"... [Newland] had built up within himself a kind of sanctuary in which [Mme Olenska] throned among his secret thoughts and longings. Little by little it became the scene of his real life, of his only rational activities; thither he brought the books he read, the ideas and feelings which nourished him, his judgements and his visions. Outside it, in the scene of his actual life, he moved with a growing sense of unreality and insufficiency, blundering against familiar prejudices and traditional points of view as an absent-minded man goes on bumping into the furniture of his own room." [Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence (New York: Modern Library, 1999), pp. 256-257].
I - iii - A Quest for Things.
Finlay listens to an overture from two in-patients, Raisin and Park, but bugs out before they begin their formal exegesis. Sasha Van Etnabaron, awaiting a sedulous message, is accosted by doxies performing tableaux vivant of Aira Phoebus, avatar of the dawn, and the medieval Princess Margaret of Austria. Soliloquies of the Archangel from the Nicean node Miranda. Aira Phoebus engages a fellow (albeit fallen) lumine, iamin'thelim, at the Sunrise Cage, wherein are displayed tapestries of Hades, and a 13 th century dinner theatre involving the Ptolemaic reconfiguration of the universe.
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Jung in 1910.* Jung, Carl Gustav Act I, Signature iii - (1) born July 26, 1875, Kesswil, Switz.
died June 6, 1961, Küsnacht
Swiss psychiatrist. As a youth he read widely in philosophy and theology. After taking his medical degree (1902), he worked in Zürich with Eugen Bleuler on studies of mental illness. From this research emerged Jung's notion of the complex, or cluster of emotionally charged (and largely unconscious) associations. Between 1907 and 1912 he was Sigmund Freud's close collaborator and most likely successor, but he broke with Freud over the latter's insistence on the sexual basis of neuroses. In the succeeding years he founded the field of analytic psychology, a response to Freud's psychoanalysis. Jung advanced the concepts of the introvert and extrovert personality, archetypes, and the collective unconscious (the pool of human experience passed from generation to generation). He went on to formulate new psychotherapeutic techniques designed to reacquaint the person with his unique “myth” or place in the collective unconscious, as expressed in dream and imagination. Sometimes criticized as disguised religion and for its lack of verifiability, his work has been influential in religion and literature as well as psychiatry. His important works include The Psychology of the Unconscious (1912; revised as Symbols of Transformation ), Psychological Types (1921), Psychology and Religion (1938), and Memories, Dreams, Reflections (1962).
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Carl Gustav Jung (German pronunciation: [ˈkaˈˈˈl ˈˈˈstaf ˈjˈŋ]; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist, an influential thinker and the founder of analytical psychology (also known as Jungian psychology). Jung's approach to psychology has been influential in the field of depth psychology and in countercultural movements across the globe. Jung is considered as the first modern psychologist to state that the human psyche is "by nature religious" and to explore it in depth [Dunne, Clare, "Prelude," Carl Jung: Wounded Healer of the Soul: An Illustrated Biography (Continuum International Publishing Group, 2002), pp. 3]. He emphasized understanding the psyche through exploring the worlds of dreams, art, mythology, religion and philosophy. Though not the first to analyze dreams, he has become perhaps the most well known pioneer in the field of dream analysis. Although he was a theoretical psychologist and practicing clinician, much of his life's work was spent exploring other areas, including Eastern and Western philosophy, alchemy, astrology, sociology, as well as literature and the arts.
Jung emphasized the importance of balance and harmony. He cautioned that modern people rely too heavily on natural science and logical positivism and would benefit from integrating spirituality and appreciation of unconscious realms. He considered the process of individuation necessary for a person to become whole. This is a psychological process of integrating the conscious with the unconscious while still maintaining conscious autonomy [http://soultherapynow.com/articles/individuation.html]. Individuation was the central concept of analytical psychology [Jung, C. G., Aniela Jaffé, Memories, Dreams, Reflections (New York: Random House, 1965), p. 209)].
Jungian ideas are routinely discussed in part by curriculum of introductory psychology course offerings with most major universities, and although rarely covered by higher level course work, his ideas are discussed further by the Faculty of Humanities [Johnson, Paul, The Renaissance (New York: The Modern Library, 2000), pp. 32–34, 37]. Many pioneering psychological concepts were originally proposed by Jung, including the Archetype, the Collective Unconscious, the Complex, and synchronicity. A popular psychometric instrument, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), has been principally developed from Jung's theories.
