in otherwise mostly natural systems. A natural, or penalty double, is one used to try to gain extra points when the defenders are confident of setting (defeating) the contract. The most common example of a conventional double is the takeout double of a low-level suit bid, implying support for the unbid suits or the unbid major suits and asking partner to choose one of them.
Basic variations
Bidding systems depart from these basic ideas in varying degrees. Standard American, for instance, is a collection of conventions designed to bolster the accuracy and power of these basic ideas, while Precision Club is a system that uses the 1 opening bid for all or almost all strong hands (but sets the threshold for "strong" rather lower than most other systems – usually 16 high card points) and may include other artificial calls to handle other situations (but it may contain natural calls as well). Many experts today use a system called 2/1 game forcing (enunciated as two over one game forcing), which amongst other features adds some complexity to the treatment of the one notrump response as used in Standard American. In the UK, Acol is the most common system; its main features are a weak one notrump opening with 12–14 high card points and several variations for 2-level openings.
There are also a variety of advanced techniques used for hand evaluation. The most basic is the Milton Work point count, (the 4-3-2-1 system detailed above) but this is sometimes modified in various ways, or either augmented or replaced by other approaches such as losing trick count, honor point count, law of total tricks, or Zar Points.
Common conventions and variations within natural systems include:
* Blackwood (either the original version or Roman Key Card)
* How the partnership's bidding practices will be varied if their opponents intervene or compete.
* Point count required for 1 NT opening bid ('mini' 10–12, 'weak' 12–14, 'strong' 15–17 or 16–18)
* Stayman (together with Blackwood, described as "the two most famous conventions in Bridge".)
* What types of ''cue bids (e.g. bidding the opponents' suit)'' the partnership will play, if any.
* Whether 1 (and sometimes 1) is 'natural' or 'suspect' ''(also called 'phoney' or 'short'), signifying an opening hand lacking a notable heart or spade suit
* Whether an opening bid of 1 and 1 requires a minimum of 4 or 5 cards in the suit (4 or 5 card majors'')
* Whether doubling a contract at the 1, 2 and sometimes higher levels signifies a belief that the opponents' contract will fail and a desire to raise the stakes (a penalty double), or an indication of strength but no biddable suit coupled with a request that partner bid something (a takeout double).
* Whether doubling or overcalling over opponents' 1NT is natural or conventional. One common artificial agreement is Cappelletti, where 2 is a transfer to be passed or corrected to a major, 2 means both majors and a major shows that suit plus a minor.
* Whether opening bids at the two level are 'strong' (20+ points) or 'weak' (i.e., pre-emptive with a 6 card suit). (Note: an opening bid of 2 is usually played in otherwise natural systems as conventional, signifying any exceptionally strong hand)
* Whether the partnership will play Jacoby transfers (bids of 2 and 2 over 1NT or 3 and 3 over 2NT respectively require the 1NT or 2NT bidder to rebid 2 and 2 or 3 and 3), minor suit transfers (bids of 2 and either 2NT or 3 over 1NT respectively require the 1NT bidder to bid 3 and 3) and Texas transfers (bids of 4 and 4 respectively require the 1NT, or 2NT bidder to rebid 4 and 4)
* Which (if any) bids are forcing and require a response.
Within play, it is also commonly agreed what systems of opening leads, signals and discards will be played:
* Conventions for the opening lead govern how the first card to be played will be chosen and what it will mean,
* Count signals cover the situation when a defender is following suit (usually to a suit that the declarer has led). In such circumstances the order in which a defender plays his spot cards will indicate whether an even or odd number of cards was originally held in that suit. This can help the other defender count out the entire original distribution of the cards in that suit. It is sometimes critical to know this when defending.
* Discards cover the situation when a defender cannot follow suit and therefore has free choice what card to play or throw away. In such circumstances the thrown-away card can be used to indicate some aspect of the hand, or a desire for a specific suit to be played.
* Signals indicate how cards played within a suit are chosen – for example, playing a noticeably high card when this is unexpected can signal encouragement to continue playing the suit, and a low card can signal discouragement and a desire for partner to choose some other suit. (Some partnerships use "reverse" signals, meaning that a noticeably high card discourages that suit and a noticeably low card encourages that suit, thus not "wasting" a potentially useful intermediate card in the suit of interest.)
* Suit preference signals cover the situation where a defender is returning a suit which will be ruffed by his partner. If he plays a high card he is showing an entry in the higher side suit and vice versa. There are some other situations where this tool may be used.
* Surrogate signals cover the situation when it is critical to show length in a side suit and it will be too late if defenders wait until that suit is played. Then, the play in the first declarer played suit is a count signal regarding the critical suit and not the trump suit itself. In fact, any signal made about a suit in another suit might be called as such.
Advanced techniques
Every call (including "pass", also sometimes called "no bid") serves two purposes. It confirms or passes some information to a partner, and, by implication, denies any other kind of hand which would have tended to support an alternative call. For example, a bid of 2NT immediately after partner's 1NT not only shows a balanced hand of a certain point range, but also almost always denies possession of a five-card major suit (otherwise the player would have bid it) or even a four card major suit (in that case, the player should use the Stayman convention).
Likewise, in some partnerships the bid of 2 in the sequence 1NT–2–2–2 between partners (opponents passing throughout) explicitly shows five hearts but also confirms four cards in spades: the bidder must hold at least five hearts to make it worth looking for a heart fit after 2 denied a four card major, and with at least five hearts, a Stayman bid must have been justified by having exactly four spades, the other major (since Stayman (as used by this partnership) is not useful with anything except a four card major suit). Thus an astute partner can read much more than the surface meaning into the bidding. Alternatively, many partnerships play this same bidding sequence as "Crawling Stayman" by which the responder shows a weak hand (less than eight high card points) with shortness in diamonds but at least four hearts and four spades; the opening bidder may correct to spades if that appears to be the better contract.
The situations detailed here are extremely simple examples; many instances of advanced bidding involve specific agreements related to very specific situations and subtle inferences regarding entire sequences of calls.
Play techniques
Terence Reese, a prolific author of bridge books, points out that there are only four ways of taking a trick by force, two of which are very easy:
* establishing long suits (the last cards in a suit will take tricks if the opponents do not have the suit and are unable to trump)
* playing a high card that no one else can beat
* playing for the opponents' high cards to be in a particular position (if their ace is to the right of your king, your king may be able to take a trick, especially if, when that suit is led, the player to your right has to play their card before you do)
* trumping an opponent's high card
Nearly all trick-taking techniques in bridge can be reduced to one of these four methods. The optimum play of the cards can require much thought and experience and is the subject of whole books on bridge.
Example
The cards are dealt as shown in the bridge hand diagram; North is the dealer and starts the auction which proceeds as shown in the bidding table.
<br />Not Vulnerable
|J 3|J 8 7 4|A 10 7 6 5|Q 3
|K Q 8 7 2|A 2|J 4 2|10 7 2
|10 9 5 4|9 6|K Q 9|K 9 6 4
|A 6|K Q 10 5 3|8 3|A J 8 5
|Lead = Lead:  K
}}
{| class"wikitable" style"float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right:10px;"
|-
!West||North||East||South
|- style="text-align:center;"
| ||Pass||Pass||1
|- style="text-align:center;"
|1||2||2||3
|- style="text-align:center;"
|Pass||4||Pass||Pass
|- style="text-align:center;"
|Pass|| || ||
|}
As neither North nor East have sufficient strength to open the bidding, they each pass, denying such strength. South, next in turn, opens with the bid of 1, which denotes a reasonable heart suit (at least 4 or 5 cards long, depending on the bidding system) and at least 12 high card points. On this hand, South has 14 high card points. West overcalls with 1, since he has a long spade suit of reasonable quality and 10 high card points (an overcall can be made on a hand that is not quite strong enough for an opening bid). North supports partner's suit with 2, showing heart support and about points. East supports spades with 2. South inserts a game try of 3, inviting the partner to bid the game of 4 with good club support and overall values. North complies, as North is at the higher end of the range for his 2 bid, and has a fourth trump (the 2 bid promised only three), and the doubleton queen of clubs to fit with partner's strength there. (North could instead have bid 3, indicating not enough strength for game, asking South to pass and so play 3.)
In the auction, north–south are trying to investigate whether their cards are sufficient to make a game (nine tricks at notrump, ten tricks in hearts or spades, 11 tricks in clubs or diamonds), which yields bonus points if bid and made. East-West are competing in spades, hoping to play a contract in spades at a low level. 4 is the final contract, 10 tricks being required for to make with hearts as trump.
South is the declarer, having been first to bid hearts, and the player to South's left, West, has to choose the first card in the play, known as the opening lead. West chooses the spade king because spades is the suit the partnership has shown strength in, and because they have agreed that when they hold two touching honors (or adjacent honors) they will play the higher one first. West plays the card face down, to give their partner and the declarer (but not dummy) a chance to ask any last questions about the bidding or to object if they believe West is not the correct hand to lead. After that, North's cards are laid on the table and North becomes dummy, as both the North and South hands will be controlled by the declarer. West turns the lead card face up, and the declarer studies the two hands to make a plan for the play. On this hand, the trump ace, a spade, and a diamond trick must be lost, so declarer must not lose a trick in clubs.
If the K is held by West, South will find it very hard to prevent it from making a trick (unless West leads a club). There is an almost equal chance that it is held by East, in which case it can be trapped against the ace, and will be beaten, using a tactic known as a finesse.
After considering the cards, the declarer directs dummy (North) to play a small spade. East plays low (small card) and South takes the A, gaining the lead. (South may also elect to duck, but for the purpose of this example, let us assume South wins the A at trick 1). South proceeds by drawing trump, leading the K. West decides there is no benefit to holding back, and so wins the trick with the ace, and then cashes the Q. For fear of conceding a ruff and discard, West plays the 2 instead of another spade. Declarer plays low from the table, and East scores the Q. Not having anything better to do, East returns the remaining trump, taken in South's hand. The trumps now accounted for, South can now execute the finesse, perhaps trapping the king as planned. South enters the dummy (i.e. wins a trick in the dummy's hand) by leading a low diamond, using dummy's A to win the trick, and leads the Q from dummy to the next trick. East covers the queen with the king, and South takes the trick with the ace, and proceeds by cashing the remaining master J. (If East does not play the king, then South will play a low club from South's hand and the queen will win anyway, this being the essence of the finesse). The game is now safe: South ruffs a small club with a dummy's trump, then ruffs a diamond in hand for an entry back, and ruffs the last club in dummy (sometimes described as a crossruff). Finally, South claims the remaining tricks by showing his or her hand, as it now contains only high trumps and there's no need to play the hand out to prove they are all winners.
(The trick-by-trick notation used above can be also expressed in tabular form, but a textual explanation is usually preferred in practice, for reader's convenience. Plays of small cards or discards are often omitted from such a description, unless they were important for the outcome).
North-South score the required 10 tricks, and their opponents take the remaining three. The contract is fulfilled, and North enters the pair numbers, the contract, and the score of +420 for the winning side (North is in charge of bookkeeping in duplicate tournaments) on the traveling sheet. North asks East to check the score entered on the traveller. All players return their own cards to the board, and the next deal is played.
On the prior hand, it is quite possible that the K is held by West. For example, by swapping the K and A between the defending hands. Then the 4 contract would fail by one trick (unless West had led a club early in the play). The failure of the contract would not mean that 4 was a bad contract on this hand. The contract depends on the club finesse working, or a defense error. The bonus points awarded for making a game contract far outweigh the penalty for going one off, so it is best strategy in the long run to bid game contracts such as this one.
Similarly, there is a minuscule chance that the K is in the west hand, but the west hand has no other clubs. In that case, declarer can succeed by simply cashing the A, felling the K and setting up the Q as a winner. The chance of this is far lower than the chance that East started with the K. Therefore, the superior percentage play is to take the club finesse, as described above.
Computers
After many years of little progress, computer bridge made great progress at the end of the 20th century. In 1996, the ACBL initiated the official World Championships Computer Bridge, to be held annually along with a major bridge event. The first Computer Bridge Championship took place in 1997 at the North American Bridge Championships in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Stand-alone software
Strong bridge playing programs such as Jack Bridge (World Champion in 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013 and 2015) and Wbridge5 (World Champion in 2005, 2007, 2008, 2016, 2017 and 2018),
* OKbridge is the oldest extant internet bridge service: it was established as a commercial enterprise in 1994, but the program started to be used interactively in August 1990 by players of all standards. OKbridge is a subscription-based club, with services such as customer support and ethics reviews.
* RealBridge was launched in November 2020. Its online platform includes built-in audio and video. It is primarily used for organised bridge, ranging from club-level games to national, zonal and world championships. It includes teaching functionality, and provides MiniBridge as an option.
* Sharkbridge founded in 2020 by Milen Milkovski (Canada), Plamen Panayotov (Canada), John Norris ( Denmark) and Michael Woywode (Germany).
* SWAN Games was founded April 2000. In March 2004, announced a partnership to provide internet services to SBF members and is a competitor in subscription-based online bridge clubs. is a subscription based club which was founded in 1994 with the Bridge Player Live Software for Windows.
* Bridge Champ was launched in 2023. It includes both browser-based and mobile apps and supports various tournament types, including bots, individuals, and teams.
Some national contract bridge organizations now offer online bridge play to their members, including the English Bridge Union, the Dutch Bridge Federation and the Australian Bridge Federation. MSN and Yahoo! Games have several online rubber bridge rooms. In 2001, the WBF issued a special edition of the lawbook adapted for internet and other electronic forms of the game.
Related card games
* 500
* Bridgette
* Chicago
* Euchre
* King
* Lanterloo
* Nap
* Ombre
* Quadrille
* Rex Bridge
* Skat
* Spades
* Spoil Five
* Vint
* Whist
See also
* Glossary of contract bridge terms
* List of bridge books
* List of bridge competitions and awards
* List of bridge magazines
* List of contract bridge people
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
External links
* [https://www.acbl.org/ American Contract Bridge League (ACBL)]
* [http://www.worldbridge.org/ World Bridge Federation (WBF)]
* [https://sites.google.com/view/bridgelibrary The Bridge Library]
}}
Category:Four-player card games
Category:Games of mental skill
Category:Multiplayer games
Category:French deck card games
Category:Card games introduced in 1925 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_bridge | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.748529 |
3996 | Boat | thumb|right|A recreational motorboat with an outboard motor
A boat is a watercraft of a large range of types and sizes, but generally smaller than a ship, which is distinguished by its larger size or capacity, its shape, or its ability to carry boats.
Small boats are typically used on inland waterways such as rivers and lakes, or in protected coastal areas. However, some boats (such as whaleboats) were intended for offshore use. In modern naval terms, a boat is a vessel small enough to be carried aboard a ship.
Boats vary in proportion and construction methods with their intended purpose, available materials, or local traditions. Canoes have been used since prehistoric times and remain in use throughout the world for transportation, fishing, and sport. Fishing boats vary widely in style partly to match local conditions. Pleasure craft used in recreational boating include ski boats, pontoon boats, and sailboats. House boats may be used for vacationing or long-term residence. Lighters are used to move cargo to and from large ships unable to get close to shore. Lifeboats have rescue and safety functions.
Boats can be propelled by manpower (e.g. rowboats and paddle boats), wind (e.g. sailboats), and inboard/outboard motors (including gasoline, diesel, and electric).
History
thumb|Silver model of a boat, tomb PG 789, Royal Cemetery of Ur, 2600–2500 BCE
Differentiation from other prehistoric watercraft
The earliest watercraft are considered to have been rafts. These would have been used for voyages such as the settlement of Australia sometime between 50,000 and 60,000 years ago.
A boat differs from a raft by obtaining its buoyancy by having most of its structure exclude water with a waterproof layer, e.g. the planks of a wooden hull, the hide covering (or tarred canvas) of a currach. In contrast, a raft is buoyant because it joins components that are themselves buoyant, for example, logs, bamboo poles, bundles of reeds, floats (such as inflated hides, sealed pottery containers or, in a modern context, empty oil drums). The key difference between a raft and a boat is that the former is a "flow through" structure, with waves able to pass up through it. Consequently, except for short river crossings, a raft is not a practical means of transport in colder regions of the world as the users would be at risk of hypothermia. Today that climatic limitation restricts rafts to between 40° north and 40° south, with, in the past, similar boundaries that have moved as the world's climate has varied.
Types
The earliest boats may have been either dugouts or hide boats. The oldest recovered boat in the world, the Pesse canoe, found in the Netherlands, is a dugout made from the hollowed tree trunk of a Pinus sylvestris that was constructed somewhere between 8200 and 7600 BC. This canoe is exhibited in the Drents Museum in Assen, Netherlands. Other very old dugout boats have also been recovered. Hide boats, made from covering a framework with animal skins, could be equally as old as logboats, but such a structure is much less likely to survive in an archaeological context.
Plank-built boats are considered, in most cases, to have developed from the logboat. There are examples of logboats that have been expanded: by deforming the hull under the influence of heat, by raising up the sides with added planks, or by splitting down the middle and adding a central plank to make it wider. (Some of these methods have been in quite recent usethere is no simple developmental sequence). The earliest known plank-built boats are from the Nile, dating to the third millennium BC. Outside Egypt, the next earliest are from England. The Ferriby boats are dated to the early part of the second millennium BC and the end of the third millennium. Plank-built boats require a level of woodworking technology that was first available in the Neolithic with more complex versions only becoming achievable in the Bronze Age.
Types
thumb|right|Boats with sails in Bangladesh
Boats can be categorized by their means of propulsion. These divide into:
Unpowered. This involves drifting with the tide or a river current.
Powered by the crew-members on board, using oars, paddles or a punting pole or quant.
Powered by sail.
Towedeither by humans or animals from a river or canal bank (or in very shallow water, by walking on the sea or river bed) or by another vessel.
Powered by machinery, such as internal combustion engines, steam engines or by batteries and an electric motor.Any one vessel may use more than one of these methods at different times or in combination. Other types of large vessels which are traditionally called boats include Great Lakes freighters, riverboats, and ferryboats. Though large enough to carry their own boats and heavy cargo, these vessels are designed for operation on inland or protected coastal waters.
Terminology
The hull is the main, and in some cases only, structural component of a boat. It provides both capacity and buoyancy. The keel is a boat's "backbone", a lengthwise structural member to which the perpendicular frames are fixed. On some boats, a deck covers the hull, in part or whole. While a ship often has several decks, a boat is unlikely to have more than one. Above the deck are often lifelines connected to stanchions, bulwarks perhaps topped by gunnels, or some combination of the two. A cabin may protrude above the deck forward, aft, along the centerline, or cover much of the length of the boat. Vertical structures dividing the internal spaces are known as bulkheads.
The forward end of a boat is called the bow, the aft end the stern. Facing forward the right side is referred to as starboard and the left side as port.
Building materials
thumb|Traditional Toba Batak boat (), photograph by Kristen Feilberg
thumb|Fishing boats in Visakhapatnam, India
Until the mid-19th century, most boats were made of natural materials, primarily wood, although bark and animal skins were also used. Early boats include the birch bark canoe, the animal hide-covered kayak and coracle and the dugout canoe made from a single log.
By the mid-19th century, some boats had been built with iron or steel frames but still planked in wood. In 1855 ferro-cement boat construction was patented by the French, who coined the name "ferciment". This is a system by which a steel or iron wire framework is built in the shape of a boat's hull and covered over with cement. Reinforced with bulkheads and other internal structures it is strong but heavy, easily repaired, and, if sealed properly, will not leak or corrode.
As the forests of Britain and Europe continued to be over-harvested to supply the keels of larger wooden boats, and the Bessemer process (patented in 1855) cheapened the cost of steel, steel ships and boats began to be more common. By the 1930s boats built entirely of steel from frames to plating were seen replacing wooden boats in many industrial uses and fishing fleets. Private recreational boats of steel remain uncommon. In 1895 WH Mullins produced steel boats of galvanized iron and by 1930 became the world's largest producer of pleasure boats.
Mullins also offered boats in aluminum from 1895 through 1899 and once again in the 1920s, but it was not until the mid-20th century that aluminium gained widespread popularity. Though much more expensive than steel, aluminum alloys exist that do not corrode in salt water, allowing a similar load carrying capacity to steel at much less weight.
Around the mid-1960s, boats made of fiberglass (aka "glass fiber") became popular, especially for recreational boats. Fiberglass is also known as "GRP" (glass-reinforced plastic) in the UK, and "FRP" (for fiber-reinforced plastic) in the US. Fiberglass boats are strong and do not rust, corrode, or rot. Instead, they are susceptible to structural degradation from sunlight and extremes in temperature over their lifespan. Fiberglass structures can be made stiffer with sandwich panels, where the fiberglass encloses a lightweight core such as balsa or foam.
Cold molding is a modern construction method, using wood as the structural component. In one cold molding process, very thin strips of wood are layered over a form. Each layer is coated with resin, followed by another directionally alternating layer laid on top. Subsequent layers may be stapled or otherwise mechanically fastened to the previous, or weighted or vacuum bagged to provide compression and stabilization until the resin sets. An alternative process uses thin sheets of plywood shaped over a disposable male mold, and coated with epoxy.
Propulsion
The most common means of boat propulsion are as follows:
Engine
Inboard motor
Stern drive (Inboard/outboard)
Outboard motor
Paddle wheel
Water jet (jetboat, personal water craft)
Fan (hovercraft, air boat)
Man (rowing, paddling, setting pole etc.)
Wind (sailing)
Buoyancy
A boat displaces its weight in water, regardless whether it is made of wood, steel, fiberglass, or even concrete. If weight is added to the boat, the volume of the hull drawn below the waterline will increase to keep the balance above and below the surface equal. Boats have a natural or designed level of buoyancy. Exceeding it will cause the boat first to ride lower in the water, second to take on water more readily than when properly loaded, and ultimately, if overloaded by any combination of structure, cargo, and water, sink.
As commercial vessels must be correctly loaded to be safe, and as the sea becomes less buoyant in brackish areas such as the Baltic, the Plimsoll line was introduced to prevent overloading.
European Union classification
Since 1998 all new leisure boats and barges built in Europe between 2.5m and 24m must comply with the EU's Recreational Craft Directive (RCD). The Directive establishes four categories that permit the allowable wind and wave conditions for vessels in each class:
Class A - the boat may safely navigate any waters.
Class B - the boat is limited to offshore navigation. (Winds up to Force 8 & waves up to 4 metres)
Class C - the boat is limited to inshore (coastal) navigation. (Winds up to Force 6 & waves up to 2 metres)
Class D - the boat is limited to rivers, canals and small lakes. (Winds up to Force 4 & waves up to 0.5 metres)
Europe is the main producer of recreational boats (the second production in the world is located in Poland). European brands are known all over the world - in fact, these are the brands that created RCD and set the standard for shipyards around the world.
See also
Abora
Barge
Cabin cruiser
Car float
Dinghy
Dory
Flatboat
Halkett boat
Inflatable boat
Launch (boat)
Log canoe
Narrowboat
Naval architecture
Panga (boat)
Pirogue
Poveiro
Rescue craft
Sampan
Ship's boat
Skiff
Tour boat
Traditional fishing boats
Tûranor PlanetSolar
Yacht
References
External links
University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections – Freshwater and Marine Image Bank (enter search term "vessels" for images of boats and vessels)
Category:Watercraft
Category:Fishing equipment | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boat | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.764467 |
3997 | Blood | Blood is a body fluid in the circulatory system of humans and other vertebrates that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells, and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells.
Blood is composed of blood cells suspended in blood plasma. Plasma, which constitutes 55% of blood fluid, is mostly water (92% by volume), and contains proteins, glucose, mineral ions, and hormones. The blood cells are mainly red blood cells (erythrocytes), white blood cells (leukocytes), and (in mammals) platelets (thrombocytes). The most abundant cells are red blood cells. These contain hemoglobin, which facilitates oxygen transport by reversibly binding to it, increasing its solubility. Jawed vertebrates have an adaptive immune system, based largely on white blood cells. White blood cells help to resist infections and parasites. Platelets are important in the clotting of blood.
Blood is circulated around the body through blood vessels by the pumping action of the heart. In animals with lungs, arterial blood carries oxygen from inhaled air to the tissues of the body, and venous blood carries carbon dioxide, a waste product of metabolism produced by cells, from the tissues to the lungs to be exhaled. Blood is bright red when its hemoglobin is oxygenated and dark red when it is deoxygenated.
Medical terms related to blood often begin with hemo-, hemato-, haemo- or haemato- from the Greek word () for "blood". In terms of anatomy and histology, blood is considered a specialized form of connective tissue, given its origin in the bones and the presence of potential molecular fibers in the form of fibrinogen.
Functions
Blood performs many important functions within the body, including:
*Supply of oxygen to tissues (bound to hemoglobin, which is carried in red cells)
*Supply of nutrients such as glucose, amino acids, and fatty acids (dissolved in the blood or bound to plasma proteins (e.g., blood lipids))
*Removal of waste such as carbon dioxide, urea, and lactic acid
*Immunological functions, including circulation of white blood cells, and detection of foreign material by antibodies
*Coagulation, the response to a broken blood vessel, the conversion of blood from a liquid to a semisolid gel to stop bleeding
*Messenger functions, including the transport of hormones and the signaling of tissue damage
*Regulation of core body temperature
*Hydraulic functions
Constituents
In mammals
Blood accounts for 7% of the human body weight, with an average density around 1060 kg/m<sup>3</sup>, very close to pure water's density of 1000 kg/m<sup>3</sup>. The average adult has a blood volume of roughly or 1.3 gallons, that are involved in clotting. By volume, the red blood cells constitute about 45% of whole blood, the plasma about 54.3%, and white cells about 0.7%.
Whole blood (plasma and cells) exhibits non-Newtonian fluid dynamics.
<gallery>
File:Krew Frakcjonowana.jpg|Human blood fractioned by centrifugation: Plasma (upper, yellow layer), buffy coat (middle, thin white layer) and erythrocyte layer (bottom, red layer) can be seen.
File:Blutkreislauf.png|Blood circulation: Red oxygenated, blue deoxygenated
File:Blausen 0425 Formed Elements.png|Illustration depicting formed elements of blood
File:Blut-EDTA.jpg|Two tubes of EDTA-anticoagulated blood.<br /> Left tube: after standing, the RBCs have settled at the bottom of the tube.<br /> Right tube: Freshly drawn blood
</gallery>
Cells
(SEM) image of a normal red blood cell (left), a platelet (middle), and a white blood cell (right)]]
One microliter of blood contains:
*4.7 to 6.1 million (male), 4.2 to 5.4 million (female) erythrocytes: Red blood cells contain the blood's hemoglobin and distribute oxygen. Mature red blood cells lack a nucleus and organelles in mammals. The red blood cells (together with endothelial vessel cells and other cells) are also marked by glycoproteins that define the different blood types. The proportion of blood occupied by red blood cells is referred to as the hematocrit, and is normally about 45%. The combined surface area of all red blood cells of the human body would be roughly 2,000 times as great as the body's exterior surface.
*4,000–11,000 leukocytes: White blood cells are part of the body's immune system; they destroy and remove old or aberrant cells and cellular debris, as well as attack infectious agents (pathogens) and foreign substances. The cancer of leukocytes is called leukemia.
*200,000–500,000 thrombocytes:
|-
| base excess || −3 to +3
|
|-
| PO<sub>2</sub> || 10–13 kPa (80–100 mm Hg)
|
|-
| PCO<sub>2</sub> || 4.8–5.8 kPa (35–45 mm Hg)
|
|-
| HCO<sub>3</sub><sup>−</sup> || 21–27 mM
|
|-
| Oxygen saturation ||
Oxygenated: 98–99%<br />
Deoxygenated: 75%
|
|}
Plasma
About 55% of blood is blood plasma, a fluid that is the blood's liquid medium, which by itself is straw-yellow in color. The blood plasma volume totals of 2.7–3.0 liters (2.8–3.2 quarts) in an average human. It is essentially an aqueous solution containing 92% water, 8% blood plasma proteins, and trace amounts of other materials. Plasma circulates dissolved nutrients, such as glucose, amino acids, and fatty acids (dissolved in the blood or bound to plasma proteins), and removes waste products, such as carbon dioxide, urea, and lactic acid.
Other important components include:
*Serum albumin
*Blood-clotting factors (to facilitate coagulation)
*Immunoglobulins (antibodies)
*lipoprotein particles
*Various other proteins
*Various electrolytes (mainly sodium and chloride)
The term serum refers to plasma from which the clotting proteins have been removed. Most of the proteins remaining are albumin and immunoglobulins.
Acidity
Blood pH is regulated to stay within the narrow range of 7.35 to 7.45, making it slightly basic (compensation). Extra-cellular fluid in blood that has a pH below 7.35 is too acidic, whereas blood pH above 7.45 is too basic.
*Red blood cells of non-mammalian vertebrates are flattened and ovoid in form, and retain their cell nuclei.
*There is considerable variation in the types and proportions of white blood cells; for example, acidophils are generally more common than in humans.
*Platelets are unique to mammals; in other vertebrates, small nucleated, spindle cells called thrombocytes are responsible for blood clotting instead.
Physiology
Circulatory system
Blood is circulated around the body through blood vessels by the pumping action of the heart. In humans, blood is pumped from the strong left ventricle of the heart through arteries to peripheral tissues and returns to the right atrium of the heart through veins. It then enters the right ventricle and is pumped through the pulmonary artery to the lungs and returns to the left atrium through the pulmonary veins. Blood then enters the left ventricle to be circulated again. Arterial blood carries oxygen from inhaled air to all of the cells of the body, and venous blood carries carbon dioxide, a waste product of metabolism by cells, to the lungs to be exhaled. However, one exception includes pulmonary arteries, which contain the most deoxygenated blood in the body, while the pulmonary veins contain oxygenated blood.
Additional return flow may be generated by the movement of skeletal muscles, which can compress veins and push blood through the valves in veins toward the right atrium.
The blood circulation was described by William Harvey in 1628.Cell production and degradationIn vertebrates, the various cells of blood are made in the bone marrow in a process called hematopoiesis, which includes erythropoiesis, the production of red blood cells; and myelopoiesis, the production of white blood cells and platelets. During childhood, almost every human bone produces red blood cells; as adults, red blood cell production is limited to the larger bones: the bodies of the vertebrae, the breastbone (sternum), the ribcage, the pelvic bones, and the bones of the upper arms and legs. In addition, during childhood, the thymus gland, found in the mediastinum, is an important source of T lymphocytes.
The proteinaceous component of blood (including clotting proteins) is produced predominantly by the liver, while hormones are produced by the endocrine glands and the watery fraction is regulated by the hypothalamus and maintained by the kidney.
Healthy erythrocytes have a plasma life of about 120 days before they are degraded by the spleen, and the Kupffer cells in the liver. The liver also clears some proteins, lipids, and amino acids. The kidney actively secretes waste products into the urine.
Oxygen transport
About 98.5% of the oxygen in a sample of arterial blood in a healthy human breathing air at sea-level pressure is chemically combined with the hemoglobin. About 1.5% is physically dissolved in the other blood liquids and not connected to hemoglobin. The hemoglobin molecule is the primary transporter of oxygen in mammals and many other species. Hemoglobin has an oxygen binding capacity between 1.36 and 1.40 ml O<sub>2</sub> per gram hemoglobin, which increases the total blood oxygen capacity seventyfold, compared to if oxygen solely were carried by its solubility of 0.03 ml O<sub>2</sub> per liter blood per mm Hg partial pressure of oxygen (about 100 mm Hg in arteries). to the body. In a healthy adult at rest, oxygen consumption is approximately 200–250 ml/min, (70 to 78%) Oxygen saturation this low is considered dangerous in an individual at rest (for instance, during surgery under anesthesia). Sustained hypoxia (oxygenation less than 90%), is dangerous to health, and severe hypoxia (saturations less than 30%) may be rapidly fatal.
A fetus, receiving oxygen via the placenta, is exposed to much lower oxygen pressures (about 21% of the level found in an adult's lungs), so fetuses produce another form of hemoglobin with a much higher affinity for oxygen (hemoglobin F) to function under these conditions.Carbon dioxide transportCO<sub>2</sub> is carried in blood in three different ways. (The exact percentages vary depending whether it is arterial or venous blood). Most of it (about 70%) is converted to bicarbonate ions by the enzyme carbonic anhydrase in the red blood cells by the reaction ; about 7% is dissolved in the plasma; and about 23% is bound to hemoglobin as carbamino compounds.
Hemoglobin, the main oxygen-carrying molecule in red blood cells, carries both oxygen and carbon dioxide. However, the CO<sub>2</sub> bound to hemoglobin does not bind to the same site as oxygen. Instead, it combines with the N-terminal groups on the four globin chains. However, because of allosteric effects on the hemoglobin molecule, the binding of CO<sub>2</sub> decreases the amount of oxygen that is bound for a given partial pressure of oxygen. The decreased binding to carbon dioxide in the blood due to increased oxygen levels is known as the Haldane effect, and is important in the transport of carbon dioxide from the tissues to the lungs. A rise in the partial pressure of CO<sub>2</sub> or a lower pH will cause offloading of oxygen from hemoglobin, which is known as the Bohr effect.
Transport of hydrogen ions
Some oxyhemoglobin loses oxygen and becomes deoxyhemoglobin. Deoxyhemoglobin binds most of the hydrogen ions as it has a much greater affinity for more hydrogen than does oxyhemoglobin.
Lymphatic system
In mammals, blood is in equilibrium with lymph, which is continuously formed in tissues from blood by capillary ultrafiltration. Lymph is collected by a system of small lymphatic vessels and directed to the thoracic duct, which drains into the left subclavian vein, where lymph rejoins the systemic blood circulation.
Thermoregulation
Blood circulation transports heat throughout the body, and adjustments to this flow are an important part of thermoregulation. Increasing blood flow to the surface (e.g., during warm weather or strenuous exercise) causes warmer skin, resulting in faster heat loss. In contrast, when the external temperature is low, blood flow to the extremities and surface of the skin is reduced and to prevent heat loss and is circulated to the important organs of the body, preferentially.
Rate of flow
Rate of blood flow varies greatly between different organs. Liver has the most abundant blood supply with an approximate flow of 1350 ml/min. Kidney and brain are the second and the third most supplied organs, with 1100 ml/min and ~700 ml/min, respectively.
Relative rates of blood flow per 100 g of tissue are different, with kidney, adrenal gland and thyroid being the first, second and third most supplied tissues, respectively.Color
Hemoglobin is the principal determinant of the color of blood (hemochrome). Each molecule has four heme groups, and their interaction with various molecules alters the exact color. Arterial blood and capillary blood are bright red, as oxygen imparts a strong red color to the heme group. Deoxygenated blood is a darker shade of red; this is present in veins, and can be seen during blood donation and when venous blood samples are taken. This is because the spectrum of light absorbed by hemoglobin differs between the oxygenated and deoxygenated states.
Blood in carbon monoxide poisoning is bright red, because carbon monoxide causes the formation of carboxyhemoglobin. In cyanide poisoning, the body cannot use oxygen, so the venous blood remains oxygenated, increasing the redness. There are some conditions affecting the heme groups present in hemoglobin that can make the skin appear blue – a symptom called cyanosis. If the heme is oxidized, methemoglobin, which is more brownish and cannot transport oxygen, is formed. In the rare condition sulfhemoglobinemia, arterial hemoglobin is partially oxygenated, and appears dark red with a bluish hue.
Veins close to the surface of the skin appear blue for a variety of reasons. However, the factors that contribute to this alteration of color perception are related to the light-scattering properties of the skin and the processing of visual input by the visual cortex, rather than the actual color of the venous blood.
Skinks in the genus Prasinohaema have green blood due to a buildup of the waste product biliverdin.DisordersGeneral medical
*Disorders of volume
**Injury can cause blood loss through bleeding. A healthy adult can lose almost 20% of blood volume (1 L) before the first symptom, restlessness, begins, and 40% of volume (2 L) before shock sets in. Thrombocytes are important for blood coagulation and the formation of blood clots, which can stop bleeding. Trauma to the internal organs or bones can cause internal bleeding, which can sometimes be severe.
**Dehydration can reduce the blood volume by reducing the water content of the blood. This would rarely result in shock (apart from the very severe cases) but may result in orthostatic hypotension and fainting.
*Disorders of circulation
**Shock is the ineffective perfusion of tissues, and can be caused by a variety of conditions including blood loss, infection, poor cardiac output.
**Atherosclerosis reduces the flow of blood through arteries, because atheroma lines arteries and narrows them. Atheroma tends to increase with age, and its progression can be compounded by many causes including smoking, hypertension, excess circulating lipids (hyperlipidemia), and diabetes mellitus.
**Coagulation can form a thrombosis, which can obstruct vessels.
**Problems with blood composition, the pumping action of the heart, or narrowing of blood vessels can have many consequences including hypoxia (lack of oxygen) of the tissues supplied. The term ischemia refers to tissue that is inadequately perfused with blood, and infarction refers to tissue death (necrosis), which can occur when the blood supply has been blocked (or is very inadequate).
Hematological
*Anemia
**Insufficient red cell mass (anemia) can be the result of bleeding, blood disorders like thalassemia, or nutritional deficiencies, and may require one or more blood transfusions. Anemia can also be due to a genetic disorder in which the red blood cells do not function effectively. Anemia can be confirmed by a blood test if the hemoglobin value is less than 13.5 gm/dl in men or less than 12.0 gm/dl in women. Several countries have blood banks to fill the demand for transfusable blood. A person receiving a blood transfusion must have a blood type compatible with that of the donor.
**Sickle-cell anemia
*Disorders of cell proliferation
**Leukemia is a group of cancers of the blood-forming tissues and cells.
**Non-cancerous overproduction of red cells (polycythemia vera) or platelets (essential thrombocytosis) may be premalignant.
**Myelodysplastic syndromes involve ineffective production of one or more cell lines.
*Disorders of coagulation
**Hemophilia is a genetic illness that causes dysfunction in one of the blood's clotting mechanisms. This can allow otherwise inconsequential wounds to be life-threatening, but more commonly results in hemarthrosis, or bleeding into joint spaces, which can be crippling.
**Ineffective or insufficient platelets can also result in coagulopathy (bleeding disorders).
**Hypercoagulable state (thrombophilia) results from defects in regulation of platelet or clotting factor function, and can cause thrombosis.
*Infectious disorders of blood
**Blood is an important vector of infection. HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is transmitted through contact with blood, semen or other body secretions of an infected person. Hepatitis B and C are transmitted primarily through blood contact. Owing to blood-borne infections, bloodstained objects are treated as a biohazard.
**Bacterial infection of the blood is bacteremia or sepsis. Viral Infection is viremia. Malaria and trypanosomiasis are blood-borne parasitic infections.
Carbon monoxide poisoning
Substances other than oxygen can bind to hemoglobin; in some cases, this can cause irreversible damage to the body. Carbon monoxide, for example, is extremely dangerous when carried to the blood via the lungs by inhalation, because carbon monoxide irreversibly binds to hemoglobin to form carboxyhemoglobin, so that less hemoglobin is free to bind oxygen, and fewer oxygen molecules can be transported throughout the blood. This can cause suffocation. A fire burning in an enclosed room with poor ventilation presents a dangerous hazard, since it can create a build-up of carbon monoxide in the air. Some carbon monoxide binds to hemoglobin when smoking tobacco.
Treatments
Transfusion
Blood for transfusion is obtained from human donors by blood donation and stored in a blood bank. There are many different blood types in humans, the ABO blood group system, and the Rhesus blood group system being the most important. Transfusion of blood of an incompatible blood group may cause severe, often fatal, complications, so crossmatching is done to ensure that a compatible blood product is transfused.
Other blood products administered intravenously are platelets, blood plasma, cryoprecipitate, and specific coagulation factor concentrates.
Intravenous administration
Many forms of medication (from antibiotics to chemotherapy) are administered intravenously, as they are not readily or adequately absorbed by the digestive tract.
After severe acute blood loss, liquid preparations, generically known as plasma expanders, can be given intravenously, either solutions of salts (NaCl, KCl, CaCl<sub>2</sub> etc.) at physiological concentrations, or colloidal solutions, such as dextrans, human serum albumin, or fresh frozen plasma. In these emergency situations, a plasma expander is a more effective life-saving procedure than a blood transfusion, because the metabolism of transfused red blood cells does not restart immediately after a transfusion.
Letting
In modern evidence-based medicine, bloodletting is used in management of a few rare diseases, including hemochromatosis and polycythemia. However, bloodletting and leeching were common unvalidated interventions used until the 19th century, as many diseases were incorrectly thought to be due to an excess of blood, according to Hippocratic medicine.
Etymology
is credited with the first classification of blood into four types (A, B, AB, and O)]]
English blood (Old English blod) derives from Germanic and has cognates with a similar range of meanings in all other Germanic languages (e.g. German Blut, Swedish blod, Gothic blōþ). There is no accepted Indo-European etymology.
History
Classical Greek medicine
Robin Fåhræus (a Swedish physician who devised the erythrocyte sedimentation rate) suggested that the Ancient Greek system of humorism, wherein the body was thought to contain four distinct bodily fluids (associated with different temperaments), were based upon the observation of blood clotting in a transparent container. When blood is drawn in a glass container and left undisturbed for about an hour, four different layers can be seen. A dark clot forms at the bottom (the "black bile"). Above the clot is a layer of red blood cells (the "blood"). Above this is a whitish layer of white blood cells (the "phlegm"). The top layer is clear yellow serum (the "yellow bile").
In general, Greek thinkers believed that blood was made from food. Plato and Aristotle are two important sources of evidence for this view, but it dates back to Homer's Iliad. Plato thinks that fire in our bellies transform food into blood. Plato believes that the movements of air in the body as we exhale and inhale carry the fire as it transforms our food into blood. Aristotle believed that food is concocted into blood in the heart and transformed into our body's matter.
Types
The ABO blood group system was discovered in the year 1900 by Karl Landsteiner. Jan Janský is credited with the first classification of blood into the four types (A, B, AB, and O) in 1907, which remains in use today. In 1907 the first blood transfusion was performed that used the ABO system to predict compatibility. The first non-direct transfusion was performed on 27 March 1914. The Rhesus factor was discovered in 1937.Culture and religion
Due to its importance to life, blood is associated with a large number of beliefs. One of the most basic is the use of blood as a symbol for family relationships through birth/parentage; to be "related by blood" is to be related by ancestry or descendence, rather than marriage. This bears closely to bloodlines, and sayings such as "blood is thicker than water" and "bad blood", as well as "Blood brother".
Blood is given particular emphasis in the Islamic, Jewish, and Christian religions, because Leviticus 17:11 says "the life of a creature is in the blood." This phrase is part of the Levitical law forbidding the drinking of blood or eating meat with the blood still intact instead of being poured off.
Mythic references to blood can sometimes be connected to the life-giving nature of blood, seen in such events as childbirth, as contrasted with the blood of injury or death.
Indigenous Australians
In many indigenous Australian Aboriginal peoples' traditions, ochre (particularly red) and blood, both high in iron content and considered Maban, are applied to the bodies of dancers for ritual. As Lawlor states: Lawlor comments that blood employed in this fashion is held by these peoples to attune the dancers to the invisible energetic realm of the Dreamtime. Lawlor then connects these invisible energetic realms and magnetic fields, because iron is magnetic.European paganism
Among the Germanic tribes, blood was used during their sacrifices; the Blóts. The blood was considered to have the power of its originator, and, after the butchering, the blood was sprinkled on the walls, on the statues of the gods, and on the participants themselves. This act of sprinkling blood was called blóedsian in Old English, and the terminology was borrowed by the Roman Catholic Church becoming to bless and blessing. The Hittite word for blood, ishar was a cognate to words for "oath" and "bond", see Ishara.
The Ancient Greeks believed that the blood of the gods, ichor, was a substance that was poisonous to mortals.
As a relic of Germanic Law, the cruentation, an ordeal where the corpse of the victim was supposed to start bleeding in the presence of the murderer, was used until the early 17th century.Christianity
In Genesis 9:4, God prohibited Noah and his sons from eating blood (see Noahide Law). This command continued to be observed by the Eastern Orthodox Church.
It is also found in the Bible that when the Angel of Death came around to the Hebrew house that the first-born child would not die if the angel saw lamb's blood wiped across the doorway.
At the Council of Jerusalem, the apostles prohibited certain Christians from consuming blood – this is documented in Acts 15:20 and 29. This chapter specifies a reason (especially in verses 19–21): It was to avoid offending Jews who had become Christians, because the Mosaic Law Code prohibited the practice.
Christ's blood is the means for the atonement of sins. Also, "... the blood of Jesus Christ his [God] Son cleanseth us from all sin." (1 John 1:7), "... Unto him [God] that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood." (Revelation 1:5), and "And they overcame him (Satan) by the blood of the Lamb [Jesus the Christ], and by the word of their testimony ..." (Revelation 12:11).
Some Christian churches, including Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and the Assyrian Church of the East teach that, when consecrated, the Eucharistic wine actually becomes the blood of Jesus for worshippers to drink. Thus in the consecrated wine, Jesus becomes spiritually and physically present. This teaching is rooted in the Last Supper, as written in the four gospels of the Bible, in which Jesus stated to his disciples that the bread that they ate was his body, and the wine was his blood. "This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you." ().
Most forms of Protestantism, especially those of a Methodist or Presbyterian lineage, teach that the wine is no more than a symbol of the blood of Christ, who is spiritually but not physically present. Lutheran theology teaches that the body and blood is present together "in, with, and under" the bread and wine of the Eucharistic feast.
Judaism
In Judaism, animal blood may not be consumed even in the smallest quantity (Leviticus 3:17 and elsewhere); this is reflected in Jewish dietary laws (Kashrut). Blood is purged from meat by rinsing and soaking in water (to loosen clots), salting and then rinsing with water again several times. Eggs must also be checked and any blood spots removed before consumption. Although blood from fish is biblically kosher, it is rabbinically forbidden to consume fish blood to avoid the appearance of breaking the Biblical prohibition.
Another ritual involving blood involves the covering of the blood of fowl and game after slaughtering (Leviticus 17:13); the reason given by the Torah is: "Because the life of the animal is [in] its blood" (ibid 17:14). In relation to human beings, Kabbalah expounds on this verse that the animal soul of a person is in the blood, and that physical desires stem from it.
Likewise, the mystical reason for salting temple sacrifices and slaughtered meat is to remove the blood of animal-like passions from the person. By removing the animal's blood, the animal energies and life-force contained in the blood are removed, making the meat fit for human consumption.
Islam
Consumption of food containing blood is forbidden by Islamic dietary laws. This is derived from the statement in the Qur'an, sura Al-Ma'ida (5:3): "Forbidden to you (for food) are: dead meat, blood, the flesh of swine, and that on which has been invoked the name of other than Allah."
Blood is considered unclean, hence there are specific methods to obtain physical and ritual status of cleanliness once bleeding has occurred. Specific rules and prohibitions apply to menstruation, postnatal bleeding and irregular vaginal bleeding. When an animal has been slaughtered, the animal's neck is cut in a way to ensure that the spine is not severed, hence the brain may send commands to the heart to pump blood to it for oxygen. In this way, blood is removed from the body, and the meat is generally now safe to cook and eat. In modern times, blood transfusions are generally not considered against the rules.
Jehovah's Witnesses
Based on their interpretation of scriptures such as Acts 15:28, 29 ("Keep abstaining...from blood."), many Jehovah's Witnesses neither consume blood nor accept transfusions of whole blood or its major components: red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets (thrombocytes), and plasma. Members may personally decide whether they will accept medical procedures that involve their own blood or substances that are further fractionated from the four major components.
Vampirism
Vampires are mythical creatures that drink blood directly for sustenance, usually with a preference for human blood. Cultures all over the world have myths of this kind; for example the 'Nosferatu' legend, a human who achieves damnation and immortality by drinking the blood of others, originates from Eastern European folklore. Ticks, leeches, female mosquitoes, vampire bats, and an assortment of other natural creatures do consume the blood of other animals, but only bats are associated with vampires. This has no relation to vampire bats, which are New World creatures discovered well after the origins of the European myths.
Invertebrates
In invertebrates, a body fluid analogous to blood called hemolymph is found, the main difference being that hemolymph is not contained in a closed circulatory system. Hemolymph may function to carry oxygen, although hemoglobin is not necessarily used. Crustaceans and mollusks use hemocyanin instead of hemoglobin. In most insects, their hemolymph does not contain oxygen-carrying molecules because their bodies are small enough for their tracheal system to suffice for supplying oxygen.
Other uses
Forensic and archaeological
Blood residue can help forensic investigators identify weapons, reconstruct a criminal action, and link suspects to the crime. Through bloodstain pattern analysis, forensic information can also be gained from the spatial distribution of bloodstains.
Blood residue analysis is also a technique used in archeology.
Artistic
Blood is one of the body fluids that has been used in art. In particular, the performances of Viennese Actionist Hermann Nitsch, Istvan Kantor, Franko B, Lennie Lee, Ron Athey, Yang Zhichao, Lucas Abela and Kira O'Reilly, along with the photography of Andres Serrano, have incorporated blood as a prominent visual element. Marc Quinn has made sculptures using frozen blood, including a cast of his own head made using his own blood.
Genealogical
The term blood is used in genealogical circles to refer to one's ancestry, origins, and ethnic background as in the word bloodline. Other terms where blood is used in a family history sense are blue-blood, royal blood, mixed-blood and blood relative.
See also
*Autotransfusion
*Blood as food
*Blood pressure
*Blood substitutes ("artificial blood")
*Blood test
*Hematology
*Hemophobia
*Hemodynamics
*Hemorheology
*Luminol, a visual test for blood left at crime scenes.
*Oct-1-en-3-one ("Smell" of blood)
*Taboo food and drink: Blood
References
External links
*[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK2261 Blood Groups and Red Cell Antigens.] Free online book at NCBI Bookshelf ID: NBK2261
*
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20161016200738/http://histology-world.com/photoalbum/thumbnails.php?album=7 Blood Photomicrographs]
Category:Hematology
Category:Tissues (biology)
Category:Articles containing video clips | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.813797 |
3999 | Benoit Mandelbrot | | birth_place = Warsaw, Poland
| death_date
| death_place = Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.
| nationality =
| fields =
| alma_mater = | University of Paris}}
| doctoral_advisor = Paul Lévy
| doctoral_students
| known_for
| awards Officier 2006)}}}} <br/>
| spouse = }}
| work_institutions =
}}
Benoit B. Mandelbrot or in English. When speaking in French, Mandelbrot pronounced his name .|groupn}} (20 November 1924 – 14 October 2010) was a Polish-born French-American mathematician and polymath with broad interests in the practical sciences, especially regarding what he labeled as "the art of roughness" of physical phenomena and "the uncontrolled element in life". He referred to himself as a "fractalist"
In 1936, at the age of 11, Mandelbrot and his family emigrated from Warsaw, Poland, to France. After World War II ended, Mandelbrot studied mathematics, graduating from universities in Paris and in the United States and receiving a master's degree in aeronautics from the California Institute of Technology. He spent most of his career in both the United States and France, having dual French and American citizenship. In 1958, he began a 35-year career at IBM, where he became an IBM Fellow, and periodically took leaves of absence to teach at Harvard University. At Harvard, following the publication of his study of U.S. commodity markets in relation to cotton futures, he taught economics and applied sciences.