Red Book . In 1913, at the age of thirty-eight, Jung experienced a horrible "confrontation with the unconscious." He saw visions and heard voices. He worried at times that he was "menaced by a psychosis" or was "doing a schizophrenia". He decided that it was valuable experience, and in private, he induced hallucinations, or, in his words, "active imaginations." He recorded everything he felt in small journals. Jung began to transcribe his notes into a large, red leather-bound book, on which he worked intermittently for sixteen years [Corbett, Sara, "The Holy Grail of the Unconscious," The New York Times , September 16, 2009].
Jung left no posthumous instructions about the final disposition of what he called the "Red Book". His family eventually moved it into a bank vault in 1984. Sonu Shamdasani, a historian from London, for three years tried to persuade Jung's heirs to have it published, to which they declined every hint of inquiry. As of mid-September 2009, less than two dozen people had seen it. But Ulrich Hoerni, Jung's grandson who manages the Jung archives, decided to publish it. To raise the additional funds needed, the Philemon Foundation was founded [Corbett]."
In 2007, two technicians for DigitalFusion, working with the publisher, W. W. Norton & Company, painstakingly scanned one-tenth of a millimeter at a time with a 10,200-pixel scanner. It was published on October 7, 2009 (ISBN 978-0-393-06567-1) in German with "separate English translation along with Shamdasani's introduction and footnotes" at the back of the book, according to Sara Corbett for The New York Times. She wrote, "The book is bombastic, baroque and like so much else about Carl Jung, a willful oddity, synched with an antediluvian and mystical reality [Corbett]."
The Rubin Museum of Art in New York City displayed the original Red Book journal, as well as some of Jung's original small journals, from October 7, 2009 to January 25, 2010 [http://www.rmanyc.org/nav/exhibitions/view/308.http://www.rmanyc.org/nav/exh ibitions/view/308]. According to them, "During the period in which he worked on this book Jung developed his principal theories of archetypes, collective unconscious, and the process of individuation." Two-thirds of the pages bear Jung's illuminations of the text [ ibid ].
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mazurka Act I, Signature iii - (2)
Polish folk dance in 3/4 time for a circle of couples, characterized by stamping feet and clicking heels, traditionally danced to the music of bagpipes. Originating in Masuria (northeastern Poland) in the 16th century, it became popular at the Polish court and spread to Russia and Germany, reaching England and France by the 1830s. The 50 piano mazurkas by Frédéric Chopin reflected and extended the dance's popularity. It had no set figures and allowed improvisation among its more than 50 different steps. [Following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
The folk origins of the mazurek are two other Polish musical forms—the slow kujawiak, and the fast oberek. The mazurek is always found to have either a triplet, trill, dotted eighth note (quaver) pair, or an ordinary eighth note pair before two quarter notes (crotchets). In the 19th century, the dance became popular in ballrooms in the rest of Europe. The Polish national anthem has a mazurek rhythm but is too slow to be considered a mazurek. There are many Polish editions of the mazurek but the most notable one is the mazurka.
In Polish, this musical form is called "mazurek"—a word derived from "mazur," which up to the nineteenth century denoted an inhabitant of Poland's Mazovia region, and which also became the root for "Masuria." In Polish, "mazurka" is actually the genitive and accusative cases of "mazurek."
Several classical composers have written mazurkas, with the best known being the 58 composed by Frédéric Chopin for solo piano. Henryk Wieniawski also wrote two for violin with piano (the popular "Obertas", op. 19), and in the 1920s, Karol Szymanowski wrote a set of twenty for piano and finished his composing career with a final pair in 1934. Also, Maria Szymanowska wrote Mazurkas long before Chopin.
Chopin first started composing mazurkas in 1825, but his composing did not become serious until 1830, the year of the November Uprising, a Polish rebellion against the Russian government. Chopin continued composing them until 1849, the year of his death. The stylistic and musical characteristics of Chopin’s mazurkas differ from the traditional variety because Chopin in effect created a completely separate and new genre of mazurkas all his own. For example, he used classical techniques in his mazurkas, including counterpoint and fugues [Charles Rosen, The Romantic Generation (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995)]. By including more chromaticism and harmony in the mazurkas, he made them more technically interesting than the traditional dances. Chopin also tried to compose his mazurkas in such a way that they could not be used for dancing, so as to distance them from the original form.
However, while Chopin changed some aspects of the original mazurkas, he maintained others. His mazurkas, like the traditional dances, contain a great deal of repetition: repetition of certain measures or groups of measures; of entire sections; and of an initial theme [Jeffrey Kallberg, The Problem of Repetition and Return in Chopin's Mazurkas (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1988)]. The rhythm of his mazurkas also remains very similar to that of earlier mazurkas. However, Chopin also incorporated the rhythmic elements of the two other Polish forms mentioned above, the kujawiak and oberek ; his mazurkas usually feature rhythms from more than one of these three forms (mazurek, kujawiak, and oberek). This use of rhythm suggests that Chopin tried to create a genre that had ties to the original form, but was still something new and different. César Franck, c.1872.* Franck, César Act I, Signature iii - (3) born Dec. 10, 1822, Liège, Neth.
died Nov. 8, 1890, Paris, France
Belgian-French composer. A piano prodigy, he arrived in Paris at age 14 to study at the Paris Conservatoire. In 1858 he became organist at the large church of Sainte-Clotilde, where he would remain the rest of his life. In 1872 he became professor of organ at the Conservatoire. His compositions, which tend to be serious, German-influenced, and often religious, include the famous Symphony in D Minor (1888); the tone poems Les Éolides (1876), Le Chasseur maudit (1882), and Psyché (1888); the oratorio Les Béatitudes (1879); chamber works including a piano quintet (1879), a violin sonata (1886), and a string quartet (1889); and many works for organ and piano.
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
César Auguste Jean Guillaume Hubert Franck was born in Liège, Belgium, to a father from the German-Belgian border and a German mother. His father had ambitions for him to become a concert pianist, and he studied at the conservatoire in Liège before going to the Paris Conservatoire in 1838 after private studies with Anton Reicha for a year. Upon leaving in 1842 he briefly returned to Belgium, but went back to Paris in 1844 and remained there for the rest of his life. His decision to give up a career as a virtuoso led to strained relations with his father during this time [Stanley Sadie, The Grove Concise Dictionary of Music (London: Macmillan Press Ltd.)]. During his first years in Paris, Franck made his living by teaching, both privately and institutionally. He also held various posts as organist: from 1847 to 1851 he was organist at Notre Dame de Lorette, and from 1851 to 1858 he was organist at Saint Jean and St François. During this time he became familiar with the work of the famous French organ builder Aristide Cavaillé-Coll, and he also worked on developing his technique as an organist and improviser.
In 1858, he became organist at the newly-consecrated Saint Clotilde Basilica, where he remained until his death. Here he began to attract attention for his skill as an improviser. His first set of organ compositions, however, was not published until 1868, when he was 46 years old, although it contains one of his finest organ pieces, the Grande Pièce Symphonique . From 1872 to his death he was professor of organ at the Paris Conservatory. His pupils included Vincent d'Indy, Ernest Chausson, Louis Vierne, and Henri Duparc. As an organist he was particularly noted for his skill in improvisation, and on the basis of merely twelve major organ works, Franck is considered by many the greatest composer of organ music after J. S. Bach. His works were some of the finest organ pieces to come from France in over a century, and laid the groundwork for the French symphonic organ style. In particular, his Grande Pièce Symphonique , a work of 25 minutes' duration, paved the way for the organ symphonies of Charles-Marie Widor, Louis Vierne, and Marcel Dupré [ibid].
In 1890, Franck was involved in a serious traffic accident. It was after this accident that he wrote his Trois chorals for organ . Franck died as a result of complications from the accident very shortly after finishing the chorales. He was interred in the Cimetière du Montparnasse in Paris.
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mercantilism Act I, Signature iii - (4)
Economic theory and policy influential in Europe from the 16th to the 18th century that called for government regulation of a nation'seconomy in order to increase its power at the expense of rival nations. Though the theory existed earlier, the term was not coined until the 18th century; it was given currency by Adam Smith in his Wealth of Nations (1776). Mercantilism's emphasis on the importance of gold and silver holdings as a sign of a nation's wealth and power led to policies designed to obtain precious metals through trade by ensuring “favourable” trade balances (see balance of trade ), meaning an excess of exports over imports, especially if a nation did not possess mines or have access to them. In a favourable trade balance, payments for the goods or services had to be made with gold or silver. Colonial possessions were to serve as markets for exports and as suppliers of raw materials to the mother country, a policy that created conflict between the European colonial powers and their colonies, in particular fanning resentment of Britain in the North American colonies and helping bring about the American Revolution. Mercantilism favoured a large population to supply labourers, purchasers of goods, and soldiers. Thrift and saving were emphasized as virtues because they made possible the creation of capital. Mercantilism provided a favourable climate for the early development of capitalism but was later severely criticized, especially by advocates of laissez- faire , who argued that all trade was beneficial and that strict government controls were counterproductive.