Because of his access to IBM's computers, Mandelbrot was one of the first to use computer graphics to create and display fractal geometric images, leading to his discovery of the Mandelbrot set in 1980. He showed how visual complexity can be created from simple rules. He said that things typically considered to be "rough", a "mess", or "chaotic", such as clouds or shorelines, actually had a "degree of order".
Toward the end of his career, he was Sterling Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Yale University, where he was the oldest professor in Yale's history to receive tenure.
Mandelbrot also held positions at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Université Lille Nord de France, Institute for Advanced Study and Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique. During his career, he received over 15 honorary doctorates and served on many science journals, along with winning numerous awards. His autobiography, The Fractalist: Memoir of a Scientific Maverick, was published posthumously in 2012.
Early years
Benedykt Mandelbrot was born in a Lithuanian Jewish family, in Warsaw during the Second Polish Republic. His father made his living trading clothing; his mother was a dental surgeon. During his first two school years, he was tutored privately by an uncle who despised rote learning: "Most of my time was spent playing chess, reading maps and learning how to open my eyes to everything around me."
In 1936, when he was 11, the family emigrated from Poland to France. The move, World War II, and the influence of his father's brother, the mathematician Szolem Mandelbrojt (who had moved to Paris around 1920), further prevented a standard education. "The fact that my parents, as economic and political refugees, joined Szolem in France saved our lives," he writes.
Mandelbrot attended the Lycée Rollin (now the Collège-lycée Jacques-Decour) in Paris until the start of World War II, when his family moved to Tulle, France. He was helped by Rabbi David Feuerwerker, the Rabbi of Brive-la-Gaillarde, to continue his studies. Much of France was occupied by the Nazis at the time, and Mandelbrot recalls this period:
According to Clarke, "the Mandelbrot set is indeed one of the most astonishing discoveries in the entire history of mathematics. Who could have dreamed that such an incredibly simple equation could have generated images of literally infinite complexity?" Clarke also notes an "odd coincidence":
<blockquote>the name Mandelbrot, and the word "mandala"—for a religious symbol—which I'm sure is a pure coincidence, but indeed the Mandelbrot set does seem to contain an enormous number of mandalas. This influential work brought fractals into the mainstream of professional and popular mathematics, as well as silencing critics, who had dismissed fractals as "program artifacts".
Mandelbrot left IBM in 1987, after 35 years and 12 days, when IBM decided to end pure research in his division. He joined the Department of Mathematics at Yale, and obtained his first tenured post in 1999, at the age of 75. At the time of his retirement in 2005, he was Sterling Professor of Mathematical Sciences.
Fractals and the "theory of roughness"
Mandelbrot created the first-ever "theory of roughness", and he saw "roughness" in the shapes of mountains, coastlines and river basins; the structures of plants, blood vessels and lungs; the clustering of galaxies. His personal quest was to create some mathematical formula to measure the overall "roughness" of such objects in nature.}}
In his paper "How Long Is the Coast of Britain? Statistical Self-Similarity and Fractional Dimension", published in Science in 1967, Mandelbrot discusses self-similar curves that have Hausdorff dimension that are examples of fractals, although Mandelbrot does not use this term in the paper, as he did not coin it until 1975. The paper is one of Mandelbrot's first publications on the topic of fractals.
Mandelbrot emphasized the use of fractals as realistic and useful models for describing many "rough" phenomena in the real world. He concluded that "real roughness is often fractal and can be measured." and a maverick. His informal and passionate style of writing and his emphasis on visual and geometric intuition (supported by the inclusion of numerous illustrations) made The Fractal Geometry of Nature accessible to non-specialists. The book sparked widespread popular interest in fractals and contributed to chaos theory and other fields of science and mathematics.
Mandelbrot also put his ideas to work in cosmology. He offered in 1974 a new explanation of Olbers' paradox (the "dark night sky" riddle), demonstrating the consequences of fractal theory as a sufficient, but not necessary, resolution of the paradox. He postulated that if the stars in the universe were fractally distributed (for example, like Cantor dust), it would not be necessary to rely on the Big Bang theory to explain the paradox. His model would not rule out a Big Bang, but would allow for a dark sky even if the Big Bang had not occurred.Awards and honorsMandelbrot's awards include the Wolf Prize in Physics in 1993, the Lewis Fry Richardson Prize of the European Geophysical Society in 2000, the Japan Prize in 2003, and the Einstein Lectureship of the American Mathematical Society in 2006.
The small asteroid 27500 Mandelbrot was named in his honor. In November 1990, he was made a Chevalier in France's Legion of Honour. In December 2005, Mandelbrot was appointed to the position of Battelle Fellow at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Mandelbrot was promoted to an Officer of the Legion of Honour in January 2006. An honorary degree from Johns Hopkins University was bestowed on Mandelbrot in the May 2010 commencement exercises.
A partial list of awards received by Mandelbrot:
* 2004 Best Business Book of the Year Award
* AMS Einstein Lectureship
* Barnard Medal
* Caltech Service
* Casimir Funk Natural Sciences Award
* Charles Proteus Steinmetz Medal
* High School Spelling Bee (1940)
* Fellow, American Geophysical Union
* Fellow of the American Statistical Association
* Fellow of the American Physical Society (1987)
* Franklin Medal
* Harvey Prize (1989)
* Honda Prize
* Humboldtpreis
* IBM Fellowship
* Japan Prize (2003)
* John Scott Award
* Légion d'honneur (Legion of Honour)
* Lewis Fry Richardson Medal
* Medaglia della Presidenza della Repubblica Italiana
* Médaille de Vermeil de la Ville de Paris
* Nevada Prize
* Member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters.
* Member of the American Philosophical Society (2004)
* Science for Art
* Sven Berggren-Priset
* Wacław Sierpiński medal of the Polish Mathematical Society (2005)
* Władysław Orlicz Prize
* Wolf Prize in Physics (1993)
Death and legacy
Mandelbrot died from pancreatic cancer at the age of 85 in a hospice in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on 14 October 2010. Reacting to news of his death, mathematician Heinz-Otto Peitgen said: "[I]f we talk about impact inside mathematics, and applications in the sciences, he is one of the most important figures of the last fifty years." Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France at the time of Mandelbrot's death, said Mandelbrot had "a powerful, original mind that never shied away from innovating and shattering preconceived notions [... h]is work, developed entirely outside mainstream research, led to modern information theory." Mandelbrot's obituary in The Economist points out his fame as "celebrity beyond the academy" and lauds him as the "father of fractal geometry".
Best-selling essayist-author Nassim Nicholas Taleb has remarked that Mandelbrot's book The (Mis)Behavior of Markets is in his opinion "The deepest and most realistic finance book ever published".<ref namenature/>BibliographyIn English
* Fractals: Form, Chance and Dimension, 1977, 2020
*
* Mandelbrot, B. (1959) Variables et processus stochastiques de Pareto-Levy, et la repartition des revenus. Comptes rendus de l'Académie des Sciences de Paris, 249, 613–615.
* Mandelbrot, B. (1960) The Pareto-Levy law and the distribution of income. International Economic Review, 1, 79–106.
* Mandelbrot, B. (1961) Stable Paretian random functions and the multiplicative variation of income. Econometrica, 29, 517–543.
* Mandelbrot, B. (1964) Random walks, fire damage amount and other Paretian risk phenomena. Operations Research, 12, 582–585.
* Fractals and Scaling in Finance: Discontinuity, Concentration, Risk. Selecta Volume E, 1997 by Benoit B. Mandelbrot and R.E. Gomory
* Mandelbrot, Benoit B. (1997) Fractals and Scaling in Finance: Discontinuity, Concentration, Risk, Springer.
* Fractales, hasard et finance, 1959–1997, 1 November 1998
* Multifractals and 1/ƒ Noise: Wild Self-Affinity in Physics (1963–1976) (Selecta; V.N) 18 January 1999 by J.M. Berger and Benoit B. Mandelbrot
*
* Gaussian Self-Affinity and Fractals: Globality, The Earth, 1/f Noise, and R/S (Selected Works of Benoit B. Mandelbrot) 14 December 2001 by Benoit Mandelbrot and F.J. Damerau
* Mandelbrot, Benoit B., Gaussian Self-Affinity and Fractals, Springer: 2002.
* Fractals and Chaos: The Mandelbrot Set and Beyond, 9 January 2004
* Mandelbrot, Benoit B. (2010). [https://www.amazon.com/Fractalist-Memoir-Scientific-Maverick/dp/030738991X The Fractalist, Memoir of a Scientific Maverick.] New York: [http://www.randomhouse.com/highschool/catalog/display.pperl?isbn9780307389916&viewemail_prep Vintage Books], Division of Random House.
* The Fractalist: Memoir of a Scientific Maverick, 2014
* ; (2006 )
* Heinz-Otto Peitgen, Hartmut Jürgens, Dietmar Saupe and Cornelia Zahlten: Fractals: An Animated Discussion (63 min video film, interviews with Benoît Mandelbrot and Edward Lorenz, computer animations), W.H. Freeman and Company, 1990. (re-published by Films for the Humanities & Sciences, )
*
* [https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/fractals/ "Hunting the Hidden Dimension: mysteriously beautiful fractals are shaking up the world of mathematics and deepening our understanding of nature"], NOVA, WGBH Educational Foundation, Boston for PBS, first aired 28 October 2008.
See also
*
*
*
*
*
*
*List of Poles
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
}}
Notes
References
Sources
* External links
*
* [http://users.math.yale.edu/mandelbrot/ Mandelbrot's page at Yale]
* [http://www.ted.com/talks/benoit_mandelbrot_fractals_the_art_of_roughness.html "Benoît Mandelbrot: Fractals and the art of roughness"] (TED address).
* [http://video.mit.edu/watch/fractals-in-science-engineering-and-finance-roughness-and-beauty-9893/ Fractals in Science, Engineering and Finance] (lecture).
* [http://video.ft.com/v/63078298001/Why-efficient-markets-collapse-Mandelbrot FT.com interview] on the subject of the financial markets which includes his critique of the "efficient market" hypothesis.
*
* [http://www.webofstories.com/people/benoit.mandelbrot/1 Mandelbrot relates his life story] (Web of Stories).
* [http://dynkincollection.library.cornell.edu/biographies/882 Interview (1 January 1981, Ithaca, NY)] held by the Eugene Dynkin Collection of Mathematics Interviews, Cornell University Library.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1o5FMTHkLQg Video animation of Mandelbrot set], zoom factor 10<sup>342</sup>.
* , a three-dimensional Mandelbrot-set projection.
*
*
*
* [http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/mandelbrot-benoit.pdf Michael Frame, "Benoit B. Mandelbrot", Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences (2014)]
Category:1924 births
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Category:20th-century American economists
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Category:20th-century French mathematicians
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Category:Chaos theorists
Category:Deaths from pancreatic cancer in Massachusetts
Category:École Polytechnique alumni
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Category:Harvard University people
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Category:Yale University faculty
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Category:Recipients of Franklin Medal | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benoit_Mandelbrot | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.841450 |
4001 | Benedict of Nursia | |death_date
|feast_day=11 July (General Roman Calendar, Lutheran Churches, Anglican Communion)<br>14 March (Eastern Orthodox Church, Byzantine Catholic Church)<br>21 March (pre-1970 General Roman Calendar)
|venerated_in= All Christian denominations which venerate saints
|image|caption A portrait of Saint Benedict as depicted in the Benedetto Portinari Triptych, by Hans Memling
|birth_place= Nursia, Kingdom of Italy
|death_place=Mons Casinus, Eastern Roman Empire
|titles=Founder of the Benedictine Order, Exorcist, Mystic, Abbot of Monte Cassino, and Father of Western Monasticism
|beatified_date|beatified_place
|beatified_by|canonized_date1220
|canonized_place=Rome, Papal States
|canonized_by=Pope Honorius III
|attributes=
|patronage=
|major_shrine=Monte Cassino Abbey, with his burial<br>
Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire, near Orléans, France<br>
Sacro Speco, at Subiaco, Italy
|suppressed_date|issues
}}
Benedict of Nursia (; ; 2 March 480 – 21 March 547), often known as Saint Benedict, was a Christian monk. He is famed in the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Lutheran Churches, the Anglican Communion, and Old Catholic Churches. In 1964, Pope Paul VI declared Benedict a patron saint of Europe.
Benedict founded twelve communities for monks at Subiaco in present-day Lazio, Italy (about to the east of Rome), before moving southeast to Monte Cassino in the mountains of central Italy. The present-day Order of Saint Benedict emerged later and, moreover, is not an "order" as the term is commonly understood, but a confederation of autonomous congregations.
Benedict's main achievement, his Rule of Saint Benedict, contains a set of rules for his monks to follow. Heavily influenced by the writings of John Cassian ( – ), it shows strong affinity with the earlier Rule of the Master, but it also has a unique spirit of balance, moderation and reasonableness (, epieíkeia), which persuaded most Christian religious communities founded throughout the Middle Ages to adopt it. As a result, Benedict's Rule became one of the most influential religious rules in Western Christendom. For this reason, Giuseppe Carletti regarded Benedict as the founder of Western Christian monasticism.
Biography
Apart from a short poem attributed to Mark of Monte Cassino, the only ancient account of Benedict is found in the second volume of Pope Gregory I's four-book Dialogues, thought to have been written in 593,
Gregory's account of Benedict's life, however, is not a biography in the modern sense of the word. It provides instead a spiritual portrait of the gentle, disciplined abbot. In a letter to Bishop Maximilian of Syracuse, Gregory states his intention for his Dialogues, saying they are a kind of floretum (an anthology, literally, 'flower garden') of the most striking miracles of Italian holy men.
Gregory did not set out to write a chronological, historically anchored story of Benedict, but he did base his anecdotes on direct testimony. To establish his authority, Gregory explains that his information came from what he considered the best sources: a handful of Benedict's disciples who lived with him and witnessed his various miracles. These followers, he says, are Constantinus, who succeeded Benedict as Abbot of Monte Cassino, Honoratus, who was abbot of Subiaco when St. Gregory wrote his Dialogues, Valentinianus, and Simplicius.
In Gregory's day, history was not recognised as an independent field of study; it was a branch of grammar or rhetoric, and historia was an account that summed up the findings of the learned when they wrote what was, at that time, considered history. Gregory's Dialogues, Book Two, then, an authentic medieval hagiography cast as a conversation between the Pope and his deacon Peter, is designed to teach spiritual lessons. the modern Norcia, in Umbria. According to Gregory's narrative, Benedict was born around 480, and the year in which he abandoned his studies and left home "was probably a few years before 500."
Benedict was sent to Rome to study, but was disappointed by the academic studies he encountered there. Seeking to flee the great city, he left with his nurse and settled in Enfide. Enfide, which the tradition of Subiaco identifies with the modern Affile, is in the Simbruini mountains, about forty miles from Rome He founded 12 monasteries in the vicinity of Subiaco, and, eventually, in 530 he founded the great Benedictine monastery of Monte Cassino, which lies on a hilltop between Rome and Naples.
and Saint Benedict, painted by Spinello Aretino. According to Pope Gregory, King Totila ordered a general to wear his kingly robes in order to see whether Benedict would discover the truth. Immediately Benedict detected the impersonation, and Totila came to pay him due respect.]]
Veneration
Benedict died of a fever at Monte Cassino not long after his sister, Scholastica, and was buried in the same tomb. According to tradition, this occurred on 21 March 547. He was named patron protector of Europe by Pope Paul VI in 1964. In 1980, Pope John Paul II declared him co-patron of Europe, together with Cyril and Methodius. Furthermore, he is the patron saint of speleologists. On the island of Tenerife (Spain) he is the patron saint of fields and farmers. An important romeria (Romería Regional de San Benito Abad) is held on this island in his honor, one of the most important in the country.
In the pre-1970 General Roman Calendar, his feast is kept on 21 March, the day of his death according to some manuscripts of the Martyrologium Hieronymianum and that of Bede. Because on that date his liturgical memorial would always be impeded by the observance of Lent, the 1969 revision of the General Roman Calendar moved his memorial to 11 July, the date that appears in some Gallic liturgical books of the end of the 8th century as the feast commemorating his birth (Natalis S. Benedicti). There is some uncertainty about the origin of this feast. Accordingly, on 21 March the Roman Martyrology mentions in a line and a half that it is Benedict's day of death and that his memorial is celebrated on 11 July, while on 11 July it devotes seven lines to speaking of him, and mentions the tradition that he died on 21 March.
The Eastern Orthodox Church commemorates Saint Benedict on 14 March.
The Lutheran Churches celebrate the Feast of Saint Benedict on July 11.
Rule of Saint Benedict
Benedict wrote the Rule for monks living communally under the authority of an abbot. The Rule comprises seventy-three short chapters. Its wisdom is twofold: spiritual (how to live a Christocentric life on earth) and administrative (how to run a monastery efficiently).
Saint Benedict Medal
for the 1,400th anniversary of his birth in 1880]]
This devotional medal originally came from a cross in honor of Saint Benedict. On one side, the medal has an image of Saint Benedict, holding the Holy Rule in his left hand and a cross in his right. There is a raven on one side of him, with a cup on the other side of him. Around the medal's outer margin are the words "Eius in obitu nostro praesentia muniamur" ("May we be strengthened by his presence in the hour of our death"). The other side of the medal has a cross with the initials CSSML on the vertical bar which signify "Crux Sacra Sit Mihi Lux" ("May the Holy Cross be my light") and on the horizontal bar are the initials NDSMD which stand for "Non-Draco Sit Mihi Dux" ("Let not the dragon be my guide"). The initials CSPB stand for "Crux Sancti Patris Benedicti" ("The Cross of the Holy Father Benedict") and are located on the interior angles of the cross. Either the inscription "PAX" (Peace) or the Christogram "IHS" may be found at the top of the cross in most cases. Around the medal's margin on this side are the Vade Retro Satana initials VRSNSMV which stand for "Vade Retro Satana, Nonquam Suade Mihi Vana" ("Begone Satan, do not suggest to me thy vanities") then a space followed by the initials SMQLIVB which signify "Sunt Mala Quae Libas, Ipse Venena Bibas" ("Evil are the things thou profferest, drink thou thine own poison").
'' which is abbreviated on the Saint Benedict Medal.]]
This medal was first struck in 1880 to commemorate the fourteenth centenary of Benedict's birth and is also called the Jubilee Medal; its exact origin, however, is unknown. In 1647, during a witchcraft trial at Natternberg near Metten Abbey in Bavaria, the accused women testified they had no power over Metten, which was under the protection of the cross. An investigation found a number of painted crosses on the walls of the abbey with the letters now found on St Benedict medals, but their meaning had been forgotten. A manuscript written in 1415 was eventually found that had a picture of Benedict holding a scroll in one hand and a staff which ended in a cross in the other. On the scroll and staff were written the full words of the initials contained on the crosses. Medals then began to be struck in Germany, which then spread throughout Europe. This medal was first approved by Pope Benedict XIV in his briefs of 23 December 1741 and 12 March 1742.
Influence
]]
The early Middle Ages have been called "the Benedictine centuries". In April 2008, Pope Benedict XVI discussed the influence St Benedict had on Western Europe. The pope said that "with his life and work St Benedict exercised a fundamental influence on the development of European civilization and culture" and helped Europe to emerge from the "dark night of history" that followed the fall of the Roman Empire.
Benedict contributed more than anyone else to the rise of monasticism in the West. His Rule was the foundational document for thousands of religious communities in the Middle Ages. To this day, The Rule of St. Benedict is the most common and influential Rule used by monasteries and monks, more than 1,400 years after its writing.
A basilica was built upon the birthplace of Benedict and Scholastica in the 1400s. Ruins of their familial home were excavated from beneath the church and preserved. The earthquake of 30 October 2016 completely devastated the structure of the basilica, leaving only the front facade and altar standing.
Gallery
:See also :Category:Paintings of Benedict of Nursia.
<gallery>
Melk16.jpg|Saint Benedict and the cup of poison (Melk Abbey, Austria)
Gold-colored_small_Saint_Benedict_crucifix.jpg|Small gold-coloured Saint Benedict crucifix
Saint Benedict Medal.jpg|Both sides of a Saint Benedict Medal
Heiligenkreuz.St. Benedict.jpg|Portrait (1926) by Herman Nieg (1849–1928); Heiligenkreuz Abbey, Austria
BenedictEpisodeCure.jpg|St. Benedict at the Death of St. Scholastica (–60), Musée National de l'Age Médiévale, Paris, orig. at the Abbatiale of St. Denis
Einsiedeln - St. Benedikt 2013-01-26 13-50-02 (P7700).JPG|Statue in Einsiedeln, Switzerland
Saint Andrew and Saint Benedict with the Archangel Gabriel (left panel) B35301.jpg|Benedict holding a bound bundle of sticks representing the strength of monks who live in community
</gallery>
See also
* Anthony the Great
* Scholastica (St. Benedict's sister)
* Benedict of Aniane
* Benedictine Order
* Camaldolese
* Hermit
* San Beneto
* Saint Benedict Medal
* Vade retro satana
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
*
External links
* (Institutional website of the Order of Saint Benedict)
*
The Rule
*
* , translated by Leonard J. Doyle
*
Publications
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Marett-Crosby, A., ed., [https://books.google.com/books?id=OxV87Fup-SUC The Benedictine Handbook] (Norwich: Canterbury Press, 2003).
*
Iconography
*
*
Category:480 births
Category:547 deaths
Category:People from Norcia
Category:History of Catholic monasticism
Category:Benedictine saints
Category:Founders of Catholic religious communities
Category:Benedictine spirituality
Category:5th-century Italo-Roman people
Category:6th-century Italo-Roman people
Category:6th-century Christian saints
Category:Medieval Italian saints
Category:Founders of Christian monasteries
Category:6th-century writers in Latin
Category:6th-century Italian writers
Category:Anglican saints
Category:Abbots of Monte Cassino
Category:6th-century Christian abbots | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benedict_of_Nursia | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.857379 |
4005 | Battle of Pharsalus | | result = Caesarian victory
| territory Most of the Eastern Roman provinces defect to Caesar
| combatant1 = Caesarians
| combatant2 = Pompeians
| commander1 = Julius Caesar<br />Mark Antony<br />Gnaeus Domitius Calvinus<br />Publius Cornelius Sulla
| commander2 = Pompey<br />Titus Labienus<br />Metellus Scipio<br />Lucius Domitius<br />Lucius Cornelius Lentulus
| units1 =
* Legio VI
* Legio VII
* Legio VIII
* Legio IX
* Legio X
* Legio XI
* Legio XII
* Legio XIII
| units2 =
* Syrian legions
* Cilician legions
* Legio I
* Legio III
| strength1 = 23,000+<hr>
| strength2 = 41,000–52,000+<hr> legionaries
|5,000–7,000 cavalry
|Thousands of light infantry}}
| casualties1 = 200–1,200 killed
| casualties2 30,000–39,000
| map_type = Greece
| map_relief = yes
| map_size = 300px
| map_marksize | map_caption
| map_label =
}}
The Battle of Pharsalus was the decisive battle of Caesar's Civil War fought on 9 August 48 BC near Pharsalus in Central Greece. Julius Caesar and his allies formed up opposite the army of the Roman Republic under the command of Pompey. Pompey had the backing of a majority of Roman senators and his army significantly outnumbered the veteran Caesarian legions.
Pressured by his officers, Pompey reluctantly engaged in battle and suffered an overwhelming defeat, ultimately fleeing the camp and his men, disguised as an ordinary citizen. Eventually making his way to Egypt, he was assassinated upon his arrival at the order of Ptolemy XIII.Prelude
Following the start of the Civil War, Caesar had captured Rome, forced Pompey and his allies to withdraw from Italy, and defeated Pompey's legates in Spain. In the campaign season for 48 BC, Caesar crossed the Adriatic and advanced on Dyrrachium. There, he besieged it, but was defeated.
Caesar then withdrew east into Thessaly, partly to relieve one of his legates from attack by Metellus Scipio's forces arriving from Syria. He besieged Gomphi after it resisted him. Pompey pursued, seeking to spare Italy from invasion by concluding the war on Greek soil, to prevent Caesar from defeating Metellus Scipio's forces arriving from Syria, and under pressure from his overconfident allies who accused him of prolonging the war to extend his command.
Date
The decisive battle took place on 9 August 48 BC according to the Republican calendar.
Location
The location of the battlefield was for a long time the subject of controversy among scholars. Caesar himself, in his Commentarii de Bello Civili, mentions few place-names; and although the battle is called after Pharsalos by modern authors, four ancient writers – the author of the Bellum Alexandrinum (48.1), Frontinus (Strategemata 2.3.22), Eutropius (20), and Orosius (6.15.27) – place it specifically at Palaepharsalus ("Old" Pharsalus). Strabo in his Geographica (Γεωγραφικά) mentions both old and new Pharsaloi, and notes that the Thetideion, the temple to Thetis south of Scotoussa, was near both. In 198 BC, in the Second Macedonian War, Philip V of Macedon sacked Palaepharsalos (Livy, Ab Urbe Condita 32.13.9), but left new Pharsalos untouched. These two details perhaps imply that the two cities were not close neighbours. Many scholars, therefore, unsure of the site of Palaepharsalos, followed Appian (2.75) and located the battle of 48 BC south of the Enipeus or close to Pharsalos (today's Pharsala). Among the scholars arguing for the south side are Béquignon (1928), Bruère (1951), and Gwatkin (1957).
An increasing number of scholars, however, have argued for a location on the north side of the river. These include Perrin (1885), Holmes (1908), Lucas (1921), Rambaud (1955), Pelling (1973), Morgan (1983), and Sheppard (2006). John D. Morgan in his definitive "Palae-pharsalus – the Battle and the Town", shows that Palaepharsalus cannot have been at Palaiokastro, as Béquignon thought (a site abandoned c. 500 BC), nor the hill of Fatih-Dzami within the walls of Pharsalus itself, as Kromayer (1903, 1931) and Gwatkin thought; and Morgan argues that it is probably also not the hill of Khtouri (Koutouri), some 7 miles north-west of Pharsalus on the south bank of the Enipeus, as Lucas and Holmes thought, although that remains a possibility. However, Morgan believes it is most likely to have been the hill just east of the village of (Krini Larisas, formerly Driskoli) very close to the ancient highway from Larisa to Pharsalus. This site is some north of Pharsalus, and three miles north of the river Enipeus, and not only has remains dating back to Neolithic times but also signs of habitation in the 1st century BC and later. The identification seems to be confirmed by the location of a place misspelled "Palfari" or "Falaphari" shown on a medieval route map of the road just north of Pharsalus. Morgan places Pompey's camp a mile to the west of Krini, just north of the village of Avra (formerly Sarikayia), and Caesar's camp some four miles to the east-south-east of Pompey's. According to this reconstruction, therefore, the battle took place not between Pharsalus and the river, as Appian wrote, but between Old Pharsalus and the river.
An interesting side-note on Palaepharsalus is that it was sometimes identified in ancient sources with Phthia, the home of Achilles. Near Old and New Pharsalus was a "Thetideion", or temple dedicated to Thetis, the mother of Achilles. However, Phthia, the kingdom of Achilles and his father Peleus, is more usually identified with the lower valley of the Spercheios river, much further south.
Name of the battle
Although it is often called the Battle of Pharsalus by modern historians, this name was rarely used in the ancient sources. Caesar merely calls it the proelium in Thessaliā ("battle in Thessalia"); Marcus Tullius Cicero and Hirtius call it the Pharsālicum proelium ("Pharsalic battle") or pugna Pharsālia ("Pharsalian battle"), and similar expressions are also used in other authors. But Hirtius (if he is the author of the de Bello Alexandrino) also refers to the battle as having taken place at Palaepharsalus, and this name also occurs in Strabo, Frontinus, Eutropius, and Orosius. Lucan in his poem about the Civil War regularly uses the name Pharsālia, and this term is also used by the epitomiser of Livy and by Tacitus. The only ancient sources to refer to the battle as being at Pharsalus are a certain calendar known as the Fasti Amiternini and the Greek authors Plutarch, Appian, and Polyaenus.
Opposing armies
The total number of soldiers on each side is unknown because ancient accounts of the battle focused primarily on giving the numbers of Italian legionaries only, regarding allied non-citizen contingents as inferior and inconsequential. According to Caesar, his own army included 22,000 Roman legionaries distributed throughout 80 cohorts (8 legions), alongside 1,000 Gallic and Germanic cavalry. All of Caesar's legions were understrength; some only had about a thousand men at the time of Pharsalus, due partly to losses at Dyrrhachium and partly to Caesar's wish to rapidly advance with a picked body as opposed to a ponderous movement with a large army. Another source adds that he had recruited Greek light infantry from Dolopia, Acarnania and Aetolia; these numbered no more than a few thousand. Caesar, Appian and Plutarch give Pompey an army of 45,000 Roman infantry. Osorius describes Pompey as having 88 cohorts of Roman infantry, which at full strength would come to 44,000 men, while Brunt and Wylie estimated Pompey's Roman infantry as being as 38,000 men, and Greenhalgh said they contained a maximum of 36,000. Greenhalgh, keeping to Caesar's own proportions, says Pompey had a maximum of 36,000 legionaries; Brunt and Wylie allow for approximately 38,000. }}
It was in his auxiliary troops and in particular his cavalry, all of which vastly outnumbered Caesar's own, that Pompey had his greatest advantage. He seems to have had at his disposal anywhere between 5,000 and 7,000 cavalry, and thousands of archers, slingers and light infantrymen in general. These all formed a remarkably diverse group, including Gallic and Germanic horsemen alongside all polyglot peoples of the east – namely Greeks, Thracians, and Anatolians from the Balkans and Syrians, Phoenicians and Jews from the Levant. To this heterogeneous force Pompey added horsemen conscripted from his own slaves. Many of the foreigners were serving under their own rulers, for more than a dozen despots and petty kings under Roman influence in the east were Pompey's personal clients and some elected to attend in person, or send proxies.Caesarian legions
Caesar had the following legions with him:
* the VI legion (later called Ferrata) veterans of his Gallic Wars
* the VII legion (later called Claudia Pia Fidelis) veterans of his Gallic Wars
* the VIII legion (later called Augusta) veterans of his Gallic Wars
* the IX legion (later called Hispania) veterans of his Gallic Wars
* the X legion (Equestris, later called Gemina) veterans of his Gallic Wars
* the XI legion (later called Paterna and Claudia Pia Fidelis, the same title as the seventh) veterans of his Gallic Wars
* the XII legion (later called Fulminata) veterans of his Gallic Wars
* the XIII legion (later also called Gemina, the 'twin' to the tenth) veterans of his Gallic Wars
The bulk of Caesar's army at Pharsalus was made up of his veterans from the Gallic Wars; very experienced, battle-hardened troops who were absolutely devoted to their commander.
Deployment
The two generals deployed their legions in the traditional three lines (triplex acies), with Pompey's right and Caesar's left flanks resting on river Enipeus. As the stream provided enough protection to that side, Pompey moved almost all of his cavalry, archers, and slingers to the left, to make the most of their numerical strength. Only a small force of 500–600 Pontic cavalry and some Cappadocian light infantry was placed on his right flank. Pompey stationed his strongest legions in the center and wings of his infantry line, and dispersed some 2,000 re-enlisted veterans throughout the entire line in order to inspire the less experienced. The Pompeian cohorts were arrayed in an unusually thick formation, 10 men deep: their task was just to tie down the enemy foot while Pompey's cavalry, his key to victory, swept through Caesar's flank and rear. The column of legions was divided under command of three subordinates, with Lentulus in charge of the left, Scipio of the center and Ahenobarbus the right. }} Labienus was entrusted with command of the cavalry charge, while Pompey himself took up a position behind the left wing in order to oversee the course of the battle.
Caesar also deployed his men in three lines, but, being outnumbered, had to thin his ranks to a depth of only six men, in order to match the frontage presented by Pompey. His left flank, resting on the Enipeus River, consisted of his battle-worn IX legion supplemented by the VIII legion, these were commanded by Mark Antony. The VI, XII, XI and XIII formed the centre and were commanded by Domitius, then came the VII and upon his right he placed his favored X legion, giving Sulla command of this flank – Caesar himself took his stand on the right, across from Pompey. Upon seeing the disposition of Pompey's army Caesar grew discomforted, and further thinned his third line in order to form a fourth line on his right: this to counter the onslaught of the enemy cavalry, which he knew his numerically inferior cavalry could not withstand. He gave this new line detailed instructions for the role they would play, hinting that upon them would rest the fortunes of the day, and gave strict orders to his third line not to charge until specifically ordered.
Battle
There was significant distance between the two armies, according to Caesar. Pompey ordered his men not to charge, but to wait until Caesar's legions came into close quarters; Pompey's adviser Gaius Triarius believed that Caesar's infantry would be fatigued and fall into disorder if they were forced to cover twice the expected distance of a battle march. Also, stationary troops were expected to be able to defend better against pila throws. Seeing that Pompey's army was not advancing, Caesar's infantry under Mark Antony and Gnaeus Domitius Calvinus started the advance. As Caesar's men neared throwing distance, without orders, they stopped to rest and regroup before continuing the charge; Pompey's right and centre line held as the two armies collided.
As Pompey's infantry fought, Labienus ordered the Pompeian cavalry on his left flank to attack Caesar's cavalry; as expected they successfully pushed back Caesar's cavalry. Caesar then revealed his hidden fourth line of infantry and surprised Pompey's cavalry charge; Caesar's men were ordered to leap up and use their pila to thrust at Pompey's cavalry instead of throwing them. Pompey's cavalry panicked and suffered hundreds of casualties, as Caesar's cavalry came about and charged after them. After failing to reform, the rest of Pompey's cavalry retreated to the hills, leaving the left wing of his legions exposed to the hidden troops as Caesar's cavalry wheeled around their flank. Caesar then ordered in his third line, containing his most battle-hardened veterans, to attack. This broke Pompey's left wing troops, who fled the battlefield.
After routing Pompey's cavalry, Caesar threw in his last line of reservesa move which at this point meant that the battle was more or less decided. Pompey lost the will to fight as he watched both cavalry and legions under his command break formation and flee from battle, and he retreated to his camp, leaving the rest of his troops at the centre and right flank to their own devices. He ordered the garrisoned auxiliaries to defend the camp as he gathered his family, loaded up gold, and threw off his general's cloak to make a quick escape. As the rest of Pompey's army were left confused, Caesar urged his men to end the day by routing the rest of Pompey's troops and capturing the Pompeian camp. They complied with his wishes; after finishing off the remains of Pompey's men, they furiously attacked the camp walls. The Thracians and the other auxiliaries who were left in the Pompeian camp, in total seven cohorts, defended bravely, but were not able to fend off the assault. These numbers seem suspiciously exaggerated with Appian suggesting the Caesarean losses to be as many as 1,200 men and the Pompeian losses to be 6,000. In his history of the war, Caesar would praise his own men's discipline and experience, and remembered each of his centurions by name. He also questioned Pompey's decision not to charge.AftermathPompey, despairing of the defeat, fled with his advisors overseas to Mytilene and thence to Cilicia where he held a council of war; at the same time, Cato and supporters at Dyrrachium attempted first to hand over command to Marcus Tullius Cicero, who refused, deciding instead to return to Italy. They then regrouped at Corcyra and went thence to Libya. Others, including Marcus Junius Brutus sought Caesar's pardon, travelling over marshlands to Larissa where he was then welcomed graciously by Caesar in his camp. Pompey's council of war decided to flee to Egypt, which had in the previous year supplied him with military aid.
In the aftermath of the battle, Caesar captured Pompey's camp and burned Pompey's correspondence. He then announced that he would forgive all who asked for mercy. Pompeian naval forces in the Adriatic and Italy mostly withdrew or surrendered.
Hearing of Pompey's flight to Egypt, Caesar remained in hot pursuit, first landing in Asia and reaching Alexandria on 2 October 48 BC, where he learnt of Pompey's murder and then was embroiled in a dynastic dispute between Ptolemy XIII and Cleopatra.Importance
14th century miniature by Niccolò da Bologna showing Caesar, the victor over Pompey at the Battle of Pharsalus]]
Paul K. Davis wrote that "Caesar's victory took him to the pinnacle of power, effectively ending the Republic." The battle itself did not end the civil war but it was decisive and gave Caesar a much needed boost in legitimacy. Until then much of the Roman world outside Italy supported Pompey and his allies due to the extensive list of clients he held in all corners of the Republic. After Pompey's defeat former allies began to align themselves with Caesar as some came to believe the gods favored him, while for others it was simple self-preservation. The ancients took great stock in success as a sign of favoritism by the gods. This is especially true of success in the face of almost certain defeat – as Caesar experienced at Pharsalus. This allowed Caesar to parlay this single victory into a huge network of willing clients to better secure his hold over power and force the Optimates into near exile in search for allies to continue the fight against Caesar.
In popular culture
The battle gives its name to the following artistic, geographical, and business concerns:
* Pharsalia, a poem by Lucan
* Pharsalia, New York, U.S.
* Pharsalia Technologies, Inc.
In Alexandre Dumas' The Three Musketeers, the author makes reference to Caesar's purported order that his men try to cut the faces of their opponents – their vanity supposedly being of more value to them than their lives.
In Mankiewicz's 1963 film Cleopatra, the immediate aftermath of Pharsalus is used as an opening scene to set the action in motion.
Notes
Citations
References
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* Bruère, Richard Treat, (1951). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/265967 "Palaepharsalus, Pharsalus, Pharsalia"]. Classical Philology, Vol. 46, No. 2 (Apr., 1951), pp. 111–115.
* Gwatkin, William E. (1956). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/283876 "Some Reflections on the Battle of Pharsalus"], Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 87.
* James, Steven (2016). [https://www.academia.edu/19860273/48_BC_The_Battle_of_Pharsalus, "48 BC: The Battle of Pharsalus"].
* Lucas, Frank Laurence (1921). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/30102514?seq=1 "The Battlefield of Pharsalos"], Annual of the British School at Athens, No. XXIV, 1919–21. [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.56336/page/n43/mode/2up]
* Nordling, John G. (2006). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/30038647 "Caesar's Pre-Battle Speech at Pharsalus (B.C. 3.85.4): Ridiculum Acri Fortius ... Secat Res"]. The Classical Journal, Vol. 101, No. 2 (Dec. – Jan., 2005/2006), pp. 183–189.
* Pelling, C.B.R. (1973). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/4435333 "Pharsalus"]. Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte. Bd. 22, H. 2 (2nd Qtr., 1973), pp. 249–259.
* Perrin, B. (1885). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/287135 "Pharsalia, Pharsalus, Palaepharsalus"]. The American Journal of Philology, Vol. 6, No. 2 (1885), pp. 170–189.
* Postgate, J.P. (1905). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/696412 "Pharsalia Nostra"]. The Classical Review, Vol. 19, No. 5 (Jun., 1905), pp. 257–260.
* Rambaud, Michel (1955). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/4434412 "Le Soleil de Pharsale"], Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte , Vol. 3, No. 4.
* Searle, Arthur (1907). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/310555 "Note on the Battle of Pharsalus"]. Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, Vol. 18 (1907), pp. 213–218.
External links
* [https://www.livius.org/articles/battle/pharsalus-48-bce/ Caesar's account of the battle]
Category:48 BC
Category:40s BC conflicts
Category:1st-century BC battles
Category:1st century BC in Greece
Category:Battles in ancient Thessaly
Category:Battles involving the Roman Republic
Category:Battles of Caesar's civil war
Category:Macedonia (Roman province)
Category:Caesar's invasion of Macedonia
Category:Pompey
Category:Farsala | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Pharsalus | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.874316 |
4009 | Bigfoot | |Region = North America
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Bigfoot (), also commonly referred to as Sasquatch (), is a large, hairy mythical creature said to inhabit forests in North America, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. Bigfoot is featured in both American and Canadian folklore, and since the mid-20th century has grown into a cultural icon, permeating popular culture and becoming the subject of its own distinct subculture.
Enthusiasts of Bigfoot, such as those within the pseudoscience of cryptozoology, have offered various forms of dubious evidence to prove Bigfoot's existence, including anecdotal claims of sightings as well as alleged photographs, video and audio recordings, hair samples, and casts of large footprints. However, the scientific consensus is that Bigfoot, and alleged evidence, is a combination of folklore, misidentification, and hoax rather than a living animal.
Folklorists trace the phenomenon of Bigfoot to a combination of factors and sources, including the European wild man figure, folk tales, and indigenous cultures. Examples of similar folk tales of wild, hair-covered humanoids exist throughout the world, such as the Skunk ape of the southeastern United States, the Almas, Yeren, and Yeti in Asia, the Australian Yowie, and creatures in the mythologies of indigenous people. Wishful thinking, a cultural increase in environmental concerns, and overall societal awareness of the subject have been cited as additional factors.
Description
statue in the Garden of the Gods Wilderness within the Shawnee National Forest, Illinois.]]
Bigfoot is often described as a large, muscular, and bipedal human or ape-like creature covered in black, dark brown, or dark reddish hair. Anecdotal descriptions estimate a height of roughly , with some descriptions having the creatures standing as tall as . Some alleged observations describe Bigfoot as more human than ape, particularly in regard to the face. In 1971, multiple people in The Dalles, Oregon, filed a police report describing an "overgrown ape", and one of the men claimed to have sighted the creature in the scope of his rifle but could not bring himself to shoot it because "it looked more human than animal".
Common descriptions include broad shoulders, no visible neck, and long arms, which many skeptics attribute to misidentification of a bear standing upright. Some alleged nighttime sightings have stated the creature's eyes "glowed" yellow or red. However, eyeshine is not present in humans or any other known great apes, and so proposed explanations for observable eyeshine off of the ground in the forest include owls, raccoons, or opossums perched in foliage.
Michael Rugg, the owner of the Bigfoot Discovery Museum, claims to have smelled Bigfoot, stating, "Imagine a skunk that had rolled around in dead animals and had hung around the garbage pits."
The enormous footprints for which the creature is named are claimed to be as large as long and wide.HistoryFolklore and early records Ecologist Robert Pyle argues that most cultures have accounts of human-like giants in their folk history, expressing a need for "some larger-than-life creature". Each language had its name for the creature featured in the local version of such legends. Many names mean something like "wild man" or "hairy man", although other names described common actions that it was said to perform, such as eating clams or shaking trees. European folklore traditionally had many instances of the "wild man of the woods," or "wild people," often described as "a naked creature covered in hair, with only the face, feet and hands (and in some cases the knees, elbows, or breasts) remaining bare" These European wild people ranged from human hermits, to human-like monsters. and according to anthropologist David Daegling, these legends existed long before contemporary reports of the creature described as Bigfoot. These stories differed in their details regionally and between families in the same community and are particularly prevalent in the Pacific Northwest. Chief Mischelle of the Nlaka'pamux at Lytton, British Columbia, told such a story to Charles Hill-Tout in 1898.
.]]
On the Tule River Indian Reservation, petroglyphs created by a tribe of Yokuts at a site called Painted Rock are alleged by Kathy Moskowitz Strain, author of the 2008 book Giants, Cannibals, Monsters: Bigfoot in Native Culture, to depict a group of Bigfoots called "the Family". The largest glyph is called "Hairy Man", and they are estimated to be 1,000 years old. According to the Tulare County Board of Education in 1975, "Big Foot, the Hairy Man, was a creature that was like a great big giant with long, shaggy hair. His long shaggy hair made him look like a big animal. He was good in a way, because he ate the animals that might harm people", and Yokuts parents warned their children not to venture near the river at night or they may encounter the creature.
16th-century Spanish explorers and Mexican settlers told tales of the los Vigilantes Oscuros, or "Dark Watchers", large creatures alleged to stalk their camps at night. In the region that is now Mississippi, a Jesuit priest was living with the Natchez in 1721 and reported stories of hairy creatures in the forest known to scream loudly and steal livestock.
In 1929, Indian agent and teacher J.W. Burns, who lived and worked with the Sts'ailes Nation (then called the Chehalis First Nation), published a collection of stories titled, ''Introducing B.C.'s Hairy Giants: A collection of strange tales about British Columbia's wild men as told by those who say they have seen them'', in Maclean's magazine. The stories offered various anecdotal reports of wild people; including an encounter a tribal member had with a hairy wild woman who could speak the language of the Douglas First Nation. Burns coined the term "Sasquatch", believed to be the anglicized version of ''sasq'ets'' (sas-kets), roughly translating to "hairy man" in the Halq'emeylem language. Burns describes the Sasquatch as, "a tribe of hairy people whom they claim have always lived in the mountains – in tunnels and caves".
The folklore of the Cherokee includes tales of the ''Tsul 'Kalu, who were described as "slant-eyed giants" that resided in the Appalachian Mountains, and is sometimes associated with Bigfoot.
Members of the Lummi tell tales about creatures known as Ts'emekwes. The stories are similar to each other in the general descriptions of Ts'emekwes'', but details differed among various family accounts concerning the creature's diet and activities. Some regional versions tell of more threatening creatures: the stiyaha or kwi-kwiyai were a nocturnal race, and children were warned against saying the names so that the "monsters" would not come and carry them off to be killed. The Iroquois tell of an aggressive, hair covered giant with rock-hard skin known as the Ot ne yar heh or "Stone Giant", more commonly referred to as the Genoskwa. In 1847, Paul Kane reported stories by the natives about skoocooms, a race of cannibalistic wild men living on the peak of Mount St. Helens. U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, in his 1893 book, The Wilderness Hunter, writes of a story he was told by an elderly mountain man named Bauman in which a foul-smelling, bipedal creature ransacked his beaver trapping camp, stalked him, and later became hostile when it fatally broke his companion's neck. Roosevelt notes that Bauman appeared fearful while telling the story but attributed the trapper's German ancestry to have potentially influenced him.
The Alutiiq of the Kenai Peninsula in Alaska tell of the Nantinaq, a Bigfoot-like creature. This folklore was featured in the Discovery+ television series, Alaskan Killer Bigfoot, which claims the Nantinaq was responsible for the population decrease of Portlock in the 1940s.
Less menacing versions have been recorded, such as one by Reverend Elkanah Walker in 1840. Walker was a Protestant missionary who recorded stories of giants among the natives living near Spokane, Washington. These giants were said to live on and around the peaks of the nearby mountains, stealing salmon from the fishermen's nets. Ape Canyon incident On July 16, 1924, an article in The Oregonian made national news when a story was published describing a conflict between a group of gold prospectors and a group of "ape-men" in a gorge near Mount St. Helens. The prospectors reported encountering "gorilla men" near their remote cabin. One of the men, Fred Beck, indicated that he shot one of the creatures with a rifle. That night, they reported coming under attack by the creatures, who were said to have thrown large rocks at the cabin, damaging the roof and knocking Beck unconscious. The men fled the area the following morning. The U.S. Forest Service investigated the site of the alleged incident. The investigators found no compelling evidence of the event and concluded it was likely a fabrication. Stories of large, hair covered bipedal ape-men or "mountain devils" had been a persistent piece of folklore in the area for centuries prior to the alleged incident. Today, the area is known as Ape Canyon and is cemented within Bigfoot-related folklore.Origin of the "Bigfoot" nameJerry Crew and Andrew GenzoliIn 1958, Jerry Crew, bulldozer operator for a logging company in Humboldt County, California, discovered a set of large, human-like footprints sunk deep within the mud in the Six Rivers National Forest. Upon informing his coworkers, many claimed to have seen similar tracks on previous job sites as well as telling of odd incidents such as an oil drum weighing having been moved without explanation. The logging company men soon began using the word "Bigfoot" to describe the apparent culprit. Crew and others initially believed someone was playing a prank on them. After observing more of these massive footprints, he contacted reporter Andrew Genzoli of the Humboldt Times newspaper. Genzoli interviewed lumber workers and wrote articles about the mysterious footprints, introducing the name "Bigfoot" in relation to the tracks and the local tales of large, hairy wild men. A plaster cast was made of the footprints and Crew appeared, holding one of the casts, on the front page of the newspaper on October 6, 1958. The story spread rapidly as Genzoli began to receive correspondence from major media outlets including the New York Times and Los Angeles Times. As a result, the term Bigfoot became widespread as a reference to an apparently large, unknown creature leaving massive footprints in Northern California.
Ray Wallace and Rant Mullens
In 2002, the family of Jerry Crew's deceased coworker Ray Wallace revealed a collection of large, carved wooden feet stored in his basement. They stated that Wallace had been secretly making the footprints and was responsible for the tracks discovered by Crew.
Wallace was inspired by another hoaxer, Rant Mullens, who revealed information about his hoaxes in 1982. In the 1930s in Toledo, Washington, Mullens and a group of other foresters carved pairs of large feet made of wood and used them to create footprints in the mud to scare huckleberry pickers in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest. The group would also claim to be responsible for hoaxing the alleged Ape Canyon incident in 1924. Mullens and the group of foresters began referring to themselves as the St. Helens Apes, and would later have a cave dedicated to them.
Wallace, also from Toledo, knew Mullens and stated he collaborated with him to obtain a pair of the large wooden feet and subsequently used them to create footprints on the 1958 construction site as a means to scare away potential thieves.Other historical uses of "Bigfoot"In the 1830s, a Wyandot chief was nicknamed "Big Foot" due to his significant size, strength and large feet. Potawatomi Chief Maumksuck, known as Chief "Big Foot", is today synonymous with the area of Walworth County, Wisconsin, and has a state park and school named for him. William A. A. Wallace, a famous 19th century Texas Ranger, was nicknamed "Bigfoot" due to his large feet and today has a town named for him: Bigfoot, Texas. Lakota leader Spotted Elk was also called "Chief Big Foot". In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, at least two enormous marauding grizzly bears were widely noted in the press and each nicknamed "Bigfoot." The first grizzly bear called "Bigfoot" was reportedly killed near Fresno, California, in 1895 after killing sheep for 15 years; his weight was estimated at 2,000 pounds (900 kg). The second one was active in Idaho in the 1890s and 1900s between the Snake and Salmon rivers, and supernatural powers were attributed to it.Regional and other names
in Colorado.]]