Also Sprach Zarathustra Act I, Signature iii - (5)
See also Act I, Signature ii – (26).
[Following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for All and None (German: Also sprach Zarathustra: Ein Buch für Alle und Keinen) is a philosophical novel by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, composed in four parts between 1883 and 1885. Much of the work deals with ideas such as the "eternal recurrence of the same," the parable on the "death of God," and the "prophecy" of the Overman, which were first introduced in The Gay Science [C. Guignon, D. Pereboom, Existentialism: Basic Writings , 2nd ed. (Hackett, 2001), pp. 101-113]. Described by Nietzsche himself as "the deepest ever written," the book is a dense and esoteric treatise on philosophy and morality, featuring as protagonist a fictionalized Zarathustra. A central irony of the text is that Nietzsche mimics the style of the Bible in order to present ideas which fundamentally oppose Christian and Jewish morality and tradition.
Genesis. Thus Spoke Zarathustra was conceived while Nietzsche was writing The Gay Science ; he made a small note, reading "6,000 feet beyond man and time," as evidence of this [Gutmann, James, "The 'Tremendous Moment' of Nietzsche's Vision," The Journal of Philosophy 51: 25 (American Philosophical Association Eastern Division: Papers to be presented at the Fifty-First Annual Meeting, Goucher College, December 28-30, 1954), pp. 837-842]. More specifically, this note related to the concept of the Eternal Recurrence, which is, by Nietzsche's admission, the central idea of Zarathustra; this idea occurred to him by a "pyramidal block of stone" on the shores of Lake Silvaplana in the Upper Engadine, a high alpine region whose valley floor is at 6,000 ft. Nietzsche planned to write the book in three parts over several years. He wrote that the ideas for Zarathustra first came to him while walking on two roads surrounding Rapallo, according to Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche in the introduction of Thomas Common's early translation of the book. While developing the general outlook of the book, he subsequently decided to write an additional three parts; ultimately, however, he composed only the fourth part, which is viewed to constitute an intermezzo.
Nietzsche commented in Ecce Homo that for the completion of each part: "Ten days sufficed; in no case, neither for the first nor for the third and last, did I require more" (trans. Kaufmann). The first three parts were first published separately, and were subsequently published in a single volume in 1887. The fourth part remained private after Nietzsche wrote it in 1885; a scant forty copies were all that were printed, apart from seven others that were distributed to Nietzsche's close friends. In March 1892, the four parts were finally reprinted as a single volume. Since then, the version most commonly produced has included all four parts. The original text contains a great deal of word-play. An example of this exists in the use of the words "over" or "super" and the words "down" or "abyss/abysmal"; some examples include "superman" or "overman," "overgoing," "downgoing" and "self- overcoming."
Style. Harold Bloom calls Thus Spoke Zarathustra a "gorgeous disaster," adding that its rhapsodic fiction is "now unreadable [Bloom, Harold, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages (Riverhead Books, 1994), pp. 261, 422]." Noteworthy for its format, the book comprises a philosophical work of fiction whose style often lightheartedly imitates that of the New Testament and of the Platonic dialogues, at times resembling pre-Socratic works in tone and in its use of natural phenomena as rhetorical and explanatory devices. It also features frequent references to the Western literary and philosophical traditions, implicitly offering an interpretation of these traditions and of their problems. Nietzsche achieves all of this through the character of Zarathustra (referring to the traditional prophet of Zoroastrianism), who makes speeches on philosophic topics as he moves along a loose plotline marking his development and the reception of his ideas. One can view this characteristic (following the genre of the bildungsroman ) as an inline commentary on Zarathustra's (and Nietzsche's) philosophy. All this, along with the book's ambiguity and paradoxical nature, has helped its eventual enthusiastic reception by the reading public, but has frustrated academic attempts at analysis (as Nietzsche may have intended). Thus Spoke Zarathustra remained unpopular as a topic for scholars (especially those in the Anglo-American analytic tradition) until the second half of the twentieth century brought widespread interest in Nietzsche and his unconventional style that does not distinguish between philosophy and literature [Behler, Ernst, "Nietzsche in the Twentieth Century," in The Cambridge Companion to Nietzsche, Magnus and Higgins (ed.) (Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 281-319]. It offers formulations of eternal recurrence, and Nietzsche for the first time speaks of the Übermensch: themes that would dominate his books from this point onwards.
A vulnerability of Nietzsche's style is that his nuances and shades of meaning are very easily lost — and all too easily gained — in translation. The Übermensch is particularly problematic: the equivalent "Superman" found in dictionaries and in the translations by Thomas Common and R.J. Hollingdale may create an unfortunate association with the heroic comic-character "Superman," while simultaneously detracting from Nietzsche's repeated play on "über" as well as losing the gender-neutrality of the German. The "Übermensch" is the being that overcomes the "great nausea" associated with nihilism; that overcomes that most "abysmal" realization of the eternal return. He is the being that "sails over morality," and that dances over gravity (the "spirit of gravity" is Zarathustra's devil and archenemy). He is a "harvester" and a "celebrant" who endlessly affirms his existence, thereby becoming the transfigurer of his consciousness and life, aesthetically. He is initially a destructive force, excising and annihilating the insidious "truths" of the herd, and consequently reclaiming the chaos from which pure creativity is born. It is this creative force exemplified by the Übermensch that justifies suffering without displacing it in some "afterworld." Orwell, George Act I, Signature iii - (6)
Orig. Eric Arthur Blair born 1903, Motihari, Bengal, India
died Jan. 21, 1950, London, Eng.
British novelist, essayist, and critic. Instead of accepting a scholarship to a university, Orwell went to Burma to serve in the Indian Imperial Police (1922–27), an experience that changed him into a literary and political rebel. On returning to Europe, he lived in self-imposed poverty, gaining material for Down and Out in Paris and London (1933), and became a socialist. He went to Spain to report on the Spanish Civil War and stayed to join the Republican militia. His war experiences, which gave him a lifelong dread of communism (he would later provide British intelligence services with lists of his fellow British communists), are recounted in Homage to Catalonia (1938). His novels typically portray a sensitive, conscientious, emotionally isolated individual at odds with an oppressive or dishonest social environment. His most famous works are the anti-Soviet satirical fable Animal Farm (1945), and Nineteen Eighty-four (1949) a dystopic vision of totalitarianism whose influence was widely felt in the postwar decades. His literary essays are also admired.
[Following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
During most of his career, Orwell was best known for his journalism, in essays, reviews, columns in newspapers and magazines and in his books of reportage: Down and Out in Paris and London (describing a period of poverty in these cities), The Road to Wigan Pier (describing the living conditions of the poor in northern England, and the class divide generally) and Homage to Catalonia . According to Irving Howe, Orwell was "the best English essayist since Hazlitt, perhaps since Dr Johnson [Irving Howe considered Orwell "the best English essayist since Hazlitt" (Irving Howe, “George Orwell: As the bones know,” Harper's Magazine , January 1969]."
Modern readers are more often introduced to Orwell as a novelist, particularly through his enormously successful titles Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four . The former is often thought to reflect developments in the Soviet Union after the Russian Revolution; the latter, life under totalitarian rule. Nineteen Eighty-Four is often compared to Brave New World by Aldous Huxley; both are powerful dystopian novels warning of a future world where the state exerts complete control.
Coming Up for Air , his last novel before World War II, is the most English of his novels; alarums of war mingle with images of idyllic Thames-side Edwardian childhood of protagonist George Bowling. The novel is pessimistic; industrialism and capitalism have killed the best of Old England, and there were great, new external threats. In homely terms, Bowling posits the totalitarian hypotheses of Borkenau, Orwell, Silone and Koestler: "Old Hitler's something different. So's Joe Stalin. They aren't like these chaps in the old days who crucified people and chopped their heads off and so forth, just for the fun of it ... They're something quite new — something that's never been heard of before."
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Illuminated initial “U” for “Uerba” (i.e., “Verba”) in the book of Jeremiah, from the Winchester Bible , English, 12th century; in the Cathedral Library, Winchester, England (MS. 17, fol. 148R). illuminated manuscripts Act I, Signature iii - (7)
Handwritten book decorated with gold or silver, brilliant colours, elaborate designs, or miniature paintings. “Illumination” originally denoted embellishment of text with gold or silver, which gave the impression that the page had been literally illuminated. In the Middle Ages those who “historiated” (illustrated texts with paintings) were differentiated from those who “illuminated” (embellished the initial capital letters with gold leaf or powder). Today the term denotes the illustration and decoration of early manuscripts in general, whether or not with gold. With the development of printing in Europe in the 15th century, illumination was superseded by printed illustrations.
*[Following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Text. In the making of an illuminated manuscript, the text was usually written first. Sheets of parchment or vellum, animal hides specially prepared for writing, were cut down to the appropriate size. After the general layout of the page was planned (e.g., initial capital, borders), the page was lightly ruled with a pointed stick, and the scribe went to work with ink-pot and either sharpened quill feather or reed pen.