Many regions throughout North America have differentiating names for Bigfoot. In Canada, the name Sasquatch is widely used in addition to Bigfoot. The United States uses both of these names but also has numerous names and descriptions of the creatures depending on the region and area in which they are allegedly sighted. These include the Skunk ape in Florida and other southern states, the Ohio Grassman in Ohio, Fouke Monster in Arkansas, Wood Booger in Virginia, the Monster of Whitehall in Whitehall, New York, Momo in Missouri, Honey Island Swamp Monster in Louisiana, Dewey Lake Monster in Michigan, Mogollon Monster in Arizona, the Big Muddy Monster in southern Illinois, and The Old Men of the Mountain in West Virginia. The term Wood Ape is also used by some as a means to deviate from the perceived mythical connotation surrounding the name "Bigfoot". Other names include Bushman, Treeman, and Wildman.
Patterson-Gimlin film
On October 20, 1967, Bigfoot enthusiast Roger Patterson and his partner Robert "Bob" Gimlin were filming a Bigfoot docudrama in an area called Bluff Creek in Northern California. The pair claimed they came upon a Bigfoot and filmed the encounter. The 59.5-second-long video, dubbed the Patterson-Gimlin film (PGF), has become iconic in popular culture and Bigfoot-related history and lore. The PGF continues to be a highly scrutinized, analyzed, and debated subject.
Academic experts from related fields have typically judged the film as providing no supportive data of any scientific value, with perhaps the most common proposed explanation being that it was a hoax.
Proposed explanations
Various explanations have been suggested for sightings and to offer conjecture on what existing animal has been misidentified in supposed sightings of Bigfoot. Scientists typically attribute sightings to hoaxes or misidentifications of known animals and their tracks, particularly black bears.
Misidentification
Bears
Scientists theorize that mistaken identification of American black bears as Bigfoot are a likely explanation for most reported sightings, particularly when observers view a subject from afar, are in dense foliage, or there are poor lighting conditions. Additionally, black bears have been observed and recorded walking upright, often as the result of an injury. While upright, adult black bears stand roughly , and grizzly bears roughly .
According to data scientist Floe Foxon, more people report seeing Bigfoot in areas with documented black bear populations. Foxon concludes, "If bigfoot is there, it may be many bears". Foxon acknowledges that alleged Bigfoot sightings have been reported in areas with minimal or no known black bear populations. She states, "Although this may be interpreted as evidence for the existence of an unknown hominid in North America, it is also explained by misidentification of other animals (including humans), among other possibilities".
Escaped apes
Some have proposed that sightings of Bigfoot may simply be people observing and misidentifying known great apes such as chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans that have escaped from captivity such as zoos, circuses, and exotic pets belonging to private owners. This explanation is often proposed in relation to the Skunk ape, as some scientists argue the humid subtropical climate of the southeastern United States could potentially support a population of escaped apes.
Humans
Humans have been mistaken for Bigfoot, with some incidents leading to injuries. In 2013, a 21-year-old man in Oklahoma was arrested after he told law enforcement he accidentally shot his friend in the back while their group was allegedly hunting for Bigfoot. In 2017, a shamanist wearing clothing made of animal furs was vacationing in a North Carolina forest when local reports of alleged Bigfoot sightings flooded in. The Greenville Police Department issued a public notice not to shoot Bigfoot for fear of mistakenly injuring or killing someone in a fur suit. In 2018, a person was shot multiple times by a hunter near Helena, Montana, who claimed he mistook him for a Bigfoot.
Additionally, some have attributed feral humans or hermits living in the wilderness as being another explanation for alleged Bigfoot sightings. One story, the Wild Man of the Navidad, tells of a wild ape-man who roamed the wilderness of eastern Texas in the mid-19th century, stealing food and goods from residents. A search party allegedly captured an escaped African slave attributed to the story. During the 1980s, several psychologically damaged American Vietnam veterans were stated by the state of Washington's veterans' affairs director, Randy Fisher, to have been living in remote wooded areas of the state.
Pareidolia
Some have proposed that pareidolia may explain Bigfoot sightings, specifically the tendency to observe human-like faces and figures within the natural environment. Photos and videos of poor quality alleged to depict Bigfoots are often attributed to this phenomenon and commonly referred to as "Blobsquatch".
Misidentified vocalizations
The majority of mainstream scientists maintain that the source of the sounds often attributed to Bigfoot are either hoaxes, anthropomorphization, or likely misidentified and produced by known animals such as owl, wolf, coyote, and fox.
Hoaxes
Both Bigfoot believers and non-believers agree that many reported sightings are hoaxes.GigantopithecusBigfoot proponents Grover Krantz and Geoffrey H. Bourne both believed that Bigfoot could be a relict population of the extinct southeast Asian ape species Gigantopithecus blacki. According to Bourne, G. blacki may have followed the many other species of animals that migrated across the Bering land bridge to the Americas. To date, no Gigantopithecus fossils have been found in the Americas. In Asia, the only recovered fossils have been of mandibles and teeth, leaving uncertainty about G. blackis locomotion. Krantz has argued that G. blacki could have been bipedal, based on his extrapolation from the shape of its mandible. However, the relevant part of the mandible is not present in any fossils. The consensus view is that G. blacki was quadrupedal, as its enormous mass would have made it difficult for it to adopt a bipedal gait.
Anthropologist Matt Cartmill criticizes the G. blacki hypothesis:
<blockquote>The trouble with this account is that Gigantopithecus was not a hominin and maybe not even a crown group hominoid; yet the physical evidence implies that Bigfoot is an upright biped with buttocks and a long, stout, permanently adducted hallux. These are hominin autapomorphies, not found in other mammals or other bipeds. It seems unlikely that Gigantopithecus would have evolved these uniquely hominin traits in parallel.</blockquote>
Paleoanthropologist Bernard G. Campbell writes: "That Gigantopithecus is in fact extinct has been questioned by those who believe it survives as the Yeti of the Himalayas and the Sasquatch of the north-west American coast. But the evidence for these creatures is not convincing."
Extinct hominidae
Primatologist John R. Napier and anthropologist Gordon Strasenburg have suggested a species of Paranthropus as a possible candidate for Bigfoot's identity, such as Paranthropus robustus, with its gorilla-like crested skull and bipedal gait —despite the fact that fossils of Paranthropus are found only in Africa.
Michael Rugg of the Bigfoot Discovery Museum presented a comparison between human, Gigantopithecus, and Meganthropus skulls (reconstructions made by Grover Krantz) in episodes 131 and 132 of the Bigfoot Discovery Museum Show. Bigfoot enthusiasts that think Bigfoot may be the "missing link" between apes and humans have promoted the idea that Bigfoot is a descendant of Gigantopithecus blacki, but that ape diverged from orangutans around 12 million years ago and is not related to humans.
Some suggest Neanderthal, Homo erectus, or Homo heidelbergensis to be the creature, but, like all other great apes, no remains of any of those species have been found in the Americas.
Scientific view
Expert consensus is that allegations of the existence of Bigfoot are not credible. Belief in the existence of such a large, ape-like creature is more often attributed to hoaxes, confusion, or delusion rather than to sightings of a genuine creature. Bigfoot is alleged to live in regions unusual for a large, nonhuman primate, i.e., temperate latitudes in the northern hemisphere; all recognized nonhuman apes are found in the tropics of Africa and Asia. Great apes have not been found in the fossil record in the Americas, and no Bigfoot remains are known to have been found. Phillips Stevens, a cultural anthropologist at the University at Buffalo, summarized the scientific consensus as follows:
In the 1970s, when Bigfoot "experts" were frequently given high-profile media coverage, McLeod writes that the scientific community generally avoided lending credence to such fringe theories by refusing even to debate them.
She later added, "Well, I'm a romantic, so I always wanted them to exist," and "Of course, the big, the big criticism of all this is, "Where is the body?" You know, why isn't there a body? I can't answer that, and maybe they don't exist, but I want them to."
Paleontologist and author Darren Naish states in a 2016 article for Scientific American that if "Bigfoot" existed, an abundance of evidence would also exist that cannot be found anywhere today, making the existence of such a creature exceedingly unlikely.ResearchersIvan T. Sanderson and Bernard Heuvelmans, founders of the study of cryptozoology, spent parts of their career searching for Bigfoot. Later scientists who researched the topic included Jason Jarvis, Carleton S. Coon, George Allen Agogino and William Charles Osman Hill, though they later stopped their research due to lack of evidence for the alleged creature.
John Napier asserts that the scientific community's attitude towards Bigfoot stems primarily from insufficient evidence. Other scientists who have shown varying degrees of interest in the creature are Grover Krantz, Jeffrey Meldrum, John Bindernagel, David J. Daegling, George Schaller, Russell Mittermeier, Daris Swindler, Esteban Sarmiento, and Mireya Mayor.
Formal studies
One study was conducted by John Napier and published in his book Bigfoot: The Yeti and Sasquatch in Myth and Reality in 1973. Napier wrote that if a conclusion is to be reached based on scant extant "'hard' evidence," science must declare "Bigfoot does not exist." However, he found it difficult to entirely reject thousands of alleged tracks, "scattered over 125,000 square miles" (325,000 km<sup>2</sup>) or to dismiss all "the many hundreds" of eyewitness accounts. Napier concluded, "I am convinced that Sasquatch exists, but whether it is all it is cracked up to be is another matter altogether. There must be something in north-west America that needs explaining, and that something leaves man-like footprints."
In 1974, the National Wildlife Federation funded a field study seeking Bigfoot evidence. No formal federation members were involved and the study made no notable discoveries. Also in 1974, the now defunct North American Wildlife Research Team constructed a "Bigfoot trap" in the Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest. It was baited with animal carcasses and captured multiple bears, but no Bigfoot. Upkeep of the trap ended in the early 1980s, but in 2006 the United States Forest Service repaired the trap, which today is a tourist destination along the Collings Mountain hiking trail.
Beginning in the late 1970s, physical anthropologist Grover Krantz published several articles and four book-length treatments of Bigfoot. However, his work was found to contain multiple scientific failings including falling for hoaxes.
A study published in the Journal of Biogeography in 2009 by J.D. Lozier et al. used ecological niche modeling on reported sightings of Bigfoot, using their locations to infer preferred ecological parameters. They found a very close match with the ecological parameters of the American black bear. They also note that an upright bear looks much like a Bigfoot's purported appearance and consider it highly improbable that two species should have very similar ecological preferences, concluding that Bigfoot sightings are likely misidentified sightings of black bears.
In the first systematic genetic analysis of 30 hair samples that were suspected to be from Bigfoot-like creatures, only one was found to be primate in origin, and that was identified as human. A joint study by the University of Oxford and Lausanne's Cantonal Museum of Zoology and published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B in 2014, the team used a previously published cleaning method to remove all surface contamination and the ribosomal mitochondrial DNA 12S fragment of the sample. The sample was sequenced and then compared to GenBank to identify the species origin. The samples submitted were from different parts of the world, including the United States, Russia, the Himalayas, and Sumatra. Other than one sample of human origin, all but two are from common animals. Black and brown bears accounted for most of the samples, other animals include cow, horse, dog/wolf/coyote, sheep, goat, deer, raccoon, porcupine, and tapir. The last two samples were thought to match a fossilized genetic sample of a 40,000 year old polar bear of the Pleistocene epoch; a second test identified these hairs as being from a rare type of brown bear.
In 2019, the FBI declassified an analysis it conducted on alleged Bigfoot hairs in 1976. Bigfoot researcher Peter Byrne sent the FBI 15 hairs attached to a small skin fragment and asked if the bureau could assist him in identifying it. Jay Cochran Jr., assistant director of the FBI's Scientific and Technical Services division responded in 1977 that the hairs were of deer family origin.
Claims
Claims about the origins and characteristics of Bigfoot vary. Thomas Sewid, a Bigfoot researcher and member of the Kwakwakaʼwakw tribe claims, "They're just the other tribe. They're just big, hairy humans with nocturnal vision that choose not to have weapons or fire or permanent shelters".
The subject of Bigfoot has also crossed over with other paranormal claims, including that Bigfoot, extraterrestrials, and UFOs are related or that Bigfoot are psychic, can shapeshift, are able to cross into different dimensions, or are completely supernatural in origin. Additionally, claims regarding Bigfoot have been associated with conspiracy theories including a government cover-up.
There have also been claims that Bigfoot is responsible for the disappearances of people in the wilderness, such as the 1969 disappearance of Dennis Martin in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
Additionally, there have been claims that Bigfoot has been responsible for vehicle accidents, vandalizing property, delaying construction, and killing people. In 2022, a man from Oklahoma claimed he killed his friend because he believed he had summoned Bigfoot and was going to be sacrificed to the creature.
Sightings
According to Live Science, there have been over 10,000 reported Bigfoot sightings in the continental United States. About one-third of all claims of Bigfoot sightings are located in the Pacific Northwest, with the remaining reports spread throughout the rest of North America. Most reports are considered mistakes or hoaxes, even by those researchers who claim Bigfoot exists.
Sightings predominantly occur in the northwestern region of Washington state, Oregon, Northern California, and British Columbia. According to data collected from the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization's (BFRO) Bigfoot sightings database in 2019, Washington has over 2,000 reported sightings, California over 1,600, Pennsylvania over 1,300, New York and Oregon over 1,000, and Texas has just over 800. The debate over the legitimacy of Bigfoot sightings reached a peak in the 1970s, and Bigfoot has been regarded as the first widely popularized example of pseudoscience in American culture.
Reports of alleged Bigfoot sightings are often featured in news stories throughout the United States.Alleged behaviorSome Bigfoot researchers allege that Bigfoot throws rocks as territorial displays and for communication. Other alleged behaviors include audible blows struck against trees or "wood knocking", further alleged to be communicative.
Skeptics argue that these behaviors are easily hoaxed.
Additionally, structures of broken and twisted foliage seemingly placed in specific areas have been attributed by some to Bigfoot behavior. In some reports, lodgepole pine and other small trees have been observed bent, uprooted, or stacked in patterns such as weaved and crisscrossed, leading some to theorize that they are potential territorial markings. Some instances have also included entire deer skeletons being suspended high in trees. Some researchers and enthusiasts believe Bigfoot construct teepee-like structures out of dead trees and foliage. In Washington state, a team of amateur Bigfoot researchers called the Olympic Project claimed to have discovered a collection of nests. The group brought in primatologists to study them, with the conclusion being that they appear to have been created by a primate.
Jeremiah Byron, host of the Bigfoot Society Podcast, believes Bigfoot are omnivores, stating, "They eat both plants and meat. I've seen accounts that they eat everything from berries, leaves, nuts, and fruit to salmon, rabbit, elk, and bear. Ronny Le Blanc, host of Expedition Bigfoot on the Travel Channel indicated he has heard anecdotal reports of Bigfoot allegedly hunting and consuming deer. In the 2001 nature documentary Great North, a dark bipedal figure was captured on film while the filmmakers were recording a herd of caribou. The footage has sparked debate, as some Bigfoot researchers claim the figure is a Bigfoot stalking the caribou. In 2016, Bigfoot researcher ThinkerThunker released a YouTube video in which he interviewed one of the Great North directors, William Reeve, who claims it could not have been a human but was possibly a bear, although he and his crew denied seeing any bears while filming.
Some Bigfoot researchers have reported the creatures moving or taking possession of intentional "gifts" left by humans such as food and jewelry, and leaving items in their places such as rocks and twigs.
Many alleged sightings are reported to occur at night leading some cryptozoologists to hypothesize that Bigfoot may possess nocturnal tendencies. However, experts find such behavior untenable in a supposed ape- or human-like creature, as all known apes, including humans, are diurnal, with only lesser primates exhibiting nocturnality. Most anecdotal sightings of Bigfoot describe the creatures allegedly observed as solitary, although some reports have described groups being allegedly observed together.Alleged vocalizationsAlleged vocalizations such as howls, screams, moans, grunts, whistles, and even a form of supposed language have been reported and allegedly recorded. Some of these alleged vocalization recordings have been analyzed by individuals such as retired U.S. Navy cryptologic linguist Scott Nelson. He analyzed audio recordings from the early 1970s said to be recorded in the Sierra Nevada mountains dubbed the "Sierra Sounds" and stated, "It is definitely a language, it is definitely not human in origin, and it could not have been faked". Les Stroud has spoken of a strange vocalization he heard in the wilderness while filming Survivorman that he stated sounded primate in origin. A number of anecdotal reports of Bigfoot encounters have resulted in witnesses claiming to be disoriented, dizzy and anxious. Some Bigfoot researchers, such as paranormal author Nick Redfern, have proposed that Bigfoot may produce infrasound, which could explain reports of this nature.
Alleged encounters
In Fouke, Arkansas, in 1971, a family reported that a large, hair-covered creature startled a woman after reaching through a window. This alleged incident caused hysteria in the Fouke area and inspired the horror movie, The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972). The report was later deemed a hoax.
In 1974, the New York Times presented the dubious tale of Albert Ostman, a Canadian prospector, who stated that he was kidnapped and held captive by a family of Bigfoot for six days in 1924.
In 1994, former U.S. Forest Service ranger Paul Freeman, a Bigfoot researcher, videotaped an alleged Bigfoot he reportedly encountered in the Blue Mountains in Oregon. The tape, often referred to as the Freeman footage, continues to be scrutinized and its authenticity debated. Freeman had previously gained media recognition in the 1980s for documenting alleged Bigfoot tracks, claiming they possessed dermal ridges.
On May 26, 1996, Lori Pate, who was on a camping trip near the Washington state-Canada border, videotaped a dark subject she reported encountering running across a field and claimed it was Bigfoot. The film, dubbed the Memorial Day Bigfoot footage, is often depicted in Bigfoot-related media, most notably in the 2003 documentary, Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science. In his research, Daniel Perez of the Skeptical Inquirer concluded that the footage was likely a hoax perpetuated by a human in a gorilla costume.
In 2018, Bigfoot researcher Claudia Ackley garnered international attention after filing a lawsuit with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) for failing to acknowledge the existence of Bigfoot. Ackley claimed to have encountered and filmed a Bigfoot in the San Bernardino Mountains in 2017, describing what she saw as a "Neanderthal man with a lot of hair". Ackley contacted emergency services as well as the CDFW; a state investigator concluded that she encountered a bear. Until her death in 2023, Ackley also ran an online support group for individuals claiming to experience psychological trauma as a result of alleged Bigfoot encounters.
In October 2023, a woman named Shannon Parker uploaded a video of an alleged Bigfoot to Facebook. The footage went viral on social media and was shared via various news publications. Shannon Parker reported she and others observed the subject while riding a train on the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad in the San Juan Mountains in Colorado. The authenticity of the video was debated across social media. Skeptics on Reddit speculated it was a publicity hoax perpetrated by an RV company located the area, Sasquatch Expedition Campers. The company denied the allegations.
In the early 1990s, 9-1-1 audio recordings were made public in which a homeowner in Kitsap County, Washington, called law enforcement for assistance with a large subject, described by him as being "all in black", having entered his backyard. He previously reported to law enforcement that his dog was killed recently when it was thrown over his fence. Anthropologist Jeffrey Meldrum notes that any large predatory animal is potentially dangerous, specifically if provoked, but indicates that most anecdotal accounts of Bigfoot encounter result in the creatures hiding or fleeing from people. The 2021 Hulu documentary series, Sasquatch, describes marijuana farmers telling stories of Bigfoots harassing and killing people within the Emerald Triangle region in the 1970s through the 1990s; and specifically the alleged murder of three migrant workers in 1993. Investigative journalist David Holthouse attributes the stories to illegal drug operations using the local Bigfoot lore to scare away the competition, specifically superstitious immigrants, and that the high rate of murder and missing persons in the area is attributed to human actions.
Skeptics argue that many of these alleged encounters are easily hoaxed, the result of misidentification, or are outright fabrications.
Evidence claims
A body print taken in the year 2000 from the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in Washington state dubbed the Skookum cast is also believed by some to have been made by a Bigfoot that sat down in the mud to eat fruit left out by researchers during the filming of an episode of the Animal X television show. Skeptics believe the cast to have been made by a known animal such as an elk.
Alleged Bigfoot footprints are often suggested by Bigfoot enthusiasts as evidence for the creature's existence. Anthropologist Jeffrey Meldrum, who specializes in the study of primate bipedalism, possesses over 300 footprint casts that he maintains could not be made by wood carvings or human feet based on their anatomy, but instead are evidence of a large, non-human primate present today in North America. In 2005, Matt Crowley obtained a copy of an alleged Bigfoot footprint cast, called the "Onion Mountain Cast", and was able to painstakingly recreate the dermal ridges. Michael Dennett of the Skeptical Inquirer spoke to police investigator and primate fingerprint expert Jimmy Chilcutt in 2006 for comment on the replica and he stated, "Matt has shown artifacts can be created, at least under laboratory conditions, and field researchers need to take precautions". Chilcutt had previously stated that some of the alleged Bigfoot footprint plaster casts he examined were genuine due to the presence of "unique dermal ridges". Dennett states that Chilcutt published nothing to substantiate his claims, nor had anyone else published anything on that topic, with Chilcutt making his statements solely through a posting on the Internet. The Pennsylvania Game Commission unsuccessfully attempted to locate the suspected mangey bear. Scientist Vanessa Woods, after estimating that the subject in the photo had approximately long arms and a torso, concluded it was more comparable to a chimpanzee.
In 2015, Centralia College professor Michael Townsend claimed to have discovered prey bones with "human-like" bite impressions on the southside of Mount St. Helens. Townsend claimed the bites were over two times wider than a human bite, and that he and two of his students also found 16-inch footprints in the area.Melba Ketchum press releaseAfter what The Huffington Post described as "a five-year study of purported Bigfoot (also known as Sasquatch) DNA samples", but prior to peer review of the work, DNA Diagnostics, a veterinary laboratory headed by veterinarian Melba Ketchum issued a press release on November 24, 2012, claiming that they had found proof that the Sasquatch "is a human relative that arose approximately 15,000 years ago as a hybrid cross of modern Homo sapiens with an unknown primate species." Ketchum called for this to be recognized officially, saying that "Government at all levels must recognize them as an indigenous people and immediately protect their human and Constitutional rights against those who would see in their physical and cultural differences a 'license' to hunt, trap, or kill them." Failing to find a scientific journal that would publish their results, Ketchum announced on February 13, 2013, that their research had been published in the DeNovo Journal of Science. The title "DeNovo: Journal of Science" in which the paper was published was found to be a Web site—registered anonymously only nine days before the paper was announced—whose first and only "journal" issue contained nothing but the "Sasquatch" article. The Scientist magazine also analyzed the paper, reporting that:
on February 4, and there is no indication that Ketchum's work, the only study it has published, was peer-reviewed.}}
Documented hoaxes
*In 1968, the frozen corpse of a supposed hair-covered hominid measuring was paraded around the United States as part of a traveling exhibition. Many stories surfaced as to its origin, such as its having been killed by hunters in Minnesota or American soldiers near Da Nang during the Vietnam War. It was attributed by some to be proof of Bigfoot-like creatures. Primatologist John R. Napier studied the subject and concluded it was a hoax made of latex. Others disputed this, claiming Napier did not study the original subject. the subject, dubbed the Minnesota Iceman, was on display at the "Museum of the Weird" in Austin, Texas.
*Tom Biscardi, long-time Bigfoot enthusiast and CEO of "Searching for Bigfoot, Inc.", appeared on the Coast to Coast AM paranormal radio show on July 14, 2005, and said that he was "98% sure that his group will be able to capture a Bigfoot which they had been tracking in the Happy Camp, California, area." A month later, he announced on the same radio show that he had access to a captured Bigfoot and was arranging a pay-per-view event for people to see it. He appeared on Coast to Coast AM again a few days later to announce that there was no captive Bigfoot. He blamed an unnamed woman for misleading him, and said that the show's audience was gullible. Tom Biscardi was contacted to investigate. Dyer and Whitton received $50,000 from "Searching for Bigfoot, Inc." The story was covered by many major news networks, including BBC, CNN, ABC News, and Fox News. Soon after a press conference, the alleged Bigfoot body was delivered in a block of ice in a freezer with the Searching for Bigfoot team. When the contents were thawed, observers found that the hair was not real, the head was hollow, and the feet were rubber. Dyer and Whitton admitted that it was a hoax after being confronted by Steve Kulls, executive director of SquatchDetective.com.
*In August 2012, a man in Montana was killed by a car while perpetrating a Bigfoot hoax using a ghillie suit.
*In January 2014, Rick Dyer, perpetrator of a previous Bigfoot hoax, said that he had killed a Bigfoot in September 2012 outside San Antonio, Texas. He claimed to have had scientific tests conducted on the body, "from DNA tests to 3D optical scans to body scans. It is the real deal. It's Bigfoot, and Bigfoot's here, and I shot it, and now I'm proving it to the world." He said that he had kept the body in a hidden location, and he intended to take it on tour across North America in 2014. He released photos of the body and a video showing a few individuals' reactions to seeing it, but never released any of the tests or scans. He refused to disclose the test results or to provide biological samples. He said that the DNA results were done by an undisclosed lab and could not be matched to identify any known animal. Dyer said that he would reveal the body and tests on February 9, 2014, at a news conference at Washington University, but he never made the test results available. After the tour, the Bigfoot body was taken to Houston, Texas.
*On March 28, 2014, Dyer admitted on his Facebook page that his "Bigfoot corpse" was another hoax. He had paid Chris Russel of "Twisted Toybox" to manufacture the prop from latex, foam, and camel hair, which he nicknamed "Hank". Dyer earned approximately US$60,000 from the tour of this second fake Bigfoot corpse. He stated that he did kill a Bigfoot, but did not take the real body on tour for fear that it would be stolen.
*In April 2022, a man in Mobile, Alabama posted photos he claimed were of a Bigfoot to his Facebook page, indicating the Mobile County Sheriff's Office validated their authenticity and the team from Finding Bigfoot was being dispatched. The photos circulated on social media, attracting the attention of NBC 15. The man admitted the photos were an April Fools' Day hoax.
*On July 7, 2022, wildlife educator and media personality Coyote Peterson released a Facebook post in which he claimed to have excavated a large primate skull in British Columbia and smuggled it into the United States, further claiming to have initially hidden the discovery due to concerns of government intervention. The post went viral, garnering the attention of multiple scientists who dismissed the finding as a likely replica gorilla skull. Darren Naish, a vertebrate paleontologist, stated, "I'm told that Coyote Peterson does this sort of thing fairly often as clickbait, and that this is a stunt done to promote an upcoming video. Maybe this is meant to be taken as harmless fun. But in an age where anti-scientific feelings and conspiracy culture are a serious problem it—again—really isn't a good look. I think this stunt has backfired". In a follow-up video, Peterson claimed the situation was staged as a hypothetical example of what <u>not</u> to do in response to such a discovery.
In popular culture
sign warning of Bigfoot crossings on Pikes Peak Highway in Colorado.]]
Bigfoot has a demonstrable impact in popular culture, and has been compared to Michael Jordan as a cultural icon. In 2018, Smithsonian magazine declared, "Interest in the existence of the creature is at an all-time high". A poll in 2020 suggested that about 1 in 10 American adults believe Bigfoot to be "a real, living creature". According to a May 2023 data study, the terms "Bigfoot" and "Sasquatch" are inputted via internet search engines over 200,000 times annually in the United States, and over 660,000 times worldwide.
The creature has inspired the naming of a medical company, music festival, amusement park ride, monster truck, and a Marvel Comics superhero. Some commentators have been critical of Bigfoot's rise to fame, arguing that the appearance of the creatures in cartoons, reality shows, and advertisements trivialize the potential validity of serious scientific research into their supposed existence. Others propose that society's fascination with the concept of Bigfoot stems from human interest in mystery, the paranormal, and loneliness. In a 2022 article discussing recent Bigfoot sightings, journalist John Keilman of the Chicago Tribune states, "As UFOs have gained newfound respect, becoming the subject of a Pentagon investigative panel, the alleged Bigfoot sighting is a reminder that other paranormal phenomena are still out there, entrancing true believers and amusing skeptics".In the Pacific NorthwestBigfoot and its likeness is symbolic with the Pacific Northwest and its culture, including the Cascadia movement. Two National Basketball Association teams located in the Pacific Northwest have used Bigfoot as a mascot; Squatch of the now-defunct Seattle SuperSonics from 1993 until 2008, and Douglas Fur of the Portland Trail Blazers. Legend the Bigfoot was selected as the official mascot for the 2022 World Athletics Championships held in Eugene, Oregon. In 2024, the United Soccer League (USL) announced the Bigfoot Football Club based in Maple Valley, Washington will begin competing in 2025.
There are laws and ordinances regarding harming or killing Bigfoot in the state of Washington. In 1969, a law was passed that criminalized killing a Bigfoot, making the act a felony, that upon conviction was punishable by a fine of up to $10,000 or by five years imprisonment. In 1984, the law was amended to make the crime a misdemeanor and the entire county was declared a "Sasquatch refuge". Whatcom County followed suit in 1991, declaring the county a "Sasquatch Protection and Refuge Area". In 2022, Grays Harbor County, Washington, passed a similar resolution after a local elementary school in Hoquiam submitted a classroom project asking for a "Sasquatch Protection and Refuge Area" to be granted.
In media
Bigfoot is featured in various films. It is often depicted as the antagonist in low budget monster movies, but has also been depicted as intelligent and friendly, with a notable example being Harry and the Hendersons (1987). Sasquatch Sunset (2024) depicts a family of Bigfoot engaging in alleged behaviors reported by Bigfoot enthusiasts and researchers. Bigfoot is also featured in television, notably as a subject of reality and paranormal television series, with notable examples being Finding Bigfoot (2011), Mountain Monsters (2013), 10 Million Dollar Bigfoot Bounty (2014), Expedition Bigfoot (2019), and Alaskan Killer Bigfoot (2021).
In advocacy
Bigfoot has been used for environmental protection and nature conservation campaigns and advocacy. Bigfoot was used in an environmental protection campaign, albeit comedically, by the U.S. Forest Service in 2015. Bigfoot is a mascot for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's "Leave No Trace Principles", a national educational program to inform the public about reducing the damage caused by outdoor activities. The 360 mile "Bigfoot Trail" in Oregon, is named for the creature. Environmental organization Oregon Wild also uses Bigfoot to promote its nature advocacy, stating, "If there really is a Sasquatch out there, there is definitely more than one, and in order to maintain a healthy breeding population a species of hominid (as Sasquatch is assumed to be) would need extremely vast expanses of uninterrupted forest. Remote Wilderness areas would be prime habitat for Sasquatch, so if there are any out there to protect, making sure Oregon's forests get the protections they need to stay untrammeled is of the utmost importance". In 2024, Bigfoot was used as a mascot for a government recycling campaign in Whitfield County, Georgia.
In the 2018 podcast Wild Thing, creator and journalist Laura Krantz argues that the concept of Bigfoot can be an important part of environmental interest and protection, stating, "If you look at it from the angle that Bigfoot is a creature that has eluded capture or hasn't left any concrete evidence behind, then you just have a group of people who are curious about the environment and want to know more about it, which isn't that far off from what naturalists have done for centuries".
During the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Bigfoot became a part of many North American social distancing advocacy campaigns, with the creature being referred to as the "Social Distancing Champion" and as the subject of various internet memes related to the pandemic.
Bigfoot subculture
at the 2015 Fremont Solstice Parade in Seattle, Washington.]]
There is an entire subculture surrounding Bigfoot. The act of searching for the creatures is often referred to as "Squatching", "Squatchin'" or "Squatch'n", popularized by the Animal Planet series, Finding Bigfoot. Bigfoot researchers and believers are often called "Bigfooters" or "Squatchers". 20th century Bigfooters Peter C. Byrne, René Dahinden, John Green and Grover Krantz have been dubbed by cryptozoologist and author Loren Coleman as the "Four Horsemen of Sasquatchery". The 2024 book The Secret History of Bigfoot by journalist John O'Connor explores this subculture of Bigfooters, particularly the wide assortment of beliefs enthusiasts of the subject hold. In 2004, David Fahrenthold of The Washington Post published an article describing a feud between Bigfoot researchers in the eastern and western United States. Fahrenthold writes, "On the one hand, East Coast Bigfooters say they have to fight discrimination from Western counterparts who think the creature does not live east of the Rocky Mountains. On the other, they have to deal with reports from a more urban population, which includes some who are unfamiliar with wildlife and apt to mistake a black bear for the missing link".
People have been injured or killed while searching for Bigfoot in the wilderness. On December 28, 2024, two men were found deceased in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in Washington state after setting off on Christmas to search for Bigfoot. Their disappearance prompted a large scale search and rescue effort, with the Skamania County Sheriff's Office concluding they were likely not prepared for the inclement weather.
October 20, the anniversary of the Patterson-Gimlin film recording, is considered by some enthusiasts as "National Sasquatch Awareness Day". In 2015, World Champion taxidermist Ken Walker completed what he believes to be a lifelike Bigfoot model based on the subject in the Patterson–Gimlin film. He entered it into the 2015 World Taxidermy & Fish Carving Championships in Missouri and was the subject of Dan Wayne's 2019 documentary Big Fur.Tourism and eventsuses local Bigfoot folklore as a means of attracting tourism to the area.]]
Bigfoot and related folklore has an impact on tourism. Willow Creek, California, considers itself the "Bigfoot Capital of the World". The Willow Creek Chamber of Commerce has hosted the "Bigfoot Daze" festival annually since the 1960s, drawing on the popularity of the local folklore, notably that of the Patterson-Gimlin film. Jefferson, Texas proclaimed itself the "Bigfoot Capital of Texas" in 2018. The city has hosted the Texas Bigfoot Conference since 2000.
In 2021, U.S. Representative Justin Humphrey, in an effort to bolster tourism, proposed an official Bigfoot hunting season in Oklahoma, indicating that the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation would regulate permits and the state would offer a $3 million bounty if such a creature was captured alive and unharmed. In 2024, mayor Grant Nicely of Derry, Pennsylvania declared Bigfoot the "official cryptid" of the borough and stated, "Willful harm or capture of the species will be punishable by law." Council Vice-president Nathan Bundy stated, "By proclaiming Bigfoot as our official cryptid and establishing Derry as a sanctuary, we are embracing our local folklore and the rich history that makes our community unique".
Events such as conferences and festivals dedicated to Bigfoot draw thousands of attendees and contribute to the economies of areas in which they are held. These events commonly include guest speakers, research and lore presentations, and sometimes live music, vendors, food trucks, and other activities such as costume contests and "Bigfoot howl" competitions. Some receive collaboration between local government and corporations, such as the Smoky Mountain Bigfoot Festival in Townsend, Tennessee, which is sponsored by Monster Energy. The 2023 Bigfoot Festival in Marion, North Carolina, saw approximately 40,000 people in attendance, resulting in a large economic boost for the small town of less than 8,000 residents. In February 2016, the University of New Mexico at Gallup held a two-day Bigfoot conference at a cost of $7,000 in university funds. Bigfoot is also featured in events alongside other famous cryptids such as the Loch Ness Monster, Mothman, and Chupacabra.
There are museums dedicated to Bigfoot. In 2019, Bigfoot researcher Cliff Barackman, notable for his role on Finding Bigfoot, opened the North American Bigfoot Center in Boring, Oregon. In 2022, The Bigfoot Crossroads of America Museum and Research Center in Hastings, Nebraska, was selected for addition into the archives of the U.S. Library of Congress. The High Desert Museum in Bend, Oregon features an exhibit called Sensing Sasquatch, which presents the subject from an Indigenous point-of-view. According to Executive Director Dana Whitelaw, "Rather than the popular, mainstream view of Sasquatch, this exhibition shows Sasquatch as a protective entity for many Indigenous peoples of the High Desert. The exhibit reflects the reverence that Native peoples have for Sasquatch and will be centered on Indigenous art, voices and storytelling".
Organizations
There are several organizations dedicated to Bigfoot. The oldest and largest is the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization (BFRO). The BFRO also provides a free database to individuals and other organizations. Their website includes reports from across North America that have been investigated by BFRO researchers. Other similar organizations exist throughout many U.S. states and their members come from a variety of backgrounds.
The North American Wood Ape Conservancy (NAWAC), a nonprofit organization, states its mission is to "ultimately have the wood ape species documented, protected, and the land they inhabit protected. Author Mike Mays of NAWAC states, "If just anyone hauled in a Bigfoot carcass the blowback from animal rights groups and beyond would be ruinous".
See also
* Bigfoot and Wildboy – 1977 live action children's television series on ABC.
* Bigfoot: The Life and Times of a Legend – 2009 book published by University of Chicago Press
* Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science – 2003 film documentary aired on Discovery Channel
* Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science – 2006 book published by Forge
* The Secret History of Bigfoot – 2024 book about the culture of Bigfoot hunters by Sourcebooks
; Similar alleged creatures
Citations
External links
*
*
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Category:California culture
Category:Canadian folklore
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Category:Wild men | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigfoot | 2025-04-05T18:26:39.988338 |
4010 | Bing Crosby | | birth_name = Harry Lillis Crosby Jr.
| birth_date =
| birth_place = Tacoma, Washington, U.S.
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| death_place = Alcobendas, Spain
| resting_place = Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City, California, U.S.
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| years_active = 1923–1977
| works =
| alma_mater = Gonzaga University
| spouse |}}
| children | (with Dixie)| (with Kathryn)}}
| relatives =
| signature = Bing Crosby signature.svg
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Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. (May 3, 1903 – October 14, 1977) was an American singer and actor. The first multimedia star, he was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century worldwide. Crosby was a leader in record sales, network radio ratings, and motion picture grosses from 1926 to 1977. He was one of the first global cultural icons. Crosby made over 70 feature films and recorded more than 1,600 songs.
Crosby's early career coincided with recording innovations that allowed him to develop an intimate singing style that influenced many male singers who followed, such as Frank Sinatra, Perry Como, Dean Martin, Dick Haymes, Elvis Presley, and John Lennon. Yank magazine said that Crosby was "the person who had done the most for the morale of overseas servicemen" during World War II. In 1948, American polls declared him the "most admired man alive", ahead of Jackie Robinson and Pope Pius XII. In 1948, Music Digest estimated that Crosby's recordings filled more than half of the 80,000 weekly hours allocated to recorded radio music in America. At his screen apex in 1946, Crosby starred in three of the year's five highest-grossing films: ''The Bells of St. Mary's, Blue Skies, and Road to Utopia''. Crosby is one of 33 people to have three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, in the categories of motion pictures, radio, and audio recording. He was also known for his collaborations with his friend Bob Hope, starring in the Road to ... films from 1940 to 1962.
Crosby influenced the development of the post–World War II recording industry. After seeing a demonstration of a German broadcast quality reel-to-reel tape recorder brought to the United States by John T. Mullin, Crosby invested $50,000 in the California electronics company Ampex to build copies. He then persuaded ABC to allow him to tape his shows and became the first performer to prerecord his radio shows and master his commercial recordings onto magnetic tape. Crosby has been associated with the Christmas season since he starred in Irving Berlin's musical film Holiday Inn and also sang "White Christmas" in the film of the same name. Through audio recordings, Crosby produced his radio programs with the same directorial tools and craftsmanship (editing, retaking, rehearsal, time shifting) used in motion picture production, a practice that became the industry standard. In addition to his work with early audio tape recording, Crosby helped finance the development of videotape, bought television stations, bred racehorses, and co-owned the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team, during which time the team won two World Series (1960 and 1971).
Early life
Crosby was born on May 3, 1903, in Tacoma, Washington, in a house his father built at 1112 North J Street. Three years later, his family moved to Spokane in eastern Washington state, where Crosby was raised. In 1913, his father built a house at 508 E. Sharp Avenue. The house stands on the campus of Crosby's alma mater, Gonzaga University, as a museum housing over 200 artifacts from his life and career, including his Oscar.
Crosby was the fourth of seven children: brothers Laurence Earl "Larry" (1895–1975), Everett Nathaniel (1896–1966), Edward John "Ted" (1900–1973), and George Robert "Bob" (1913–1993); and two sisters, Catherine Cordelia (1904–1974) and Mary Rose (1906–1990). His parents were Harry Lillis Crosby (1870–1950), a bookkeeper, and Catherine Helen "Kate" (née Harrigan; 1873–1964). His mother was a second-generation Irish-American. Through another line, also on his father's side, Crosby is descended from Mayflower passenger William Brewster ( 1567 – 1644).
In 1917, Crosby took a summer job as property boy at Spokane's Auditorium, where he witnessed some of the acts of the day, including Al Jolson, who held Crosby spellbound with ad-libbing and parodies of Hawaiian songs. Crosby later described Jolson's delivery as "electric".
Crosby graduated from Gonzaga High School in 1920 and enrolled at Gonzaga University. He attended Gonzaga for three years but did not earn a degree. As a freshman, Crosby played on the university's baseball team. The university granted him an honorary doctorate in 1937. Gonzaga University houses a large collection of photographs, correspondence, and other material related to Crosby.
On November 8, 1937, after Lux Radio Theatre's adaptation of She Loves Me Not, Joan Blondell asked Crosby how he got his nickname:
As it happens, that story was pure whimsy for dramatic effect; the Associated Press had reported as early as February 1932—as would later be confirmed by both Bing himself and his biographer Charles Thompson—that it was in fact a neighbor—Valentine Hobart, circa 1910—who had named him "Bingo from Bingville" after a comic feature in the local paper called The Bingville Bugle which the young Harry liked. In time, Bingo got shortened to Bing.
Career
Early years
In 1923, Crosby was invited to join a new band composed of high-school students a few years younger than himself. Al and Miles Rinker (brothers of singer Mildred Bailey), James Heaton, Claire Pritchard and Robert Pritchard, along with drummer Crosby, formed the Musicaladers, Crosby and Al Rinker obtained work at the Clemmer Theatre in Spokane (now known as the Bing Crosby Theater).
On August 14, 1925, Bing appeared at the Clemmer Theater as part of The Clemmer Trio (Frank McBride, Lloyd Grinnell and Harry Crosby) and they were shown as being presented with special stage effects.Rinker played piano in the pit. They continued at the theater alongside the film of the week for a very successful 12 weeks. They were initially billed as The Clemmer Trio and later as The Clemmer Entertainers depending who performed.
In October 1925, Crosby and Rinker decided to seek fame in California. They traveled to Los Angeles, where Bailey introduced them to her show business contacts. The Fanchon and Marco Time Agency hired them for 13 weeks for the revue The Syncopation Idea starting at the Boulevard Theater in Los Angeles and then on the Loew's circuit. They each earned $75 a week. As minor parts of The Syncopation Idea, Crosby and Rinker started to develop as entertainers. They had a lively style that was popular with college students. After The Syncopation Idea closed, they worked in the Will Morrissey Music Hall Revue. They honed their skills with Morrissey, and when they got a chance to present an independent act, they were spotted by a member of the Paul Whiteman organization.
Whiteman needed something different to break up his musical selections, and Crosby and Rinker filled this requirement. After less than a year in show business, they were attached to one of the biggest names.
The Rhythm Boys
in c. 1929-30]]
Success with Whiteman was followed by disaster when they reached New York. Whiteman considered letting them go. However, the addition of pianist and aspiring songwriter Harry Barris made the difference, and The Rhythm Boys were born. The additional voice meant they could be heard more easily in large New York theaters. Crosby gained valuable experience on tour for a year with Whiteman and performing and recording with Bix Beiderbecke, Jack Teagarden, Tommy Dorsey, Jimmy Dorsey, Eddie Lang, and Hoagy Carmichael. Crosby matured as a performer and was in demand as a solo singer.
Crosby became the star attraction of the Rhythm Boys. In 1928, he had his first number one hit, a jazz-influenced rendition of "Ol' Man River". In 1929, the Rhythm Boys appeared in the film King of Jazz with Whiteman, but Crosby's growing dissatisfaction with Whiteman led to the Rhythm Boys leaving his organization. They joined the Gus Arnheim Orchestra, performing nightly in the Coconut Grove of the Ambassador Hotel. Singing with the Arnheim Orchestra, Crosby's solos began to steal the show while the Rhythm Boys' act gradually became redundant. Harry Barris wrote several of Crosby's hits, including "At Your Command", "I Surrender Dear", and "Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams". When Mack Sennett signed Crosby to a solo film contract in 1931, a break with the Rhythm Boys became almost inevitable. Crosby married Dixie Lee in September 1930. After a threat of divorce in March 1931, he applied himself to his career.
Success as a solo singer
On September 2, 1931, 15 Minutes with Bing Crosby, his nationwide solo radio debut, began broadcasting. The weekly broadcast made Crosby a hit. Before the end of the year, he with both Brunswick Records and CBS Radio. "Out of Nowhere", "Just One More Chance", "At Your Command", and "I Found a Million Dollar Baby (in a Five and Ten Cent Store)" were among the best-selling songs of 1931.
His first son Gary was born in 1933 with twin boys following in 1934. By 1936, Crosby replaced his former boss, Paul Whiteman, as host of the weekly NBC radio program Kraft Music Hall, where he remained for the next decade. "Where the Blue of the Night (Meets the Gold of the Day)", with his trademark whistling, became his theme song and signature tune.
Crosby's vocal style helped take popular singing beyond the "belting" associated with Al Jolson and Billy Murray, who had been obligated to reach the back seats in New York theaters without the aid of a microphone. As music critic Henry Pleasants noted in The Great American Popular Singers, something new had entered American music, a style that might be called "singing in American" with conversational ease. This new sound led to the popular epithet crooner.
Crosby admired Louis Armstrong for his musical ability, and the trumpet maestro was a formative influence on Crosby's singing style. When the two met, they became friends. In 1936, Crosby exercised an option in his Paramount contract to regularly star in an out-of-house film. Signing an agreement with Columbia for a single motion picture, Crosby wanted Armstrong to appear in a screen adaptation of The Peacock Feather that eventually became Pennies from Heaven. Crosby asked Harry Cohn, but Cohn had no desire to pay for the flight or to meet Armstrong's "crude, mob-linked but devoted manager, Joe Glaser". Crosby threatened to leave the film and refused to discuss the matter. Cohn gave in; Armstrong's musical scenes and comic dialogue extended his influence to the silver screen, creating more opportunities for him and other African Americans to appear in future films. Crosby also ensured behind the scenes that Armstrong received equal billing with his white co-stars. Armstrong appreciated Crosby's progressive attitudes on race, and often expressed gratitude for the role in later years.
During World War II, Crosby made live appearances before American troops who had been fighting in the European Theater. He learned how to pronounce German from written scripts and read propaganda broadcasts intended for German forces. The nickname "Der Bingle" was common among Crosby's German listeners and came to be used by his English-speaking fans. In a poll of U.S. troops at the close of World War II, Crosby topped the list as the person who had done the most for G.I. morale, ahead of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, General Dwight Eisenhower, and Bob Hope.
The June 18, 1945, issue of Life magazine stated, "America's number one star, Bing Crosby, has won more fans, made more money than any entertainer in history. Today he is a kind of national institution." "In all, 60,000,000 Crosby discs have been marketed since he made his first record in 1931. His biggest best seller is "White Christmas" 2,000,000 impressions of which have been sold in the U.S. and 250,000 in Great Britain."White Christmas
'' (1954)]]
The biggest hit song of Crosby's career was his recording of Irving Berlin's "White Christmas", which Crosby introduced on a Christmas Day radio broadcast in 1941. A copy of the recording from the radio program is owned by the estate of Bing Crosby and was loaned to CBS Sunday Morning for their December 25, 2011, program. The song appeared in his films Holiday Inn (1942), and—a decade later—in White Christmas (1954). Crosby's record hit the charts on October 3, 1942, and rose to number 1 on October 31, where it stayed for 11 weeks. A holiday perennial, the song was repeatedly re-released by Decca, charting another 16 times. It topped the charts again in 1945 and a third time in January 1947. The song remains the bestselling single of all time. Crosby was dismissive of his role in the song's success, saying "a jackdaw with a cleft palate could have sung it successfully".
Motion pictures
, Marquita Rivera, and Bing Crosby in 1947]]
In the wake of a solid decade of headlining mainly smash hit musical comedy films in the 1930s, Crosby starred with Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour in six of the seven Road to musical comedies between 1940 and 1962 (Lamour was replaced with Joan Collins in The Road to Hong Kong and limited to a lengthy cameo), cementing Crosby and Hope as an on-and-off duo, despite never declaring themselves a "team" in the sense that Laurel and Hardy or Martin and Lewis (Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis) were teams. The series consists of Road to Singapore (1940), Road to Zanzibar (1941), Road to Morocco (1942), Road to Utopia (1946), Road to Rio (1947), Road to Bali (1952), and The Road to Hong Kong (1962). When they appeared solo, Crosby and Hope frequently made note of the other in a comically insulting fashion. They performed together countless times on stage, radio, film, and television, and made numerous brief and not so brief appearances together in movies aside from the "Road" pictures, Variety Girl (1947) being an example of lengthy scenes and songs together along with billing.
In the 1949 Disney animated film The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, Crosby provided the narration and song vocals for The Legend of Sleepy Hollow segment. In 1960, he starred in High Time, a collegiate comedy with Fabian Forte and Tuesday Weld that predicted the emerging gap between Crosby and the new younger generation of musicians and actors who had begun their careers after World War II. The following year, Crosby and Hope reunited for one more Road movie, The Road to Hong Kong, which teamed them up with the much younger Joan Collins and Peter Sellers. Collins was used in place of their longtime partner Dorothy Lamour, whom Crosby felt was getting too old for the role, though Hope refused to do the film without her, and she instead made a lengthy and elaborate cameo appearance.