The script depended on local customs and tastes. The sturdy Roman letters of the early Middle Ages gradually gave way to scripts such as Uncial and half-Uncial, especially in the British Isles, where distinctive scripts such as insular majuscule and insular minuscule developed. Stocky, richly textured blackletter was first seen around the 13th century and was particularly popular in the later Middle Ages. Palaeography is the study of historical handwritten scripts, and codicology the related study of other physical aspects of manuscript codexes.
One of the most important features in the production of an illuminated manuscript is the amount of time that was spent in the pre-production stages outlining the work. Prior to the days of such careful planning, "A typical black- letter page of these Gothic years would show a page in which the lettering was cramped and crowded into a format dominated by huge ornamented capitals that descended from uncial forms or by illustrations [Anderson, Donald M., The Art of Written Forms: The Theory and Practice of Calligraphy (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston Inc., 1969)]." To prevent such poorly made manuscripts and illuminations from occurring a script was typically supplied first, "and blank spaces were left for the decoration. This pre-supposes very careful planning by the scribe even before he put pen to parchment [De Hamel, Christopher, Medieval Craftsmen: Scribes and Illuminations (Buffalo: University of Toronto, 1992), p. 65]." If the scribe and the illuminator were separate labors the planning period allowed for adequate space to be given to each individual.
The Process of Illumination. The following steps outline the detailed labor involved to create the illuminations of one page of a manuscript. 1) Silverpoint drawing of the design were executed 2) Burnished gold dots applied 3) The application of modulating colors 4) Continuation of the previous three steps in addition to the outlining of marginal figures 5) The penning of a rinceaux appearing in the border of a page 6) The final step, the marginal figures are painted [Calkins, Robert G., "Stages of Execution: Procedures of Illumination as Revealed in an Unfinished Book of Hours," International Center of Medieval Art 17: 1 (1978), pp. 61-70, JSTOR.org., 17 Apr. 2010, http://www.jostor.org/stable/766713].
The illumination and decoration was normally planned at the inception of the work, and space reserved for it. However normally the text was written before illumination began. In the Early Medieval period the text and illumination were often done by the same people, normally monks, but by the High Middle Ages the roles were typically separated, except for routine initials and flourishes, and by at least the 14th century there were secular workshops producing manuscripts, and by the beginning of the 15th century these were producing most of the best work, and were commissioned even by monasteries. When the text was complete, the illustrator set to work. Complex designs were planned out beforehand, probably on wax tablets, the sketch pad of the era. The design was then traced or drawn onto the vellum (possibly with the aid of pinpricks or other markings, as in the case of the Lindisfarne Gospels ). Many incomplete manuscripts survive from most periods, giving us a good idea of working methods.
At all times, most manuscripts did not have images in them. In the early Middle Ages, manuscripts tend to either be display books with very full illumination, or manuscripts for study with at most a few decorated initials and flourishes. By the Romanesque period many more manuscripts had decorated or historiated initials, and manuscripts essentially for study often contained some images, often not in colour. This trend intensified in the Gothic period, when most manuscripts had at least decorative flourishes in places, and a much larger proportion had images of some sort. Display books of the Gothic period in particular had very elaborate decorated borders of foliate patterns, often with small drolleries. A Gothic page might contain several areas and types of decoration: a miniature in a frame, a historiated initial beginning a passage of text, and a border with drolleries. Often different artists worked on the different parts of the decoration.
Use of Color in Illuminated Manuscripts. While the use of gold is by far one of the most captivating features of illuminated manuscripts, the bold use of varying colors provided multiple layers of dimension to the illumination. From a religious perspective, "the diverse colors wherewith the book is illustrated, not unworthily represent the multiple grace of heavenly wisdom [Putnam, A. M., Geo. Haven, Books and Their Makers During The Middle Ages , Vol. 1 (New York: Hillary House, 1962)]." While religious authors view themselves as instilling a part of Gods vast glory on the work, many illustrations can be linked to "the history of the texts that were required to be illustrated and the needs and tastes of the readers of those manuscripts ["Manuscript," http://arts.jrank.org/pages/9716/Manuscript.html, 17 Apr. 2010]." Color brought the images on the page to life and captivated the readers. Without color the impact of the image would have been completely lost. Ernst Haeckel, Kunstformen der Natur (1904), plate 88: Discomedusae (http://caliban.mpiz- koeln.mpg.de/haeckel/kunstformen/high/Tafel_088_300.html ).*
Medusa Act I, Signature iii - (8)
*[Image and caption and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
In biology, a medusa (plural: medusae) is a form of cnidarian in which the body is shortened on its principal axis and broadened, sometimes greatly, in contrast with polyps. Medusae vary from bell-shaped to the shape of a thin disk, scarcely convex above and only slightly concave below. The upper or aboral surface is called the exumbrella and the lower surface is called the subumbrella; the mouth is located on the lower surface, which may be partially closed by a membrane extending inward from the margin (called the velum). The digestive cavity consists of the gastrovascular cavity and radiating canals which extend toward the margin; these canals may be simple or branching, and vary in number from few to many. The margin of the disk bears sensory organs and tentacles.
In the class Hydrozoa, medusae are the sexual individuals of many species, alternating in the life cycle with asexual polyps. The medusa form of Hydrozoans are known as hydromedusae .
The medusa form predominates in the classes Scyphozoa (the common, colorful, large jellyfish) and Cubozoa. Except for freshwater hydrozoans like Craspedacusta sowerbyi , these are the only classes in which medusae appear.
German biologist Ernst Haeckel popularized medusae through his vivid illustrations, particularly in Kunstformen der Natur . Gorgon, carved marble mask of the early 6th century BC; in the Acropolis Museum, Athens.
One of three monsters in Greek mythology, the most famous of which was Medusa. According to Hesiod, the three Gorgons were daughters of the sea god Phorcys. Another tradition held that they were created by the earth goddess, Gaea, to aid her sons, the Titans, in their struggle with the gods. Classical art depicts them as winged females with snakes for hair.
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Act I, Signature iii - (9)
Card game. In one popular version of pinochle three players use two packs of 24 cards ranking ace, 10, king, queen, jack, and 9 of each suit. Each player is dealt 15 cards, 3 at a time. Bidding is based on certain combinations of cards within the player's hand and an estimation of tricks, or hands, the player can win. The name derives from Binokel, a German game resembling bezique.
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
History. Pinochle derives from the game bezique, . The French word "binocle" also meant "eyeglasses [http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fr:binocle]." The word is also possibly derived from the French word, "binage", for the combination of cards called "binocle [Deborah Doyle, ed., Hoyle's Official Rules of Card Games (Redwood, CA: Dingley, 2000), p. 420]." This latter pronunciation of the game would be adopted by German speakers. German immigrants brought the game to America, where it was later mispronounced and misspelled "Pinochle [John Scarne, Scarne on Cards (New York, NY: Signet, 1965), pp. 310-311]."
Auction pinochle for three players has some similarities with the German game skat, although the bidding is more similar to that of bid whist.
During World War I, the city of Syracuse, New York outlawed the playing of pinochle in a fit of anti-German sentiment [Rensselaer County Historical Society, "Online Exhibitions: 'Grüß Gott,'" in Rensselaer County: The Twentieth Century , October 17, 2002, http://www.rchsonline.org/grus_20th.htm]. Pinochle was the favorite card game of American Jews and Irish immigrants, while skat was the preferred game of a majority of German immigrants.
The deck. A pinochle deck consists of two copies of each of the 9, 10, jack, queen, king, and ace cards of all four suits, for 48 cards per deck. Aces are always considered high. Pinochle follows a nonstandard card ordering. The complete ordering from highest to lowest is A, 10, K, Q, J, 9. The game can also be played using standard ranking with a simple change to scoring.
Originally, the deck had to be composed by combining two poker, piquet or euchre decks and removing unneeded cards (a piquet deck does not have the 2-6, making it easier to modify, and a euchre deck is exactly half a pinochle deck), but with the game's popularity in the United States in the early 1900s, a single boxed deck with the necessary cards was marketed, and these specialized pinochle decks are now widely available in similar styles to common 52- card counterparts. Variants of pinochle can be played with five, six, eight or more players. These larger variations can combine two pinochle decks called a "double deck". The double deck can also be used when playing with 4 players; hand sizes, average scores and minimum bids are doubled.
Playing tricks. In playing cards for tricks, there are strict rules of forced play, which limit a player's ability to strategically retain high cards: The high bidder leads the play with the first card, which can be any card in the contract winner's hand, although some rules require the first card led to be a trump card. Then there are two variations of following suit depending if you are playing post-1945 or pre-1945 rules.