Television
The Fireside Theater'' (1950) was his first television production. The series of 26-minute shows was filmed at Hal Roach Studios rather than performed live on the air. The "telefilms" were syndicated to individual television stations. Crosby was a frequent guest on the musical variety shows of the 1950s and 1960s, appearing on various variety shows as well as numerous late-night talk shows and his own highly rated specials. Bob Hope memorably devoted one of his monthly NBC specials to his long intermittent partnership with Crosby titled "On the Road With Bing". Crosby was associated with ABC's The Hollywood Palace as the show's first and most frequent guest host and appeared annually on its Christmas edition with his wife Kathryn and his younger children, and continued after The Hollywood Palace was eventually canceled. In the early 1970s, Crosby made two late appearances on the Flip Wilson Show, singing duets with the comedian. His last TV appearance was a Christmas special, Merrie Olde Christmas, taped in London in September 1977 and aired weeks after his death. It was on this special that Crosby recorded a duet of "The Little Drummer Boy" and "Peace on Earth" with rock musician David Bowie. Their duet was released in 1982 as a single 45 rpm record and reached No. 3 in the UK singles charts. Crosby was, by his own definition, a "phraser", a singer who placed equal emphasis on both the lyrics and the music. Paul Whiteman's hiring of Crosby, with phrasing that echoed jazz, particularly his bandmate Bix Beiderbecke's trumpet, helped bring the genre to a wider audience. He had already been introduced to Louis Armstrong and Bessie Smith before his first appearance on record. Crosby and Armstrong remained warm acquaintances for decades, occasionally singing together in later years, e.g. "Now You Has Jazz" in the film High Society (1956). In Crosby's performances, the presence of jazz phrasing, jazz rhythm and jazz improvisation varied depending on the piece of music, but those were elements that Crosby frequently used. This can be observed particularly in his straight jazz work during the late 1920s/early 1930s, Crosby's recordings with Buddy Cole and His Trio from the mid-1950s, as well as in his numerous collaborations with such jazz musicians as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Joe Venuti, or Eddie Lang. However, while Crosby can be called a jazz singer, he was not strictly only a jazz singer as he modeled the style and techniques to a broad scope of music that he performed, ranging from Jazz to Country to even such material as operetta arias.
During the early portion of his solo career (about 1931–1934), Crosby's emotional, often pleading style of crooning was popular. But Jack Kapp, manager of Brunswick and later Decca, talked Crosby into dropping many of his jazzier mannerisms in favor of a clear vocal style. Crosby credited Kapp for choosing hit songs, working with many other musicians, and most important, diversifying his repertoire into several styles and genres. Kapp helped Crosby have number one hits in Christmas music, Hawaiian music, and country music, and top-30 hits in Irish music, French music, rhythm and blues, and ballads.
Crosby elaborated on an idea of Al Jolson's: phrasing, or the art of making a song's lyric ring true. "I used to tell Sinatra over and over," said Tommy Dorsey, "there's only one singer you ought to listen to and his name is Crosby. All that matters to him is the words, and that's the only thing that ought to for you, too."
Critic Henry Pleasants wrote in 1985: [While] the octave B flat to B flat in Bing's voice at that time [1930s] is, to my ears, one of the loveliest I have heard in forty-five years of listening to baritones, both classical and popular, it dropped conspicuously in later years. From the mid-1950s, Bing was more comfortable in a bass range while maintaining a baritone quality, with the best octave being G to G, or even F to F. In a recording he made of 'Dardanella' with Louis Armstrong in 1960, he attacks lightly and easily on a low E flat. This is lower than most opera basses care to venture, and they tend to sound as if they were in the cellar when they get there.
Career achievements
and Arthur Godfrey in 1950]]
Crosby's was among the most popular and successful musical acts of the 20th century. Billboard magazine used different methodologies during his career, but his chart success remains impressive: 396 chart singles, including roughly 41 number 1 hits. Crosby had separate charting singles every year between 1931 and 1954; the annual re-release of "White Christmas" extended that streak to 1957. He had 24 separate popular singles in 1939 alone. Statistician Joel Whitburn at Billboard determined that Crosby was America's most successful recording act of the 1930s and again in the 1940s.
The number of Bing Crosby record sales varies. Organizations that audit record sales do not have an official tally, but some claim sales are notable, namely: In 1960, Crosby was honored as "First Citizen of Record Industry" based on having sold 200 million discs. The Guinness Book reported some of the singer's worldwide sales on a few occasions: In 1973, Crosby had sold more than 400 million records worldwide, and by 1977 he had sold 500 million discs, being ranked as the most successful and best-selling musical artist in 1978. Some sources contradict these alleged sales to the Guinness Book, as it is not an organization that counts or audits artists' sales in the United States or worldwide. According to different sources, Bing Crosby's sales number varies between: 300 million, 500 million, or even 1 billion, making him one of the best-selling singers in history. The single "White Christmas" sold over 50 million copies according to Guinness World Records. The International Motion Picture Almanac lists Crosby in a tie for second-most years at number one on the All Time Number One Stars List with Clint Eastwood, Tom Hanks, and Burt Reynolds. His most popular film, White Christmas, grossed $30 million in 1954 ($}} million in current value).
Crosby received 23 gold and platinum records, according to the book Million Selling Records. The Recording Industry Association of America did not institute its gold record certification program until 1958 when Crosby's record sales were low. Before 1958, gold records were awarded by record companies. Crosby charted 23 Billboard hits from 47 recorded songs with the Andrews Sisters, whose Decca record sales were second only to Crosby's throughout the 1940s. They were his most frequent collaborators on disc from 1939 to 1952, a partnership that produced four million-selling singles: "Pistol Packin' Mama", "Jingle Bells", "Don't Fence Me In", and "South America, Take It Away".
They made one film appearance together in Road to Rio singing "You Don't Have to Know the Language", and sang together on radio airwaves throughout the 1940s and 1950s. They appeared as guests on each other's shows and on Armed Forces Radio Service programming during and after World War II. The quartet's additional Top-10 Billboard hits from 1943 to 1945 include "The Vict'ry Polka", "There'll Be a Hot Time in the Town of Berlin (When the Yanks Go Marching In)", and "Is You Is or Is You Ain't (Ma' Baby?)" which helped the morale of the American public.
In 1962, Crosby was given the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. He has been inducted into the halls of fame for both radio and popular music. In 2007, Crosby was inducted into the Hit Parade Hall of Fame and in 2008 the Western Music Hall of Fame.Global impactCrosby's popularity around the world was such that Dorothy Masuka, the best-selling African recording artist, stated that, "Only Bing Crosby the famous American crooner sold more records than me in Africa." His great popularity throughout the continent led other African singers to emulate him, including Masuka, Dolly Rathebe, and Míriam Makeba, known locally as "The Bing Crosby of Africa".
Presenter Mike Douglas commented in a 1975 interview, "During my days in the Navy in World War II, I remember walking the streets of Calcutta, India, on the coast; it was a lonely night, so far from my home and from my new wife, Gen. I needed something to lift my spirits. As I passed a Hindu sitting on the corner of a street, I heard something surprisingly familiar. I came back to see the man playing one of those old Vitrolas, like those of RCA with the horn speaker. The man was listening to Bing Crosby sing, "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate The Positive". I stopped and smiled in grateful acknowledgment. The Hindu nodded and smiled back. The whole world knew and loved Bing Crosby." His popularity in India led many Hindu singers to imitate and emulate him, notably Kishore Kumar, considered the "Bing Crosby of India".
Throughout Europe and Russia, Crosby was also known as "Der Bingle", a pseudonym coined in 1944 by Bob Musel, an American journalist based in London, after Crosby had recorded three 15-minute programs with Jack Russin for broadcast to Germany from ABSIE.
Entrepreneurship
According to Shoshana Klebanoff, Crosby became one of the richest men in the history of show business. He had investments in real estate, mines, oil wells, cattle ranches, race horses, music publishing, baseball teams, and television. Crosby made a fortune from the Minute Maid Orange Juice Corporation, in which he was a principal stockholder.
Role in early tape recording
During the Golden Age of Radio, performers had to create their shows live, sometimes even redoing the program a second time for the West Coast time zone. Crosby had to do two live radio shows on the same day, three hours apart, for the East and West Coasts. Crosby's radio career took a significant turn in 1945, when he clashed with NBC over his insistence that he be allowed to pre-record his radio shows. The live production of radio shows was reinforced by the musicians' union and ASCAP, which wanted to ensure continued work for their members. In On the Air: The Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio, John Dunning wrote about German engineers having developed a tape recorder with a near-professional broadcast quality standard:
Crosby's insistence eventually factored into the further development of magnetic tape sound recording and the radio industry's widespread adoption of it. He used his clout, both professionally and financially, for innovations in audio. But NBC and CBS refused to broadcast prerecorded radio programs. Crosby left the network and remained off the air for seven months, creating a legal battle with his sponsor Kraft that was settled out of court. Crosby returned to broadcasting for the last 13 weeks of the 1945–1946 season.
The Mutual Network, on the other hand, pre-recorded some of its programs as early as 1938 for The Shadow with Orson Welles. ABC was formed from the sale of the NBC Blue Network in 1943 after a federal antitrust suit and was willing to join Mutual in breaking the tradition. ABC offered Crosby $30,000 per week to produce a recorded show every Wednesday that would be sponsored by Philco. He would get an additional $40,000 from 400 independent stations for the rights to broadcast the 30-minute show, which was sent to them every Monday on three lacquer discs that played ten minutes per side at rpm.
Murdo MacKenzie of Bing Crosby Enterprises had seen a demonstration of the German Magnetophon in June 1947—the same device that Jack Mullin had brought back from Radio Frankfurt with 50 reels of tape, at the end of the war. It was one of the magnetic tape recorders that BASF and AEG had built in Germany starting in 1935. The 6.5 mm ferric-oxide-coated tape could record 20 minutes per reel of high-quality sound. Alexander M. Poniatoff ordered Ampex, which he founded in 1944, to manufacture an improved version of the Magnetophone.
Crosby hired Mullin to start recording his Philco Radio Time show on his German-made machine in August 1947 using the same 50 reels of I.G. Farben magnetic tape that Mullin had found at a radio station at Bad Nauheim near Frankfurt while working for the U.S. Army Signal Corps. The advantage was editing. As Crosby wrote in his autobiography:
Mullin's 1976 memoir of these early days of experimental recording agrees with Crosby's account:
Crosby invested $50,000 in Ampex with the intent to produce more machines.
With Frank Sinatra, Crosby was one of the principal backers for the United Western Recorders studio complex in Los Angeles.
Videotape development
Mullin continued to work for Crosby to develop a videotape recorder (VTR). Television production was mostly live television in its early years, but Crosby wanted the same ability to record that he had achieved in radio. The Fireside Theater (1950) sponsored by Procter & Gamble, was his first television production. Mullin had not yet succeeded with videotape, so Crosby filmed the series of 26-minute shows at the Hal Roach Studios, and the "telefilms" were syndicated to individual television stations.
Crosby continued to finance the development of videotape. Bing Crosby Enterprises gave the world's first demonstration of videotape recording in Los Angeles on November 11, 1951. Developed by John T. Mullin and Wayne R. Johnson since 1950, the device aired what were described as "blurred and indistinct" images, using a modified Ampex 200 tape recorder and standard quarter-inch (6.3 mm) audio tape moving at per second.
Television station ownership
A Crosby-led group purchased station KCOP-TV, in Los Angeles, California, in 1954. NAFI Corporation and Crosby purchased television station KPTV in Portland, Oregon, for $4 million on September 1, 1959. In 1960, NAFI purchased KCOP from Crosby's group. Operating from the Del Mar Racetrack in Del Mar, California, the group included millionaire businessman Charles S. Howard, who owned a successful racing stable that included Seabiscuit. The Bing Crosby Breeders' Cup Handicap at Del Mar Racetrack is named in his honor.
Sports
Crosby had a keen interest in sports. In the 1930s, his friend and former college classmate, Gonzaga head coach Mike Pecarovich, appointed Crosby as an assistant football coach. From 1946 until his death, Crosby owned a 25% share of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Although he was passionate about the team, Crosby was too nervous to watch the deciding Game 7 of the 1960 World Series, choosing to go to Paris with Kathryn and listen to its radio broadcast. Crosby had arranged for Ampex, another of his financial investments, to record the NBC telecast on kinescope. The game was one of the most famous in baseball history, capped off by Bill Mazeroski's walk-off home run that won the game for Pittsburgh. Crosby apparently viewed the complete film just once, and then stored it in his wine cellar, where it remained undisturbed until it was discovered in December 2009. The restored broadcast was shown on MLB Network in December 2010.
Crosby was also an early investor in Bob Cobb's Billings Mustangs baseball club in 1948, joining other Hollywood stars Cecil B. DeMille, Robert Taylor, and Barbara Stanwyck who were also shareholders in the club. Crosby was also the honorary chairman of the club's board of directors.
Crosby was also an avid golfer. He first took up golf at age 12 as a caddy. Crosby was already spending much time on the golf course while touring the country in a vaudeville act or with Paul Whiteman's orchestra in the mid to late 1920s. Eventually, Crosby became accomplished at the sport, at his best reaching a two handicap. Crosby competed in both the British and U.S. Amateur championships, was a five-time club champion at Lakeside Golf Club in Hollywood, and once made a hole-in-one on the 16th hole at Cypress Point.
In 1937, Crosby hosted the first 'Crosby Clambake', a pro-am tournament at Rancho Santa Fe Golf Club in Rancho Santa Fe, California, the event's location prior to World War II. After the war, the event resumed play in 1947 on golf courses in Pebble Beach, where it has been played ever since. Now the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, the tournament is a staple of the PGA Tour, having featured Hollywood stars and other celebrities.
In 1950, Crosby became the third person to win the William D. Richardson award, which is given to a non-professional golfer "who has consistently made an outstanding contribution to golf". In 1978, he and Bob Hope were voted the Bob Jones Award, the highest honor given by the United States Golf Association in recognition of distinguished sportsmanship. Crosby is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, having been inducted in 1978.
Crosby also was a keen fisherman. In the summer of 1966, he spent a week as the guest of Lord Egremont, staying in Cockermouth and fishing on the River Derwent. Crosby's trip was filmed for The American Sportsman on ABC, although all did not go well at first as the salmon were not running. He did make up for it at the end of the week by catching a number of sea trout.
In Front Royal, Virginia, a baseball stadium was named in Crosby's honor. The Front Royal Cardinals of the Valley Baseball League play their home games here. The Bing is also home to both of the county's high schools' baseball teams.
Personal life
, Gary, Lindsay, and Phillip, 1959]]
Crosby reportedly had a problem with alcohol abuse between the late 1920s and early 1930s, spending 60 days in jail for drinking and crashing his car during prohibition. He got his drinking under control in 1931.
In 1977, Crosby told Barbara Walters in a televised interview that he thought marijuana should be legalized, because he believed it would make it much easier for the authorities to exert proper legal control over the market.
In December 1999, the New York Post published an article by Bill Hoffmann and Murray Weiss called ''Bing Crosby's Single Life'' which claimed that "recently published" FBI files revealed connections with figures in the Mafia "since his youth".
The comments made by FBI investigators in the memos discredited the claims made in the letters. In the FBI files, there is only one reference to a person associated with the Mafia. In a memorandum dated January 16, 1959, it is said: "The Salt Lake City Office has developed information indicating that Moe Dalitz received an invitation to join a deer hunting party at Bing Crosby's Elko, Nevada, ranch, together with the crooner, his Las Vegas dentist and several business associates." However, Crosby had already sold his Elko ranch a year earlier, in 1958, and it is doubtful how much he was really involved in that meeting.
Romantic relationships
Crosby was married twice. His first wife was actress and nightclub singer Dixie Lee, to whom he was married from 1930 until she died of ovarian cancer in 1952. They had four sons: Gary, twins Dennis and Phillip, and Lindsay. Smash-Up: The Story of a Woman (1947) was rumored to be based on Lee's life. The Crosby family lived at 10500 Camarillo Street in North Hollywood for more than five years.
After his wife died, Crosby had relationships with model Pat Sheehan, who married his son Dennis in 1958, and actresses Inger Stevens and Grace Kelly. Crosby married actress Kathryn Grant, who converted to Catholicism, in 1957. They had three children: Harry Lillis III, who played Bill in Friday the 13th, Mary Frances, best known for portraying Kristin Shepard on TV's Dallas, and Nathaniel, the 1981 U.S. Amateur champion in golf.
Particularly during the late 1930s and the 1940s, Crosby's domestic life was dominated by his wife's excessive drinking. His efforts to cure her with the help of specialists failed. Tired of Dixie's drinking, Crosby even asked her for a divorce in January 1941. During the 1940s, he consistently had difficulties trying to stay away from home, while also trying to be there as much as possible for his children.
Crosby had one confirmed extramarital affair between 1945 and the late 1940s, while married to his first wife Dixie. Actress Patricia Neal, who herself at the time was having an affair with the married Gary Cooper, wrote in her 1988 autobiography As I Am about a cruise to England with actress Joan Caulfield in 1948:
In the 2018 Crosby biography Bing Crosby: Swinging on a Star; the War Years, 1940–1946, there are excerpts from an original diary of two sisters, Violet and Mary Barsa, who, as young women, used to stalk Crosby in New York City in December 1945 and January 1946, and who detailed their observations in the diary. The document reveals that, during that time, Crosby was taking Caulfield out to dinner, visited theaters and opera houses with her, and Caulfield and a person in her company entered the Waldorf Hotel where Crosby was staying. The document also clearly indicates that at their meetings a third person, in most instances, Caulfield's mother, was present. In 1954, Caulfield admitted to a relationship with a "top film star" who was a married man with children, who, in the end, chose his wife and children over her. Attorney Ira Shadwell declined to disclose the purchase price. In October 1978, actor Clint Eastwood purchased the ranch under the name of his business manager, Roy Kaufman, for $1.5 million.
Crosby and his family lived in the San Francisco area for many years. In 1963, he and his wife Kathryn moved with their three young children from Los Angeles to a $175,000 ten-bedroom Tudor estate in Hillsborough, formerly owned by fellow horseman Lindsay C. Howard, one of Crosby's closest friends, because they did not want to raise their children in Hollywood, according to son Nathaniel. This house went up for sale by its current owners in 2021 for $13.75 million.
In 1965, the Crosbys moved to a larger, 40-room French chateau-style house on nearby Jackling Drive, where Kathryn Crosby continued to reside after Bing's death. This house served as a setting for some of the family's Minute Maid orange juice television commercials. While acknowledging that corporal punishments took place, there were reports of all of Gary's immediate siblings distancing themselves from the abuse claims, either in public or in private. Nevertheless, Phillip did not deny that Crosby believed in corporal punishment. However, after the book was published, Lindsay addressed the abuse claims and what the media had made out of them:
Dennis Crosby reportedly "said his older brother (Gary) was the most severely treated of the four boys. 'He got the first licking, and we got the second.'"
Gary's first wife of 19 years, Barbara Cosentino, of whom Gary wrote in his book, "I could confide in her about Mom and Dad and my childhood", and with whom Gary stayed friendly after the divorce, stated:
Bing's younger brother, singer and jazz bandleader Bob Crosby, recalled at the time of Gary's revelations that Bing was a "disciplinarian", as their mother and father had been. He added, "We were brought up that way."
Crosby's will established a blind trust in which none of the sons received an inheritance until they reached the age of 65, intended by Crosby to keep them out of trouble. They instead received several thousand dollars per month from a trust left in 1952 by their mother, Dixie Lee. The trust, tied to high-performing oil stocks, folded in December 1989 following the 1980s oil glut.
Lindsay Crosby died in 1989 at age 51, and Dennis Crosby died in 1991 at age 56, both by suicide from self-inflicted gunshot wounds. Gary Crosby died of lung cancer in 1995 at age 62. Phillip Crosby died of a heart attack in 2004 at age 69.
Nathaniel Crosby, Crosby's younger son from his second marriage, is a former high-level golfer who won the U.S. Amateur in 1981 at age 19, becoming the youngest winner in the history of that event at the time. Harry Crosby is an investment banker who occasionally makes singing appearances.
Denise Crosby, Dennis Crosby's daughter, is an actress and is known for her role as Tasha Yar on Star Trek: The Next Generation. She appeared in the 1989 film adaptation of Stephen King's novel Pet Sematary.
In 2006, Crosby's niece through his sister Mary Rose, Carolyn Schneider, published the laudatory book Me and Uncle Bing.
Disputes between Crosby's two families began in the late 1990s. When Dixie died in 1952, her will provided that her share of the community property be distributed in trust to her sons. After Crosby's death in 1977, he left the residue of his estate to a marital trust for the benefit of his widow, Kathryn, and HLC Properties, Ltd., was formed for the purpose of managing his interests, including his right of publicity. In 1996, Dixie's trust sued HLC and Kathryn for declaratory relief as to the trust's entitlement to interest, dividends, royalties, and other income derived from the community property of Crosby and Dixie.
In 1999, the parties settled for approximately $1.5 million. Relying on a retroactive amendment to the California Civil Code, Dixie's trust brought suit again, in 2010, alleging that Crosby's right of publicity was community property, and that Dixie's trust was entitled to a share of the revenue it produced. The trial court granted Dixie's trust's claim. The California Court of Appeals reversed it, holding that the 1999 settlement barred the claim. In light of the court's ruling, it was unnecessary for the court to decide whether a right of publicity can be characterized as community property under California law.
Health and death
Following his recovery from a life-threatening fungal infection in his right lung in January 1974, Crosby emerged from semi-retirement to start a new spate of albums and concerts. On March 20, 1977, after videotaping a CBS concert special, "Bing – 50th Anniversary Gala", at the Ambassador Auditorium with Bob Hope looking on, Crosby fell off the stage into an orchestra pit, rupturing a disc in his back requiring a month-long stay in the hospital. Crosby's first performance after the accident was his last American concert, on August 16, 1977, the day Elvis Presley died, at the Concord Pavilion in Concord, California. When the electric power failed during his performance, Crosby continued singing without amplification. On August 27, Crosby gave a televised concert in Norway.
In September, Crosby, his family and singer Rosemary Clooney began a concert tour of Britain that included two weeks at the London Palladium. While in the UK, Crosby recorded his final album, Seasons, and his final TV Christmas special with guest David Bowie on September 11, which aired a little over a month after Crosby's death. Crosby's last concert was in the Brighton Centre on October 10, four days before his death, with British entertainer <!-- Not a DBE until the 1979 New Year Honours. -->Gracie Fields in attendance. The following day, Crosby made his final appearance in a recording studio and sang eight songs at the BBC's Maida Vale Studios for a radio program, which included an interview with Alan Dell. Accompanied by the Gordon Rose Orchestra, Crosby's last recorded performance was of the song "Once in a While". Later that afternoon, he met with Chris Harding to take photographs for the Seasons album jacket. The next day, Crosby played 18 holes of golf at the La Moraleja Golf Course near Madrid. His partner was World Cup champion Manuel Piñero. Their opponents were club president César de Zulueta and Valentín Barrios. At the ninth hole, construction workers building a house nearby recognized Crosby, and when asked for a song, Crosby sang "Strangers in the Night". At the clubhouse and later in the ambulance, house physician Dr. Laiseca tried to revive him, but was unsuccessful. At Reina Victoria Hospital, Crosby was administered the last rites of the Catholic Church and was pronounced dead at the age of 74. Crosby was buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California.Legacy
, 6769 Hollywood Blvd. ]]
Crosby is a member of the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame in the radio division.
The family created an official website on October 14, 2007, the 30th anniversary of Crosby's death.
In his autobiography ''Don't Shoot, It's Only Me! (1990), Bob Hope wrote, "Dear old Bing, as we called him, the Economy-sized Sinatra''. And what a voice. God I miss that voice. I can't even turn on the radio around Christmas time without crying anymore."
Calypso musician Roaring Lion wrote a tribute song in 1939 titled "Bing Crosby", in which he wrote: "Bing has a way of singing with his very heart and soul / Which captivates the world / His millions of listeners never fail to rejoice / At his golden voice...."
In 2006, the former Metropolitan Theater of Performing Arts ('The Met') in Spokane, Washington, was renamed to The Bing Crosby Theater.
Crosby has three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. One each for radio, recording, and motion pictures.
Compositions
Crosby wrote or co-wrote lyrics to 22 songs. His composition "At Your Command" was number 1 for three weeks on the U.S. pop singles chart beginning on August 8, 1931. "I Don't Stand a Ghost of a Chance With You" was his most successful composition, recorded by Duke Ellington, Frank Sinatra, Thelonious Monk, Billie Holiday, and Mildred Bailey, among others. Songs co-written by Crosby include:
# "That's Grandma" (1927), with Harry Barris and James Cavanaugh
# "From Monday On" (1928), with Harry Barris and recorded with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra featuring Bix Beiderbecke on cornet, number 14 on US pop singles charts
# "What Price Lyrics?" (1928), with Harry Barris and Matty Malneck
# "Ev'rything's Agreed Upon" (1930), with Harry Barris
# "At Your Command" (1931), with Harry Barris and Harry Tobias, US, number 1 (3 weeks)
# "Believe Me" (1931), with James Cavanaugh and Frank Weldon (1932), written by Bing Crosby, Irving Bibo, and Paul McVey, featured in the 1932 Universal film The Cohens and Kellys in Hollywood
# "I Would If I Could But I Can't" (1933), with Mitchell Parish and Alan Grey
# "Where the Turf Meets the Surf" (1941) with Johnny Burke and James V. Monaco.
# "Tenderfoot" (1953) with Bob Bowen and Perry Botkin, originally issued using the pseudonym of "Bill Brill" for Bing Crosby.
# "Domenica" (1961) with Pietro Garinei / Gorni Kramer / Sandro Giovannini
# "That's What Life is All About" (1975), with Ken Barnes, Peter Dacre, and Les Reed, US, AC chart, no. 35; UK, no. 41
# "Sail Away from Norway" (1977) – Crosby wrote lyrics to go with a traditional song.
Grammy Hall of Fame
Four performances by Bing Crosby have been inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, which is a special Grammy award established in 1973 to honor recordings that are at least 25 years old and that have "qualitative or historical significance".
{| class=wikitable
|-
| colspan"6" style"text-align:center;"| Bing Crosby: Grammy Hall of Fame
|-
! Year Recorded
! Title
! Genre
! Label
! Year Inducted
! Notes
|- align=center
| 1942
| "White Christmas"
| Traditional Pop (single)
| Decca
| 1974
|With the Ken Darby Singers
|- align=center
| 1944
| "Swinging on a Star"
| Traditional Pop (single)
| Decca
| 2002
|With the Williams Brothers Quartet
|- align=center
| 1936
| "Pennies from Heaven"
| Traditional Pop (single)
| Decca
| 2004
|With the Jimmy Dorsey Orchestra
|- align=center
| 1944
| "Don't Fence Me In"
| Traditional Pop (single)
| Decca
| 1998
|With the Andrews Sisters
|}
Discography
Filmography
Television appearances
Radio
* 15 Minutes with Bing Crosby (1931, CBS), Unsponsored. 6 nights a week, 15 minutes.
* The Cremo Singer (1931–1932, CBS), 6 nights a week, 15 minutes.
* 15 Minutes with Bing Crosby (1932, CBS), initially 3 nights a week, then twice a week, 15 minutes.
* Chesterfield Cigarettes Presents Music that Satisfies (1933, CBS), broadcast two nights a week, 15 minutes.
* Bing Crosby Entertains (1933–1935, CBS), weekly, 30 minutes.
* Kraft Music Hall (1935–1946, NBC), Thursday nights, 60 minutes until January 1943, then 30 minutes.
* Bing Crosby on Armed Forces Radio in World War II (1941–1945; World War II).
* Philco Radio Time (1946–1949, ABC), 30 minutes weekly.
* This Is Bing Crosby (The Minute Maid Show) (1948–1950, CBS), 15 minutes each weekday morning; Bing as disc jockey.
* The Bing Crosby – Chesterfield Show (1949–1952, CBS), 30 minutes weekly.
* The Bing Crosby Show for General Electric (1952–1954, CBS), 30 minutes weekly.
* The Bing Crosby Show (1954–1956) (CBS), 15 minutes, 5 nights a week.
* A Christmas Sing with Bing (1955–1962), (CBS, VOA and AFRS), 1 hour each year, sponsored by the Insurance Company of North America.
* The Ford Road Show Featuring Bing Crosby (1957–1958, CBS), 5 minutes, 5 days a week.
* The Bing Crosby – Rosemary Clooney Show (1960–1962, CBS), 20 minutes, 5 mornings a week, with Rosemary Clooney.RIAA certification{| cellpadding"2"
|-
| style="width:30%; background:white;"|Album
| style"width:20%; background:white;"|RIAA
|-
|Merry Christmas (1945)
|Gold
|-
|White Christmas (re-issue of album above) (1995)
|4× Platinum
|-
|Bing Sings (1977)
|2× Platinum
|}
Awards and nominations
{| class"wikitable sortable" style"width:100%;"
|-
! style="width:5%;"| Year
! style="width:30%;"| Award
! style="width:30%;"| Category/Status
! style="width:30%;"| Project/Team
! style="width:5%;"| Result
|-
| 1944
| New York Film Critics Circle Awards
| Best Actor
| Going My Way
|
|-
| 1944
| rowspan="2" | Photoplay Awards
| rowspan="2" | Most Popular Male Star
| —
|
|-
| 1945
| —
|
|-
| 1945
| Academy Awards
| Best Actor in a Leading Role
| Going My Way
|
|-
| 1946
| Photoplay Awards
| Most Popular Male Star
| —
|
|-
| 1946
| Academy Awards
| Best Actor in a Leading Role
| ''The Bells of St. Mary's
|
|-
| 1947
| rowspan="2" | Photoplay Awards
| rowspan="2" | Most Popular Male Star
| —
|
|-
| 1948
| —
|
|-
| 1952
| Golden Globes
| Best Motion Picture Actor
| Here Comes the Groom
|
|-
| 1954
| National Board of Review
| Best Actor
| rowspan="2" | The Country Girl
|
|-
| 1955
| Academy Awards
| Best Actor in a Leading Role
|
|-
| 1958
| rowspan="3" | Laurel Awards
| rowspan="2" | Golden Laurel Top Male Star
| —
|
|-
| 1959
| —
|
|-
| 1960
| Golden Laurel Top Male Performance
| Say One for Me''
|
|-
| 1960
| Golden Globe Awards
| Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award
| —
|
|-
| 1960
| rowspan="3" | Hollywood Walk of Fame
| Radio
| 6769 Hollywood Blvd.
|
|-
| 1960
| Recording
| 6751 Hollywood Blvd.
|
|-
| 1960
| Motion Picture
| 1611 Vine Street.
|
|-
| 1960
| 1960 World Series
| Co-owner
| Pittsburgh Pirates
|
|-
| 1961
| rowspan="2" | Laurel Awards
| Golden Laurel Top Male Star
| —
|
|-
| 1962
| Golden Laurel Special Award
| —
|
|-
| 1963
| Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
|
|
|
|-
| 1970
| Peabody Awards
| Personal Award
| —
|
|-
| 1971
| 1971 World Series
| Co-owner
| Pittsburgh Pirates
|
|-
| 1974
| American Music Awards
| Award of Merit
|
|
|}
<!-- commenting this out until/unless this template becomes active again
See also
-->
References
Citations
Sources
* |titlePat: A Biography of Hollywood's Blonde Starlet |firstSamuel |lastClemens |publisherSequoia Press |year2020 |page51 |isbn978-0578682822}}
* Fisher, J. (2012). "Bing Crosby: Through the years, volumes one-nine (1954–56)." ARSC Journal, 43(1), 127–130.
* Crosby interviewed [https://findingaids.library.unt.edu/?pcollections/findingaid&id959&q&rootcontentid204947 1971 July 8].
*
*
*
* Osterholm, J. Roger. Bing Crosby: A Bio-Bibliography. Greenwood Press, 1994.
* Prigozy, R. & Raubicheck, W., ed. Going My Way: Bing Crosby and American Culture. The Boydell Press, 2007.
*
Primary sources
* Crosby, Bing. Call Me Lucky (1953)
* Crosby, Bing. Bing: The Authorized Biography (1975), written with Charles Thompson.
Further reading
* Bookbinder, Robert. The Films of Bing Crosby (Lyle Stuart, 1977)
* Giddins, Gary. Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams-The Early Years 1903-1940 (Back Bay Books, 2009) [https://www.amazon.com/Bing-Crosby-Pocketful-Dreams-1903-1940/dp/0316881880/ excerpt].
** Giddins, Gary. Bing Crosby: Swinging on a Star: The War Years, 1940-1946 (Little, Brown, 2018) [https://www.amazon.com/Bing-Crosby-Swinging-Years-1940-1946/dp/0316887927/ excerpt].
* Gilbert, Roger. "Beloved and Notorious: A Theory of American Stardom, with Special Reference to Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra." Southwest Review 95.1/2 (2010): 167–184. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/43473045 online]
* Morgereth, Timothy A. Bing Crosby: a discography, radio program list, and filmography (McFarland & Co Inc Pub, 1987).
* Pitts, Michael, et al. The Rise of the Crooners: Gene Austin, Russ Columbo, Bing Crosby, Nick Lucas, Johnny Marvin and Rudy Vallee (Scarecrow Press, 2001).
* Prigozy, Ruth, and Walter Raubicheck, eds. Going My Way: Bing Crosby and American Culture (University of Rochester Press, 2007), essays by scholars.
* Includes a chapter on Crosby's involvement in the making of "White Christmas" and an interview with record producer Ken Barnes.
* Schofield, Mary Anne. "Marketing Iron Pigs, Patriotism, and Peace: Bing Crosby and World War II—A Discourse." Journal of Popular Culture 40.5 (2007): 867–881.
* Smith, Anthony B. "Entertaining Catholics: Bing Crosby, Religion and Cultural Pluralism in 1940s America." American Catholic Studies (2003) 11#4: 1-19 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/44190902 online].
* Teachout, Terry. "The Swinging Star: Why is Bing Crosby forgotten?' Commentary (Nov 2018), Vol. 146 Issue 4, pp 51–54.
* Includes an interview
External links
*
*
*
*
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Category:DownBeat Jazz Hall of Fame members | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bing_Crosby | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.047204 |
4011 | Base | Base or BASE may refer to:
Brands and enterprises
BASE (mobile operator), a Belgian mobile telecommunications operator
Base CRM, an enterprise software company founded in 2009 with offices in Mountain View and Kraków, Poland
Base Design, an international design, communications, audiovisual, copywriting and publishing firm
Base FX, a visual effects and animation company founded in 2006 with studios in Beijing, Wuxi and Xiamen, China
Budapest Aircraft Services, callsign BASE
Computing
BASE (search engine), Bielefeld Academic Search Engine
, an HTML element
Basically Available, Soft state, Eventual consistency (BASE), a consistency model
Google Base, an online database provided by Google
LibreOffice Base, LibreOffice's database module
OpenOffice.org Base, OpenOffice.org's database module, also known as ooBase
Mathematics
Base of computation, commonly called radix, the number of distinct digits in a positional numeral system
Base of a logarithm, the number whose logarithm is
Base (exponentiation), the number in an expression of the form
Base (geometry), a side of a plane figure (for example a triangle) or face of a solid
Base (group theory), a sequence of elements not jointly stabilized by any nontrivial group element.
Base (topology), a type of generating set for a topological space
Organizations
Backward Society Education, a Nepali non-governmental organization
BASE (social centre), a self-managed social centre in Bristol, UK
Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management, a German federal environmental authority
Beaverton Academy of Science and Engineering, in Hillsboro, Oregon, US
Bible Archaeology Search and Exploration Institute
British Association for Screen Entertainment
Brooklyn Academy of Science and the Environment, a high school in New York, US
Science and technology
Base (chemistry), a substance that can accept hydrogen ions (protons)
Base, an attribute to medication in pure form, for example erythromycin base
Base, one of the three terminals of a Bipolar junction transistor
BASE experiment, an antiproton experiment at CERN
Base pair, a pair of connected nucleotides on complementary DNA and RNA strands
Beta-alumina solid electrolyte, a fast ion conductor material
Nucleobase, in genetics, the parts of DNA and RNA involved in forming base pairs
Base (blockchain), an Ethereum layer 2 blockchain
Social science
Base (politics), a group of voters who almost always support a single party's candidates
Base (social class), a lower social class
Base and superstructure (Marxism), parts of society in Marxist theory
Sports
Base (baseball), a station that must be touched by a runner
Base, a position in some cheerleading stunts
BASE jumping, parachuting or wingsuit flying from a fixed structure or cliff
Base, a variant name for the children's game darebase
Other uses
Base (character), character in Marvel Comics
Base (EP), an album by South Korean singer Kim Jonghyun
Base, Maharashtra, a village in India
Rob Base, American rapper
Base, or binder (material), a material that holds paint or other materials together
Base, or foundation (architecture), the lowest and supporting layer of a structure
Base, or foundation (cosmetics), a cosmetic applied to the face
Base (heraldry), the lower part of the shield in heraldry
Base, or pedestal, a supporting feature of a statue or other item
Cooking base, a concentrated flavouring compound
Military base, or non-military base camp, a bivouac which provides shelter, military equipment and personnel
See also
Base camp (disambiguation)
Bases (disambiguation)
Basis (disambiguation)
Bass (disambiguation)
Bottom (disambiguation)
Radix (disambiguation)
The Base (disambiguation) | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.051604 |
4012 | Basel Convention | It does not address the movement of radioactive waste, controlled by the International Atomic Energy Agency. The Basel Convention is also intended to minimize the rate and toxicity of wastes generated, to ensure their environmentally sound management as closely as possible to the source of generation, and to assist developing countries in environmentally sound management of the hazardous and other wastes they generate.
The convention was opened for signature on 21 March 1989, and entered into force on 5 May 1992. As of June 2024, there are 191 parties to the convention. In addition, Haiti and the United States have signed the convention but did not ratify it.
Following a petition urging action on the issue signed by more than a million people around the world, most of the world's countries, but not the United States, agreed in May 2019 to an amendment of the Basel Convention to include plastic waste as regulated material. Although the United States is not a party to the treaty, export shipments of plastic waste from the United States are now "criminal traffic as soon as the ships get on the high seas," according to the Basel Action Network (BAN), and carriers of such shipments may face liability, because the transportation of plastic waste is prohibited in just about every other country.HistoryWith the tightening of environmental laws (for example, RCRA) in developed nations in the 1970s, disposal costs for hazardous waste rose dramatically. At the same time, the globalization of shipping made cross-border movement of waste easier, and many less developed countries were desperate for foreign currency. Consequently, the trade in hazardous waste, particularly to poorer countries, grew rapidly. In 1990, OECD countries exported around 1.8 million tons of hazardous waste. Although most of this waste was shipped to other developed countries, a number of high-profile incidents of hazardous waste-dumping led to calls for regulation.
One of the incidents which led to the creation of the Basel Convention was the Khian Sea waste disposal incident, in which a ship carrying incinerator ash from the city of Philadelphia in the United States dumped half of its load on a beach in Haiti before being forced away. It sailed for many months, changing its name several times. Unable to unload the cargo in any port, the crew was believed to have dumped much of it at sea.
Another incident was a 1988 case in which five ships transported 8,000 barrels of hazardous waste from Italy to the small Nigerian town of Koko in exchange for $100 monthly rent which was paid to a Nigerian for the use of his farmland.
At its meeting that took place from 27 November to 1 December 2006, the parties of the Basel Agreement focused on issues of electronic waste and the dismantling of ships.
Increased trade in recyclable materials has led to an increase in a market for used products such as computers. This market is valued in billions of dollars. At issue is the distinction when used computers stop being a "commodity" and become a "waste".
As of June 2023, there are 191 parties to the treaty, which includes 188 UN member states, the Cook Islands, the European Union, and the State of Palestine. The five UN member states that are not party to the treaty are East Timor, Fiji, Haiti, South Sudan, and United States.
In other words, it must both be listed and possess a characteristic such as being explosive, flammable, toxic, or corrosive. The other way that a waste may fall under the scope of the convention is if it is defined as or considered to be a hazardous waste under the laws of either the exporting country, the importing country, or any of the countries of transit.
The definition of the term disposal is made in Article 2 al 4 and just refers to annex IV, which gives a list of operations which are understood as disposal or recovery. Examples of disposal are broad, including recovery and recycling.
Alternatively, to fall under the scope of the convention, it is sufficient for waste to be included in Annex II, which lists other wastes, such as household wastes and residue that comes from incinerating household waste.
Radioactive waste that is covered under other international control systems and wastes from the normal operation of ships are not covered.
Annex IX attempts to define wastes which are not considered hazardous wastes and which would be excluded from the scope of the Basel Convention. If these wastes however are contaminated with hazardous materials to an extent causing them to exhibit an Annex III characteristic, they are not excluded.
Obligations
In addition to conditions on the import and export of the above wastes, there are stringent requirements for notice, consent and tracking for movement of wastes across national boundaries. The convention places a general prohibition on the exportation or importation of wastes between parties and non-parties. The exception to this rule is where the waste is subject to another treaty that does not take away from the Basel Convention. The United States is a notable non-party to the convention and has a number of such agreements for allowing the shipping of hazardous wastes to Basel Party countries.
The OECD Council also has its own control system that governs the transboundary movement of hazardous materials between OECD member countries. This allows, among other things, the OECD countries to continue trading in wastes with countries like the United States that have not ratified the Basel Convention.
Parties to the convention must honor import bans of other parties.
Article 4 of the Basel Convention calls for an overall reduction of waste generation. By encouraging countries to keep wastes within their boundaries and as close as possible to its source of generation, the internal pressures should provide incentives for waste reduction and pollution prevention. Parties are generally prohibited from exporting covered wastes to, or importing covered waste from, non-parties to the convention.
The convention states that illegal hazardous waste traffic is criminal but contains no enforcement provisions.
According to Article 12, parties are directed to adopt a protocol that establishes liability rules and procedures that are appropriate for damage that comes from the movement of hazardous waste across borders.
The current consensus is that as space is not classed as a "country" under the specific definition, export of e-waste to non-terrestrial locations would not be covered.
Basel Ban Amendment
After the initial adoption of the convention, some least developed countries and environmental organizations argued that it did not go far enough. Many nations and NGOs argued for a total ban on shipment of all hazardous waste to developing countries. In particular, the original convention did not prohibit waste exports to any location except Antarctica but merely required a notification and consent system known as "prior informed consent" or PIC. Further, many waste traders sought to exploit the good name of recycling and begin to justify all exports as moving to recycling destinations. Many believed a full ban was needed including exports for recycling. These concerns led to several regional waste trade bans, including the Bamako Convention.
Lobbying at 1995 Basel conference by developing countries, Greenpeace and several European countries such as Denmark, led to the adoption of an amendment to the convention in 1995 termed the Basel Ban Amendment to the Basel Convention. The amendment has been accepted by 86 countries and the European Union, but has not entered into force (as that requires ratification by three-fourths of the member states to the convention). On 6 September 2019, Croatia became the 97th country to ratify the amendment which will enter into force after 90 days on 5 December 2019. The amendment prohibits the export of hazardous waste from a list of developed (mostly OECD) countries to developing countries. The Basel Ban applies to export for any reason, including recycling. An area of special concern for advocates of the amendment was the sale of ships for salvage, shipbreaking. The Ban Amendment was strenuously opposed by a number of industry groups as well as nations including Australia and Canada. The number of ratification for the entry-into force of the Ban Amendment is under debate: Amendments to the convention enter into force after ratification of "three-fourths of the Parties who accepted them" [Art. 17.5]; so far, the parties of the Basel Convention could not yet agree whether this would be three-fourths of the parties that were party to the Basel Convention when the ban was adopted, or three-fourths of the current parties of the convention [see Report of COP 9 of the Basel Convention]. The status of the amendment ratifications can be found on the Basel Secretariat's web page. The European Union fully implemented the Basel Ban in its Waste Shipment Regulation (EWSR), making it legally binding in all EU member states. Norway and Switzerland have similarly fully implemented the Basel Ban in their legislation.
In the light of the blockage concerning the entry into force of the Ban Amendment, Switzerland and Indonesia have launched a "Country-led Initiative" (CLI) to discuss in an informal manner a way forward to ensure that the trans boundary movements of hazardous wastes, especially to developing countries and countries with economies in the transition, do not lead to an unsound management of hazardous wastes. This discussion aims at identifying and finding solutions to the reasons why hazardous wastes are still brought to countries that are not able to treat them in a safe manner. It is hoped that the CLI will contribute to the realization of the objectives of the Ban Amendment. The Basel Convention's website informs about the progress of this initiative.
Regulation of plastic waste
In the wake of popular outcry, in May 2019 most of the world's countries, but not the United States, agreed to amend the Basel Convention to include plastic waste as a regulated material. opposed the amendment, but since it is not a party to the treaty it did not have an opportunity to vote on it to try to block it. Information about, and visual images of, wildlife, such as seabirds, ingesting plastic, and scientific findings that nanoparticles do penetrate through the blood–brain barrier were reported to have fueled public sentiment for coordinated international legally binding action. Over a million people worldwide signed a petition demanding official action.
Basel watchdog
The Basel Action Network (BAN) is a charitable civil society non-governmental organization that works as a consumer watchdog for implementation of the Basel Convention. BAN's principal aims is fighting exportation of toxic waste, including plastic waste, from industrialized societies to developing countries. BAN is based in Seattle, Washington, United States, with a partner office in the Philippines. BAN works to curb trans-border trade in hazardous electronic waste, land dumping, incineration, and the use of prison labor.
See also
* Asbestos and the law
* Bamako Convention
* Electronic waste by country
* Rotterdam Convention
* Stockholm Convention
References
Further reading
* Toxic Exports, Jennifer Clapp, Cornell University Press, 2001.
* Challenging the Chip: Labor Rights and Environmental Justice in the Global Electronics Industry, Ted Smith, David A. Sonnenfeld, and David Naguib Pellow, eds., Temple University Press [https://web.archive.org/web/20170328014135/http://www.temple.edu/tempress/titles/1788_reg.html link], .
* "Toxic Trade: International Knowledge Networks & the Development of the Basel Convention," Jason Lloyd, International Public Policy Review, UCL.
External links
*
** [https://web.archive.org/web/20090124051608/http://www.basel.int/text/con-e-rev.pdf Text of the Convention]
** [https://web.archive.org/web/20080423102037/http://www.basel.int/pub/simp-guide.pdf "A Simplified Guide to the Basel Convention"]
* [https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/ALL/?uri=CELEX:32006R1013 Text of the regulation no.1013/2006 of the European Union on shipments of waste]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070915081437/http://www.vitalgraphics.net/waste/ Flow of Waste among Basel Parties]
* [http://legal.un.org/avl/ha/bcctmhwd/bcctmhwd.html Introductory note to the Basel Convention by Dr. Katharina Kummer Peiry, Executive Secretary of the Basel Convention, UNEP] on the website of the [https://www.un.org/law/avl/ UN Audiovisual Library of International Law]
*[https://www.ecolex.org/details/treaty/basel-convention-on-the-control-of-transboundary-movements-of-hazardous-wastes-and-their-disposal-tre-001003/ Basel Convention], Treaty available in ECOLEX-the gateway to environmental law (English)
;Organisations
* [https://www.ban.org/ Basel Action Network]
* [https://africainstitute.info/ Africa Institute for the Environmentally Sound Management of Hazardous and other Wastes] a.k.a. Basel Convention Regional Centre Pretoria
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050217040523/http://www.greenpeaceweb.org/shipbreak/basel.asp Page on the Basel Convention] at Greenpeace
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100612025545/http://www.bcrc.cn/ Basel Convention Coordinating Centre for Asia and the Pacific]
Category:Pollution
Category:Environmental treaties
Category:Waste treaties
Category:Chemical safety
Category:Treaties concluded in 1989
Category:Treaties entered into force in 1992
Category:1992 in the environment
Category:Hazardous waste | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basel_Convention | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.058358 |
4013 | Bar Kokhba (album) | Bar Kokhba is a double album by John Zorn, recorded between 1994 and 1996. It features music from Zorn's Masada project, rearranged for small ensembles. It also features the original soundtrack from [http://riverlightspictures.com/taor/index.html The Art of Remembrance – Simon Wiesenthal], a film by [http://hannahheer.com Hannah Heer] and Werner Schmiedel (1994–95). Reception The AllMusic review by Marc Gilman noted: "While some compositions retain their original structure and sound, some are expanded and probed by Zorn's arrangements, and resemble avant-garde classical music more than jazz. But this is the beauty of the album; the ensembles provide a forum for Zorn to expand his compositions. The album consistently impresses."
}}
Track listing
All compositions by John Zorn
;Disc One
# "Gevurah" – 6:55
# "Nezikin" – 1:51
# "Mahshav" – 4:33
# "Rokhev" – 3:10
# "Abidan" – 5:19
# "Sheloshim" – 5:03
# "Hath-Arob" – 2:25
# "Paran" – 4:48
# "Mahlah" – 7:48
# "Socoh" – 4:07
# "Yechida" – 8:24
# "Bikkurim" – 3:25
# "Idalah-Abal" – 5:04
;Disc Two
# "Tannaim" – 4:38
# "Nefesh" – 3:33
# "Abidan" – 3:13
# "Mo'ed" – 4:59
# "Maskil" – 4:41
# "Mishpatim" – 6:46
# "Sansanah" – 6:56
# "Shear-Jashub" – 2:06
# "Mahshav" – 4:50
# "Sheloshim" – 6:45
# "Mochin" – 13:11
# "Karaim" – 3:39
Personnel
* John Zorn – Producer
* Mark Feldman (2,4,6,10,12,14,16,20,21,25) – violin
* Erik Friedlander (2,4,6,10,12,14,16,21,25) – cello
* Greg Cohen (2,4,6,9,10,12,14,16,18,21,25) – bass
* Marc Ribot (9,18,24) – guitar
* Anthony Coleman (1,3,11,17,19) – piano
* David Krakauer (3,8) – clarinets
* John Medeski (5,7,8,13,15,17,20,22,23) – organ, piano
* Mark Dresser (1,15,19) – bass
* Kenny Wollesen (1,2,15,19,23) – drums
* Chris Speed (5,13,20,23) – clarinet
* Dave Douglas (23) – trumpet
References
Category:1996 albums
Category:Tzadik Records albums
Category:Albums produced by John Zorn
Category:Bar Kokhba albums
Category:Jewish music albums | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Kokhba_(album) | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.063482 |
4015 | BASIC | | released =
| implementations
| dialects | influenced by
| influenced =
| wikibooks = BASIC Programming
}}
BASIC ('''Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code') is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College in 1963. They wanted to enable students in non-scientific fields to use computers. At the time, nearly all computers required writing custom software, which only scientists and mathematicians tended to learn.
In addition to the programming language, Kemeny and Kurtz developed the Dartmouth Time-Sharing System (DTSS), which allowed multiple users to edit and run BASIC programs simultaneously on remote terminals. This general model became popular on minicomputer systems like the PDP-11 and Data General Nova in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Hewlett-Packard produced an entire computer line for this method of operation, introducing the HP2000 series in the late 1960s and continuing sales into the 1980s. Many early video games trace their history to one of these versions of BASIC.
The emergence of microcomputers in the mid-1970s led to the development of multiple BASIC dialects, including Microsoft BASIC in 1975. Due to the tiny main memory available on these machines, often 4 KB, a variety of Tiny BASIC dialects were also created. BASIC was available for almost any system of the era and became the de facto'' programming language for home computer systems that emerged in the late 1970s. These PCs almost always had a BASIC interpreter installed by default, often in the machine's firmware or sometimes on a ROM cartridge.
BASIC declined in popularity in the 1990s, as more powerful microcomputers came to market and programming languages with advanced features (such as Pascal and C) became tenable on such computers. By then, most nontechnical personal computer users relied on pre-written applications rather than writing their own programs. In 1991, Microsoft released Visual Basic, combining an updated version of BASIC with a visual forms builder. This reignited use of the language and "VB" remains a major programming language in the form of VB.NET, while a hobbyist scene for BASIC more broadly continues to exist. Origin John G. Kemeny was the chairman of the Dartmouth College Mathematics Department. Based largely on his reputation as an innovator in math teaching, in 1959 the college won an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation award for $500,000 to build a new department building. Thomas E. Kurtz had joined the department in 1956, and from the 1960s Kemeny and Kurtz agreed on the need for programming literacy among students outside the traditional STEM fields. Kemeny later noted that "Our vision was that every student on campus should have access to a computer, and any faculty member should be able to use a computer in the classroom whenever appropriate. It was as simple as that."
Kemeny and Kurtz had made two previous experiments with simplified languages, DARSIMCO (Dartmouth Simplified Code) and DOPE (Dartmouth Oversimplified Programming Experiment). These did not progress past a single freshman class. New experiments using Fortran and ALGOL followed, but Kurtz concluded these languages were too tricky for what they desired. As Kurtz noted, Fortran had numerous oddly formed commands, notably an "almost impossible-to-memorize convention for specifying a loop: . Is it '1, 10, 2' or '1, 2, 10', and is the comma after the line number required or not?"
Moreover, the lack of any sort of immediate feedback was a key problem; the machines of the era used batch processing and took a long time to complete a run of a program. While Kurtz was visiting MIT, John McCarthy suggested that time-sharing offered a solution; a single machine could divide up its processing time among many users, giving them the illusion of having a (slow) computer to themselves. Small programs would return results in a few seconds. This led to increasing interest in a system using time-sharing and a new language specifically for use by non-STEM students.
Kemeny wrote the first version of BASIC. The acronym BASIC comes from the name of an unpublished paper by Thomas Kurtz. The new language was heavily patterned on FORTRAN II; statements were one-to-a-line, numbers were used to indicate the target of loops and branches, and many of the commands were similar or identical to Fortran. However, the syntax was changed wherever it could be improved. For instance, the difficult to remember <code>DO</code> loop was replaced by the much easier to remember , and the line number used in the DO was instead indicated by the <code>NEXT I</code>. Likewise, the cryptic <code>IF</code> statement of Fortran, whose syntax matched a particular instruction of the machine on which it was originally written, became the simpler . These changes made the language much less idiosyncratic while still having an overall structure and feel similar to the original FORTRAN.
The project received a $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, which was used to purchase a GE-225 computer for processing, and a Datanet-30 realtime processor to handle the Teletype Model 33 teleprinters used for input and output. A team of a dozen undergraduates worked on the project for about a year, writing both the DTSS system and the BASIC compiler. The first version BASIC language was released on 1 May 1964.
Initially, BASIC concentrated on supporting straightforward mathematical work, with matrix arithmetic support from its initial implementation as a batch language, and character string functionality being added by 1965. Usage in the university rapidly expanded, requiring the main CPU to be replaced by a GE-235, and still later by a GE-635. By the early 1970s there were hundreds of terminals connected to the machines at Dartmouth, some of them remotely.
Wanting use of the language to become widespread, its designers made the compiler available free of charge. In the 1960s, software became a chargeable commodity; until then, it was provided without charge as a service with expensive computers, usually available only to lease. They also made it available to high schools in the Hanover, New Hampshire, area and regionally throughout New England on Teletype Model 33 and Model 35 teleprinter terminals connected to Dartmouth via dial-up phone lines, and they put considerable effort into promoting the language. In the following years, as other dialects of BASIC appeared, Kemeny and Kurtz's original BASIC dialect became known as Dartmouth BASIC.
New Hampshire recognized the accomplishment in 2019 when it erected a highway historical marker in Hanover describing the creation of "the first user-friendly programming language". Spread on time-sharing services The emergence of BASIC took place as part of a wider movement toward time-sharing systems. First conceptualized during the late 1950s, the idea became so dominant in the computer industry by the early 1960s that its proponents were speaking of a future in which users would "buy time on the computer much the same way that the average household buys power and water from utility companies".
General Electric, having worked on the Dartmouth project, wrote their own underlying operating system and launched an online time-sharing system known as Mark I. It featured BASIC as one of its primary selling points. Other companies in the emerging field quickly followed suit; Tymshare introduced SUPER BASIC in 1968, CompuServe had a version on the DEC-10 at their launch in 1969, and by the early 1970s BASIC was largely universal on general-purpose mainframe computers. Even IBM eventually joined the club with the introduction of VS-BASIC in 1973.
Although time-sharing services with BASIC were successful for a time, the widespread success predicted earlier was not to be. The emergence of minicomputers during the same period, and especially low-cost microcomputers in the mid-1970s, allowed anyone to purchase and run their own systems rather than buy online time which was typically billed at dollars per minute. per hour () for accessing their systems.}} Spread on minicomputers
BASIC, by its very nature of being small, was naturally suited to porting to the minicomputer market, which was emerging at the same time as the time-sharing services. These machines had small main memory, perhaps as little as 4 KB in modern terminology, and lacked high-performance storage like hard drives that make compilers practical. On these systems, BASIC was normally implemented as an interpreter rather than a compiler due to its lower requirement for working memory.
A particularly important example was HP Time-Shared BASIC, which, like the original Dartmouth system, used two computers working together to implement a time-sharing system. The first, a low-end machine in the HP 2100 series, was used to control user input and save and load their programs to tape or disk. The other, a high-end version of the same underlying machine, ran the programs and generated output. For a cost of about $100,000, one could own a machine capable of running between 16 and 32 users at the same time. The system, bundled as the HP 2000, was the first mini platform to offer time-sharing and was an immediate runaway success, catapulting HP to become the third-largest vendor in the minicomputer space, behind DEC and Data General (DG).
DEC, the leader in the minicomputer space since the mid-1960s, had initially ignored BASIC. This was due to their work with RAND Corporation, who had purchased a PDP-6 to run their JOSS language, which was conceptually very similar to BASIC. This led DEC to introduce a smaller, cleaned up version of JOSS known as FOCAL, which they heavily promoted in the late 1960s. However, with timesharing systems widely offering BASIC, and all of their competition in the minicomputer space doing the same, DEC's customers were clamoring for BASIC. After management repeatedly ignored their pleas, David H. Ahl took it upon himself to buy a BASIC for the PDP-8, which was a major success in the education market. By the early 1970s, FOCAL and JOSS had been forgotten and BASIC had become almost universal in the minicomputer market. DEC would go on to introduce their updated version, BASIC-PLUS, for use on the RSTS/E time-sharing operating system.
During this period a number of simple text-based games were written in BASIC, most notably Mike Mayfield's Star Trek. David Ahl collected these, some ported from FOCAL, and published them in an educational newsletter he compiled. He later collected a number of these into book form, 101 BASIC Computer Games, published in 1973. During the same period, Ahl was involved in the creation of a small computer for education use, an early personal computer. When management refused to support the concept, Ahl left DEC in 1974 to found the seminal computer magazine, Creative Computing. The book remained popular, and was re-published on several occasions.
Explosive growth: the home computer era
v2.0 on the Commodore 64 ]]
version 3.0]]
The introduction of the first microcomputers in the mid-1970s was the start of explosive growth for BASIC. It had the advantage that it was fairly well known to the young designers and computer hobbyists who took an interest in microcomputers, many of whom had seen BASIC on minis or mainframes. Despite Dijkstra's famous judgment in 1975, "It is practically impossible to teach good programming to students that have had a prior exposure to BASIC: as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration", BASIC was one of the few languages that was both high-level enough to be usable by those without training and small enough to fit into the microcomputers of the day, making it the de facto standard programming language on early microcomputers.
The first microcomputer version of BASIC was co-written by Bill Gates, Paul Allen and Monte Davidoff for their newly formed company, Micro-Soft. This was released by MITS in punch tape format for the Altair 8800 shortly after the machine itself, immediately cementing BASIC as the primary language of early microcomputers. Members of the Homebrew Computer Club began circulating copies of the program, causing Gates to write his Open Letter to Hobbyists, complaining about this early example of software piracy.
Partially in response to Gates's letter, and partially to make an even smaller BASIC that would run usefully on 4 KB machines, Bob Albrecht urged Dennis Allison to write their own variation of the language. How to design and implement a stripped-down version of an interpreter for the BASIC language was covered in articles by Allison in the first three quarterly issues of the ''People's Computer Company newsletter published in 1975 and implementations with source code published in Dr. Dobb's Journal of Tiny BASIC Calisthenics & Orthodontia: Running Light Without Overbyte''. This led to a wide variety of Tiny BASICs with added features or other improvements, with versions from Tom Pittman and Li-Chen Wang becoming particularly well known.
Micro-Soft, by this time Microsoft, ported their interpreter for the MOS 6502, which quickly become one of the most popular microprocessors of the 8-bit era. When new microcomputers began to appear, notably the "1977 trinity" of the TRS-80, Commodore PET and Apple II, they either included a version of the MS code, or quickly introduced new models with it. Ohio Scientific's personal computers also joined this trend at that time. By 1978, MS BASIC was a de facto standard and practically every home computer of the 1980s included it in ROM. Upon boot, a BASIC interpreter in direct mode was presented.
Commodore Business Machines includes Commodore BASIC, based on Microsoft BASIC. The Apple II and TRS-80 each have two versions of BASIC: a smaller introductory version with the initial releases of the machines and a Microsoft-based version introduced as interest in the platforms increased. As new companies entered the field, additional versions were added that subtly changed the BASIC family. The Atari 8-bit computers use the 8 KB Atari BASIC which is not derived from Microsoft BASIC. Sinclair BASIC was introduced in 1980 with the Sinclair ZX80, and was later extended for the Sinclair ZX81 and the Sinclair ZX Spectrum. The BBC published BBC BASIC, developed by Acorn Computers, incorporates extra structured programming keywords and floating-point features.
As the popularity of BASIC grew in this period, computer magazines published complete source code in BASIC for video games, utilities, and other programs. Given BASIC's straightforward nature, it was a simple matter to type in the code from the magazine and execute the program. Different magazines were published featuring programs for specific computers, though some BASIC programs were considered universal and could be used in machines running any variant of BASIC (sometimes with minor adaptations). Many books of type-in programs were also available, and in particular, Ahl published versions of the original 101 BASIC games converted into the Microsoft dialect and published it from Creative Computing as BASIC Computer Games. This book, and its sequels, provided hundreds of ready-to-go programs that could be easily converted to practically any BASIC-running platform. The book reached the stores in 1978, just as the home computer market was starting off, and it became the first million-selling computer book. Later packages, such as Learn to Program BASIC would also have gaming as an introductory focus. On the business-focused CP/M computers which soon became widespread in small business environments, Microsoft BASIC (MBASIC) was one of the leading applications.
In 1978, David Lien published the first edition of The BASIC Handbook: An Encyclopedia of the BASIC Computer Language, documenting keywords across over 78 different computers. By 1981, the second edition documented keywords from over 250 different computers, showcasing the explosive growth of the microcomputer era. IBM PC and compatibles
1.10]]
When IBM was designing the IBM PC, they followed the paradigm of existing home computers in having a built-in BASIC interpreter. They sourced this from Microsoft – IBM Cassette BASIC – but Microsoft also produced several other versions of BASIC for MS-DOS/PC DOS including IBM Disk BASIC (BASIC D), IBM BASICA (BASIC A), GW-BASIC (a BASICA-compatible version that did not need IBM's ROM) and QBasic, all typically bundled with the machine. In addition they produced the Microsoft QuickBASIC Compiler (1985) for power users and hobbyists, and the Microsoft BASIC Professional Development System (PDS) for professional programmers. Turbo Pascal-publisher Borland published Turbo Basic 1.0 in 1985 (successor versions were marketed under the name PowerBASIC).
On Unix-like systems, specialized implementations were created such as XBasic and X11-Basic. XBasic was ported to Microsoft Windows as XBLite, and cross-platform variants such as SmallBasic, yabasic, Bywater BASIC, nuBasic, MyBasic, Logic Basic, Liberty BASIC, and wxBasic emerged. FutureBASIC and Chipmunk Basic meanwhile targeted the Apple Macintosh, while yab is a version of yaBasic optimized for BeOS, ZETA and Haiku.
These later variations introduced many extensions, such as improved string manipulation and graphics support, access to the file system and additional data types. More important were the facilities for structured programming, including additional control structures and proper subroutines supporting local variables.
By the late 1980s, many users were using pre-made applications written by others rather than learning programming themselves, and professional developers had a wide range of advanced languages available on small computers. C and later C++ became the languages of choice for professional "shrink wrap" application development.
A niche that BASIC continued to fill was for hobbyist video game development, as game creation systems and readily available game engines were still in their infancy. The Atari ST had STOS BASIC while the Amiga had AMOS BASIC for this purpose. Microsoft first exhibited BASIC for game development with DONKEY.BAS for GW-BASIC, and later GORILLA.BAS and NIBBLES.BAS for QuickBASIC. QBasic maintained an active game development community, which helped later spawn the QB64 and FreeBASIC implementations. An early example of this market is the QBasic software package Microsoft Game Shop (1990), a hobbyist-inspired release that included six "arcade-style" games that were easily customizable in QBasic.
In 2013, a game written in QBasic and compiled with QB64 for modern computers entitled Black Annex was released on Steam. Blitz Basic, Dark Basic, SdlBasic, Super Game System Basic, PlayBASIC, CoolBasic, AllegroBASIC, ethosBASIC, GLBasic and Basic4GL further filled this demand, right up to the modern RCBasic, NaaLaa, AppGameKit, Monkey 2, and Cerberus-X. Visual Basic
In 1991, Microsoft introduced Visual Basic, an evolutionary development of QuickBASIC. It included constructs from that language such as block-structured control statements, parameterized subroutines and optional static typing as well as object-oriented constructs from other languages such as "With" and "For Each". The language retained some compatibility with its predecessors, such as the Dim keyword for declarations, "Gosub"/Return statements and optional line numbers which could be used to locate errors. An important driver for the development of Visual Basic was as the new macro language for Microsoft Excel, a spreadsheet program. To the surprise of many at Microsoft who still initially marketed it as a language for hobbyists, the language came into widespread use for small custom business applications shortly after the release of VB version 3.0, which is widely considered the first relatively stable version. Microsoft also spun it off as Visual Basic for Applications and Embedded Visual Basic.
While many advanced programmers still scoffed at its use, VB met the needs of small businesses efficiently as by that time, computers running Windows 3.1 had become fast enough that many business-related processes could be completed "in the blink of an eye" even using a "slow" language, as long as large amounts of data were not involved. Many small business owners found they could create their own small, yet useful applications in a few evenings to meet their own specialized needs. Eventually, during the lengthy lifetime of VB3, knowledge of Visual Basic had become a marketable job skill. Microsoft also produced VBScript in 1996 and Visual Basic .NET in 2001. The latter has essentially the same power as C# and Java but with syntax that reflects the original Basic language, and also features some cross-platform capability through implementations such as Mono-Basic. The IDE, with its event-driven GUI builder, was also influential on other rapid application development tools, most notably Borland Software's Delphi for Object Pascal and its own descendants such as Lazarus.
Mainstream support for the final version 6.0 of the original Visual Basic ended on March 31, 2005, followed by extended support in March 2008. Owing to its persistent remaining popularity, third-party attempts to further support it exist. On February 2, 2017, Microsoft announced that development on VB.NET would no longer be in parallel with that of C#, and on March 11, 2020, it was announced that evolution of the VB.NET language had also concluded. Even so, the language was still supported.
Basic, OpenOffice.org Basic and Gambas]]
Post-1990 versions and dialects
Many other BASIC dialects have also sprung up since 1990, including the open source QB64 and FreeBASIC, inspired by QBasic, and the Visual Basic-styled RapidQ, HBasic, Basic For Qt and Gambas. A number of compilers also exist that convert BASIC into JavaScript. such as NS Basic. for the Sony PS2]]Building from earlier efforts such as Mobile Basic, many dialects are now available for smartphones and tablets.
On game consoles, an application for the Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo DSi called Petit Computer allows for programming in a slightly modified version of BASIC with DS button support. A version has also been released for Nintendo Switch, which has also been supplied a version of the Fuze Code System, a BASIC variant first implemented as a custom Raspberry Pi machine. Previously BASIC was made available on consoles as Family BASIC (for the Nintendo Famicom) and PSX Chipmunk Basic (for the original PlayStation), while yabasic was ported to the PlayStation 2 and FreeBASIC to the original Xbox. Calculators Variants of BASIC are available on graphing and otherwise programmable calculators made by Texas Instruments (TI-BASIC), HP (HP BASIC), Casio (Casio BASIC), and others. Windows command-line QBasic, a version of Microsoft QuickBASIC without the linker to make EXE files, is present in the Windows NT and DOS-Windows 95 streams of operating systems and can be obtained for more recent releases like Windows 7 which do not have them. Prior to DOS 5, the Basic interpreter was GW-Basic. QuickBasic is part of a series of three languages issued by Microsoft for the home and office power user and small-scale professional development; QuickC and QuickPascal are the other two. For Windows 95 and 98, which do not have QBasic installed by default, they can be copied from the installation disc, which will have a set of directories for old and optional software; other missing commands like Exe2Bin and others are in these same directories. Other
.]]
The various Microsoft, Lotus, and Corel office suites and related products are programmable with Visual Basic in one form or another, including LotusScript, which is very similar to VBA 6. The Host Explorer terminal emulator uses WWB as a macro language; or more recently the programme and the suite in which it is contained is programmable in an in-house Basic variant known as Hummingbird Basic. The VBScript variant is used for programming web content, Outlook 97, Internet Explorer, and the Windows Script Host. WSH also has a Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) engine installed as the third of the default engines along with VBScript, JScript, and the numerous proprietary or open source engines which can be installed like PerlScript, a couple of Rexx-based engines, Python, Ruby, Tcl, Delphi, XLNT, PHP, and others; meaning that the two versions of Basic can be used along with the other mentioned languages, as well as LotusScript, in a WSF file, through the component object model, and other WSH and VBA constructions. VBScript is one of the languages that can be accessed by the 4Dos, 4NT, and Take Command enhanced shells. SaxBasic and WWB are also very similar to the Visual Basic line of Basic implementations. The pre-Office 97 macro language for Microsoft Word is known as WordBASIC. Excel 4 and 5 use Visual Basic itself as a macro language. Chipmunk Basic, an old-school interpreter similar to BASICs of the 1970s, is available for Linux, Microsoft Windows and macOS.
Legacy
The ubiquity of BASIC interpreters on personal computers was such that textbooks once included simple "Try It In BASIC" exercises that encouraged students to experiment with mathematical and computational concepts on classroom or home computers. Popular computer magazines of the day typically included type-in programs.
Futurist and sci-fi writer David Brin mourned the loss of ubiquitous BASIC in a 2006 Salon article as have others who first used computers during this era. In turn, the article prompted Microsoft to develop and release Small Basic; it also inspired similar projects like Basic-256 and the web based Quite Basic. Dartmouth held a 50th anniversary celebration for BASIC on 1 May 2014. The pedagogical use of BASIC has been followed by other languages, such as Pascal, Java and particularly Python.
Dartmouth College celebrated the 50th anniversary of the BASIC language with a day of events on April 30, 2014. A short documentary film was produced for the event.
Syntax
Typical BASIC keywords
Data manipulation
; <code>LET</code> : assigns a value (which may be the result of an expression) to a variable. In most dialects of BASIC, <code>LET</code> is optional, and a line with no other identifiable keyword will assume the keyword to be <code>LET</code>.
; <code>DATA</code> : holds a list of values which are assigned sequentially using the READ command.
; <code>READ</code> : reads a value from a <code>DATA</code> statement and assigns it to a variable. An internal pointer keeps track of the last <code>DATA</code> element that was read and moves it one position forward with each <code>READ</code>. Most dialects allow multiple variables as parameters, reading several values in a single operation.
; <code>RESTORE</code> : resets the internal pointer to the first <code>DATA</code> statement, allowing the program to begin <code>READ</code>ing from the first value. Many dialects allow an optional line number or ordinal value to allow the pointer to be reset to a selected location.
; <code>DIM</code> : Sets up an array.
Program flow control
; <code>IF ... THEN ... {ELSE}</code> : used to perform comparisons or make decisions. Early dialects only allowed a line number after the <code>THEN</code>, but later versions allowed any valid statement to follow. <code>ELSE</code> was not widely supported, especially in earlier versions.
; <code>FOR ... TO ... {STEP} ... NEXT</code> : repeat a section of code a given number of times. A variable that acts as a counter, the "index", is available within the loop.
; <code>WHILE ... WEND</code> and <code>REPEAT ... UNTIL</code> : repeat a section of code while the specified condition is true. The condition may be evaluated before each iteration of the loop, or after. Both of these commands are found mostly in later dialects.
; <code>DO ... LOOP {WHILE}</code> or <code>{UNTIL}</code> : repeat a section of code indefinitely or while/until the specified condition is true. The condition may be evaluated before each iteration of the loop, or after. Similar to <code>WHILE</code>, these keywords are mostly found in later dialects.
; <code>GOTO</code> : jumps to a numbered or labelled line in the program. Most dialects also allowed the form .
; <code>GOSUB ... RETURN</code> : jumps to a numbered or labelled line, executes the code it finds there until it reaches a <code>RETURN</code> command, on which it jumps back to the statement following the <code>GOSUB</code>, either after a colon, or on the next line. This is used to implement subroutines.
; <code>ON ... GOTO/GOSUB</code> : chooses where to jump based on the specified conditions. See Switch statement for other forms.
; <code>DEF FN</code> : a pair of keywords introduced in the early 1960s to define functions. The original BASIC functions were modelled on FORTRAN single-line functions. BASIC functions were one expression with variable arguments, rather than subroutines, with a syntax on the model of <code>DEF FND(x) x*x</code> at the beginning of a program. Function names were originally restricted to FN, plus one letter, i.e., FNA, FNB ... Input and output
; <code>LIST</code> : displays the full source code of the current program.
; <code>PRINT</code> : displays a message on the screen or other output device.
; <code>INPUT</code> : asks the user to enter the value of a variable. The statement may include a prompt message.
; <code>TAB</code> : used with <code>PRINT</code> to set the position where the next character will be shown on the screen or printed on paper. <code>AT</code> is an alternative form.
; <code>SPC</code> : prints out a number of space characters. Similar in concept to <code>TAB</code> but moves by a number of additional spaces from the current column rather than moving to a specified column.
Mathematical functions
; <code>ABS</code> : Absolute value
; <code>ATN</code> : Arctangent (result in radians)
; <code>COS</code> : Cosine (argument in radians)
; <code>EXP</code> : Exponential function
; <code>INT</code> : Integer part (typically floor function)
; <code>LOG</code> : Natural logarithm
; <code>RND</code> : Random number generation
; <code>SIN</code> : Sine (argument in radians)
; <code>SQR</code> : Square root
; <code>TAN</code> : Tangent (argument in radians)
Miscellaneous
; <code>REM</code> : holds a programmer's comment or REMark; often used to give a title to the program and to help identify the purpose of a given section of code.
; <code>USR</code> ("User Serviceable Routine"): transfers program control to a machine language subroutine, usually entered as an alphanumeric string or in a list of DATA statements.
; <code>CALL</code> : alternative form of <code>USR</code> found in some dialects. Does not require an artificial parameter to complete the function-like syntax of <code>USR</code>, and has a clearly defined method of calling different routines in memory.
; <code>TRON</code> / <code>TROFF</code>: turns on display of each line number as it is run ("TRace ON"). This was useful for debugging or correcting of problems in a program. TROFF turns it back off again.
; <code>ASM</code> : some compilers such as Freebasic, Purebasic, and Powerbasic also support inline assembly language, allowing the programmer to intermix high-level and low-level code, typically prefixed with "ASM" or "!" statements.
Data types and variables
Minimal versions of BASIC had only integer variables and one- or two-letter variable names, which minimized requirements of limited and expensive memory (RAM). More powerful versions had floating-point arithmetic, and variables could be labelled with names six or more characters long. There were some problems and restrictions in early implementations; for example, Applesoft BASIC allowed variable names to be several characters long, but only the first two were significant, thus it was possible to inadvertently write a program with variables "LOSS" and "LOAN", which would be treated as being the same; assigning a value to "LOAN" would silently overwrite the value intended as "LOSS". Keywords could not be used in variables in many early BASICs; "SCORE" would be interpreted as "SC" OR "E", where OR was a keyword. String variables are usually distinguished in many microcomputer dialects by having $ suffixed to their name as a sigil, and values are often identified as strings by being delimited by "double quotation marks". Arrays in BASIC could contain integers, floating point or string variables.
Some dialects of BASIC supported matrices and matrix operations, which can be used to solve sets of simultaneous linear algebraic equations. These dialects would directly support matrix operations such as assignment, addition, multiplication (of compatible matrix types), and evaluation of a determinant. Many microcomputer BASICs did not support this data type; matrix operations were still possible, but had to be programmed explicitly on array elements.
Examples
Unstructured BASIC
New BASIC programmers on a home computer might start with a simple program, perhaps using the language's PRINT statement to display a message on the screen; a well-known and often-replicated example is Kernighan and Ritchie's "Hello, World!" program:
<syntaxhighlight lang="basic">
10 PRINT "Hello, World!"
20 END
</syntaxhighlight>
An infinite loop could be used to fill the display with the message:
<syntaxhighlight lang="basic">
10 PRINT "Hello, World!"
20 GOTO 10
</syntaxhighlight>
Note that the <code>END</code> statement is optional and has no action in most dialects of BASIC. It was not always included, as is the case in this example. This same program can be modified to print a fixed number of messages using the common <code>FOR...NEXT</code> statement:
<syntaxhighlight lang="basic">
10 LET N=10
20 FOR I=1 TO N
30 PRINT "Hello, World!"
40 NEXT I
</syntaxhighlight>
Most home computers BASIC versions, such as MSX BASIC and GW-BASIC, supported simple data types, loop cycles, and arrays. The following example is written for GW-BASIC, but will work in most versions of BASIC with minimal changes:
<syntaxhighlight lang="basic">
10 INPUT "What is your name: "; U$
20 PRINT "Hello "; U$
30 INPUT "How many stars do you want: "; N
40 S$ = ""
50 FOR I = 1 TO N
60 S$ = S$ + "*"
70 NEXT I
80 PRINT S$
90 INPUT "Do you want more stars? "; A$
100 IF LEN(A$) = 0 THEN GOTO 90
110 A$ = LEFT$(A$, 1)
120 IF A$ "Y" OR A$ "y" THEN GOTO 30
130 PRINT "Goodbye "; U$
140 END
</syntaxhighlight>
The resulting dialog might resemble:
What is your name: Mike
Hello Mike
How many stars do you want: 7
*******
Do you want more stars? yes
How many stars do you want: 3
***
Do you want more stars? no
Goodbye Mike
The original Dartmouth Basic was unusual in having a matrix keyword, MAT. Although not implemented by most later microprocessor derivatives, it is used in this example from the 1968 manual which averages the numbers that are input:
<syntaxhighlight lang="basic">
5 LET S = 0
10 MAT INPUT V
20 LET N = NUM
30 IF N = 0 THEN 99
40 FOR I = 1 TO N
45 LET S = S + V(I)
50 NEXT I
60 PRINT S/N
70 GO TO 5
99 END
</syntaxhighlight>
Structured BASIC
Second-generation BASICs (for example, VAX Basic, SuperBASIC, True BASIC, QuickBASIC, BBC BASIC, Pick BASIC, PowerBASIC, Liberty BASIC, QB64 and (arguably) COMAL) introduced a number of features into the language, primarily related to structured and procedure-oriented programming. Usually, line numbering is omitted from the language and replaced with labels (for GOTO) and procedures to encourage easier and more flexible design. In addition keywords and structures to support repetition, selection and procedures with local variables were introduced.
The following example is in Microsoft QuickBASIC:
<syntaxhighlight lang="QBasic">
REM QuickBASIC example
REM Forward declaration - allows the main code to call a
REM subroutine that is defined later in the source code
DECLARE SUB PrintSomeStars (StarCount!)
REM Main program follows
INPUT "What is your name: ", UserName$
PRINT "Hello "; UserName$
DO
INPUT "How many stars do you want: ", NumStars
CALL PrintSomeStars(NumStars)
DO
INPUT "Do you want more stars? ", Answer$
LOOP UNTIL Answer$ <> ""
Answer$ = LEFT$(Answer$, 1)
LOOP WHILE UCASE$(Answer$) = "Y"
PRINT "Goodbye "; UserName$
END
REM subroutine definition
SUB PrintSomeStars (StarCount)
REM This procedure uses a local variable called Stars$
Stars$ = STRING$(StarCount, "*")
PRINT Stars$
END SUB
</syntaxhighlight>
Object-oriented BASIC
Third-generation BASIC dialects such as Visual Basic, Xojo, Gambas, StarOffice Basic, BlitzMax and PureBasic introduced features to support object-oriented and event-driven programming paradigm. Most built-in procedures and functions are now represented as methods of standard objects rather than operators. Also, the operating system became increasingly accessible to the BASIC language.
The following example is in Visual Basic .NET:
<!-- needs a better (event-driven?) example -->
<syntaxhighlight lang="vbnet">
Public Module StarsProgram
Private Function Ask(prompt As String) As String
Console.Write(prompt)
Return Console.ReadLine()
End Function
Public Sub Main()
Dim userName = Ask("What is your name: ")
Console.WriteLine("Hello {0}", userName)
Dim answer As String
Do
Dim numStars = CInt(Ask("How many stars do you want: "))
Dim stars As New String("*"c, numStars)
Console.WriteLine(stars)
Do
answer = Ask("Do you want more stars? ")
Loop Until answer <> ""
Loop While answer.StartsWith("Y", StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)
Console.WriteLine("Goodbye {0}", userName)
End Sub
End Module
</syntaxhighlight>
Standards
* ANSI/ISO/IEC/ECMA Standard for Minimal BASIC:
** ANSI X3.60-1978 "For minimal BASIC"
** ISO/IEC 6373:1984 "Data Processing—Programming Languages—Minimal BASIC"
** ECMA-55 Minimal BASIC (withdrawn, similar to ANSI X3.60-1978)
* ANSI/ISO/IEC/ECMA Standard for Full BASIC:
** ANSI X3.113-1987 "Programming Languages Full BASIC"
** INCITS/ISO/IEC 10279-1991 (R2005) "Information Technology – Programming Languages – Full BASIC"
** ECMA-116 BASIC (withdrawn, similar to ANSI X3.113-1987)
* ANSI/ISO/IEC Addendum Defining Modules:
** ANSI X3.113 Interpretations-1992 "BASIC Technical Information Bulletin # 1 Interpretations of ANSI 03.113-1987"
** ISO/IEC 10279:1991/ Amd 1:1994 "Modules and Single Character Input Enhancement"
Compilers and interpreters
See also
* List of BASIC dialects
Notes
References
General references
*
*
*
*
*
External links
<!-- Please do not add any links for specific implementations of BASIC here. Add them to List of BASIC dialects and List of BASIC dialects by platform instead -->
*
* [https://gotbasic.com/ gotBASIC.com]—For all people interested in the continued usage and evolution of the BASIC programming language.
* [https://github.com/JohnBlood/awesome-basic Awesome Basic]—A curated list of awesome BASIC dialects, IDEs, and tutorials.
* [http://basic.mindteq.com/ The Basics' page (Since 2001)]—Comprehensive listing of dialects.
Category:American inventions
Category:Articles with example BASIC code
Category:Programming languages
Category:Programming languages created in 1964
Category:Programming languages with an ISO standard | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BASIC | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.114765 |
4016 | List of Byzantine emperors | }}
| began = 11 May 330
| ended = 29 May 1453
| pretender = None
}}
The foundation of Constantinople in 330 AD marks the conventional start of the Eastern Roman Empire, which fell to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 AD. Only the emperors who were recognized as legitimate rulers and exercised sovereign authority are included, to the exclusion of junior co-emperors who never attained the status of sole or senior ruler, as well as of the various usurpers or rebels who claimed the imperial title.
The following list starts with Constantine the Great, the first Christian emperor, who rebuilt the city of Byzantium as an imperial capital, Constantinople, and who was regarded by the later emperors as the model ruler. Modern historians distinguish this later phase of the Roman Empire as Byzantine due to the imperial seat moving from Rome to Byzantium, the Empire's integration of Christianity, and the predominance of Greek instead of Latin.
The Byzantine Empire was the direct legal continuation of the eastern half of the Roman Empire following the division of the Roman Empire in 395. Emperors listed below up to Theodosius I in 395 were sole or joint rulers of the entire Roman Empire. The Western Roman Empire continued until 476. Byzantine emperors considered themselves to be Roman emperors in direct succession from Augustus; the term "Byzantine" became convention in Western historiography in the 19th century. The use of the title "Roman Emperor" by those ruling from Constantinople was not contested until after the papal coronation of the Frankish Charlemagne as Holy Roman emperor (25 December 800).
The title of all Emperors preceding Heraclius was officially "Augustus", although other titles such as Dominus were also used. Their names were preceded by Imperator Caesar and followed by Augustus. Following Heraclius, the title commonly became the Greek Basileus (Gr. Βασιλεύς), which had formerly meant sovereign, though Augustus continued to be used in a reduced capacity. Following the establishment of the rival Holy Roman Empire in Western Europe, the title "Autokrator" (Gr. Αὐτοκράτωρ) was increasingly used. In later centuries, the Emperor could be referred to by Western Christians as the "Emperor of the Greeks". Towards the end of the Empire, the standard imperial formula of the Byzantine ruler was "[Emperor's name] in Christ, Emperor and Autocrat of the Romans" (cf. Ῥωμαῖοι and Rûm).
Dynasties were a common tradition and structure for rulers and government systems in the Medieval period. The principle or formal requirement for hereditary succession was not a part of the Empire's governance; hereditary succession was a custom and tradition, carried on as habit and benefited from some sense of legitimacy, but not as a "rule" or inviolable requirement for office at the time.
Constantinian dynasty (306–363)
) – Ambiguous legitimacy|name=ambig}}}}
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine I<br/ >"the Great"<br/>
| 25 July 306 – 22 May 337<br/>)<br/>West; then whole}}
| Born at Naissus 272 as the son of the Augustus Constantius and Helena. Proclaimed Augustus of the western empire upon the death of his father on 25 July 306, he became sole ruler of the western empire after the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in 312. In 324, he defeated the eastern Augustus Licinius and re-united the empire under his rule, reigning as sole emperor until his death. Constantine completed the administrative and military reforms begun under Diocletian, who had begun ushering in the Dominate period. Actively interested in Christianity, he played a crucial role in its development and the Christianization of the Roman world, through his convocation of the First Ecumenical Council at Nicaea. He is said to have received baptism on his deathbed. He also reformed coinage through the introduction of the gold solidus, and initiated a large-scale building program, crowned by the re-foundation the city of Byzantium as "New Rome", popularly known as Constantinople. He was regarded as the model of all subsequent Byzantine emperors. His reign was marked by greater imperial control over the Eastern Church and the construction of new churches, especially at the holy places sacred to Christianity. To this day, Constantine is venerated as a saint by the eastern Orthodox church.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantius II<br/>
| 9 September 337 – 3 November 361<br/>)<br/>East; then whole}}
| Born on 7 August 317, as the second surviving son of Constantine I, he inherited the eastern third of Roman Empire upon his father's death, sole Roman Emperor from 353, after the overthrow of the western usurper Magnentius; after two years on the run, the latter committed suicide. Constantius' reign saw military activity on all frontiers, and dissension between Arianism, favoured by the emperor, and the supporters of the Nicene Creed. In his reign, Constantinople was accorded equal status to Rome, and the original Hagia Sophia was built. Constantius appointed Constantius Gallus and Julian as Caesares, and died on his way to confront Julian, who had risen up against him.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Julian "the Apostate"<br/>
| 3 November 361 – 26 June 363<br/>)}}
| Born in May 332 at Constantinople (the first emperor born there), Julian was the grandson of Constantius Chlorus and cousin of Constantius II. Proclaimed by his army in Gaul, he became the legitimate Emperor upon the death of Constantius. Julian has been described as the last pagan emperor of the Roman Empire and was generally opposed to Christianity. He was killed on campaign against Sassanid Persia, despite his initial success in surrounding the ancient city of Ctesiphon. For his adherence to the old Roman gods and rejection of the Christian faith, he became known as Julian the Apostate.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Jovian<br/> "Flavius" will generally be omitted in the following entries for simplicity.}}
| 27 June 363 – 17 February 364<br/>)}}
| Born in , Jovian hailed from a military family and was captain of the guards (protector domesticus) under both Constantius II and Julian. He was elected by the army upon Julian's death. After assuming power, Jovian withdrew Roman forces from Persia and made an unpopular peace with them, which lasted until the early sixth-century. Following an autumn spent in Antioch, he died of natural causes in central Anatolia and was buried in Constantinople.
|}
Valentinianic dynasty (364–392)
) – Ambiguous legitimacy}}
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name}}
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Valentinian I "the Great"<br/>
| 25/26 February 364 – 17 November 375<br/>)<br/>Whole; then West}}
| Born in 321. An officer under Julian and Jovian, he was elected by the army upon Jovian's death. He soon appointed his younger brother Valens as Emperor of the East, while he himself ruled in the West. Died of cerebral haemorrhage in 375.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Valens
| 28 March 364 – 9 August 378<br/>; East)}}
| Born in 328, Valens was not especially fit for the imperial office if Ammianus can be believed, but he was appointed Emperor of the East in 364 by his elder brother Valentinian I, who wanted a malleable colleague in the other half of the Empire. }} Following Valentinians's death in 375, his son Gratian succeeded him. Meanwhile, Valens faced the challenge of the invading Huns, whose ferocity pushed the Gothic tribes to seek refuge within the Empire; Valens allowed them to settle on the condition that they become allies to the Empire. When the Goths were mistreated at Roman hands and rebelled, Valens proceeded to face them without awaiting assistance from Gratian's armies and was killed at the Battle of Adrianople.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
| style="background:#EBEBEB" |
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#EBEBEB" | Procopius ()
| style="background:#EBEBEB" | 28 September 365 – 27 May 366<br/>; East)}}
| style"background:#EBEBEB" | Maternal cousin of Julian; revolted against Valens and captured Constantinople, where the people proclaimed him emperor. Deposed, captured and executed by Valens
|}
Theodosian dynasty (379–457)
) – Ambiguous legitimacy}}
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theodosius I<br/ >"the Great"
| 19 January 379 – 17 January 395<br/>) <br/>East; then whole}}
| Born on 11 January 347 in Spain, Theodosius was an aristocrat and military leader, and later brother-in-law of Gratian, who appointed him as emperor of the East in 379 and gave him charge of Macedonia and Dacia. During his reign, Theodosius made Nicene Christianity the official religion of the state. He reunited the whole Empire after defeating Eugenius at the Battle of the Frigidus, in September 394. Theodosius died of a fever at Milan in 395 and his two sons, Honorius and Arcadius, became the emperors of the West and East, splitting power between them.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Arcadius
| 17 January 395 – 1 May 408<br/>; East)}}
| Born in 377/378, Arcadius was the eldest son of Theodosius I and upon the latter's death in 395, the Roman Empire was permanently divided between the Eastern Roman Empire—later referred to as the Byzantine Empire—and the Western Roman Empire with Arcadius becoming Byzantine emperor in the East while his younger brother Honorius became emperor in the West; both were manipulated by court officials and did not possess their father's leadership abilities. After contracting an illness, Arcadius died in 408.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theodosius II
| 1 May 408 – 28 July 450<br/>; East)}}
| Born on 10 April 401, he was the only son of Emperor Arcadius and Empress Aelia Eudoxia. Theodosius II succeeded the throne in 408 upon the death of his father. Because he was a minor, the praetorian prefect Anthemius was essentially regent from 408 to 414, but Theodosius II's elder sister Aelia Pulcheria played a critical role as regent and co-ruler during his early years. Pulcheria exerted considerable influence, shaping court policies and fostering Christian orthodoxy. Theodosius II was known for his mild and scholarly temperament. He had a keen interest in theology, astronomy, and calligraphy, and was reportedly well-educated, thanks to the influence of his sister Pulcheria. His long reign was marked by significant legal, administrative, and theological developments. One of the most enduring legacies of Theodosius II's reign was the construction of the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople. These massive fortifications protected the city for over a millennium and are regarded as one of the greatest defensive structures of antiquity. Theodosius II strongly supported Nicene Christianity and convened the Council of Ephesus in 431 CE, which declared the Virgin Mary as Theotokos ("God-bearer") and condemned the theology of Nestorianism. He also commissioned the Theodosian Code, a comprehensive compilation of Roman laws published in 438; this codex organized and systematized the legal framework of the empire and influenced later European legal traditions. During his reign, he faced constant threats from the Huns of Attila and negotiated treaties with the them, paying substantial tributes to prevent invasions. He married Aelia Eudocia Augusta, a learned woman of Greek descent, who, like the emperor's sister Pulcheria, became an influential figure in the court. Their marriage produced one daughter, Licinia Eudoxia, who later married Valentinian III, the Western Roman Emperor. Theodosius II died in 450 CE from injuries sustained after falling off his horse while hunting. His death marked the end of a relatively peaceful and prosperous reign, though it left unresolved issues such as rising threats from external enemies and religious divisions.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Marcian<br/>
| 25 August 450 – 27 January 457<br/>; East)}}
| Born in 396. A soldier and politician, he became emperor after being wed by the Augusta Pulcheria, sister of Theodosius II, following the latter's death. Died of gangrene.
|}
Leonid dynasty (457–518)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
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! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Leo I "the Butcher"
| 7 February 457 – 18 January 474<br/>)}}
| Born in Dacia 400, and of Bessian origin, Leo became a low-ranking officer and served as an attendant of the Gothic , Aspar, who chose him as emperor on Marcian's death. He was the first emperor to be crowned by the Patriarch of Constantinople, and the first one to legislate in Greek. His reign was marked by the pacification of the Danube and peace with Persia, which allowed him to intervene in the affairs of the West, supporting candidates for the throne and dispatching an expedition to recover Carthage from the Vandals in 468. Initially a puppet of Aspar, Leo began promoting the Isaurians as a counterweight to Aspar's Goths, marrying his daughter Ariadne to the Isaurian leader Tarasicodissa (Zeno). With their support, in 471 Aspar was murdered and Gothic power over the army was broken.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Leo II "the Younger"
| 18 January – November 474<br/>
| Born 468, he was the grandson of Leo I by Leo's daughter Ariadne and her Isaurian husband, Zeno. He was raised to Augustus on 17 November 473. Leo ascended the throne after the death of his grandfather on 18 January 474. He crowned his father as co-emperor and effective regent on 29 January, dying shortly after.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Zeno
| 29 January 474 – 9 January 475<br/>)}}
| Born 425 in Isauria, originally named Tarasicodissa. As the leader of Leo I's Isaurian soldiers, he rose to comes domesticorum, married the emperor's daughter Ariadne and took the name Zeno, and played a crucial role in the elimination of Aspar and his Goths. He was named co-emperor by his son on 29 January 474 and became sole ruler upon the latter's death, but had to flee to his native country before Basiliscus in 475, regaining control of the capital in 476. Zeno concluded peace with the Vandals, saw off challenges against him by Illus and Verina, and secured peace in the Balkans by enticing the Ostrogoths under Theodoric the Great to migrate to Italy where the Gothic king ruled. Convincing Theodoric to move his Goths westward into Italy allowed Zeno to reduce what had been a drain to imperial resources, since these Germanic warriors had been exacting payments from the Empire throughout the 470s and 480s and menacing Eastern territories. As a consequence, Zeno's reign also saw the end of the western line of emperors. His pro-Monophysite stance made him unpopular and his promulgation of the Henotikon resulted in the Acacian Schism with the papacy.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Basiliscus
| 9 January 475 – August 476<br/>}}
| General and brother-in-law of Leo I, seized power from Zeno and crowned himself emperor on 12 January. Zeno was restored soon after. Died in 476/477
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Zeno <br/>
| August 476 – 9 April 491<br/>
| Retook the throne with the help of general Illus. Saw the end of the Western Roman Empire. Died of dysentery or epilepsy
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Anastasius I "Dicorus"
| 11 April 491 – 9 July 518<br/>)}}
| Born 430 at Dyrrhachium, Anastasius was a palace official (silentiarius) when he was chosen as the husband and ultimately Emperor by Empress-dowager Ariadne. He was nicknamed "Dikoros" (Latin: Dicorus), because of his heterochromia. Apparently, there was some insistence from the citizenry of Constantinople that Zeno's successor should be an "Orthodox" Christian, which caused Ariadne to turn to Anastasius in the first place. Anastasius reformed the tax system and the Byzantine coinage and proved a frugal ruler, so that by the end of his reign he left a substantial surplus. His Monophysite sympathies led to widespread opposition, most notably the Revolt of Vitalian and the Acacian Schism. His reign was also marked by the first Bulgar raids into the Balkans and by a war with Persia over the foundation of Dara. He died childless. Shortly before his death, he tried to devise a means for one of his three nephews to succeed him by placing a note that read Regnum under their beds, but when none of them chose that bed, he decided instead to name the first person he saw the following morning. Keeping true to his word, when Justin—commander of the imperial guards—entered his presence first that morning, he was pronounced as Anastasius's successor.
|}
Justinian dynasty (518–602)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Justin I <br/>
| 9/10 July 518 – 1 August 527<br/>)}}
| Born at Bederiana (Justiniana Prima), Dardania. Officer and commander of the Excubitors bodyguard under Anastasius I, he was elected by army and people upon the death of Anastasius I.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Justinian I "the Great"<br/>
| 1 April 527 – 14 November 565<br/>)}}
| Born in 482/483 at Tauresium (Taor) Macedonia, Justinian was the nephew of Justin I and was made consul in 521; he was elevated to co-emperor on 1 April 527, when Justin fell ill. He succeeded Justin I's as emperor upon the former's death. Through his mighty commanding general Belisarius, Justinian was able to regain North Africa, as well as much of Italy and Spain; these were territories that had been seized and occupied previously by various Germanic tribes (Vandals and Goths) at the former Western Roman Empire's expense. He carried out a massive building program throughout the Empire, including construction of the famous Hagia Sophia at Constantinople. Justinian was also responsible for the , or the "body of civil law", which is the foundation of law for many modern European nations.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Justin II<br/>
| 14 November 565 – 5 October 578<br/>)}}
| Born . Nephew of Justinian I, he seized the throne on the death of Justinian I with support of army and Senate. Became insane, hence in 573–574 under the regency of his wife Sophia, and in 574–578 under the regency of Tiberius Constantine.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Tiberius II Constantine<br/>
| 26 September 578 – 14 August 582<br/>)}}
| Born , commander of the Excubitors, friend and adoptive son of Justin. Was named Caesar and regent in 574. Succeeded on Justin II's death.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Maurice<br/>
| 13 August 582 – 27 November 602<br/>)<hr/>with Theodosius (590–602)}}
| Born in 539 at Arabissus, Cappadocia. Maurice became an official and later a general of the Byzantine army in the East under Tiberius II, achieving notable successes against the Sassanian Empire during the Byzantine–Sassanian War of 572–591. He married the daughter of Tiberius II and was proclaimed emperor on 13 August 582 after Tiberius II's death. Maurice fought wars against the Sassanian kingdom on the eastern front of his empire, the Avars and Slavs for control over the Balkans, and reinforced Byzantine holdings in Ravenna and Carthage. He is best remembered for his contributions to Byzantine military theory, notably his treatise Strategikon, a manual on warfare. Maurice named his son Theodosius as co-emperor in 590. Deposed by a centurion named Phocas, he was captured and executed on 27 November 602 along with his family at Chalcedon.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Phocas<br/>
| 23 November 602 – 5 October 610<br/>)}}
| Subaltern in the Balkan army, he led a rebellion that deposed Maurice. Increasingly unpopular and tyrannical, he was deposed and executed by Heraclius.
|}
Heraclian dynasty (610–695)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Heraclius Latin continued to be used in communication with Western Europe until the end of the empire and coins continued to be struck with Latin inscriptions until the early eighth century.}}
| 5 October 610 – 11 February 641<br/>)}}
| Born as the eldest son of the Exarch of Africa, Heraclius the Elder. Began a revolt against Phocas in 609 and deposed him in October 610. Brought the Byzantine-Sassanid War of 602–628 to successful conclusion but was unable to stop the Muslim conquest of Syria. Heraclius' officials worked to replace Latin with Greek as the official language of administration in the East. By this time Latin had long fallen out of everyday use in the Eastern part of the Empire and Heraclius's adopting of the title basileus (king or emperor) "marked a shift from Rome towards a Greek and Eastern Christian culture."
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Heraclius Constantine<br/> though this name is also often applied to the earlier western emperor and has also been used for Heraclius Constantine's son Constans II (who actually ruled under the name 'Constantine', 'Constans' being a nickname).}}<br/>Heraclius Constantinus<br/>Ἡράκλειος Κωνσταντῖνος}}
| 11 February – 25 May 641<br/>)}}
| Born on 3 May 612 as the eldest son of Heraclius by his first wife Fabia Eudokia. Named co-emperor on 22 January 613, he succeeded to throne with his younger brother Heraklonas following the death of Heraclius. Died of tuberculosis, allegedly poisoned by Empress-dowager Martina.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Heraclonas<br/>
| 25 May – 5 November (?) 641<br/>)<hr/>with Tiberius-David, son of Heraclius (641)}}
| Born in 626 to Heraclius' second wife Martina, named co-emperor on 4 July 638. Succeeded to throne with Constantine III following the death of Heraclius. Sole emperor after the death of Constantine III, under the regency of Martina, but was forced to name Constans II co-emperor by the army, and was deposed by the Senate in September 641 (or early 642).
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constans II "the Bearded"<br/>
| September 641 – 15 July 668<br/>
| Born on 7 November 630, Constans II was the son of Constantine III. Raised to co-emperor in summer 641 after his father's death due to army pressure, he became sole emperor after the forced abdication of his uncle Heracleonas and his exile. Baptized Heraclius, he reigned as Constantin but was given the nickname "Constans". He faced a number of Arab incursions, almost losing his life while commanding the Byzantine fleet. Constans had some military success against the Slavs in the Balkans. Around 662, he moved his seat and court to Syracuse, intending to liberate Italy from the Lombards. His presence was unwelcome in Italy and there was "fierce opposition" to Constans II's abandonment of Constantinople. He was assassinated by a chamberlain in 668.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine IV<br/>
| September 668 – 10 July (?) 685<br/>
| Born in 652, co-emperor since 13 April 654, he succeeded following the murder of his father Constans II. Erroneously called "Constantine the Bearded" by historians through confusion with his father. He called the Third Council of Constantinople which condemned the heresy of Monothelitism, repelled the First Arab Siege of Constantinople, and died of dysentery.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Justinian II "Rhinotmetus"<br/>
| July 685 – 695<br/>
| Born in 669, son of Constantine IV, he was named co-emperor in 681 and became sole emperor upon Constantine IV's death. Deposed by military revolt in 695, mutilated (hence his surname) and exiled to Cherson, whence he recovered his throne in 705.
|}
Twenty Years' Anarchy (695–717)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Leontius<br/>
| 695 – 698<br/>
| General from Isauria, he deposed Justinian II and was overthrown in another revolt in 698. He was executed in February 706.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Tiberius III
| 698 – 21 August (?) 705<br/>
| Admiral of Germanic origin, originally named Apsimar. He rebelled against Leontius after a failed expedition. Reigned under the name of Tiberius until deposed by Justinian II in 705. Executed in February 706.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Justinian II "Rhinotmetus"<br/>
| 21 August (?) 705 – 4 November 711<br/>)<hr/>with Tiberius, son of Justinian II (706–711)}}
| Returned on the throne with Bulgar support. Named son Tiberius as co-emperor in 706. Deposed and killed by military revolt.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Philippicus<br/>
| 4 November 711 – 3 June 713<br/>)}}
| A general of Armenian origin, he deposed Justinian II and was in turn overthrown by a revolt of the Opsician troops.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Anastasius II<br/>
| 4 June 713 – fall 715<br/>
| Originally named Artemios. A bureaucrat and secretary under Philippicus, he was raised to the purple by the soldiers who overthrew Philippicus. Deposed by another military revolt, he led an abortive attempt to regain the throne in 718 and was killed.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theodosius III
| Fall 715 – 25 March 717<br/>
| A fiscal official, he was proclaimed emperor by the rebellious Opsician troops. Entered Constantinople in November 715. Abdicated following the revolt of Leo the Isaurian and became a monk.
|}
Isaurian (Syrian) dynasty (717–802)
) – Ambiguous legitimacy}}
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
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! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Leo III "the Isaurian"<br/>}}
| 25 March 717 – 18 June 741<br/>)}}
| Born in Germanikeia, Commagene, he became a general. Rose in rebellion and secured the throne in spring 717. Repelled the Second Arab Siege of Constantinople and initiated the Byzantine Iconoclasm.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine V "Copronymus"<br/>
| 18 June 741 – 14 September 775<br/>)}}
| Born in July 718, the only son of Leo III. Co-emperor since 720, he succeeded upon his father's death. After overcoming the usurpation of Artabasdos, he continued his father's iconoclastic policies and won several victories against the Arabs and the Bulgars. He is given the surname "the Dung-named" by hostile later chroniclers.
|-
| style="background:#EBEBEB" |
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#EBEBEB" | Artabasdos ()<br/>
| style="background:#EBEBEB" | June 741 – 2 November 743<br/>
| General and son-in-law of Leo III, Count of the Opsician Theme. Led a revolt that secured Constantinople, but was defeated and deposed by Constantine V, who blinded and tonsured him.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Leo IV "the Khazar"<br/>
| 14 September 775 – 8 September 780<br/>)}}
| Born on 25 January 750 as the eldest son of Constantine V. Co-emperor since 751, he succeeded upon his father's death.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine VI<br/>
| 8 September 780 – 19 August 797<br/>)}}
| Born in 771, the only child of Leo IV. Co-emperor since 14 April 776, sole emperor upon Leo's death in 780, until 790 under the regency of his mother, Irene of Athens. He was overthrown on Irene's orders, blinded and imprisoned, probably dying of his wounds shortly after.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Irene<br/>
| 19 August 797 – 31 October 802<br/>)}}
| Born in Athens, she married Leo IV on 3 November 768 and was crowned empress on 17 December. Regent for her son Constantine VI in 780–790, she dethroned and blinded him in 797 and became empress-regnant. In 787 she called the Second Council of Nicaea which condemned the practice of iconoclasm and restored the veneration of icons to Christian practice. Deposed in a palace coup in 802, she was exiled and died on 9 August 803.
|}
Nikephorian dynasty (802–813)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Nikephoros I<br/ >"the Logothete"<br/>
| 31 October 802 – 26 July 811<br/>)}}
| Logothetes tou genikou (general finance minister) under Irene, led initially successful campaigns against the Bulgars but was killed at the Battle of Pliska.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Staurakios<br/>
| 28 July – 2 October 811<br/>)}}
| Only son of Nikephoros I, crowned co-emperor in December 803. Succeeded on his father's death; however, he had been heavily wounded at Pliska and left paralyzed. He was forced to abdicate, and retired to a monastery where he died soon after.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael I Rangabe<br/>
| 2 October 811 – 11 July 813<br/>)<hr/>with Theophylact and Staurakios, sons of Michael I (811–813)}}
| Son-in-law of Nikephoros I, he succeeded Staurakios on his abdication. Resigned after the revolt under Leo the Armenian and retired to a monastery, where he died on 11 January 844. Reigned with eldest son Theophylact as co-emperor.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Leo V "the Armenian"<br/>
| 11 July 813 – 25 December 820<br/>)<hr/>with Constantine Symbatios (813–820)}}
| General of Armenian origin, born . He rebelled against Michael I and became emperor. Appointed his son Symbatios co-emperor under the name of Constantine in 813. Revived Byzantine Iconoclasm. Murdered by a conspiracy led by Michael the Amorian.
|}
Amorian dynasty (820–867)
though not always, seen as having been empresses regnant.|nameTheodoraEudokia}}}}
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
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! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael II "the Amorian"<br/>
| 25 December 820 – 2 October 829<br/>)}}
| Born in 770 at Amorium, he became an army officer. A friend of Leo V, he was raised to high office but led the conspiracy that murdered him. He was sentenced to execution by Leo, but was proclaimed emperor by Leo's assassins and crowned by Patriarch Theodotus I on the same day. He survived the rebellion of Thomas the Slav, lost Crete to the Arabs, faced the beginning of the Muslim conquest of Sicily, and reinforced iconoclasm.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theophilos<br/>
| 2 October 829 – 20 January 842<br/>)<hr/>with Constantine ( 834–835)}}
| Born in 813 as the only son of Michael II. Crowned co-emperor on 12 May 821, he succeeded on his father's death.
|-
| style="background:#F0FFFF" |
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F0FFFF" | Theodora (§)<br/>
| style"background:#F0FFFF" | 20 January 842 – 15 March 856<br/>)<hr/>with Thekla (842–856)}}
| Widow of Theophilos, she was a ruler in her own right during the minority of their son Michael III, who deposed her in 856. Died of natural causes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael III "the Drunkard"<br/>
| 20 January 842 – 24 September 867<br/>)}}
| His precise date of birth is uncertain, but the balance of available evidence supports a birthdate in January 840. The son of Theophilos, he succeeded on Theophilos' death. Under the regency of his mother Theodora until 856, and under the effective control of his uncle Bardas in 862–866. Ended iconoclasm. Murdered by Basil the Macedonian. A pleasure-loving ruler, he was nicknamed "the Drunkard" by later, pro-Basil chroniclers.
|}
Macedonian dynasty (867–1056)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
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! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Basil I "the Macedonian"<br/>
| 24 September 867 – 29 August 886<br/>)<hr/>with Constantine (868–879)}}
| Born in the Theme of Macedonia 811, he rose in prominence through palace service, becoming a favourite of Michael III, who crowned him co-emperor on 26 May 866. He overthrew Michael and established the Macedonian dynasty. He led successful wars in the East against the Arabs and the Paulicians, and recovered southern Italy for the Empire.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Leo VI "the Wise"<br/>
| 29 August 886 – 11 May 912<br/>)}}
| Born on 19 September 866, either the legitimate son of Basil I or the illegitimate son of Michael III. Co-emperor since 6 January 870. Leo was known for his erudition. His reign saw a height in Saracen (Muslim) naval raids, culminating in the Sack of Thessalonica, and was marked by unsuccessful wars against the Bulgarians under Simeon I.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Alexander<br/>
| 11 May 912 – 6 June 913<br/>)}}
| Son of Basil I, Alexander was born in 870 and raised to co-emperor in 879. Sidelined by Leo VI, Alexander dismissed his brother's principal aides on his accession. Died of illness, possibly testicular cancer
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine VII<br/>Porphyrogenitus<br/>
| 6 June 913 – 9 November 959<br/>)}}
| Son of Leo VI, he was born on 17/18 May 905 and raised to co-emperor on 15 May 908. His early reign was dominated by successive regencies, first by his mother, Zoe Karbonopsina, and Patriarch Nicholas Mystikos, and from 919 by the admiral Romanos Lekapenos, who wedded his daughter to Constantine and was crowned senior emperor in 920. Constantine re-asserted his control by deposing Romanos's sons on 27 January 945. His reign was marked by struggles with Sayf al-Dawla in the East and an unsuccessful campaign against Crete, and pro-aristocratic policies that saw a partial reversal of Lekapenos' legislation against the dynatoi. He is notable for his promotion of the "Macedonian Renaissance", sponsoring encyclopaedic works and histories. He was a prolific writer himself, best remembered for the manuals on statecraft () and ceremonies (De ceremoniis) he compiled for his son.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Romanos I Lekapenos<br/>
| 17 December 920 – 20 December 944<br/>)<hr/>with Christopher (921–931), Stephen and Constantine Lekapenos (924–945)}}
| An admiral of lowly origin, Romanos rose to power as a protector of the young Constantine VII against the general Leo Phokas the Elder. He became emperor in 920. His reign was marked by the end of warfare with Bulgaria and the great conquests of John Kourkouas in the East. Romanos promoted his sons Stephen and Constantine (alongside Christopher, who died soon after) as co-emperors over Constantine VII, but was himself overthrown by them and confined to an island as a monk. He died there on 15 June 948.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Romanos II<br/>
| 9 November 959 – 15 March 963<br/>)}}
| The only surviving son of Constantine VII, he was born on 15 March 938 and succeeded his father on the latter's death. He ruled until his own death, although the government was led mostly by the eunuch Joseph Bringas. His reign was marked by successful warfare in the East against Sayf al-Dawla and the recovery of Crete by general Nikephoros Phokas.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Nikephoros II Phokas<br/>
| 16 August 963 – 11 December 969<br/>)}}
| The most successful general of his generation, Nikephoros II was born 912 to the powerful Phokas clan. After the death of Romanos II, he rose to the throne with the support of the army and people as regent for the young emperors Basil II and Constantine VIII, marrying the empress-dowager Theophano. Throughout his reign he led campaigns in the East, conquering much of Syria. He was murdered by his nephew and one-time associate John Tzimiskes.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John I Tzimiskes<br/>
| 11 December 969 – 10 January 976<br/>)}}
| Nephew of Nikephoros Phokas, Tzimiskes was born 925. A successful general, he fell out with his uncle and led a conspiracy of disgruntled generals who murdered him. Tzimiskes succeeded Nikephoros as emperor and regent for the young sons of Romanos II. As ruler, Tzimiskes crushed the Rus' in Bulgaria and ended the Bulgarian tsardom before going on to campaign in the East, where he died.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Basil II "the Bulgar-Slayer"<br/>
| 10 January 976 – 15 December 1025<br/>)}}
| Eldest son of Romanos II, Basil II was born in 958 to Romanus II. The first decade of his reign was marked by rivalry with the powerful Basil Lekapenos, an unsuccessful war against Bulgaria, and rebellions by generals in Asia Minor. Basil solidified his position through a marriage alliance of his sister Anna to Vladimir I of Kiev, which was accompanied by the conversion to Christian Orthodoxy of the grand Kievian Rus' prince and his people. After over 20 years of war, Basil eventually succeeded in his conquest of Bulgaria, which was finally subdued in 1018, earning him the name "Bulgar-slayer". His conquest of Bulgar was periodically interrupted by warfare in Syria against the Fatimid Caliphate. Basil expanded Byzantine control over most of Armenia and his reign is widely considered as the apogee of medieval Byzantium.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine VIII<br/>
| 15 December 1025 – 12 November 1028<br/>)}}
| The second son of Romanos II, Constantine was born in 960 and raised to co-emperor on 30 March 962. During the rule of Basil II, he spent his time in idle pleasure. During his short reign he was an indifferent ruler, easily influenced by his courtiers and suspicious of plots to depose him, especially among the military aristocracy, many of whom were blinded and exiled.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Romanos III Argyros<br/>
| 12 November 1028 – 11 April 1034<br/>)}}
| Born in 968, the elderly aristocrat Romanos—who had served in both the judiciary and civil service—was chosen by Constantine VIII on his deathbed, after being required to marry the emperor's daughter Zoe under the alternative threat of being blinded and sent to a monastery. Romanos III succeeded to the throne upon Constantine's death a few days later. Deluded by grandeur, Romanos fashioned himself at one time as a philosopher king like Marcus Aurelius and later as a military genius like Trajan, resulting in military debacles. He initiated expensive church building projects. A subsequent affair between his wife Zoe and his chief eunuch's brother Michael, led to the pair colluding in poisoning Romanos, before ultimately resolving to having the emperor strangled and drowned in his own bath.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael IV "the Paphlagonian"<br/>
| 12 April 1034 – 10 December 1041<br/>)}}
| Born in 1010, he became a lover of Zoe even while Romanos III was alive, and succeeded him upon his death as her husband and emperor. Aided by his older brother, the eunuch John the Orphanotrophos, his reign was moderately successful against internal rebellions, but his attempt to recover Sicily failed. He died after a long illness.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael V "Kalaphates"<br/>
| 13 December 1041 – 21 April 1042<br/>)}}
| Born in 1015, he was the nephew and adopted son of Michael IV. During his reign he tried to sideline Zoe, but a popular revolt forced him to restore her as empress on 19 April 1042, along with her sister Theodora. He was deposed the next day, castrated and tonsured, dying on 24 August 1042.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Zoë Porphyrogenita<br/>
| 21 April – 11 June 1042<br/>)}}
| The daughter of Constantine VIII, she succeeded on her father's death, as the only surviving member of the Macedonian dynasty, along with her sister Theodora. Her three husbands, Romanos III (1028–1034), Michael IV (1034–1041) and Constantine IX (1042–1050) ruled alongside her.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theodora Porphyrogenita<br/>
| 21 April – 11 June 1042<br/>)}}
| The younger sister of Zoe, born in 984, she was raised as co-ruler on 19 April 1042. After Zoe married her third husband, Constantine IX, in June 1042, Theodora was again sidelined. After Zoe died in 1050 and Constantine in 1055, Theodora assumed full governance of the Empire and reigned until her death. She nominated Michael VI as her successor.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine IX Monomachos<br/>|namefamnames}}
| 11 June 1042 – 11 January 1055<br/>)}}
| Born 1000 of noble origin, he had an undistinguished life but was exiled to Lesbos by Michael IV, returning when he was chosen as Zoe's third husband. Constantine supported the mercantile classes and favoured the company of intellectuals, thereby alienating the military aristocracy. A pleasure-loving ruler, he lived an extravagant life with his favourite mistresses and endowed a number of monasteries, chiefly the Nea Moni of Chios and the Mangana Monastery. His reign was marked by invasions by the Pechenegs in the Balkans and the Seljuk Turks in the East, the revolts of George Maniakes and Leo Tornikios, and the Great Schism between the patriarchates of Rome and Constantinople.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theodora Porphyrogenita<br/>
| 11 January 1055 – 31 August 1056<br/>)}}
| Claimed the throne again after Constantine IX's death as the last living member of the Macedonian dynasty. Died of natural causes
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael VI Bringas "Stratiotikos"<br/>
| 22 August 1056 – 30 August 1057<br/>)}}
| A court bureaucrat and stratiotikos logothetes (hence his first sobriquet). Proclaimed emperor by Theodora on her deathbed on 22 August 1056. Deposed by military revolt under Isaac Komnenos, he retired to a monastery where he died in 1059.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Isaac I Komnenos<br/>
| 1 September 1057 – 22 November 1059<br/>)}}
| Born . A successful general, he rose in revolt leading the eastern armies and was declared emperor on 8 June 1057; he was recognized after the abdication of Michael. He resigned in 1059 and died .
|}
Doukas dynasty (1059–1078)
}}
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine X Doukas<br/>
| 23 November 1059 – 23 May 1067<br/>)}}
| Born in 1006, he became a general and close ally of Isaac Komnenos, and succeeded him as emperor on his abdication. Named his sons Michael, Andronikos and Konstantios as co-emperors. After his death his widow was regent until the accession of Romanus IV.
|-
| style="background:#F0FFFF" |
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F0FFFF" | Eudokia Makrembolitissa<br/> (§)
| style="background:#F0FFFF" | 23 May – 31 December 1067<br/>)}}
| Widow of Constantine X; ruler in her own right on behalf of their sons until her marriage to Romanos IV. She briefly resumed her regency in September 1071, became a nun in November 1071 and later died of natural causes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Romanos IV Diogenes<br/>
| 1 January 1068 – 26 August 1071<br/>)<hr/>with Leo and Nikephoros Diogenes ( 1070–71)}}}}
| Born in 1032, a successful general he married empress-dowager Eudokia Makrembolitissa and became senior emperor as guardian of her sons by Constantine X. Deposed by the Doukas partisans after the Battle of Manzikert, blinded in June 1072 and exiled. He died soon after.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael VII Doukas "Parapinakes"<br/>
| 1 October 1071 – 24/31 March 1078<br/>
| Born in 1050 as the eldest son of Constantine X. Co-emperor since 1059, he succeeded on his father's death. Due to his minority he was under the regency of his mother, Eudokia Makrembolitissa, in 1067–1068, and relegated to junior emperor under her second husband Romanos IV Diogenes in 1068–71. Senior emperor in 1071–78, he named his son Constantine co-emperor alongside his brothers. He abdicated before the revolt of Nikephoros Botaneiates, retired to a monastery and died . His reign saw the devaluation of the Byzantine currency by 25%, hence his nickname "minus-a-quarter".
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Nikephoros III Botaneiates<br/>
| 3 April 1078 – 1 April 1081<br/>)}}<!-- The chronology of Nikephoros III's rise is confusing and often contradictory; 3 April is the date shown in the ODB and thus the one usually used. -->
| Born in 1001, he was the strategos of the Anatolic Theme. He was proclaimed emperor on 7 January and crowned on 27 March or 3 April. He weathered several revolts, but was overthrown by the Komnenos clan. He retired to a monastery where he died in the same year.
|}
Komnenos dynasty (1081–1185)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Alexios I Komnenos<br/>
| 1 April 1081 – 15 August 1118<br/>)<hr/>with Constantine Doukas<br/>(1081–1087; 2nd time)}}
| Born in 1056, a nephew of Isaac I Komnenos. A distinguished general, he overthrew Nikephoros III. His reign was dominated by wars against the Normans and the Seljuk Turks, as well as the arrival of the First Crusade and the establishment of independent Crusader states. He retained Constantine Doukas as co-emperor until 1087 and named his eldest son John co-emperor in 1092.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John II Komnenos<br/>"the Good"<br/>
| 15 August 1118 – 8 April 1143<br/>)<hr/>with Alexios Komnenos, son of John II<br/ >(1119–1142)}}
| Born on 13 September 1087 as the eldest son of Alexios I. Co-emperor since 1092, he succeeded upon his father's death. His reign was focused on wars with the Turks. A popular, pious and frugal ruler, he was known as "John the Good". Named his eldest son Alexios co-emperor in 1122, but the son predeceased his father.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Manuel I Komnenos<br/>"the Great"<br/>
| 8 April 1143 – 24 September 1180<br/>)}}
| Born on 28 November 1118 as the fourth and youngest son of John II, he was chosen as emperor over his elder brother Isaac by his father on his deathbed. An energetic ruler, he launched campaigns against the Turks, humbled Hungary, achieved supremacy over the Crusader states, and tried unsuccessfully to recover Italy and Egypt. His extravagance and constant campaigning, however, depleted the Empire's resources.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Alexios II Komnenos<br/>
| 24 September 1180 – c. September 1183<br/>
| Born on 14 September 1169 as the only son of Manuel I. In 1180–1182 under the regency of his mother, Maria of Antioch. She was overthrown by Andronikos I Komnenos, who became co-emperor and had Alexios II, aged 14, strangled and his body thrown in the sea
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Andronikos I Komnenos <br/>
| c. September 1183 – 12 September 1185<br/>
| Born , a nephew of John II by his brother Isaac. A general, he was imprisoned for conspiring against John II, but escaped and spent 15 years in exile in various courts in eastern Europe and the Middle East. He seized the regency from Maria of Antioch in 1182 and subsequently throne from his nephew Alexios II. An unpopular ruler, he was overthrown by Isaac II, tortured and mutilated in the imperial palace, then slowly dismembered alive by a mob in the Hippodrome
|}
Angelos dynasty (1185–1204)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Isaac II Angelos<br/>
| 12 September 1185 – 8 April 1195<br/>)}}<br/>1 August 1203 –<br />27 January 1204<br/>)}}
| Born in September 1156, Isaac came to the throne at the head of a popular revolt against Andronikos I. His reign was marked by revolts and wars in the Balkans, especially against a resurgent Bulgaria. He was deposed, blinded and imprisoned by his elder brother, Alexios III. He was later restored to the throne by the Crusaders and Alexios IV. Due to their failure to deal with the Crusaders' demands, he was deposed by Alexios V Doukas in January 1204 and died in January 1204, perhaps of poison.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Alexios III Angelos<br/> }}
| 8 April 1195 – 17/18 July 1203<br/>)}}
| Born in 1153, Alexios was the elder brother of Isaac II. His reign was marked by misgovernment and the increasing autonomy of provincial magnates. He was deposed by the Fourth Crusade and fled Constantinople, roaming Greece and Asia Minor, searching for support to regain his throne. He died in Nicaean captivity (confined to a monastery) in 1211.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Alexios IV Angelos<br/>
| 19 July 1203 – 27 January 1204<br/>)}}
| Born in 1182, the son of Isaac II. He enlisted the Fourth Crusade to return his father to the throne, and reigned alongside his restored father from 19 July 1203. Due to their failure to deal with the Crusaders' demands, he was deposed by Alexios V Doukas in January 1204, and was strangled in prison on 8 February.
|-
! colspan=4 |
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Alexios V Doukas "Mourtzouphlos"<br/>
| 27/28 January – 12 April 1204<br/>)}}
| Born in 1140, the son-in-law of Alexios III and a prominent aristocrat, he deposed Isaac II and Alexios IV in a palace coup. He tried to repel the Crusaders, but they captured Constantinople forcing Mourtzouphlos to flee. He joined the exiled Alexios III, but was later blinded by the latter. Captured by crusader Thierry de Loos, he was thrown from the Column of Theodosius
|}
Laskaris dynasty (1205–1261)
: For other lines of claimant emperors, see List of Trapezuntine emperors and List of Thessalonian emperors.}}
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
! scopecol width"50%" | Notes
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theodore I Laskaris<br/>
| May 1205 – November 1221<br/>
| Born , he rose to prominence as a son-in-law of Alexios III. His brother Constantine Laskaris (or Theodore himself, it is uncertain) was elected emperor by the citizens of Constantinople on the day before the city fell to the Crusaders; Constantine only remained for a few hours before the sack of the city and later fled to Nicaea, where Theodore organized the Greek resistance to the Latins. Proclaimed emperor after Constantine's death in 1205, Theodore was crowned only in Easter 1208. He managed to stop the Latin advance in Asia and to repel Seljuk attacks, establishing the Empire of Nicaea as the strongest of the Greek successor states.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John III Vatatzes<br/>
| c. December 1221 – 3 November 1254<br/>
| Born , he became the son-in-law and successor of Theodore I in 1212. A capable ruler and soldier, he expanded his state in Bithynia, Thrace, and Macedonia at the expense of the Latin Empire, Bulgaria, and the rival Greek state of Epirus.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Theodore II Laskaris<br/>
| 3 November 1254 – 16 August 1258<br/>)}}
| Born in 1221/1222 as the only son of John III, he succeeded on his father's death. His reign was marked by his hostility towards the major houses of the aristocracy, and by his victory against Bulgaria and the subsequent expansion into Albania.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John IV Laskaris<br/>
| 16 August 1258 – 25 December 1261<br/>)}}
| Born on 25 December 1250 as the only son of Theodore II, he succeeded on his father's death. Due to his minority, the regency was exercised at first by George Mouzalon until his assassination, and then by Michael Palaiologos, who within months was crowned senior emperor. After the recovery of Constantinople in August 1261, Palaiologos sidelined John IV completely, had him blinded and imprisoned. John IV died in captivity several decades later, .
|}
Palaiologos dynasty (1259–1453)
{| class"wikitable plainrowheaders" style"width:100%; text-align:center"
|+
! scopecol width"7%" | Portrait
! scopecol width"17%" | Name
! scopecol width"26%" | Reign
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|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Michael VIII Palaiologos<br/>
| 1 January 1259 – 11 December 1282<br/>)}}
| Born in 1223, great-grandson of Alexios III, grandnephew of John III by marriage. Senior emperor alongside John IV in 1259. His forces reconquered Constantinople on 25 July 1261, thus restoring the Empire. He entered the city and was crowned on 15 August. Became sole emperor after deposing John IV on 25 December 1261.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Andronikos II Palaiologos<br/>
| 11 December 1282 – 24 May 1328<br/>)<hr/>with Irene (1303–1317, in Thessalonica)}}
| Son of Michael VIII, Andronikos II was born on 25 March 1259. Named co-emperor in 1261, crowned in 1272, he succeeded as sole emperor on Michael's death. Favouring monks and intellectuals, he neglected the army by significantly reducing military spending, and his reign saw the collapse of the Byzantine position in Asia Minor. He named his son Michael IX co-emperor. In a protracted civil war, he was first forced to recognize his grandson Andronikos III as co-emperor and was then deposed outright. He became a monk and died peacefully in 1332.
|-
| style="background:#F0FFFF" |
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F0FFFF" | Michael IX Palaiologos (§)<br/>
| style="background:#F0FFFF" | 21 May 1294 – 12 October 1320<br/>)}}
| Son and co-ruler of Andronikos II, named co-emperor in 1281 but not crowned until 21 May 1294. Allegedly died of grief due to the accidental murder of his second son.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Andronikos III Palaiologos<br/>
| 24 May 1328 – 15 June 1341<br/>)}}
| Son of Michael IX, he was born on 25 March 1297 and named co-emperor in 1316. Rival emperor since July 1321, he deposed his grandfather Andronikos II in 1328 and ruled as sole emperor until his death. Supported by John Kantakouzenos, his reign saw defeats against the Ottoman emirate but successes in Europe, where Epirus and Thessaly were recovered.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John V Palaiologos<br/>
|<br/>15 June 1341 – 16 February 1391<br/>)<br/>)}}
* 1 July 1379 – 14 April 1390<br/>)}}
* 17 September 1390 – 16 February 1391<br/>)}}
}}<hr/>with Anna (1351–1365, in Thessalonica)}}
| While the only son of Andronikos III, John V was not crowned or declared heir at his father's death—partly due to being only 10-years old at the time—which contributed to the outbreak of a destructive civil war between his regents and his father's closest aide, John VI Kantakouzenos, who was instead crowned co-emperor. The conflict ended in 1347 with Kantakouzenos recognized as senior emperor, but he was deposed by John V during another civil war. After successful Turkish incursions and their seizure of Adrianople, John V appealed to the West for aid against the Ottomans, even going so far as to seek religious union and journeying to Rome to convert to Catholicism. Despite his efforts otherwise, John V was forced to recognize Ottoman suzerainty in 1371.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John VI Kantakouzenos<br/>
| 8 February 1347 – 10 December 1354<br/>)<hr/>with Matthew Kantakouzenos (1353–1357)}}
| A maternal relative of the Palaiologoi, he was declared co-emperor on 26 October 1341, and was recognized as senior emperor for ten years after the end of the civil war on 8 February 1347. Deposed by John V in 1354, he became a monk, dying on 15 June 1383.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Andronikos IV Palaiologos<br/>
| 12 August 1376 – 1 July 1379<br/>)}}<br/>May 1381 – June 1385<br/>
| Son of John V and grandson of John VI, he was named co-emperor and heir in 1352, but imprisoned and partially blinded after a failed rebellion in May 1373. He rebelled again and successfully deposed his father in 1376. Deposed by John V in 1379, he fled to Galata in exile but was restored as co-emperor and heir in May 1381, ruling over Selymbria and the coast of Marmara. Rebelled again in June 1385 but died shortly thereafter
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John VII Palaiologos<br/>
| 1385 – 1403<br/><br/>14 April – 17 September 1390<br/>)}}<br/>late 1403 – 22 September 1408<br/>
| Son of Andronikos IV, he was born in 1370, and named co-emperor under his father in 1377–79. He usurped the throne from his grandfather John V for five months in 1390, but with Ottoman mediation he was reconciled with John V and his uncle, Manuel II. As regent, he held Constantinople against the Ottomans in 1399–1402, and was then given Thessalonica as an appanage, which he governed until his death on 22 September 1408.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Manuel II Palaiologos<br/>
| 1382 – 1387<br/><br/>16 February 1391 – 21 July 1425<br/>)}}
| Second son of John V, he was born on 27 June 1350. Raised to co-emperor in 1373, he became senior emperor on John V's death and ruled until his death. He journeyed to the West European courts seeking aid against the Turks, and was able to use the Ottoman defeat in the Battle of Ankara—thanks largely to the fact that Timur and the Tartars attacked the Turks when they were besieging Constantinople, which forced the Turks' retreat—to regain some territories and throw off his vassalage to them. Manuel II died in 1425 and was succeeded by his son, John VIII.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | John VIII Palaiologos<br/>
| 21 July 1425 – 31 October 1448<br/>)}}
| Eldest surviving son of Manuel II, he was born on 18 December 1392. Raised to co-emperor around 1416 and named full autokrator in 1425, he succeeded his father on his death. Seeking aid against the resurgent Ottomans, he ratified the Union of the Churches in 1439, a move to reunite the Orthodox and Catholic churches that proved very unpopular in Constantinople.
|-
|
! scoperow style"text-align:center; background:#F8F9FA" | Constantine XI Palaiologos<br/>
| 6 January 1449 – 29 May 1453<br/>)}}
| The fourth son of Manuel II and Serbian princess Helena Dragaš, he was born on 8 February 1405. As Despot of the Morea since 1428, he distinguished himself in campaigns that annexed the Principality of Achaea and brought the Duchy of Athens under temporary Byzantine suzerainty, but was unable to repel Turkish attacks under Turahan Bey. As the eldest surviving brother, he succeeded John VIII after the latter's death. Facing the designs of the new sultan, Mehmed II, on Constantinople, Constantine acknowledged the Union of the Churches and made repeated appeals for help to the West, but in vain. Refusing to surrender the city, he was killed in battle during the Fall of Constantinople on 29 May 1453.
|}
See also
* Family tree of Byzantine emperors
* List of Roman emperors
* List of Trapezuntine emperors
* List of Roman usurpers
* List of Byzantine usurpers
* Succession to the Byzantine Empire
* List of Roman and Byzantine empresses
* List of Byzantine emperors of Armenian origin
* Family tree of Roman emperors
* History of the Byzantine Empire
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
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Byzantine Empire
Byzantine emperors
Emperors | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Byzantine_emperors | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.210167 |
4024 | Butterfly effect | for values ρ28, σ 10, β = 8/3. The butterfly effect or sensitive dependence on initial conditions is the property of a dynamical system that, starting from any of various arbitrarily close alternative initial conditions on the attractor, the iterated points will become arbitrarily spread out from each other.]]
. In each recording, the pendulum starts with almost the same initial condition. Over time, the differences in the dynamics grow from almost unnoticeable to drastic.]]
In chaos theory, the butterfly effect is the sensitive dependence on initial conditions in which a small change in one state of a deterministic nonlinear system can result in large differences in a later state.
The term is closely associated with the work of the mathematician and meteorologist Edward Norton Lorenz. He noted that the butterfly effect is derived from the example of the details of a tornado (the exact time of formation, the exact path taken) being influenced by minor perturbations such as a distant butterfly flapping its wings several weeks earlier. Lorenz originally used a seagull causing a storm but was persuaded to make it more poetic with the use of a butterfly and tornado by 1972. He discovered the effect when he observed runs of his weather model with initial condition data that were rounded in a seemingly inconsequential manner. He noted that the weather model would fail to reproduce the results of runs with the unrounded initial condition data. A very small change in initial conditions had created a significantly different outcome.
The idea that small causes may have large effects in weather was earlier acknowledged by the French mathematician and physicist Henri Poincaré. The American mathematician and philosopher Norbert Wiener also contributed to this theory. Lorenz's work placed the concept of instability of the Earth's atmosphere onto a quantitative base and linked the concept of instability to the properties of large classes of dynamic systems which are undergoing nonlinear dynamics and deterministic chaos.
The concept of the butterfly effect has since been used outside the context of weather science as a broad term for any situation where a small change is supposed to be the cause of larger consequences.
History
In The Vocation of Man (1800), Johann Gottlieb Fichte says "you could not remove a single grain of sand from its place without thereby ... changing something throughout all parts of the immeasurable whole".
Chaos theory and the sensitive dependence on initial conditions were described in numerous forms of literature. This is evidenced by the case of the three-body problem by Poincaré in 1890. He later proposed that such phenomena could be common, for example, in meteorology.
In 1898, Jacques Hadamard noted general divergence of trajectories in spaces of negative curvature. Pierre Duhem discussed the possible general significance of this in 1908.
The idea that the death of one butterfly could eventually have a far-reaching ripple effect on subsequent historical events made its earliest known appearance in "A Sound of Thunder", a 1952 short story by Ray Bradbury. "A Sound of Thunder" features time travel.
More precisely, though, almost the exact idea and the exact phrasing —of a tiny insect's wing affecting the entire atmosphere's winds— was published in a children's book which became extremely successful and well-known globally in 1962, the year before Lorenz published:
In 1961, Lorenz was running a numerical computer model to redo a weather prediction from the middle of the previous run as a shortcut. He entered the initial condition 0.506 from the printout instead of entering the full precision 0.506127 value. The result was a completely different weather scenario.
Lorenz wrote:
In 1963, Lorenz published a theoretical study of this effect in a highly cited, seminal paper called Deterministic Nonperiodic Flow (the calculations were performed on a Royal McBee LGP-30 computer).}}
Following proposals from colleagues, in later speeches and papers, Lorenz used the more poetic butterfly. According to Lorenz, when he failed to provide a title for a talk he was to present at the 139th meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1972, Philip Merilees concocted ''Does the flap of a butterfly's wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?'' as a title.
The phrase refers to the effect of a butterfly's wings creating tiny changes in the atmosphere that may ultimately alter the path of a tornado or delay, accelerate, or even prevent the occurrence of a tornado in another location. The butterfly does not power or directly create the tornado, but the term is intended to imply that the flap of the butterfly's wings can cause the tornado: in the sense that the flap of the wings is a part of the initial conditions of an interconnected complex web; one set of conditions leads to a tornado, while the other set of conditions doesn't. The flapping wing creates a small change in the initial condition of the system, which cascades to large-scale alterations of events (compare: domino effect). Had the butterfly not flapped its wings, the trajectory of the system might have been vastly different—but it's also equally possible that the set of conditions without the butterfly flapping its wings is the set that leads to a tornado.
The butterfly effect presents an obvious challenge to prediction, since initial conditions for a system such as the weather can never be known to complete accuracy. This problem motivated the development of ensemble forecasting, in which a number of forecasts are made from perturbed initial conditions.
Some scientists have since argued that the weather system is not as sensitive to initial conditions as previously believed. David Orrell argues that the major contributor to weather forecast error is model error, with sensitivity to initial conditions playing a relatively small role. Stephen Wolfram also notes that the Lorenz equations are highly simplified and do not contain terms that represent viscous effects; he believes that these terms would tend to damp out small perturbations. Recent studies using generalized Lorenz models that included additional dissipative terms and nonlinearity suggested that a larger heating parameter is required for the onset of chaos.
While the "butterfly effect" is often explained as being synonymous with sensitive dependence on initial conditions of the kind described by Lorenz in his 1963 paper (and previously observed by Poincaré), the butterfly metaphor was originally applied which took the idea a step further. Lorenz proposed a mathematical model for how tiny motions in the atmosphere scale up to affect larger systems. He found that the systems in that model could only be predicted up to a specific point in the future, and beyond that, reducing the error in the initial conditions would not increase the predictability (as long as the error is not zero). This demonstrated that a deterministic system could be "observationally indistinguishable" from a non-deterministic one in terms of predictability. Recent re-examinations of this paper suggest that it offered a significant challenge to the idea that our universe is deterministic, comparable to the challenges offered by quantum physics.
In the book entitled The Essence of Chaos published in 1993,Illustrations:{|class"wikitable" width=100%
|-
! colspan=3|The butterfly effect in the Lorenz attractor
|-
| colspan"2" style"text-align:center;" | time 0 ≤ t ≤ 30 (larger)
| style="text-align:center;" | z coordinate (larger)
|-
| colspan"2" style"text-align:center;"|
| style="text-align:center;"|
|-
|colspan3 | These figures show two segments of the three-dimensional evolution of two trajectories (one in blue, and the other in yellow) for the same period of time in the Lorenz attractor starting at two initial points that differ by only 10<sup>−5</sup> in the x-coordinate. Initially, the two trajectories seem coincident, as indicated by the small difference between the z coordinate of the blue and yellow trajectories, but for t > 23 the difference is as large as the value of the trajectory. The final position of the cones indicates that the two trajectories are no longer coincident at t 30.
|-
| style"text-align:center;" colspan"3" | An animation of the Lorenz attractor shows the continuous evolution.
|}
Theory and mathematical definition
Recurrence, the approximate return of a system toward its initial conditions, together with sensitive dependence on initial conditions, are the two main ingredients for chaotic motion. They have the practical consequence of making complex systems, such as the weather, difficult to predict past a certain time range (approximately a week in the case of weather) since it is impossible to measure the starting atmospheric conditions completely accurately.
A dynamical system displays sensitive dependence on initial conditions if points arbitrarily close together separate over time at an exponential rate. The definition is not topological, but essentially metrical. Lorenz defined sensitive dependence as follows:
The property characterizing an orbit (i.e., a solution) if most other orbits that pass close to it at some point do not remain close to it as time advances.
If M is the state space for the map <math>f^t</math>, then <math>f^t</math> displays sensitive dependence to initial conditions if for any x in M and any δ > 0, there are y in M, with distance such that <math>0 < d(x, y) < \delta </math> and such that
:<math>d(f^\tau(x), f^\tau(y)) > \mathrm{e}^{a\tau} \, d(x,y)</math>
for some positive parameter a. The definition does not require that all points from a neighborhood separate from the base point x, but it requires one positive Lyapunov exponent. In addition to a positive Lyapunov exponent, boundedness is another major feature within chaotic systems.
The simplest mathematical framework exhibiting sensitive dependence on initial conditions is provided by a particular parametrization of the logistic map:
:<math>x_{n+1} = 4 x_n (1-x_n) , \quad 0\leq x_0\leq 1,</math>
which, unlike most chaotic maps, has a closed-form solution:
:<math>x_{n}=\sin^{2}(2^{n} \theta \pi)</math>
where the initial condition parameter <math>\theta</math> is given by <math>\theta \tfrac{1}{\pi}\sin^{-1}(x_0^{1/2})</math>. For rational <math>\theta</math>, after a finite number of iterations <math>x_n</math> maps into a periodic sequence. But almost all <math>\theta</math> are irrational, and, for irrational <math>\theta</math>, <math>x_n</math> never repeats itself – it is non-periodic. This solution equation clearly demonstrates the two key features of chaos – stretching and folding: the factor 2<sup>n</sup> shows the exponential growth of stretching, which results in sensitive dependence on initial conditions (the butterfly effect), while the squared sine function keeps <math>x_n</math> folded within the range [0, 1].In physical systemsIn weather Overview The butterfly effect is most familiar in terms of weather; it can easily be demonstrated in standard weather prediction models, for example. The climate scientists James Annan and William Connolley explain that chaos is important in the development of weather prediction methods; models are sensitive to initial conditions. They add the caveat: "Of course the existence of an unknown butterfly flapping its wings has no direct bearing on weather forecasts, since it will take far too long for such a small perturbation to grow to a significant size, and we have many more immediate uncertainties to worry about. So the direct impact of this phenomenon on weather prediction is often somewhat wrong." Differentiating types of butterfly effects The concept of the butterfly effect encompasses several phenomena. The two kinds of butterfly effects, including the sensitive dependence on initial conditions, In Palmer et al.,
A comparison of the two kinds of butterfly effects In recent studies, it was reported that both meteorological and non-meteorological linear models have shown that instability plays a role in producing a butterfly effect, which is characterized by brief but significant exponential growth resulting from a small disturbance.
Recent debates on butterfly effects
The first kind of butterfly effect (BE1), known as SDIC (Sensitive Dependence on Initial Conditions), is widely recognized and demonstrated through idealized chaotic models. However, opinions differ regarding the second kind of butterfly effect, specifically the impact of a butterfly flapping its wings on tornado formation, as indicated in two 2024 articles. In more recent discussions published by Physics Today, it is acknowledged that the second kind of butterfly effect (BE2) has never been rigorously verified using a realistic weather model. While the studies suggest that BE2 is unlikely in the real atmosphere,
For the third kind of butterfly effect, the limited predictability within the Lorenz 1969 model is explained by scale interactions in one article the presence of SDIC (commonly known as the butterfly effect) implies that chaotic systems have a finite predictability limit. In a literature review, it was found that Lorenz's perspective on the predictability limit can be condensed into the following statement:
* (A). The Lorenz 1963 model qualitatively revealed the essence of a finite predictability within a chaotic system such as the atmosphere. However, it did not determine a precise limit for the predictability of the atmosphere.
* (B). In the 1960s, the two-week predictability limit was originally estimated based on a doubling time of five days in real-world models. Since then, this finding has been documented in Charney et al. (1966) and has become a consensus.
Recently, a short video has been created to present Lorenz's perspective on predictability limit.
A recent study refers to the two-week predictability limit, initially calculated in the 1960s with the Mintz-Arakawa model's five-day doubling time, as the "Predictability Limit Hypothesis." Inspired by Moore's Law, this term acknowledges the collaborative contributions of Lorenz, Mintz, and Arakawa under Charney's leadership. The hypothesis supports the investigation into extended-range predictions using both partial differential equation (PDE)-based physics methods and Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques. Revised perspectives on chaotic and non-chaotic systems By revealing coexisting chaotic and non-chaotic attractors within Lorenz models, Shen and his colleagues proposed a revised view that "weather possesses chaos and order", in contrast to the conventional view of "weather is chaotic". As a result, sensitive dependence on initial conditions (SDIC) does not always appear. Namely, SDIC appears when two orbits (i.e., solutions) become the chaotic attractor; it does not appear when two orbits move toward the same point attractor. The above animation for double pendulum motion provides an analogy. For large angles of swing the motion of the pendulum is often chaotic. By comparison, for small angles of swing, motions are non-chaotic.
Multistability is defined when a system (e.g., the double pendulum system) contains more than one bounded attractor that depends only on initial conditions. The multistability was illustrated using kayaking in Figure on the right side (i.e., Figure 1 of ) where the appearance of strong currents and a stagnant area suggests instability and local stability, respectively. As a result, when two kayaks move along strong currents, their paths display SDIC. On the other hand, when two kayaks move into a stagnant area, they become trapped, showing no typical SDIC (although a chaotic transient may occur). Such features of SDIC or no SDIC suggest two types of solutions and illustrate the nature of multistability.
By taking into consideration time-varying multistability that is associated with the modulation of large-scale processes (e.g., seasonal forcing) and aggregated feedback of small-scale processes (e.g., convection), the above revised view is refined as follows:
"The atmosphere possesses chaos and order; it includes, as examples, emerging organized systems (such as tornadoes) and time varying forcing from recurrent seasons."
In quantum mechanics
The potential for sensitive dependence on initial conditions (the butterfly effect) has been studied in a number of cases in semiclassical and quantum physics, including atoms in strong fields and the anisotropic Kepler problem. Some authors have argued that extreme (exponential) dependence on initial conditions is not expected in pure quantum treatments; however, the sensitive dependence on initial conditions demonstrated in classical motion is included in the semiclassical treatments developed by Martin Gutzwiller and John B. Delos and co-workers. The random matrix theory and simulations with quantum computers prove that some versions of the butterfly effect in quantum mechanics do not exist.
Other authors suggest that the butterfly effect can be observed in quantum systems. Zbyszek P. Karkuszewski et al. consider the time evolution of quantum systems which have slightly different Hamiltonians. They investigate the level of sensitivity of quantum systems to small changes in their given Hamiltonians. David Poulin et al. presented a quantum algorithm to measure fidelity decay, which "measures the rate at which identical initial states diverge when subjected to slightly different dynamics". They consider fidelity decay to be "the closest quantum analog to the (purely classical) butterfly effect". Whereas the classical butterfly effect considers the effect of a small change in the position and/or velocity of an object in a given Hamiltonian system, the quantum butterfly effect considers the effect of a small change in the Hamiltonian system with a given initial position and velocity. This quantum butterfly effect has been demonstrated experimentally. Quantum and semiclassical treatments of system sensitivity to initial conditions are known as quantum chaos.<ref name"What is... Quantum Chaos"/><ref name"iqc.ca"/>
In popular culture
The butterfly effect has appeared across mediums such as literature (for instance, A Sound of Thunder), films and television (such as The Simpsons), video games (such as Life Is Strange), webcomics (such as Homestuck), AI-driven expansive language models, and more.
See also
<!-- please keep entries in alphabetical order -->
<!-- Please keep entries in alphabetical order & add a short description WP:SEEALSO -->
* Avalanche effect
* Behavioral cusp
* Cascading failure
* Catastrophe theory
* Causality
* Chain reaction
* Clapotis
* Determinism
* Domino effect
* Dynamical system
* Fractal
* Great Stirrup Controversy
* Innovation butterfly
* Kessler syndrome
* Norton's dome
* Numerical analysis
* Point of divergence
* Positive feedback
* Potentiality and actuality
* Representativeness heuristic
* Ripple effect
* Snowball effect
* Traffic congestion
* Tropical cyclogenesis
* Unintended consequences
<!-- please keep entries in alphabetical order -->
<!-- Please don't add the movie DASAVATHARAM here. There is a discussion on the talk page of the Chaos theory article this movie... if this movie should be mentioned or not in the realm of chaos theory. The current opinion is, that this movie should not (yet) be added to this list. Please add your opinion add the talk page. This is the way Wikipedia works, Thank you. -->
References
Further reading
* James Gleick, Chaos: Making a New Science, New York: Viking, 1987. 368 pp.
*
*
* Bradbury, Ray. "A Sound of Thunder." Collier's. 28 June 1952
External links
* [https://vimeo.com/287523707/ Weather and Chaos: The Work of Edward N. Lorenz]. A short documentary that explains the "butterfly effect" in context of Lorenz's work.
* [https://hypertextbook.com/chaos/ The Chaos Hypertextbook]. An introductory primer on chaos and fractals
*
* [https://necsi.edu/butterfly-effect New England Complex Systems Institute - Concepts: Butterfly Effect]
* [https://chaosbook.org/ ChaosBook.org]. Advanced graduate textbook on chaos (no fractals)
*
Category:Causality
Category:Chaos theory
Category:Determinism
Category:Metaphors referring to insects
Category:Physical phenomena
Category:Stability theory | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.254913 |
4027 | Borland | in California (Borland International, Inc.)<br/>April 29, 1998 (Inprise Corporation)<br/>April 29, 1998 (Borland Software Corporation)
| founders = Niels Jensen<br/>Ole Henriksen<br/>Mogens Glad<br/>Philippe Kahn
| fate = acquired by Micro Focus, merged ()
| parent = OpenText
| defunct =
| location = Austin, Texas
| key_people = Erik Prusch (acting CEO)
| num_employees approx. 1,100
| industry = Computer software
| products = Borland SilkTest, Borland StarTeam, Borland Together, others
| revenue US$172 million (2008)
| website =
}}
Borland Software Corporation was a computing technology company founded in 1983 by Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, Mogens Glad, and Philippe Kahn. Its main business was developing and selling software development and software deployment products. Borland was first headquartered in Scotts Valley, California, then in Cupertino, California, and then in Austin, Texas. In 2009, the company became a full subsidiary of the British firm Micro Focus International plc. In 2023, Micro Focus (including Borland) was acquired by Canadian firm OpenText, which later absorbed Borland's portfolio into its application delivery management division.History
}}
The 1980s: Foundations
Borland Ltd. was founded in August 1981 by three Danish citizens Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, and Mogens Glad to develop products like Word Index for the CP/M operating system using an off-the-shelf company. However, the response to the company's products at the CP/M-82 show in San Francisco showed that a U.S. company would be needed to reach the American market. They met Philippe Kahn, who had just moved to Silicon Valley and had been a key developer of the Micral. Kahn was chairman, president, and CEO of Borland Inc. at its inception in 1983 and until 1995.
The first name for the company was not Borland. It was MIT. The acronym MIT stood for "Market In Time". The name "Borland" originated from a small company in Ireland, which was one of MIT initial customers. After they went bankrupt, MIT sought permission to acquire and use the name "Borland" in the U.S., following a legal recommendation during a rebranding prompted by a letter from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology).
The main shareholders at the incorporation of Borland were Niels Jensen (250,000 shares), Ole Henriksen (160,000), Mogens Glad (100,000), and Kahn (80,000).Borland International, Inc. eraBorland developed various software development tools. Its first product was Turbo Pascal in 1983, developed by Anders Hejlsberg (who later developed .NET and C# for Microsoft) and before Borland acquired the product which was sold in Scandinavia under the name Compas Pascal. In 1984, Borland launched Sidekick, a time organization, notebook, and calculator utility that was an early terminate-and-stay-resident program (TSR) for MS-DOS compatible operating systems.
By the mid-1980s, the company had an exhibit at the 1985 West Coast Computer Faire along with IBM and AT&T. Bruce Webster reported that "the legend of Turbo Pascal has by now reached mythic proportions, as evidenced by the number of firms that, in marketing meetings, make plans to become 'the next Borland'". After Turbo Pascal and Sidekick, the company launched other applications such as SuperKey and Lightning, all developed in Denmark. While the Danes remained majority shareholders, board members included Kahn, Tim Berry, John Nash, and David Heller. With the assistance of John Nash and David Heller, both British members of the Borland Board, the company was taken public on London's Unlisted Securities Market (USM) in 1986.
Schroders was the lead investment banker. According to the London IPO filings, the management team was Philippe Kahn as president, Spencer Ozawa as VP of Operations, Marie Bourget as CFO, and Spencer Leyton as VP of sales and business development. All software development continued to take place in Denmark and later London as the Danish co-founders moved there. A first US IPO followed in 1989 after Ben Rosen joined the Borland board with Goldman Sachs as the lead banker and a second offering in 1991 with Lazard as the lead banker.
In 1985, Borland acquired Analytica and its Reflex database product. Forrester Research considered Borland with Analytica, Ashton-Tate, Lotus Development, and Microsoft the "Big Four" of personal computer software. The engineering team of Analytica, managed by Brad Silverberg and including Reflex co-founder Adam Bosworth, became the core of Borland's engineering team in the US. Brad Silverberg was VP of engineering until he left in early 1990 to head up the Personal Systems division at Microsoft. Adam Bosworth initiated and headed up the Quattro project until moving to Microsoft later in 1990 to take over the project which eventually became Access.
In 1987, Borland purchased Wizard Systems and incorporated portions of the Wizard C technology into Turbo C. Bob Jervis, the author of Wizard C became a Borland employee. Turbo C was released on May 18, 1987. This drove a wedge between Borland and Niels Jensen and the other members of his team who had been working on a brand-new series of compilers at their London development centre. They reached an agreement and spun off a company named Jensen & Partners International (JPI), later TopSpeed. JPI first launched an MS-DOS compiler named JPI Modula-2, which later became TopSpeed Modula-2, and followed up with TopSpeed C, TopSpeed C++, and TopSpeed Pascal compilers for both the MS-DOS and OS/2 operating systems. The TopSpeed compiler technology still exists as the underlying technology of the Clarion 4GL programming language, a Windows development tool.
In September 1987, Borland purchased Ansa-Software, including their Paradox (version 2.0) database management tool. Richard Schwartz, a cofounder of Ansa, became Borland's CTO and Ben Rosen joined the Borland board.
The Quattro Pro spreadsheet was launched in 1989. Lotus Development, under the leadership of Jim Manzi, sued Borland for copyright infringement (see Look and feel). The litigation, ''Lotus Dev. Corp. v. Borland Int'l, Inc.'', brought forward Borland's open standards position as opposed to Lotus' closed approach. Borland, under Kahn's leadership, took a position of principle and announced that they would defend against Lotus' legal position and "fight for programmer's rights". After a decision in favour of Borland by the First Circuit Court of Appeals, the case went to the United States Supreme Court. Because Justice John Paul Stevens had recused himself, only eight justices heard the case, and concluded in a 4–4 tie.
Additionally, Borland's approach towards software piracy and intellectual property (IP) included its "Borland no-nonsense license agreement"; allowing the developer/user to utilize its products "just like a book". The user was allowed to make multiple copies of a program, as long as it was the only copy in use at any point in time.
The 1990s: Rise and change
In September 1991, Borland purchased Ashton-Tate, bringing the dBASE and InterBase databases to the house, in an all-stock transaction. However, competition with Microsoft was fierce. Microsoft launched the competing database Microsoft Access and bought the dBASE clone FoxPro in 1992, undercutting Borland's prices. During the early 1990s, Borland's implementation of C and C++ outsold Microsoft's. Borland survived as a company, but no longer dominated the software tools that it once had. It went through a radical transition in products, financing, and staff, and became a very different company from the one which challenged Microsoft and Lotus in the early 1990s.
The internal problems that arose with the Ashton-Tate merger were a large part of the downfall. Ashton-Tate's product portfolio proved to be weak, with no provision for evolution into the GUI environment of Windows. Almost all product lines were discontinued. The consolidation of duplicate support and development offices was costly and disruptive. Worst of all, the highest revenue earner of the combined company was dBASE with no Windows version ready. Borland had an internal project to clone dBASE which was intended to run on Windows and was part of the strategy of the acquisition, but by late 1992 this was abandoned due to technical flaws and the company had to constitute a replacement team (the ObjectVision team, redeployed) headed by Bill Turpin to redo the job.
Borland lacked the financial strength to project its marketing and move internal resources off other products to shore up the dBASE/W effort. Layoffs occurred in 1993 to keep the company afloat, the third instance of this in five years. By the time dBASE for Windows eventually shipped, the developer community had moved on to other products such as Clipper or FoxBase, and dBASE never regained a significant share of Ashton-Tate's former market. This happened against the backdrop of the rise in Microsoft's combined Office product marketing.
A change in market conditions also contributed to Borland's fall from prominence. In the 1980s, companies had few people who understood the growing personal computer phenomenon and so most technical people were given free rein to purchase whatever software they thought they needed. Borland had done an excellent job marketing to those with a highly technical bent. By the mid-1990s, however, companies were beginning to ask what the return was on the investment they had made in this loosely controlled PC software buying spree. Company executives were starting to ask questions that were hard for technically minded staff to answer, and so corporate standards began to be created. This required new kinds of marketing and support materials from software vendors, but Borland remained focused on the technical side of its products.
In 1993 Borland explored ties with WordPerfect as a possible way to form a suite of programs to rival Microsoft's nascent integration strategy. WordPerfect itself was struggling with a late and troubled transition to Windows. The eventual joint company effort, named Borland Office for Windows (a combination of the WordPerfect word processor, Quattro Pro spreadsheet, and Paradox database) was introduced at the 1993 Comdex computer show. Borland Office never made significant inroads against Microsoft Office. WordPerfect was then bought by Novell. In October 1994, Borland sold Quattro Pro and rights to sell up to a million copies of Paradox to Novell for $140 million in cash, repositioning the company on its core software development tools and the Interbase database engine and shifting toward client-server scenarios in corporate applications. This later proved a good foundation for the shift to web development tools.
Philippe Kahn and the Borland board disagreed on how to focus the company, and Kahn resigned as chairman, CEO and president, after 12 years, in January 1995. Kahn remained on the board until November 7, 1996. Borland named Gary Wetsel as CEO, but he resigned in July 1996. William F. Miller was interim CEO until September of that year, when Whitney G. Lynn (the current chairman at mergers & acquisitions company XRP Healthcare) became interim president and CEO (along with other executive changes), followed by a succession of CEOs including Dale Fuller and Tod Nielsen.
The Delphi 1 rapid application development (RAD) environment was launched in 1995, under the leadership of Anders Hejlsberg.
In 1996 Borland acquired Open Environment Corporation, a Cambridge-based company founded by John J. Donovan.
On November 25, 1996, Del Yocam was hired as Borland CEO and chairman.
In 1997, Borland sold Paradox to Corel, but retained all development rights for the core BDE. In November 1997, Borland acquired Visigenic, a middleware company that was focused on implementations of CORBA.Inprise Corporation eraIn April 1998, Borland International, Inc. announced it had become Inprise Corporation.
For several years, before and during the Inprise name, Borland suffered from serious financial losses and poor public image. When the name was changed to Inprise, many thought Borland had gone out of business. In March 1999, dBASE was sold to KSoft, Inc. which was soon renamed dBASE Inc. (In 2004 dBASE Inc. was renamed to DataBased Intelligence, Inc.).
In 1999, Dale L. Fuller replaced Yocam. At this time Fuller's title was "interim president and CEO". The "interim" was dropped in December 2000. Keith Gottfried served in senior executive positions with the company from 2000 to 2004.
A proposed merger between Inprise and Corel was announced in February 2000, aimed at producing Linux-based products. The plan was abandoned when Corel's shares fell and it became clear that there was no strategic fit.
InterBase 6.0 was made available as open-source software in July 2000.
In November 2000, Inprise Corporation announced the company intended to officially change its name to Borland Software Corporation. The legal name of the company would continue to be Inprise Corporation until the completion of the renaming process during the first quarter of 2001. Once the name change was completed, the company would also expect to change its Nasdaq market symbol from "INPR" to "BORL".
Borland Software Corporation era
On January 2, 2001, Borland Software Corporation announced it had completed its name change from Inprise Corporation. Effective at the opening of trading on Nasdaq, the company's Nasdaq market symbol would also be changed from "INPR" to "BORL".
Under the Borland name and a new management team headed by president and CEO Dale L. Fuller, a now-smaller and profitable Borland refocused on Delphi and created a version of Delphi and C++Builder for Linux, both under the name Kylix. This brought Borland's expertise in integrated development environments to the Linux platform for the first time. Kylix was launched in 2001.
Plans to spin off the InterBase division as a separate company were abandoned after Borland and the people who were to run the new company could not agree on terms for the separation. Borland stopped open-source releases of InterBase and has developed and sold new versions at a fast pace.
In 2001, Delphi 6 became the first integrated development environment to support web services. All of the company's development platforms now support web services.
C#Builder was released in 2003 as a native C# development tool, competing with Visual Studio .NET. By the 2005 release, C#Builder, Delphi for Win32, and Delphi for .NET were combined into one IDE named "Borland Developer Studio", though it was still
popularly known as "Delphi". In late 2002 Borland purchased design tool vendor TogetherSoft and tool publisher Starbase, makers of the StarTeam configuration management tool and the CaliberRM requirements management tool (eventually, CaliberRM was renamed as "Caliber"). The latest releases of JBuilder and Delphi integrate these tools to give developers a broader set of tools for development.
Former CEO Dale Fuller quit in July 2005, but remained on the board of directors. Former COO Scott Arnold took the title of interim president and chief executive officer until November 8, 2005, when it was announced that Tod Nielsen would take over as CEO effective November 9, 2005. Nielsen remained with the company until January 2009, when he accepted the position of chief operating officer at VMware; CFO Erik Prusch then took over as acting president and CEO. The transaction was approved by Borland shareholders on July 22, 2009, with Micro Focus acquiring the company for $1.50 per share. Following Micro Focus shareholder approval and the required corporate filings, the transaction was completed in late July 2009. Borland was estimated to have 750 employees at the time.
On April 5, 2015, Micro Focus announced the completion of integrating the Attachmate Group of companies that was merged on November 20, 2014. During the integration period, the affected companies were merged into one organization. In the announced reorganization, Borland products would be part of the Micro Focus portfolio.
Subsidiaries
*Leaders: In October 2005, Borland acquired Leaders, to add its IT management and governance suite, named Tempo, to the Borland product line.
*CodeGear: On February 8, 2006, Borland announced the divestiture of their IDE division, including Delphi, JBuilder, and InterBase. At the same time, they announced the planned acquisition of Segue Software, a maker of software test and quality tools, to concentrate on application life-cycle management (ALM). On March 20, 2006, Borland announced its acquisition of Gauntlet Systems, a provider of technology that screens software under development for quality and security. On November 14, 2006, Borland announced its decision to separate the developer tools group into a wholly-owned subsidiary. The newly formed operation, CodeGear, was responsible for four IDE product lines. On May 7, 2008, Borland announced the sale of the CodeGear division to Embarcadero Technologies for an expected price and in CodeGear accounts receivables retained by Borland.
Products
RecentThe products acquired from Segue Software include Silk Central, Silk Performer, and Silk Test. The Silk line was first announced in 1997. Other programs are:
Historical products
Unreleased software
* Turbo Modula-2: Later sold by TopSpeed as TopSpeed Modula-2.
Marketing
* CB Magazine: It is an official magazine by Borland Japan. The magazine was republished on April 3, 1997.
Renaming to Inprise Corporation
Along with renaming from Borland International, Inc. to Inprise Corporation, the company refocused its efforts on targeting enterprise applications development. Borland hired a marketing firm Lexicon Branding to come up with a new name for the company. Yocam explained that the new name, Inprise, was meant to evoke "integrating the enterprise". The idea was to integrate Borland's tools, Delphi, C++Builder, and JBuilder with enterprise environment software, including Visigenic's implementations of CORBA, Visibroker for C++ and Java, and the new product, Application Server.
Frank Borland
Frank Borland is a mascot character for Borland products. According to Philippe Kahn, the mascot first appeared in advertisements and the cover of Borland Sidekick 1.0 manual, which was in 1984 during Borland International, Inc. era. Frank Borland also appeared in Turbo Tutor - A Turbo Pascal Tutorial, Borland JBuilder 2.
A live action version of Frank Borland was made after Micro Focus plc had acquired Borland Software Corporation. This version was created by True Agency Limited. An introductory film was also made about the mascot.See also
* List of file formats (alphabetical)
* Lotus Development Corp. v. Borland International, Inc.
Citations
General references
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External links
* [https://web.archive.org/web/19980423080957/http://www.borland.com/ Borland International, Inc.]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20010118233900/http://www.inprise.com/ Inprise Corporation]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20141029002108/http://www.borland.com/ Borland Software Corporation]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20200224020050/https://www.microfocus.com/en-us/products/borland/overview?utm_medium301&utm_sourceborland.com Micro Focus Borland site]
Category:OpenText
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4031 | Buckminster Fuller | | birth_place = Milton, Massachusetts, U.S.
| death_date
| death_place = Los Angeles, California, U.S.
| alma_mater | occupation
| spouse =
| children = 2, including Allegra Fuller Snyder
<!-- Neither link elsewhere: | children 2: Allegra Fuller Snyder and Alexandra who died in childhood -->| significant_buildings Geodesic dome (1940s)
| significant_projects = Dymaxion house (1928)
| embedded =
| education | era 20th-century philosophy
| region =
| notable_works =
| main_interests =
| notable_ideas =
* Geoscope
* Space frame
* Spaceship earth
* Synergetics
* Tensegrity
}}
| influences =
| influenced =
}}
| awards = Presidential Medal of Freedom (1983)
| education = Harvard University (expelled)
}}
Richard Buckminster Fuller (; July 12, 1895 – July 1, 1983) was an American architect, systems theorist, writer, designer, inventor, philosopher, and futurist. He styled his name as R. Buckminster Fuller in his writings, publishing more than 30 books and coining or popularizing such terms as "Spaceship Earth", "Dymaxion" (e.g., Dymaxion house, Dymaxion car, Dymaxion map), "ephemeralization", "synergetics", and "tensegrity".
Fuller developed numerous inventions, mainly architectural designs, and popularized the widely known geodesic dome; carbon molecules known as fullerenes were later named by scientists for their structural and mathematical resemblance to geodesic spheres. He also served as the second World President of Mensa International from 1974 to 1983.
Fuller was awarded 28 United States patents and many honorary doctorates. In 1960, he was awarded the Frank P. Brown Medal from The Franklin Institute. He was elected an honorary member of Phi Beta Kappa in 1967, on the occasion of the 50-year reunion of his Harvard class of 1917 (from which he had been expelled in his first year). He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1968. The same year, he was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member. He became a full Academician in 1970, and he received the Gold Medal award from the American Institute of Architects the same year. Also in 1970, Fuller received the title of Master Architect from Alpha Rho Chi (APX), the national fraternity for architecture and the allied arts.
In 1976, he received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. In 1977, he received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement. He also received numerous other awards, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, presented to him on February 23, 1983, by President Ronald Reagan. Life and work Fuller was born on July 12, 1895, in Milton, Massachusetts, the son of Richard Buckminster Fuller, a prosperous leather and tea merchant, and Caroline Wolcott Andrews. He was a grand-nephew of Margaret Fuller, an American journalist, critic, and women's rights advocate associated with the American transcendentalism movement. The unusual middle name, Buckminster, was an ancestral family name. As a child, Richard Buckminster Fuller tried numerous variations of his name. He used to sign his name differently each year in the guest register of his family summer vacation home at Bear Island, Maine. He finally settled on R. Buckminster Fuller.
Fuller spent much of his youth on Bear Island, in Penobscot Bay off the coast of Maine. He attended Froebelian Kindergarten He was dissatisfied with the way geometry was taught in school, disagreeing with the notions that a chalk dot on the blackboard represented an "empty" mathematical point, or that a line could stretch off to infinity. To him these were illogical, and led to his work on synergetics. He often made items from materials he found in the woods, and sometimes made his own tools. He experimented with designing a new apparatus for human propulsion of small boats. By age 12, he had invented a 'push pull' system for propelling a rowboat by use of an inverted umbrella connected to the transom with a simple oar lock which allowed the user to face forward to point the boat toward its destination. Later in life, Fuller took exception to the term "invention."
Years later, he decided that this sort of experience had provided him with not only an interest in design, but also a habit of being familiar with and knowledgeable about the materials that his later projects would require. Fuller earned a machinist's certification, and knew how to use the press brake, stretch press, and other tools and equipment used in the sheet metal trade. Education Fuller attended Milton Academy in Massachusetts, and after that began studying at Harvard College, where he was affiliated with Adams House. He was expelled from Harvard twice: first for spending all his money partying with a vaudeville troupe, and then, after having been readmitted, for his "irresponsibility and lack of interest." By his own appraisal, he was a non-conforming misfit in the fraternity environment. Depression and epiphany Fuller recalled 1927 as a pivotal year of his life. His daughter Alexandra had died in 1922 of complications from polio and spinal meningitis just before her fourth birthday. Barry Katz, a Stanford University scholar who wrote about Fuller, found signs that around this time in his life Fuller had developed depression and anxiety. Fuller dwelled on his daughter's death, suspecting that it was connected with the Fullers' damp and drafty living conditions.
Fuller said that he had experienced a profound incident which would provide direction and purpose for his life. He felt as though he was suspended several feet above the ground enclosed in a white sphere of light. A voice spoke directly to Fuller, and declared:
Fuller stated that this experience led to a profound re-examination of his life. He ultimately chose to embark on "an experiment, to find what a single individual could contribute to changing the world and benefiting all humanity."
Speaking to audiences later in life, Fuller would frequently recount the story of his Lake Michigan experience, and its transformative impact on his life.
Recovery
In 1927, Fuller resolved to think independently which included a commitment to "the search for the principles governing the universe and help advance the evolution of humanity in accordance with them ... finding ways of doing more with less to the end that all people everywhere can have more and more." By 1928, Fuller was living in Greenwich Village and spending much of his time at the popular café Romany Marie's, where he had spent an evening in conversation with Marie and Eugene O'Neill several years earlier. Fuller accepted a job decorating the interior of the café in exchange for meals, and models of the Dymaxion house were exhibited at the café. Isamu Noguchi arrived during 1929—Constantin Brâncuși, an old friend of Marie's, had directed him there including the modeling of the Dymaxion car based on recent work by Aurel Persu. It was the beginning of their lifelong friendship.
Geodesic domes
Fuller taught at Black Mountain College in North Carolina during the summers of 1948 and 1949, serving as its Summer Institute director in 1949. Fuller had been shy and withdrawn, but he was persuaded to participate in a theatrical performance of Erik Satie's Le piège de Méduse produced by John Cage, who was also teaching at Black Mountain. During rehearsals, under the tutelage of Arthur Penn, then a student at Black Mountain, Fuller broke through his inhibitions to become confident as a performer and speaker.
At Black Mountain, with the support of a group of professors and students, he began reinventing a project that would make him famous: the geodesic dome. Although the geodesic dome had been created, built and awarded a German patent on June 19, 1925, by Dr. Walther Bauersfeld, Fuller was awarded United States patents. Fuller's patent application made no mention of Bauersfeld's self-supporting dome built some 26 years prior. Although Fuller undoubtedly popularized this type of structure he is mistakenly given credit for its design.
One of his early models was first constructed in 1945 at Bennington College in Vermont, where he lectured often. Although Bauersfeld's dome could support a full skin of concrete it was not until 1949 that Fuller erected a geodesic dome building that could sustain its own weight with no practical limits. It was in diameter and constructed of aluminium aircraft tubing and a vinyl-plastic skin, in the form of an icosahedron. To prove his design, Fuller suspended from the structure's framework several students who had helped him build it. The U.S. government recognized the importance of this work, and employed his firm Geodesics, Inc. in Raleigh, North Carolina to make small domes for the Marines. Within a few years, there were thousands of such domes around the world.
Fuller's first "continuous tension – discontinuous compression" geodesic dome (full sphere in this case) was constructed at the University of Oregon Architecture School in 1959 with the help of students. These continuous tension – discontinuous compression structures featured single force compression members (no flexure or bending moments) that did not touch each other and were 'suspended' by the tensional members.
Dymaxion Chronofile
For half of a century, Fuller developed many ideas, designs, and inventions, particularly regarding practical, inexpensive shelter and transportation. He documented his life, philosophy, and ideas scrupulously by a daily diary (later called the Dymaxion Chronofile), and by twenty-eight publications. Fuller financed some of his experiments with inherited funds, sometimes augmented by funds invested by his collaborators, one example being the Dymaxion car project.
World stage
by Buckminster Fuller, 1967]]
in Carbondale, Illinois]]
International recognition began with the success of huge geodesic domes during the 1950s. Fuller lectured at North Carolina State University in Raleigh in 1949, where he met James Fitzgibbon, who would become a close friend and colleague. Fitzgibbon was director of Geodesics, Inc. and Synergetics, Inc. the first licensees to design geodesic domes. Thomas C. Howard was lead designer, architect, and engineer for both companies. Richard Lewontin, a new faculty member in population genetics at North Carolina State University, provided Fuller with computer calculations for the lengths of the domes' edges.
Fuller began working with architect Shoji Sadao This building is now the "Montreal Biosphère".
In 1962, the artist and searcher John McHale wrote the first monograph on Fuller, published by George Braziller in New York.
After employing several Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIU) graduate students to rebuild his models following an apartment fire in the summer of 1959, Fuller was recruited by longtime friend Harold Cohen to serve as a research professor of "design science exploration" at the institution's School of Art and Design. According to SIU architecture professor Jon Davey, the position was "unlike most faculty appointments ... more a celebrity role than a teaching job" in which Fuller offered few courses and was only stipulated to spend two months per year on campus. Nevertheless, his time in Carbondale was "extremely productive", and Fuller was promoted to university professor in 1968 and distinguished university professor in 1972. During this period, he also held a joint fellowship at a consortium of Philadelphia-area institutions, including the University of Pennsylvania, Bryn Mawr College, Haverford College, Swarthmore College, and the University City Science Center; as a result of this affiliation, the University of Pennsylvania appointed him university professor emeritus in 1975. His speech can be watched in the archives of the AA School of Architecture, in which he spoke after Sir Robert Sainsbury's introductory speech and Foster's keynote address.
In May, 1983 Buckminster Fuller participated in an interview with futurist Barbara Marx Hubbard. The hour-long DVD, "Our Spiritual Experience: A Conversation with Buckminster Fuller and Barbara Marx Hubbard" was produced by David L. Smith and was hosted by Michael Toms of New Dimensions Radio. The program was recorded at Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio. It can be viewed at Spiritual Visionaries.com, a new website expected to go "public" in February, 2025.[David L. Smith Productions]
Death
)]]
In the year of his death, Fuller described himself as follows:
Fuller died on July 1, 1983, 11 days before his 88th birthday. During the period leading up to his death, his wife had been lying comatose in a Los Angeles hospital<!-- What was the name of this hospital? -->, dying of cancer. It was while visiting her there that he exclaimed, at a certain point: "She is squeezing my hand!" He then stood up, had a heart attack, and died an hour later, at age 87. His wife of 66 years died 36 hours later. They are buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Philosophy
Buckminster Fuller was a Unitarian, and, like his grandfather Arthur Buckminster Fuller (brother of Margaret Fuller), a Unitarian minister. Fuller was also an early environmental activist, aware of Earth's finite resources, and promoted a principle he termed "ephemeralization", which, according to futurist and Fuller disciple Stewart Brand, was defined as "doing more with less". Resources and waste from crude, inefficient products could be recycled into making more valuable products, thus increasing the efficiency of the entire process. Fuller also coined the word synergetics, a catch-all term used broadly for communicating experiences using geometric concepts, and more specifically, the empirical study of systems in transformation; his focus was on total system behavior unpredicted by the behavior of any isolated components.
Fuller was a pioneer in thinking globally and explored energy and material efficiency in the fields of architecture, engineering, and design. In his book Critical Path (1981) he cited the opinion of François de Chadenèdes (1920–1999) that petroleum, from the standpoint of its replacement cost in our current energy "budget" (essentially, the net incoming solar flux), had cost nature "over a million dollars" per U.S. gallon ($300,000 per litre) to produce. From this point of view, its use as a transportation fuel by people commuting to work represents a huge net loss compared to their actual earnings. An encapsulation quotation of his views might best be summed up as: "There is no energy crisis, only a crisis of ignorance."
Though Fuller was concerned about sustainability and human survival under the existing socioeconomic system, he remained optimistic about humanity's future. Defining wealth in terms of knowledge as the "technological ability to protect, nurture, support, and accommodate all growth needs of life", his analysis of the condition of "Spaceship Earth" caused him to conclude that at a certain time during the 1970s, humanity had attained an unprecedented state. He was convinced that the accumulation of relevant knowledge, combined with the quantities of major recyclable resources that had already been extracted from the earth, had attained a critical level, such that competition for necessities had become unnecessary. Cooperation had become the optimum survival strategy. He declared: "selfishness is unnecessary and hence-forth unrationalizable ... War is obsolete." He criticized previous utopian schemes as too exclusive and thought this was a major source of their failure. To work, he felt that a utopia needed to include everyone.
Fuller was influenced by Alfred Korzybski's idea of general semantics. In the 1950s, Fuller attended seminars and workshops organized by the Institute of General Semantics, and he delivered the annual Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture in 1955. Korzybski is mentioned in the Introduction of his book Synergetics. The two shared a remarkable amount of similarity in their general semantics formulations.
In his 1970 book, I Seem To Be a Verb, he wrote: "I live on Earth at present, and I don't know what I am. I know that I am not a category. I am not a thing—a noun. I seem to be a verb, an evolutionary process—an integral function of the universe."
Fuller wrote that the universe's natural analytic geometry was based on tetrahedra arrays. He developed this in several ways, from the close-packing of spheres and the number of compressive or tensile members required to stabilize an object in space. One confirming result was that the strongest possible homogeneous truss is cyclically tetrahedral.
He had become a guru of the design, architecture, and "alternative" communities, such as Drop City, the community of experimental artists to whom he awarded the 1966 "Dymaxion Award" for "poetically economic" domed living structures.
Major design projects
The geodesic dome
Fuller was most famous for his lattice shell structures – geodesic domes, which have been used as parts of military radar stations, civic buildings, environmental protest camps, and exhibition attractions. An examination of the geodesic design by Walther Bauersfeld for the Zeiss-Planetarium, built some 28 years prior to Fuller's work, reveals that Fuller's Geodesic Dome patent (U.S. 2,682,235; awarded in 1954) is the same design as Bauersfeld's.
Their construction is based on extending some basic principles to build simple "tensegrity" structures (tetrahedron, octahedron, and the closest packing of spheres), making them lightweight and stable. The geodesic dome was a result of Fuller's exploration of nature's constructing principles to find design solutions. The Fuller Dome is referenced in the Hugo Award-winning 1968 novel Stand on Zanzibar by John Brunner, in which a geodesic dome is said to cover the entire island of Manhattan, and it floats on air due to the hot-air balloon effect of the large air-mass under the dome (and perhaps its construction of lightweight materials).
Transportation
shown entering the car, carrying coat]]
The Dymaxion car was a vehicle designed by Fuller, featured prominently at Chicago's 1933-1934 Century of Progress World's Fair. During the Great Depression, Fuller formed the Dymaxion Corporation and built three prototypes with noted naval architect Starling Burgess and a team of 27 workmen — using donated money as well as a family inheritance.
Fuller associated the word Dymaxion, a blend of the words dynamic, maximum, and tension to sum up the goal of his study, "maximum gain of advantage from minimal energy input".
The Dymaxion was not an automobile but rather the 'ground-taxying mode' of a vehicle that might one day be designed to fly, land and drive — an "Omni-Medium Transport" for air, land and water. Fuller focused on the landing and taxiing qualities, and noted severe limitations in its handling. The team made improvements and refinements to the platform,
Shortly after launch, a prototype rolled over and crashed, killing the Dymaxion's driver and seriously injuring its passengers. Fuller blamed the accident on a second car that collided with the Dymaxion. Eyewitnesses reported, however, that the other car hit the Dymaxion only after it had begun to roll over. — eventually selling all three, dissolving Dymaxion Corporation and maintaining the Dymaxion was never intended as a commercial venture. One of the three original prototypes survives.
Housing
Museum in Dearborn, Michigan]]
Fuller's energy-efficient and inexpensive Dymaxion house garnered much interest, but only two prototypes were ever produced. Here the term "Dymaxion" is used in effect to signify a "radically strong and light tensegrity structure". One of Fuller's Dymaxion Houses is on display as a permanent exhibit at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. Designed and developed during the mid-1940s, this prototype is a round structure (not a dome), shaped something like the flattened "bell" of certain jellyfish. It has several innovative features, including revolving dresser drawers, and a fine-mist shower that reduces water consumption. According to Fuller biographer Steve Crooks, the house was designed to be delivered in two cylindrical packages, with interior color panels available at local dealers. A circular structure at the top of the house was designed to rotate around a central mast to use natural winds for cooling and air circulation.
Conceived nearly two decades earlier, and developed in Wichita, Kansas, the house was designed to be lightweight, adapted to windy climates, cheap to produce and easy to assemble. Because of its light weight and portability, the Dymaxion House was intended to be the ideal housing for individuals and families who wanted the option of easy mobility. The design included a "Go-Ahead-With-Life Room" stocked with maps, charts, and helpful tools for travel "through time and space". It was to be produced using factories, workers, and technologies that had produced World War II aircraft. It looked ultramodern at the time, built of metal, and sheathed in polished aluminum. The basic model enclosed of floor area. Due to publicity, there were many orders during the early Post-War years, but the company that Fuller and others had formed to produce the houses failed due to management problems.
In 1967, Fuller developed a concept for an offshore floating city named Triton City and published a report on the design the following year. Models of the city aroused the interest of President Lyndon B. Johnson who, after leaving office, had them placed in the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum.
In 1969, Fuller began the Otisco Project, named after its location in Otisco, New York. The project developed and demonstrated concrete spray with mesh-covered wireforms for producing large-scale, load-bearing spanning structures built on-site, without the use of pouring molds, other adjacent surfaces, or hoisting. The initial method used a circular concrete footing in which anchor posts were set. Tubes cut to length and with ends flattened were then bolted together to form a duodeca-rhombicahedron (22-sided hemisphere) geodesic structure with spans ranging to . The form was then draped with layers of ¼-inch wire mesh attached by twist ties. Concrete was sprayed onto the structure, building up a solid layer which, when cured, would support additional concrete to be added by a variety of traditional means. Fuller referred to these buildings as monolithic ferroconcrete geodesic domes. However, the tubular frame form proved problematic for setting windows and doors. It was replaced by an iron rebar set vertically in the concrete footing and then bent inward and welded in place to create the dome's wireform structure and performed satisfactorily. Domes up to three stories tall built with this method proved to be remarkably strong. Other shapes such as cones, pyramids, and arches proved equally adaptable.
The project was enabled by a grant underwritten by Syracuse University and sponsored by U.S. Steel (rebar), the Johnson Wire Corp (mesh), and Portland Cement Company (concrete). The ability to build large complex load bearing concrete spanning structures in free space would open many possibilities in architecture, and is considered one of Fuller's greatest contributions.
Dymaxion map and World Game
Fuller, along with co-cartographer Shoji Sadao, also designed an alternative projection map, called the Dymaxion map. This was designed to show Earth's continents with minimum distortion when projected or printed on a flat surface.
In the 1960s, Fuller developed the World Game, a collaborative simulation game played on a 70-by-35-foot Dymaxion map, in which players attempt to solve world problems. The object of the simulation game is, in Fuller's words, to "make the world work, for 100% of humanity, in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation, without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone".
Appearance and style
Buckminster Fuller wore thick-lensed spectacles to correct his extreme hyperopia, a condition that went undiagnosed for the first five years of his life. Fuller's hearing was damaged during his naval service in World War I and deteriorated during the 1960s. Fuller adopted electronic hearing aids from the 1970s onward. Fuller learned the importance of physical appearance as part of one's credibility, and decided to become "the invisible man" by dressing in clothes that would not draw attention to himself.}}
Lifestyle
Following his global prominence from the 1960s onward, Fuller became a frequent flier, often crossing time zones to lecture. In the 1960s and 1970s, he wore three watches simultaneously; one for the time zone of his office at Southern Illinois University, one for the time zone of the location he would next visit, and one for the time zone he was currently in. In the 1970s, Fuller was only in 'homely' locations (his personal home in Carbondale, Illinois; his holiday retreat in Bear Island, Maine; and his daughter's home in Pacific Palisades, California) roughly 65 nights per year—the other 300 nights were spent in hotel beds in the locations he visited on his lecturing and consulting circuits. Fuller worked until he was tired, and then slept short naps. This generally resulted in Fuller sleeping 30-minute naps every 6 hours. This allowed him "twenty-two thinking hours a day", which aided his work productivity. Despite no longer personally partaking in the habit, in 1943 Fuller suggested Dymaxion sleep as a strategy that the United States could adopt to win World War II. by Barry Farrell in Life magazine, who noted that Fuller stayed up all night replying to mail during Farrell's 1970 trip to Bear Island.
Language and neologisms
Buckminster Fuller spoke and wrote in a unique style and said it was important to describe the world as accurately as possible. Fuller often created long run-on sentences and used unusual compound words (omniwell-informed, intertransformative, omni-interaccommodative, omniself-regenerative), as well as terms he himself invented. His style of speech was characterized by progressively rapid and breathless delivery and rambling digressions of thought, which Fuller described as "thinking out loud". The effect, combined with Fuller's dry voice and non-rhotic New England accent, was varyingly considered "hypnotic" or "overwhelming".
Fuller used the word Universe without the definite or indefinite article (the or a) and always capitalized the word. Fuller wrote that "by Universe I mean: the aggregate of all humanity's consciously apprehended and communicated (to self or others) Experiences".
The words "down" and "up", according to Fuller, are awkward in that they refer to a planar concept of direction inconsistent with human experience. The words "in" and "out" should be used instead, he argued, because they better describe an object's relation to a gravitational center, the Earth. "I suggest to audiences that they say, 'I'm going "outstairs" and "instairs."' At first that sounds strange to them; They all laugh about it. But if they try saying in and out for a few days in fun, they find themselves beginning to realize that they are indeed going inward and outward in respect to the center of Earth, which is our Spaceship Earth. And for the first time they begin to feel real 'reality.'"
Fuller preferred the term "world-around" to replace "worldwide". The general belief in a flat Earth died out in classical antiquity, so using "wide" is an anachronism when referring to the surface of the Earth—a spheroidal surface has area and encloses a volume but has no width. Fuller held that unthinking use of obsolete scientific ideas detracts from and misleads intuition. Other neologisms collectively invented by the Fuller family, according to Allegra Fuller Snyder, are the terms "sunsight" and "sunclipse", replacing "sunrise" and "sunset" to overturn the geocentric bias of most pre-Copernican celestial mechanics.
Fuller also invented the word "livingry", as opposed to weaponry (or "killingry"), to mean that which is in support of all human, plant, and Earth life. "The architectural profession—civil, naval, aeronautical, and astronautical—has always been the place where the most competent thinking is conducted regarding livingry, as opposed to weaponry."
As well as contributing significantly to the development of tensegrity technology, Fuller invented the term "tensegrity", a portmanteau of "tensional integrity". "Tensegrity describes a structural-relationship principle in which structural shape is guaranteed by the finitely closed, comprehensively continuous, tensional behaviors of the system and not by the discontinuous and exclusively local compressional member behaviors. Tensegrity provides the ability to yield increasingly without ultimately breaking or coming asunder."
"Dymaxion" is a portmanteau of "dynamic maximum tension". It was invented around 1929 by two admen at Marshall Field's department store in Chicago to describe Fuller's concept house, which was shown as part of a house of the future store display. They created the term using three words that Fuller used repeatedly to describe his design – dynamic, maximum, and tension.
Fuller also helped to popularize the concept of Spaceship Earth: "The most important fact about Spaceship Earth: an instruction manual didn't come with it."
In the preface for his "cosmic fairy tale" Tetrascroll: Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Fuller stated that his distinctive speaking style grew out of years of embellishing the classic tale for the benefit of his daughter, allowing him to explore both his new theories and how to present them. The Tetrascroll narrative was eventually transcribed onto a set of tetrahedral lithographs (hence the name), as well as being published as a traditional book.
Fuller's language posed problems for his credibility. John Julius Norwich recalled commissioning a 600-word introduction for a planned history of world architecture from him, and receiving a 3500-word proposal which ended:
Norwich commented: "On reflection, I asked Dr. Nikolaus Pevsner instead." Concepts and buildings
His concepts and buildings include:
* Dymaxion house (1928)
* R. Buckminster Fuller and Anne Hewlett Dome Home
* Aerodynamic Dymaxion car (1933)
* Prefabricated compact bathroom cell (1937)
* Dymaxion deployment unit (1940)
* Dymaxion map of the world (1946)
* Tensegrity structures (1949)
* Geodesic dome for Ford Motor Company (1953)
* Patent on geodesic domes (1954)
* Tokyo Tower (1958) (unselected design)
* Tokyo Olympic Stadium (1958) (unselected design)
* The World Game (1961) and the World Game Institute (1972)
* Patent on octet truss (1961)
* Montreal Biosphere (1967), United States pavilion at Expo 67
* Fly's Eye Dome
* Dewan Tunku Geodesic Dome, KOMTAR, Penang, Malaysia (proposed 1974, completed 1985)
* Comprehensive anticipatory design science
Influence and legacy
is a type of fullerene with the formula C<sub>60</sub>. The names are homages to Buckminster Fuller, whose geodesic domes they resemble.]]
Among the many people who were influenced by Buckminster Fuller are:
Constance Abernathy,
Ruth Asawa,
J. Baldwin,
Michael Ben-Eli, Pierre Cabrol,
John Cage,
Joseph Clinton,
Peter Floyd,
Medard Gabel,
Michael Hays,
David Johnston,
Peter Jon Pearce,
Robert Anton Wilson, Stewart Brand, Jason McLennan, and John Denver.
An allotrope of carbon, fullerene—and a particular molecule of that allotrope C<sub>60</sub> (buckminsterfullerene or buckyball) has been named after him. The Buckminsterfullerene molecule, which consists of 60 carbon atoms, very closely resembles a spherical version of Fuller's geodesic dome. The 1996 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was given to Kroto, Curl, and Smalley for their discovery of the fullerene.
On July 12, 2004, the United States Post Office released a new commemorative stamp honoring R. Buckminster Fuller on the 50th anniversary of his patent for the geodesic dome and by the occasion of his 109th birthday. The stamp's design replicated the January 10, 1964, cover of Time magazine.
Fuller was the subject of two documentary films: The World of Buckminster Fuller (1971) and Buckminster Fuller: Thinking Out Loud (1996). Additionally, filmmaker Sam Green and the band Yo La Tengo collaborated on a 2012 "live documentary" about Fuller, The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller.
In June 2008, the Whitney Museum of American Art presented "Buckminster Fuller: Starting with the Universe", the most comprehensive retrospective to date of his work and ideas. The exhibition traveled to the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago in 2009. It presented a combination of models, sketches, and other artifacts, representing six decades of the artist's integrated approach to housing, transportation, communication, and cartography. It also featured the extensive connections with Chicago from his years spent living, teaching, and working in the city.
In 2009, a number of US companies decided to repackage spherical magnets and sell them as toys. One company, Maxfield & Oberton, told The New York Times that they saw the product on YouTube and decided to repackage them as "Buckyballs", because the magnets could self-form and hold together in shapes reminiscent of the Fuller inspired buckyballs. The buckyball toy launched at New York International Gift Fair in 2009 and sold in the hundreds of thousands, but by 2010 began to experience problems with toy safety issues and the company was forced to recall the packages that were labelled as toys.
In 2012, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art hosted "The Utopian Impulse" – a show about Buckminster Fuller's influence in the Bay Area. Featured were concepts, inventions and designs for creating "free energy" from natural forces, and for sequestering carbon from the atmosphere. The show ran January through July.
In 2025 historian Eva Díaz published the book After Spaceship Earth: Art, Techno-utopia, and Other Science Fictions (Yale University Press) about the legacy of Buckminster Fuller's work in contemporary culture. The book considers works of art and design using geodesic domes in various ways: as ad-hoc architectural projects dealing with climate change, as spaces of exhibition display and communication design, as proposals to solve housing crises, and as critiques of corporate and governmental surveillance. The book also takes up the influence of Fuller and Stewart Brand in artworks exploring outer space exploration and colonization. In popular culture Fuller is quoted in "The Tower of Babble" from the musical Godspell: "Man is a complex of patterns and processes."
Belgian rock band dEUS released the song The Architect, inspired by Fuller, on their 2008 album Vantage Point.
Indie band Driftless Pony Club titled their 2011 album Buckminster after Fuller. Each of the album's songs is based upon his life and works.
The design podcast 99% Invisible (2010–present) takes its title from a Fuller quote: "Ninety-nine percent of who you are is invisible and untouchable."
Fuller is briefly mentioned in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) when Kitty Pryde is giving a lecture to a group of students regarding utopian architecture.
Robert Kiyosaki's 2009 book Conspiracy of the Rich and 2015 book Second Chance both concern Kiyosaki's interactions with Fuller as well as Fuller's unusual final book, Grunch of Giants.
In The House of Tomorrow (2017), based on Peter Bognanni's 2010 novel of the same name, Ellen Burstyn's character is obsessed with Fuller and provides retro-futurist tours of her geodesic home that include videos of Fuller sailing and talking with Burstyn, who had in real life befriended Fuller.
In The Simpsons' Treehouse of Horror episode airing on October 29, 1992, a scan over Springfield graveyard reveals graves for American workmanship, Drexell's class, slapstick, and Buckminster Fuller. Patents
(from the Table of Contents of Inventions: The Patented Works of R. Buckminster Fuller (1983) )
* 1927 Stockade: building structure
* 1927 Stockade: pneumatic forming process
* 1928 (Application Abandoned) 4D house
* 1937 Dymaxion car
* 1940 Dymaxion bathroom
* 1944 Dymaxion deployment unit (sheet)
* 1944 Dymaxion deployment unit (frame)
* 1946 Dymaxion map
* 1946 (No Patent) Dymaxion house (Wichita)
* 1954 Geodesic dome
* 1959 Paperboard dome
* 1959 Plydome
* 1959 Catenary (geodesic tent)
* 1961 Octet truss
* 1962 Tensegrity
* 1963 Submarisle (undersea island)
* 1964 Aspension (suspension building)
* 1965 Monohex (geodesic structures)
* 1965 Laminar dome
* 1965 (Filed – No Patent) Octa spinner
* 1967 Star tensegrity (octahedral truss)
* 1970 Rowing needles (watercraft)
* 1974 Geodesic hexa-pent
* 1975 Floatable breakwater
* 1975 Non-symmetrical tensegrity
* 1979 Floating breakwater
* 1980 Tensegrity truss
* 1983 Hanging storage shelf unit
Bibliography
* 4d Timelock (1928)
* Nine Chains to the Moon (1938)
* Untitled Epic Poem on the History of Industrialization (1962)
* Ideas and Integrities, a Spontaneous Autobiographical Disclosure (1963),
* No More Secondhand God and Other Writings (1963)
* Education Automation: Freeing the Scholar to Return (1963)
* What I Have Learned: A Collection of 20 Autobiographical Essays, Chapter "How Little I Know" (1968)
* Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth (1968),
* Utopia or Oblivion (1969),
* Approaching the Benign Environment (1970), (with Eric A. Walker and James R. Killian Jr.)
* I Seem to Be a Verb (1970), coauthors Jerome Agel, Quentin Fiore,
* Intuition (1970)
* Buckminster Fuller to Children of Earth (1972), compiled and photographed by Cam Smith,
* The Buckminster Fuller Reader (1972), editor James Meller,
* The Dymaxion World of Buckminster Fuller (1960, 1973), coauthor Robert Marks,
* Earth, Inc (1973),
* [http://www.rwgrayprojects.com/synergetics/toc/toc.html Synergetics: Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking] (1975), in collaboration with E. J. Applewhite with a preface and contribution by Arthur L. Loeb,
* Tetrascroll: Goldilocks and the Three Bears, A Cosmic Fairy Tale (1975)
* And It Came to Pass — Not to Stay (1976),
* R. Buckminster Fuller on Education (1979),
* [http://www.rwgrayprojects.com/synergetics/toc/toc.html Synergetics 2: Further Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking] (1979), in collaboration with E. J. Applewhite
* Buckminster Fuller – Autobiographical Monologue/Scenario (1980), p. 54, R. Buckminster Fuller, documented and edited by Robert Snyder, St. Martin's Press, Inc.,
* Buckminster Fuller Sketchbook (1981)
* Critical Path (1981),
* Grunch of Giants (1983),
* Inventions: The Patented Works of R. Buckminster Fuller (1983),
* Humans in Universe (1983), coauthor Anwar Dil,
* Cosmography: A Posthumous Scenario for the Future of Humanity (1992), coauthor Kiyoshi Kuromiya,
Discography
* R. Buckminster Fuller Thinks Aloud (Part 1) (1966), Credo - credo 2
* Thinks Aloud (1967), Society Of Typographic Arts – 919S-7200
* R. Buckminster Fuller Speaks His Mind On Records (1967), Cook – COOK05025
* The Clock Is Stopping! (1976), Cook – 6061
* Dymaxion Ditties - The Greatest Hits Of Buckminster Fuller (1976), Not on Label - Cherry Tree Folk Club - Philadelphia, PA
* Tunings (1979), Tanam Press – 7902
* A Primer Conversation (1988), New Dimensions Productions – C010
See also
* Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station
* The Buckminster Fuller Challenge
* Bucky Ball
* Cloud Nine (tensegrity sphere)
* Design science revolution
* Drop City
* Emissions Reduction Currency System
* Kārlis Johansons, tensegrity innovator
* Kenneth Snelson, tensegrity sculptor
* Noosphere
* Old Man River's City project
* Space frame
* Spome
* Whole Earth Catalog
* Post-scarcity economy
References
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Ward, James, ed., The Artifacts Of R. Buckminster Fuller, A Comprehensive Collection of His Designs and Drawings in Four Volumes: Volume One. The Dymaxion Experiment, 1926–1943; Volume Two. Dymaxion Deployment, 1927–1946; Volume Three. The Geodesic Revolution, Part 1, 1947–1959; Volume Four. The Geodesic Revolution, Part 2, 1960–1983: Edited with descriptions by James Ward. Garland Publishing, New York. 1984 ( vol. 1, vol. 2, vol. 3, vol. 4)
*
*
External links
* [http://buckminsterfuller.net/ The Estate of R. Buckminster Fuller] k
* [http://www.bfi.org/ Buckminster Fuller Institute]
Category:1895 births
Category:1983 deaths
Category:20th-century American architects
Category:20th-century American non-fiction writers
Category:American architecture writers
Category:American humanists
Category:American industrial designers
Category:American inventors
Category:American male non-fiction writers
Category:United States Navy personnel of World War I
Category:American non-fiction environmental writers
Category:American systems scientists
Category:American technology writers
Category:American Unitarians
Category:Bates College alumni
Category:Black Mountain College faculty
Category:Burials at Mount Auburn Cemetery
Category:Critics of work and the work ethic
Category:Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Category:American futurologists
Category:Harvard College alumni
Category:Independent scholars
Category:Innovation economists
Category:Mensans
Category:Milton Academy alumni
Category:Modernist architects from the United States
Category:People from Milton, Massachusetts
Category:People from Penobscot County, Maine
Category:American philosophers of technology
Category:Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients
Category:Recipients of the Royal Gold Medal
Category:Refusal of work
Category:Solar building designers
Category:Southern Illinois University Carbondale faculty
Category:American sustainability advocates
Category:Washington University in St. Louis faculty
Category:Authors of utopian literature
Category:Recipients of the AIA Gold Medal | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buckminster_Fuller | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.322600 |
4032 | Bill Watterson | "Bill Watterson" (song)}}
| birth_place = Washington, D.C., U.S.
| occupation = Cartoonist
| education = Kenyon College (BA)
| signature = Bill Watterson signature.svg
}}
William Boyd Watterson II (born July 5, 1958) is an American cartoonist who authored the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes. The strip was syndicated from 1985 to 1995. Watterson concluded Calvin and Hobbes with a short statement to newspaper editors and his readers that he felt he had achieved all he could in the medium. Watterson is known for his negative views on comic syndication and licensing, his efforts to expand and elevate the newspaper comic as an art form, and his move back into private life after Calvin and Hobbes ended. Watterson was born in Washington, D.C., and grew up in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. The suburban Midwestern United States setting of Ohio was part of the inspiration for the setting of Calvin and Hobbes. Watterson currently lives in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.Early lifeBill Watterson was born on July 5, 1958, in Washington, D.C., to Kathryn Watterson (1933–2022) and James Godfrey Watterson (1932–2016). His father worked as a patent attorney. In 1965, six-year-old Watterson and his family moved to Chagrin Falls, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland. Watterson has a younger brother, Thomas Watterson, who lives in Austin, Texas, and worked as a musician before becoming an educator. On one occasion when he was in fourth grade, he wrote a letter to Schulz, who responded, much to Watterson's surprise. This made a big impression on him at the time. His parents encouraged him in his artistic pursuits. Later, they recalled him as a "conservative child" — imaginative, but "not in a fantasy way", and certainly nothing like the character of Calvin that he later created. Watterson found avenues for his cartooning talents throughout primary and secondary school, creating high school-themed super hero comics with his friends and contributing cartoons and art to the school newspaper and yearbook.
After high school, Watterson attended Kenyon College, where he majored in political science. He had already decided on a career in cartooning but he felt studying political science would help him move into editorial cartooning. He continued to develop his art skills and during his sophomore year he painted Michelangelo's Creation of Adam on the ceiling of his dormitory room. He also contributed cartoons to the college newspaper, some of which included the original "Spaceman Spiff" cartoons. Watterson graduated from Kenyon in 1980 with a Bachelor of Arts degree.
Later, when Watterson was creating names for the characters in his comic strip, he decided on Calvin (after the Protestant reformer John Calvin) and Hobbes (after the political philosopher Thomas Hobbes), allegedly as a "tip of the hat" to Kenyon's political science department. In The Complete Calvin and Hobbes, Watterson stated that Calvin was named for "a 16th-century theologian who believed in predestination" and Hobbes for "a 17th-century philosopher with a dim view of human nature".
He then joined a small advertising agency and worked there for four years as a designer, creating grocery advertisements while also working on his own projects, including development of his own cartoon strip and contributions to Target: The Political Cartoon Quarterly.
As a freelance artist, Watterson has drawn other works for various merchandise, including album art for his brother's band, calendars, clothing graphics, educational books, magazine covers, posters, and post cards.Calvin and Hobbes and rise to successWatterson has said that he works for personal fulfillment. As he told the graduating class of 1990 at Kenyon College, "It's surprising how hard we'll work when the work is done just for ourselves." Calvin and Hobbes was first published on November 18, 1985. In Calvin and Hobbes Tenth Anniversary Book, he wrote that his influences included Peanuts, Pogo, and Krazy Kat. Watterson wrote the introduction to the first volume of The Komplete Kolor Krazy Kat. Watterson's style also reflects the influence of Winsor McCay's Little Nemo in Slumberland.
Like many artists, Watterson incorporated elements of his life, interests, beliefs, and values into his work—for example, his hobby as a cyclist, memories of his own father's speeches about "building character", and his views on merchandising and corporations. Watterson's cat Sprite very much inspired the personality and physical features of Hobbes.
Watterson spent much of his career trying to change the climate of newspaper comics. He believed that the artistic value of comics was being undermined and that the space that they occupied in newspapers continually decreased, subject to arbitrary whims of shortsighted publishers. Furthermore, he opined that art should not be judged by the medium for which it is created (i.e., there is no "high" art or "low" art—just art).
Watterson wrote a foreword for FoxTrot.Fight against merchandising his charactersFor years, Watterson battled against pressure from publishers to merchandise his work, something that he felt would cheapen his comic through compromising the act of creation or reading.
He refused to merchandise his creations on the grounds that displaying Calvin and Hobbes images on commercially sold mugs, stickers, and T-shirts would devalue the characters and their personalities. Watterson said that Universal kept putting pressure on him and that he had signed his contract without fully perusing it because, as a new artist, he was happy just to find a syndicate willing to give him a chance (two other syndicates had previously turned him down). He added that the contract was so one-sided that, if Universal really wanted to, they could license his characters against his will, and could even fire him and continue Calvin and Hobbes with a new artist. Watterson's position eventually won out, and he was able to renegotiate his contract so that he would receive all rights to his work. Later he said that the licensing fight exhausted him and contributed to the need for a nine-month sabbatical in 1991.
Despite Watterson's efforts, many unofficial knockoffs have been found, including items that depict Calvin and Hobbes consuming alcohol or Calvin urinating on a logo. Watterson has said, "Only thieves and vandals have made money on Calvin and Hobbes merchandise."
Changing the format of the Sunday strip
Watterson was critical of the prevailing format for the Sunday comic strip that was in place when he began drawing (and remained so, to varying degrees). The typical layout consists of three rows with eight total squares, which take up half a page if published with its normal size.approximately half a nominal page sizeand not related to the actual page size on which a cartoon might eventually be printed for distribution.}} Some newspapers are restricted with space for their Sunday features and reduce the size of the strip. One of the more common ways is to cut out the top two panels, which Watterson believed forced him to waste the space on throwaway jokes that did not always fit the strip.
While he was set to return from his first sabbatical, Watterson discussed with his syndicate a new format for Calvin and Hobbes that would enable him to use his space more efficiently and would almost require the papers to publish it as a half-page. Universal agreed that they would sell the strip as the half-page and nothing else, which garnered anger from papers and criticism for Watterson from both editors and some of his fellow cartoonists (whom he described as "unnecessarily hot-tempered"). Eventually, Universal compromised and agreed to offer papers a choice between the full half-page or a reduced-sized version to alleviate concerns about the size issue. Watterson conceded that this caused him to lose space in many papers, but he said that, in the end, it was a benefit because he felt that he was giving the papers' readers a better strip for their money and editors were free not to run Calvin and Hobbes at their own risk. He added that he was not going to apologize for drawing a popular feature.
End of Calvin and Hobbes
On November 9, 1995, Watterson announced the end of Calvin and Hobbes with the following letter to newspaper editors:
The last strip of Calvin and Hobbes was published on December 31, 1995.
After Calvin and Hobbes
In the years since Calvin and Hobbes was ended, many attempts have been made to contact Watterson. Both The Plain Dealer and the Cleveland Scene sent reporters, in 1998 and 2003 respectively, but neither were able to make contact with the media-shy Watterson. Since 1995, Watterson has taken up painting, at one point drawing landscapes of the woods with his father. He has kept away from the public eye and shown no interest in resuming the strip, creating new works based on the strip's characters, or embarking on new commercial projects, though he has published several Calvin and Hobbes "treasury collection" anthologies. He does not sign autographs or license his characters. Watterson was once known to sneak autographed copies of his books onto the shelves of the Fireside Bookshop, a family-owned bookstore in his hometown of Chagrin Falls, Ohio. He ended this practice after discovering that some of the autographed books were being sold online for high prices.
Watterson rarely gives interviews or makes public appearances. His lengthiest interviews include the cover story in The Comics Journal No. 127 in February 1989, an interview that appeared in a 1987 issue of Honk Magazine,
On December 21, 1999, a short piece was published in the Los Angeles Times, written by Watterson to mark the forthcoming retirement of Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz.
Circa 2003, Gene Weingarten of The Washington Post sent Watterson the first edition of the Barnaby book as an incentive, hoping to land an interview. Weingarten passed the book to Watterson's parents, along with a message, and declared that he would wait in his hotel for as long as it took Watterson to contact him. Watterson's editor Lee Salem called the next day to tell Weingarten that the cartoonist would not be coming.
In October 2005, Watterson answered 15 questions submitted by readers. In October 2007, he wrote a review of Schulz and Peanuts, a biography of Charles M. Schulz, in The Wall Street Journal.
In 2008, he provided a foreword for the first book collection of Richard Thompson's Cul de Sac comic strip. In April 2011, a representative for Andrews McMeel received a package from a "William Watterson in Cleveland Heights, Ohio" which contained a oil-on-board painting of Cul de Sac character Petey Otterloop, done by Watterson for the Team Cul de Sac fundraising project for Parkinson's disease in honor of Richard Thompson, who was diagnosed in 2009. Watterson's syndicate revealed that the painting was the first new artwork of his that the syndicate has seen since Calvin and Hobbes ended in 1995.
In October 2009, Nevin Martell published a book called Looking for Calvin and Hobbes, which included a story about the author seeking an interview with Watterson. In his search he interviews friends, co-workers and family but never gets to meet the artist himself.
In early 2010, Watterson was interviewed by The Plain Dealer on the 15th anniversary of the end of Calvin and Hobbes. Explaining his decision to discontinue the strip, he said,
In October 2013, the magazine Mental Floss published an interview with Watterson, only the second since the strip ended. Watterson again confirmed that he would not be revisiting Calvin and Hobbes, and that he was satisfied with his decision. He also gave his opinion on the changes in the comic-strip industry and where it would be headed in the future:
In 2013 the documentary Dear Mr. Watterson, exploring the cultural impact of Calvin and Hobbes, was released. Watterson himself did not appear in the film.
On February 26, 2014, Watterson published his first cartoon since the end of Calvin and Hobbes: a poster for the documentary Stripped.
In 2014, Watterson co-authored The Art of Richard Thompson with Washington Post cartoonist Nick Galifianakis and David Apatoff.
In June 2014, three strips of Pearls Before Swine (published June 4, June 5, and June 6, 2014) featured guest illustrations by Watterson after mutual friend Nick Galifianakis connected him and cartoonist Stephan Pastis, who communicated via e-mail. Pastis likened this unexpected collaboration to getting "a glimpse of Bigfoot". "I thought maybe Stephan and I could do this goofy collaboration and then use the result to raise some money for Parkinson's research in honor of Richard Thompson. It seemed like a perfect convergence", Watterson told The Washington Post. The day that Stephan Pastis returned to his own strip, he paid tribute to Watterson by alluding to the final strip of Calvin and Hobbes from December 31, 1995.
On November 5, 2014, a poster was unveiled, drawn by Watterson for the 2015 Angoulême International Comics Festival where he was awarded the Grand Prix in 2014.
On April 1, 2016, for April Fools' Day, Berkeley Breathed posted on Facebook that Watterson had signed "the franchise over to my 'administration'". He then posted a comic with Calvin, Hobbes, and Opus all featured. The comic is signed by Watterson, though the degree of his involvement was speculative. Breathed posted another "Calvin County" strip featuring Calvin and Hobbes, also "signed" by Watterson on April 1, 2017, along with a fake New York Times story ostensibly detailing the "merger" of the two strips. Berkeley Breathed included Hobbes in a November 27, 2017, strip as a stand-in for the character Steve Dallas. Hobbes has also returned in the June 9, 11, and 12, 2021, strips as a stand-in for Bill The Cat.ExhibitionsIn 2001, the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum at Ohio State University mounted an exhibition of Watterson's Sunday strips. He chose thirty-six of his favorites, displaying them with both the original drawing and the colored finished product, with most pieces featuring personal annotations. Watterson also wrote an accompanying essay that served as the foreword for the exhibit, called "Calvin and Hobbes: Sunday Pages 1985–1995", which opened on September 10, 2001. It was taken down in January 2002. The accompanying published catalog had the same title.
From March 22 to August 3, 2014, Watterson exhibited again at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum at Ohio State University. In conjunction with this exhibition, Watterson also participated in an interview with the school. An exhibition catalog named Exploring Calvin and Hobbes was released with the exhibit. The book contained a lengthy interview with Bill Watterson, conducted by Jenny Robb, the curator of the museum.
The Mysteries
Watterson released his first published work in 28 years on October 10, 2023, called The Mysteries. It was an illustrated "fable for grown-ups" about "what lies beyond human understanding". The work was a collaboration with the illustrator and caricaturist John Kascht.
Awards and honors
Watterson was awarded the National Cartoonists Society's Reuben Award in both 1986 and 1988. Watterson's second Reuben win made him the youngest cartoonist to be so honored, and only the sixth person to win twice, following Milton Caniff, Charles M. Schulz, Dik Browne, Chester Gould, and Jeff MacNelly. Gary Larson is the only cartoonist to win a second Reuben since Watterson.
In 2014, Watterson was awarded the Grand Prix at the Angoulême International Comics Festival for his body of work, becoming just the fourth non-European cartoonist to be so honored in the first 41 years of the event.
*1986: Reuben Award, Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year
*1988: Reuben Award, Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year
*1988: National Cartoonists Society, Newspaper Comic Strips Humor Award
*1988: Sproing Award, for Tommy og Tigern (Calvin and Hobbes)
*1989: Harvey Award, Special Award for Humor, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1990: Harvey Award, Best Syndicated Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1990: Max & Moritz Prize, Best Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1991: Harvey Award, Best Syndicated Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1991: Adamson Award, for Kalle och Hobbe (Calvin and Hobbes)
*1992: Harvey Award, Best Syndicated Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1992: Eisner Award, Best Comic Strip Collection, for The Revenge of the Baby-Sat
*1992: Angoulême International Comics Festival, Prize for Best Foreign Comic Book, for En avant tête de thon!
*1993: Eisner Award, Best Comic Strip Collection, for Attack of the Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons
*1993: Harvey Award, Best Syndicated Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1994: Harvey Award, Best Syndicated Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1995: Harvey Award, Best Syndicated Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*1996: Harvey Award, Best Syndicated Comic Strip, for Calvin and Hobbes
*2014: Grand Prix, Angoulême International Comics Festival
*2020: Inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame
Bibliography
*1987: Calvin and Hobbes
*1988: Something Under the Bed is Drooling
*1988: Yukon Ho!
*1990: Weirdos from Another Planet
*1991: The Revenge of the Baby-Sat
*1991: Scientific Progress Goes "Boink"
*1992: Attack of the Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons
*1993: The Days are Just Packed
*1994: Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat: A Calvin and Hobbes Collection
*1995: The Calvin and Hobbes Tenth Anniversary Book
*1996: ''There's Treasure Everywhere
*1996: It's a Magical World
*2023: The Mysteries
Treasury collections
*1988: The Essential Calvin and Hobbes: A Calvin and Hobbes Treasury
*1989: The Lazy Sunday Book
*1990: The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes
*1992: The Indispensable Calvin and Hobbes
*2002: Calvin and Hobbes Sunday Pages 1985–1995
*2005: The Complete Calvin and Hobbes
*2019: The Complete Calvin and Hobbes'' (reprint)
Notes
References
External links
*
*
*
* .
*
* , [http://www.ankitsrivastava.net/tchotchkes/kenyon-speech/ Bill Watterson's Commencement Address to Kenyon College].
* .
Category:1958 births
Category:American comic strip cartoonists
Category:American people of English descent
Category:Artists from Washington, D.C.
Category:Grand Prix de la ville d'Angoulême winners
Category:Harvey Award winners
Category:Kenyon College alumni
Category:Living people
Category:People from Chagrin Falls, Ohio
Category:Reuben Award winners | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Watterson | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.347076 |
4035 | Black | | caption = Clockwise, from top left: Anubis statue; American black bear; Milky Way Galaxy; The Supreme Court of the United States in October 2022; Portrait painting of Queen Victoria.
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<!--do NOT change this to say that black is "not a color", read the entire article. achromatic colors are still colors-->
Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white have often been used to describe opposites such as good and evil, the Dark Ages versus the Age of Enlightenment, and night versus day. Since the Middle Ages, black has been the symbolic color of solemnity and authority, and for this reason it is still commonly worn by judges and magistrates. In the Roman Empire, it became the color of mourning, and over the centuries it was frequently associated with death, evil, witches, and magic. In the 14th century, it was worn by royalty, clergy, judges, and government officials in much of Europe. It became the color worn by English romantic poets, businessmen and statesmen in the 19th century, and a high fashion color in the 20th century.
Black is the most common ink color used for printing books, newspapers and documents, as it provides the highest contrast with white paper and thus is the easiest color to read. Similarly, black text on a white screen is the most common format used on computer screens. the darkest material is made by MIT engineers from vertically aligned carbon nanotubes.
Etymology
The word black comes from Old English blæc ("black, dark", also, "ink"), from Proto-Germanic *blakkaz ("burned"), from Proto-Indo-European *bhleg- ("to burn, gleam, shine, flash"), from base *bhel- ("to shine"), related to Old Saxon blak ("ink"), Old High German blach ("black"), Old Norse blakkr ("dark"), Dutch blaken ("to burn"), and Swedish bläck ("ink"). More distant cognates include Latin flagrare ("to blaze, glow, burn"), and Ancient Greek phlegein ("to burn, scorch"). The Ancient Greeks sometimes used the same word to name different colors, if they had the same intensity. Kuanos could mean both dark blue and black. The Ancient Romans had two words for black: ater was a flat, dull black, while niger was a brilliant, saturated black. Ater has vanished from the vocabulary, but niger was the source of the country name Nigeria, the English word Negro, and the word for "black" in most modern Romance languages (French: noir; Spanish and Portuguese: negro; Italian: nero; Romanian: negru).
Old High German also had two words for black: swartz for dull black and blach for a luminous black. These are parallelled in Middle English by the terms swart for dull black and blaek for luminous black. Swart still survives as the word swarthy, while blaek became the modern English black. In heraldry, the word used for the black color is sable, named for the black fur of the sable, an animal.
Art
Prehistoric
cave art at Lascaux]]
Black was one of the first colors used in art. The Lascaux Cave in France contains drawings of bulls and other animals drawn by paleolithic artists between 18,000 and 17,000 years ago. They began by using charcoal, and later achieved darker pigments by burning bones or grinding a powder of manganese oxide.
. Ajax and Achilles playing a game, about 540–530 BC. Vatican Museums]]
In the social hierarchy of ancient Rome, purple was reserved for the emperor; red was the color worn by soldiers (red cloaks for the officers, red tunics for the soldiers); white the color worn by the priests, and black was worn by craftsmen and artisans. The black they wore was not deep and rich; the vegetable dyes used to make black were not solid or lasting, so the blacks often faded to gray or brown.
In Latin, the word for black, ater and to darken, atere, were associated with cruelty, brutality and evil. They were the root of the English words "atrocious" and "atrocity". For the Romans, black symbolized death and mourning. In the 2nd century BC Roman magistrates wore a dark toga, called a toga pulla, to funeral ceremonies. Later, under the Empire, the family of the deceased also wore dark colors for a long period; then, after a banquet to mark the end of mourning, exchanged the black for a white toga. In Roman poetry, death was called the hora nigra, the black hour.
Postclassical
In the early Middle Ages, black was commonly associated with darkness and evil. In Medieval paintings, the devil was usually depicted as having human form, but with wings and black skin or hair.
12th and 13th centuries
In fashion, black did not have the prestige of red, the color of the nobility. It was worn by Benedictine monks as a sign of humility and penitence. In the 12th century a famous theological dispute broke out between the Cistercian monks, who wore white, and the Benedictines, who wore black. A Benedictine abbot, Pierre the Venerable, accused the Cistercians of excessive pride in wearing white instead of black. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, the founder of the Cistercians responded that black was the color of the devil, hell, "of death and sin", while white represented "purity, innocence and all the virtues".
Black symbolized both power and secrecy in the medieval world. The emblem of the Holy Roman Empire of Germany was a black eagle. The black knight in the poetry of the Middle Ages was an enigmatic figure, hiding his identity, usually wrapped in secrecy.
Black ink, invented in China, was traditionally used in the Middle Ages for writing, for the simple reason that black was the darkest color and therefore provided the greatest contrast with white paper or parchment, making it the easiest color to read. It became even more important in the 15th century, with the invention of printing. A new kind of ink, printer's ink, was created out of soot, turpentine and walnut oil. The new ink made it possible to spread ideas to a mass audience through printed books, and to popularize art through black and white prints. Because of its contrast and clarity, black ink on white paper continued to be the standard for printing books, newspapers and documents; and for the same reason black text on a white background is the most common format used on computer screens.
The change to the more austere but elegant black was quickly picked up by the kings and nobility. It began in northern Italy, where the Duke of Milan and the Count of Savoy and the rulers of Mantua, Ferrara, Rimini and Urbino began to dress in black. It then spread to France, led by Louis I, Duke of Orleans, younger brother of King Charles VI of France. It moved to England at the end of the reign of King Richard II (1377–1399), where all the court began to wear black. In 1419–20, black became the color of the powerful Duke of Burgundy, Philip the Good. It moved to Spain, where it became the color of the Spanish Habsburgs, of Charles V and of his son, Philip II of Spain (1527–1598). European rulers saw it as the color of power, dignity, humility and temperance. By the end of the 16th century, it was the color worn by almost all the monarchs of Europe and their courts.
<gallery widths"160" heights"180" class="center">
File:Philip the good.jpg|Portrait of Philip the Good, Rogier van der Weyden, c. 1450
File:Petrus Christus - Portrait of a Young Woman - Google Art Project.jpg|Portrait of a Young Girl, Petrus Christus, between 1465 and 1470
File:Titian - Portrait of Charles V Seated - WGA22964.jpg|Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, Titian, c.1500–1558
File:Portrait of Philip II of Spain by Sofonisba Anguissola - 002b.jpg|Portrait of Philip II of Spain (1527–1598)
</gallery>
Modern
16th and 17th centuries
s have been accused for centuries of being the familiar spirits of witches or of bringing bad luck.]]
While black was the color worn by the Catholic rulers of Europe, it was also the emblematic color of the Protestant Reformation in Europe and the Puritans in England and America. John Calvin, Philip Melanchthon and other Protestant theologians denounced the richly colored and decorated interiors of Roman Catholic churches. They saw the color red, worn by the pope and his cardinals, as the color of luxury, sin, and human folly. In some northern European cities, mobs attacked churches and cathedrals, smashed the stained glass windows and defaced the statues and decoration. In Protestant doctrine, clothing was required to be sober, simple and discreet. Bright colors were banished and replaced by blacks, browns and grays; women and children were recommended to wear white.
In the Protestant Netherlands, Rembrandt used this sober new palette of blacks and browns to create portraits whose faces emerged from the shadows expressing the deepest human emotions. The Catholic painters of the Counter-Reformation, like Rubens, went in the opposite direction; they filled their paintings with bright and rich colors. The new Baroque churches of the Counter-Reformation were usually shining white inside and filled with statues, frescoes, marble, gold and colorful paintings, to appeal to the public. But European Catholics of all classes, like Protestants, eventually adopted a sober wardrobe that was mostly black, brown and gray.
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File:Increase Mather.jpg|Increase Mather, an American Puritan clergyman (1688).
File:Rembrandt van Rijn - Self-Portrait - Google Art Project.jpg|Rembrandt, Self-portrait (1659)
File:Portrait of John, Duke of Braganza c. 1630 (The Royal Castle in Warsaw).png|John, Duke of Braganza, later King John IV of Portugal (1628)
File:Infantry Armor MET DP277181.jpg|Black painted suit of German armor crafted circa 1600.
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s]]
In the second part of the 17th century, Europe and America experienced an epidemic of fear of witchcraft. People widely believed that the devil appeared at midnight in a ceremony called a Black Mass or black sabbath, usually in the form of a black animal, often a goat, a dog, a wolf, a bear, a deer or a rooster, accompanied by their familiar spirits, black cats, serpents and other black creatures. This was the origin of the widespread superstition about black cats and other black animals. In medieval Flanders, in a ceremony called Kattenstoet, black cats were thrown from the belfry of the Cloth Hall of Ypres to ward off witchcraft.
Witch trials were common in both Europe and America during this period. During the notorious Salem witch trials in New England in 1692–93, one of those on trial was accused of being able turn into a "black thing with a blue cap," and others of having familiars in the form of a black dog, a black cat and a black bird. Nineteen women and men were hanged as witches.
18th and 19th centuries
In the 18th century, during the European Age of Enlightenment, black receded as a fashion color. Paris became the fashion capital, and pastels, blues, greens, yellow and white became the colors of the nobility and upper classes. But after the French Revolution, black again became the dominant color. Black was the color of the industrial revolution, largely fueled by coal, and later by oil. Thanks to coal smoke, the buildings of the large cities of Europe and America gradually turned black. By 1846 the industrial area of the West Midlands of England was "commonly called 'the Black Country'". Charles Dickens and other writers described the dark streets and smoky skies of London, and they were vividly illustrated in the wood-engravings of French artist Gustave Doré.
, 1867]]
A different kind of black was an important part of the romantic movement in literature. Black was the color of melancholy, the dominant theme of romanticism. The novels of the period were filled with castles, ruins, dungeons, storms, and meetings at midnight. The leading poets of the movement were usually portrayed dressed in black, usually with a white shirt and open collar, and a scarf carelessly over their shoulder, Percy Bysshe Shelley and Lord Byron helped create the enduring stereotype of the romantic poet.
's last paintings]]
The invention of inexpensive synthetic black dyes and the industrialization of the textile industry meant that high-quality black clothes were available for the first time to the general population. In the 19th century black gradually became the most popular color of business dress of the upper and middle classes in England, the Continent, and America. Black dominated literature and fashion in the 19th century, and played a large role in painting. James McNeill Whistler made the color the subject of his most famous painting, Arrangement in grey and black number one (1871), better known as ''Whistler's Mother''.
Some 19th-century French painters had a low opinion of black: "Reject black," Paul Gauguin said, "and that mix of black and white they call gray. Nothing is black, nothing is gray." But Édouard Manet used blacks for their strength and dramatic effect. Manet's portrait of painter Berthe Morisot was a study in black which perfectly captured her spirit of independence. The black gave the painting power and immediacy; he even changed her eyes, which were green, to black to strengthen the effect. Henri Matisse quoted the French impressionist Pissarro telling him, "Manet is stronger than us all – he made light with black."
Pierre-Auguste Renoir used luminous blacks, especially in his portraits. When someone told him that black was not a color, Renoir replied: "What makes you think that? Black is the queen of colors. I always detested Prussian blue. I tried to replace black with a mixture of red and blue, I tried using cobalt blue or ultramarine, but I always came back to ivory black."
Vincent van Gogh used black lines to outline many of the objects in his paintings, such as the bed in the famous painting of his bedroom. making them stand apart. His painting of black crows over a cornfield, painted shortly before he died, was particularly agitated and haunting. In the late 19th century, black also became the color of anarchism. (See the section political movements.)
<gallery widths"180" heights"180" class="center">
File:Carneiro e Gaspar, J. Courtois - Imperatriz Teresa Cristina.jpg|Portrait of Empress Teresa Cristina of Brazil (circa 1870)
File:Whistlers Mother high res.jpg|Arrangement in Grey and Black Number 1 (1871) by James McNeill Whistler better known as ''Whistler's Mother.
File:Edouard Manet - Berthe Morisot With a Bouquet of Violets - Google Art Project.jpg|Berthe Morisot with a Bouquet of Violets, by Édouard Manet (1872).
File:Pierre-Auguste Renoir 023.jpg|The Theater Box (1874) by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, captured the luminosity of black fabric in the light.
</gallery>
20th and 21st centuries
In the 20th century, black was utilised by Italian and German fascism. (See the section political movements). In art, the colour regained some of the territory that it had lost during the 19th century. The Russian painter Kasimir Malevich, a member of the Suprematist movement, created the Black Square in 1915, is widely considered the first purely abstract painting. He wrote, "The painted work is no longer simply the imitation of reality, but is this very reality ... It is not a demonstration of ability, but the materialization of an idea."
Black was appreciated by Henri Matisse. "When I didn't know what color to put down, I put down black," he said in 1945. "Black is a force: I used black as ballast to simplify the construction ... Since the impressionists it seems to have made continuous progress, taking a more and more important part in color orchestration, comparable to that of the double bass as a solo instrument."
In the 1950s, black came to be a symbol of individuality and intellectual and social rebellion, the color of those who did not accept established norms and values. In Paris, it was worn by Left-Bank intellectuals and performers such as Juliette Gréco, and by some members of the Beat Movement in New York and San Francisco. Black leather jackets were worn by motorcycle gangs such as the Hells Angels and street gangs on the fringes of society in the United States. Black as a color of rebellion was celebrated in such films as The Wild One, with Marlon Brando. By the end of the 20th century, black was the emblematic color of punk fashion and the goth subculture. Goth fashion, which emerged in England in the 1980s, was inspired by Victorian era mourning dress.
In men's fashion, black gradually ceded its dominance to navy blue, particularly in business suits. Black evening dress and formal dress in general were worn less and less. In 1960, John F. Kennedy was the last American President to be inaugurated wearing formal dress; Lyndon Johnson and his successors were inaugurated wearing business suits.
Women's fashion was revolutionized and simplified in 1926 by the French designer Coco Chanel, who published a drawing of a simple black dress in Vogue magazine. She famously said, "A woman needs just three things; a black dress, a black sweater, and, on her arm, a man she loves." Other designers contributed to the trend of the little black dress. The Italian designer Gianni Versace said, "Black is the quintessence of simplicity and elegance," and French designer Yves Saint Laurent said, "black is the liaison which connects art and fashion.
Chemistry
Pigments
The earliest pigments used by Neolithic man were charcoal, red ocher and yellow ocher. The black lines of cave art were drawn with the tips of burnt torches made of a wood with resin. Different charcoal pigments were made by burning different woods and animal products, each of which produced a different tone. The charcoal would be ground and then mixed with animal fat to make the pigment.
* Vine black was produced in Roman times by burning the cut branches of grapevines. It could also be produced by burning the remains of the crushed grapes, which were collected and dried in an oven. According to the historian Vitruvius, the deepness and richness of the black produced corresponded to the quality of the wine. The finest wines produced a black with a bluish tinge the color of indigo.
The 15th-century painter Cennino Cennini described how this pigment was made during the Renaissance in his famous handbook for artists: "...there is a black which is made from the tendrils of vines. And these tendrils need to be burned. And when they have been burned, throw some water onto them and put them out and then mull them in the same way as the other black. And this is a lean and black pigment and is one of the perfect pigments that we use."
Cennini also noted that "There is another black which is made from burnt almond shells or peaches and this is a perfect, fine black." The dye was very expensive; a great quantity of gall-nuts were needed for a very small amount of dye. The gall-nuts which made the best dye came from Poland, eastern Europe, the near east and North Africa. Beginning in about the 14th century, dye from gall-nuts was used for clothes of the kings and princes of Europe.
Another important source of natural black dyes from the 17th century onwards was the logwood tree, or Haematoxylum campechianum, which also produced reddish and bluish dyes. It is a species of flowering tree in the legume family, Fabaceae, that is native to southern Mexico and northern Central America. The modern nation of Belize grew from 17th century English logwood logging camps.
Since the mid-19th century, synthetic black dyes have largely replaced natural dyes. One of the important synthetic blacks is Nigrosin, a mixture of synthetic black dyes (CI 50415, Solvent black 5) made by heating a mixture of nitrobenzene, aniline and aniline hydrochloride in the presence of a copper or iron catalyst. Its main industrial uses are as a colorant for lacquers and varnishes and in marker-pen inks.
Inks
The first known inks were made by the Chinese, and date back to the 23rd century B.C. They used natural plant dyes and minerals such as graphite ground with water and applied with an ink brush. Early Chinese inks similar to the modern inkstick have been found dating to about 256 BC at the end of the Warring States period. They were produced from soot, usually produced by burning pine wood, mixed with animal glue. To make ink from an inkstick, the stick is continuously ground against an inkstone with a small quantity of water to produce a dark liquid which is then applied with an ink brush. Artists and calligraphists could vary the thickness of the resulting ink by reducing or increasing the intensity and time of ink grinding. These inks produced the delicate shading and subtle or dramatic effects of Chinese brush painting.
India ink (or "Indian ink" in British English) is a black ink once widely used for writing and printing and now more commonly used for drawing, especially when inking comic books and comic strips. The technique of making it probably came from China. India ink has been in use in India since at least the 4th century BC, where it was called masi. In India, the black color of the ink came from bone char, tar, pitch and other substances.
The ancient Romans had a black writing ink they called atramentum librarium. Its name came from the Latin word atrare, which meant to make something black. (This was the same root as the English word atrocious.) It was usually made, like India ink, from soot, although one variety, called atramentum elephantinum, was made by burning the ivory of elephants.
Gall-nuts were also used for making fine black writing ink. Iron gall ink (also known as iron gall nut ink or oak gall ink) was a purple-black or brown-black ink made from iron salts and tannic acids from gall nut. It was the standard writing and drawing ink in Europe, from about the 12th century to the 19th century, and remained in use well into the 20th century.
<gallery mode"packed" heights"150px">
File:Charcoal sticks 051907.jpg|Sticks of vine charcoal and compressed charcoal. Charcoal, along with red and yellow ochre, was one of the first pigments used by Paleolithic man.
File:Inkstick.jpg|A Chinese inkstick, in the form of lotus flowers and blossoms. Inksticks are used in Chinese calligraphy and brush painting.
File:Živočišné uhlí (Carbocit).jpg|Ivory black or bone char, a natural black pigment made by burning animal bones.
File:Oak apple.jpg|The oak apple or gall-nut, a tumor growing on oak trees, was the main source of black dye and black writing ink from the 14th century until the 19th century.
File:Noir de fumee.jpg|The industrial production of lamp black, made by producing, collecting and refining soot, in 1906.
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Astronomy
* A black hole is a region of spacetime where gravity prevents anything, including light, from escaping. The theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass will deform spacetime to form a black hole. Around a black hole there is a mathematically defined boundary called an event horizon that marks the point of no return. It is called "black" because it absorbs all the light that hits the horizon, reflecting nothing, just like a perfect black body in thermodynamics. Black holes of stellar mass are expected to form when very massive stars collapse at the end of their life cycle. After a black hole has formed it can continue to grow by absorbing mass from its surroundings. By absorbing other stars and merging with other black holes, supermassive black holes of millions of solar masses may form. There is general consensus that supermassive black holes exist in the centers of most galaxies. Although a black hole itself is black, infalling material forms an accretion disk, one of the brightest types of object in the universe.
* Black-body radiation refers to the radiation coming from a body at a given temperature where all incoming energy (light) is converted to heat.
* Black sky refers to the appearance of space as one emerges from Earth's atmosphere.
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File:NGC 406 Hubble WikiSky.jpg|Image of the NGC 406 galaxy from the Hubble Space Telescope
File:Spirit Rover-Mars Night Sky.jpg|The night sky seen from Mars, with the two moons of Mars visible, taken by the NASA Spirit Rover.
File:Top of Atmosphere.jpg|Outside Earth's atmosphere, the sky is black day and night.
File:Olber's Paradox - All Points.gif|An illustration of Olbers' paradox (see below)
File:Black hole - Messier 87 crop max res.jpg|Image of the central black hole of Messier 87 taken by the Event Horizon Telescope.
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Why the night sky and space are black – Olbers' paradox
The fact that outer space is black is sometimes called Olbers' paradox. In theory, because the universe is full of stars, and is believed to be infinitely large, it would be expected that the light of an infinite number of stars would be enough to brilliantly light the whole universe all the time. However, the background color of outer space is black. This contradiction was first noted in 1823 by German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers, who posed the question of why the night sky was black.
The current accepted answer is that, although the universe may be infinitely large, it is not infinitely old. It is thought to be about 13.8 billion years old, so we can only see objects as far away as the distance light can travel in 13.8 billion years. Light from stars farther away has not reached Earth, and cannot contribute to making the sky bright. Furthermore, as the universe is expanding, many stars are moving away from Earth. As they move, the wavelength of their light becomes longer, through the Doppler effect, and shifts toward red, or even becomes invisible. As a result of these two phenomena, there is not enough starlight to make space anything but black.
The daytime sky on Earth is blue because light from the Sun strikes molecules in Earth's atmosphere scattering light in all directions. Blue light is scattered more than other colors, and reaches the eye in greater quantities, making the daytime sky appear blue. This is known as Rayleigh scattering.
The nighttime sky on Earth is black because the part of Earth experiencing night is facing away from the Sun, the light of the Sun is blocked by Earth itself, and there is no other bright nighttime source of light in the vicinity. Thus, there is not enough light to undergo Rayleigh scattering and make the sky blue. On the Moon, on the other hand, because there is virtually no atmosphere to scatter the light, the sky is black both day and night. This also holds true for other locations without an atmosphere, such as Mercury.
Biology
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File:Corvus brachyrhynchos 30196.JPG|The American crow is one of the most intelligent of all animals.
File:01 Schwarzbär.jpg|American black bear (Ursus americanus) near Riding Mountain Park, Manitoba, Canada
File:Dendroaspis polylepis by Bill Love.jpg|The black mamba of Africa is one of the most venomous snakes, as well as the fastest-moving snake in the world.
File:Black Widow 11-06.jpg |The black widow spider, or latrodectus, The females frequently eat their male partners after mating. The female's venom is at least three times more potent than that of the males, making a male's self-defense bite ineffective.
File:Blackleopard.JPG|A black panther is actually a melanistic leopard or jaguar, the result of an excess of melanin in their skin caused by a recessive gene.
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Culture
In China, the color black is associated with water, one of the five fundamental elements believed to compose all things; and with winter, cold, and the direction north, usually symbolized by a black tortoise. It is also associated with disorder, including the positive disorder which leads to change and new life. When the first emperor of China Qin Shi Huang seized power from the Zhou dynasty, he changed the Imperial color from red to black, saying that black extinguished red. Only when the Han dynasty appeared in 206 BC was red restored as the imperial color.
In Japan, black is associated with mystery, the night, the unknown, the supernatural, the invisible and death. Combined with white, it can symbolize intuition. In 10th- and 11th-century Japan, it was believed that wearing black could bring misfortune. It was worn at court by those who wanted to set themselves apart from the established powers or who had renounced material possessions.
In Japan black can also symbolize experience, as opposed to white, which symbolizes naiveté. The black belt in martial arts symbolizes experience, while a white belt is worn by novices. Japanese men traditionally wear a black kimono with some white decoration on their wedding day.
Black is associated with depth in Indonesia, as well as the subterranean world, demons, disaster, and the left hand. When combined with white, however, it symbolizes harmony and equilibrium.
Political movements
Anarchism
Anarchism is a political philosophy, most popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which holds that governments and capitalism are harmful and undesirable. The symbols of anarchism was usually either a black flag or a black letter A. More recently it is usually represented with a bisected red and black flag, to emphasise the movement's socialist roots in the First International. Anarchism was most popular in Spain, France, Italy, Ukraine and Argentina. There were also small but influential movements in the United States, Russia and many other countries all around the world. Fascism
The Blackshirts () were Fascist paramilitary groups in Italy during the period immediately following World War I and until the end of World War II. The Blackshirts were officially known as the Voluntary Militia for National Security (Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale, or MVSN).
Inspired by the black uniforms of the Arditi, Italy's elite storm troops of World War I, the Fascist Blackshirts were organized by Benito Mussolini as the military tool of his political movement. They used violence and intimidation against Mussolini's opponents. The emblem of the Italian fascists was a black flag with fasces, an axe in a bundle of sticks, an ancient Roman symbol of authority. Mussolini came to power in 1922 through his March on Rome with the blackshirts.
Black was also adopted by Adolf Hitler and the Nazis in Germany. Red, white and black were the colors of the flag of the German Empire from 1870 to 1918. In Mein Kampf, Hitler explained that they were "revered colors expressive of our homage to the glorious past." Hitler also wrote that "the new flag ... should prove effective as a large poster" because "in hundreds of thousands of cases a really striking emblem may be the first cause of awakening interest in a movement." The black swastika was meant to symbolize the Aryan race, which, according to the Nazis, "was always anti-Semitic and will always be anti-Semitic." Several designs by a number of different authors were considered, but the one adopted in the end was Hitler's personal design. Black became the color of the uniform of the SS, the Schutzstaffel or "defense corps", the paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party, and was worn by SS officers from 1932 until the end of World War II.
The Nazis used a black triangle to symbolize anti-social elements. The symbol originates from Nazi concentration camps, where every prisoner had to wear one of the Nazi concentration camp badges on their jacket, the color of which categorized them according to "their kind". Many Black Triangle prisoners were either mentally disabled or mentally ill. The homeless were also included, as were alcoholics, the Romani people, the habitually "work-shy", prostitutes, draft dodgers and pacifists. More recently the black triangle has been adopted as a symbol in lesbian culture and by disabled activists.
Black shirts were also worn by the British Union of Fascists before World War II, and members of fascist movements in the Netherlands.
Patriotic resistance
The Lützow Free Corps, composed of volunteer German students and academics fighting against Napoleon in 1813, could not afford to make special uniforms and therefore adopted black, as the only color that could be used to dye their civilian clothing without the original color showing. In 1815 the students began to carry a red, black and gold flag, which they believed (incorrectly) had been the colors of the Holy Roman Empire (the imperial flag had actually been gold and black). In 1848, this banner became the flag of the German confederation. In 1866, Prussia unified Germany under its rule, and imposed the red, white and black of its own flag, which remained the colors of the German flag until the end of the Second World War. In 1949 the Federal Republic of Germany returned to the original flag and colors of the students and professors of 1815, which is the flag of Germany today.
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File:Махновское знамя.svg|A flag used by the Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine during the Russian Civil War. It says, "Power begets parasites. Long live Anarchy!"
File:March on Rome.jpg|Benito Mussolini and his blackshirt followers during his March on Rome in 1922.
File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-R99621, Heinrich Himmler.jpg|Black uniform of Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS, the military wing of the Nazi Party (1938).
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Military
on the mirliton (ger. Flügelmütze).]]
Black has been a traditional color of cavalry and armoured or mechanized troops. German armoured troops (Panzerwaffe) traditionally wore black uniforms, and even in others, a black beret is common. In Finland, black is the symbolic color for both armoured troops and combat engineers, and military units of these specialities have black flags and unit insignia.
The black beret and the color black is also a symbol of special forces in many countries. Soviet and Russian OMON special police and Russian naval infantry wear a black beret. A black beret is also worn by military police in the Canadian, Czech, Croatian, Portuguese, Spanish and Serbian armies.
The silver-on-black skull and crossbones symbol or Totenkopf and a black uniform were used by Hussars and Black Brunswickers, the German Panzerwaffe and the Nazi Schutzstaffel, and U.S. 400th Missile Squadron (crossed missiles), and continues in use with the Estonian Kuperjanov Battalion.
Religion
In Christian theology, black was the color of the universe before God created light. In many religious cultures, from Mesoamerica to Oceania to India and Japan, the world was created out of a primordial darkness. In the Bible the light of faith and Christianity is often contrasted with the darkness of ignorance and paganism.
in New Jersey]]
In Christianity, the devil is often called the "prince of darkness". The term was used in John Milton's poem Paradise Lost, published in 1667, referring to Satan, who is viewed as the embodiment of evil. It is an English translation of the Latin phrase princeps tenebrarum, which occurs in the Acts of Pilate, written in the fourth century, in the 11th-century hymn Rhythmus de die mortis by Pietro Damiani, and in a sermon by Bernard of Clairvaux from the 12th century. The phrase also occurs in King Lear by William Shakespeare (), Act III, Scene IV, l. 14:
'The prince of darkness is a gentleman."
Priests and pastors of the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and Protestant churches commonly wear black, as do monks of the Benedictine Order, who consider it the color of humility and penitence.
* In Islam, black, along with green, plays an important symbolic role. It is the color of the Black Standard, the banner that is said to have been carried by the soldiers of Muhammad. It is also used as a symbol in Shi'a Islam (heralding the advent of the Mahdi), and the flag of followers of Islamism and Jihadism.
* In Hinduism, the goddess Kali, goddess of time and change, is portrayed with black or dark blue skin. wearing a necklace adorned with severed heads and hands. Her name means "The black one". She destroys anger and passion according to Hindu mythology and her devotees are supposed to abstain from meat or intoxication. Kali does not eat meat, but it is the śāstra's injunction that those who are unable to give up meat-eating, they may sacrifice one goat, not cow, one small animal before the goddess Kali, on amāvāsya (new moon) day, night, not day, and they can eat it.
* In Paganism, black represents dignity, force, stability, and protection. The color is often used to banish and release negative energies, or binding. An athame is a ceremonial blade often having a black handle, which is used in some forms of witchcraft.Sports
* The national rugby union team of New Zealand is called the All Blacks'', in reference to their black outfits, and the color is also shared by other New Zealand national teams such as the Black Caps (cricket) and the Kiwis (rugby league).
* Association football (soccer) referees traditionally wear all-black uniforms, however nowadays other uniform colors may also be worn.
* In auto racing, a black flag signals a driver to go into the pits.
* In baseball, "the black" refers to the batter's eye, a blacked out area around the center-field bleachers, painted black to give hitters a decent background for pitched balls.
* A large number of teams have uniforms designed with black colors even when the team does not normally feature that color. Many feel the color sometimes imparts a psychological advantage in its wearers. Black is used by numerous professional and collegiate sports teams
Idioms and expressions
* In general, the Negro race of African origin is called "Black", while the Caucasian race of European origin is called "White".
* In the United States, "Black Friday" (the day after Thanksgiving Day, the fourth Thursday in November) is traditionally the busiest shopping day of the year. Many Americans are on holiday because of Thanksgiving, and many retailers open earlier and close later than normal, and offer special prices. The day's name originated in Philadelphia sometime before 1961, and originally was used to describe the heavy and disruptive downtown pedestrian and vehicle traffic which would occur on that day. Later an alternative explanation began to be offered: that "Black Friday" indicates the point in the year that retailers begin to turn a profit, or are "in the black", because of the large volume of sales on that day.
* "In the black" means profitable. Accountants originally used black ink in ledgers to indicate profit, and red ink to indicate a loss.
* Black Friday also refers to any particularly disastrous day on financial markets. The first Black Friday (1869), 24 September 1869, was caused by the efforts of two speculators, Jay Gould and James Fisk, to corner the gold market on the New York Gold Exchange.
* A blacklist is a list of undesirable persons or entities (to be placed on the list is to be "blacklisted").
* Black comedy is a form of comedy dealing with morbid and serious topics. The expression is similar to black humor or black humour.
* A black mark against a person relates to something bad they have done.
* A black mood is a bad one (cf Winston Churchill's clinical depression, which he called "my black dog").
* Black market is used to denote the trade of illegal goods, or alternatively the illegal trade of otherwise legal items at considerably higher prices, e.g. to evade rationing.
* Black propaganda is the use of known falsehoods, partial truths, or masquerades in propaganda to confuse an opponent.
* Blackmail is the act of threatening someone to do something that would hurt them in some way, such as by revealing sensitive information about them, in order to force the threatened party to fulfill certain demands. Ordinarily, such a threat is illegal.
* If the black eight-ball, in billiards, is sunk before all others are out of play, the player loses.
* The black sheep of the family is the ne'er-do-well.
* To blackball someone is to block their entry into a club or some such institution. In the traditional English gentlemen's club, members vote on the admission of a candidate by secretly placing a white or black ball in a hat. If upon the completion of voting, there was even one black ball amongst the white, the candidate would be denied membership, and he would never know who had "blackballed" him.
* Black tea in the Western culture is known as "crimson tea" in Chinese and culturally influenced languages (, Mandarin Chinese hóngchá; Japanese kōcha; Korean hongcha).
* "The black" is a wildfire suppression term referring to a burned area on a wildfire capable of acting as a safety zone.
* Black coffee refers to coffee without sugar or cream.
Associations and symbolism
In the West, black is commonly associated with mourning and bereavement, and usually worn at funerals and memorial services. In some traditional societies, for example in Greece and Italy, some widows wear black for the rest of their lives. In contrast, across much of Africa and parts of Asia like Vietnam, white is a color of mourning.
A "black day" (or week or month) usually refers to tragic date. The Romans marked fasti days with white stones and nefasti days with black. The term is often used to remember massacres. Black months include the Black September in Jordan, when large numbers of Palestinians were killed, and Black July in Sri Lanka, the killing of members of the Tamil population by the Sinhalese government. In the financial world, the term often refers to a dramatic drop in the stock market. For example, the Wall Street crash of 1929, the stock market crash on 29 October 1929, which marked the start of the Great Depression, is nicknamed Black Tuesday, and was preceded by Black Thursday, a downturn on 24 October the previous week.
In western popular culture, black has long been associated with evil and darkness. It is the traditional color of witchcraft and black magic.
Black is frequently used as a color of power, law and authority. In many countries judges and magistrates wear black robes. That custom began in Europe in the 13th and 14th centuries. Jurists, magistrates and certain other court officials in France began to wear long black robes during the reign of Philip IV of France (1285–1314), and in England from the time of Edward I (1271–1307). The custom spread to the cities of Italy at about the same time, between 1300 and 1320. The robes of judges resembled those worn by the clergy, and represented the law and authority of the King, while those of the clergy represented the law of God and authority of the church. Until the 20th century most police uniforms were black, until they were largely replaced by blue in France, the U.S. and other countries. In the United States, police cars are frequently Black and white. The riot control units of the Basque Autonomous Police in Spain are known as beltzak ("blacks") after their uniform.
Black formal attire is still worn at many solemn occasions or ceremonies, from graduations to formal balls. Graduation gowns are copied from the gowns worn by university professors in the Middle Ages, which in turn were copied from the robes worn by judges and priests, who often taught at the early universities. The mortarboard hat worn by graduates is adapted from a square cap called a biretta worn by Medieval professors and clerics.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, many machines and devices, large and small, were painted black, to stress their functionality. These included telephones, sewing machines, steamships, railroad locomotives, and automobiles. The Ford Model T, the first mass-produced car, was available only in black from 1914 to 1926. Of means of transportation, only airplanes were rarely ever painted black.
The term "Black" is often used in the West to describe people whose skin is darker. In the United States, it is particularly used to describe African Americans. Black is also commonly used as a racial description in the United Kingdom, since ethnicity was first measured in the 2001 census. In Canada, census respondents can identify themselves as Black. In Brazil, the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) asks people to identify themselves as branco (white), pardo (brown), preto (black), or amarelo (yellow).
, like the Lone Ranger, traditionally wore a white hat, while the villains wore black hats.]]
Black and white have often been used to describe opposites, particularly light and darkness and good and evil. In Medieval literature, the white knight usually represented virtue, the black knight something mysterious and sinister. In American westerns, the hero often wore a white hat, the villain a black hat.
In philosophy and arguments, the issue is often described as black-and-white, meaning that the issue at hand is dichotomized (having two clear, opposing sides with no middle ground).
Black is commonly associated with secrecy.
* The Black Chamber was a term given to an office which secretly opened and read diplomatic mail and broke codes. Queen Elizabeth I had such an office, headed by her Secretary, Sir Francis Walsingham, which successfully broke the Spanish codes and broke up several plots against the Queen. In France a cabinet noir'' was established inside the French post office by Louis XIII to open diplomatic mail. It was closed during the French Revolution but re-opened under Napoleon I. The Habsburg Empire and Dutch Republic had similar black chambers.
* The United States created a secret peacetime Black Chamber, called the Cipher Bureau, in 1919. It was funded by the State Department and Army and disguised as a commercial company in New York. It successfully broke a number of diplomatic codes, including the code of the Japanese government. It was closed down in 1929 after the State Department withdrew funding, when the new Secretary of State, Henry Stimson, stated that "Gentlemen do not read each other's mail." The Cipher Bureau was the ancestor of the U.S. National Security Agency.
* A black project is a secret unacknowledged military project, such as Enigma Decryption during World War II, or a secret counter-narcotics or police sting operation.
* Black ops are covert operations carried out by a government, government agency or military.
* A black budget is a government budget that is allocated for classified or other secret operations of a nation. The black budget is an account expenses and spending related to military research and covert operations. The black budget is mostly classified due to security reasons.
Black is the color most commonly associated with elegance in Europe and the United States. Black first became a fashionable color for men in Europe in the 17th century, in the courts of Italy and Spain. In the 19th century, it was the fashion for men both in business and for evening wear. For women's fashion, the defining moment was the invention of the simple black dress by Coco Chanel in 1926. Thereafter, a long black gown was used for formal occasions, while the simple black dress could be used for everything else.<ref name"ReferenceA"/> The expression "X is the new black" is a reference to the latest trend or fad that is considered a wardrobe basic for the duration of the trend, on the basis that black is always fashionable. The phrase has taken on a life of its own and has become a cliché.
See also
* Black Rose (disambiguation)
* Lists of colors
* Rich black, which is different from using black ink alone, in printing.
* Shades of black
References
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Category:Shades of gray
Category:Color
Category:Spoken articles
Category:Darkness
Category:Web colors
Category:Cultural aspects of death | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black | 2025-04-05T18:26:40.398529 |
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