Pre-1945 rules: Every player must follow the lead suit if possible. Usually every player must play a winning card against those played so far, if it is possible to do so, even when the current player expects a later player to win the hand with a better card. The only exception is if a player played a trump card when trump was not the suit led. In that case, those following that player may play any card of the lead suit, since they must follow the lead suit but are already losing to the player who played trump. So if a player can play a card in suit, higher than any played so far, the player must do so, even if the player expects to lose to a later played card. Likewise, if a player cannot follow suit, but has trump, they must play trump. Again, if a player does not have any cards of the lead suit and can play a trump card higher than any other trump played so far, the player must do so, even if the player expects that a later player will beat the card. If another trump has already been played that a player cannot beat, then they can play any trump in their hand, but they still must play a trump card if they can. Only when a player has no cards in suit, and has no trump, can the player choose to play any card in their hand.
Post-1945 rules: Most books today say that unless trump is led you need not try to win the trick. It is only when trump is led that "heading" the trick is mandatory. In pinochle circles and tournaments the post-1945 rules are played about 50% of the time according to Pagat and Hoyle [http://www.pagat.com/].
See also Joli Kansil, Bicycle Official Rules of Card Games , 90th Ed. (Cincinnati, OH: U.S. Playing Card Company, 2004), p. 208
~ page 42 ~ Oberon* Act I, Signature iii - (10)
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Oberon, also designated as Uranus IV, is the outermost of the major moons of the planet Uranus. It is the second largest and second most massive of Uranian moons, and the ninth most massive moon in the solar system [http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/?sat_phys_par]. Oberon was discovered by William Herschel in 1787 and named after a character in Shakespeare's “A Midsummer Night's Dream.” Oberon's orbit lies outside Uranus's magnetosphere.
Oberon consists of approximately equal amounts of ice and rock, and is likely differentiated into a rocky core and an icy mantle. A layer of liquid water may be present at the core/mantle boundary. The surface of Oberon, which is dark red in color, appears to have been primarily shaped by asteroid and comet impacts. It is covered by numerous impact craters reaching 210 km in diameter. In addition to craters, Oberon possesses a system of canyons (grabens), which were formed as a result of the expansion of the interior during the early phases of the moon’s evolution. Oberon probably formed in the accretion disk that surrounded Uranus just after its formation.
As of 2008, the Uranian system has been studied up close only once: by the spacecraft Voyager 2 in January 1986. It took several images of Oberon, which allowed mapping of about 40% of the moon’s surface.
Oberon was discovered on January 11, 1787, by William Herschel; the same year he discovered Uranus's largest moon, Titania [Herschel, William, Sr., "An Account of the Discovery of Two Satellites Revolving Round the Georgian Planet," Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London 77: 125–129 (1787); Herschel, William, Sr., "On George's Planet and its satellites ," Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London 78: 364–378 (1788)]. He would later report four more satellites, which would turn out to be an erroneous observation ["On the Discovery of Four Additional Satellites of the Georgium Sidus; The Retrograde Motion of Its Old Satellites Announced; And the Cause of Their Disappearance at Certain Distances from the Planet Explained," Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London 88: 47–79. 1798]. Remarkably, for nearly fifty years following their discovery, Titania and Oberon would not be observed by any other instrument than William Herschel's [Herschel, John, "On the Satellites of Uranus," Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 3 (5): 35–36 (1834)]. However, the moon can be seen from Earth with a present-day amateur telescope [http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets /oberon.html]. antipode Act I, Signature iii - (11)
Main Entry: an£ti£pode
Pronunciation: ‚an-t„-ƒp‹d
Function: noun Inflected Form: plural an£tip£o£des \an-‚ti-p„-ƒd‡z\
Etymology: Middle English antipodes, plural, persons dwelling at opposite points on the globe, from Latin, from Greek, from plural of antipod-, antipous with feet opposite, from anti- + pod-, pous foot— more at foot
Date: 1549 1 : the parts of the earth diametrically opposite — usually used in plural; often used of Australia and New Zealand 2 : the exact opposite or contrary –an£tip£o£de£an \(ƒ)an-ƒti-p„-‚d‡-„n\ adjective or noun.
Photograph of a complete electrocardigraph, showing the manner in which the electrodes are attached to the patient, in this case the hands and one foot being immersed in jars of salt solution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Willem_Einthoven_ECG.jpg).* cardiogram Act I, Signature iii - (12)
Medical specialty dealing with heart diseases and disorders.
It began with the 1749 publication by Jean Baptiste de Sénac of contemporary knowledge of the heart. Diagnostic methods improved in the 19th century, and in 1905 the electrocardiograph was invented. The 20th century saw many surgical advances in cardiology, including heart transplantsand the use of artificial hearts. Current diagnostic methods include chest percussion (tapping) and auscultation, electrocardiography, and echocardiography (see ultrasound). Cardiologists provide continuing care of heart patients, doing basic heart-function studies, supervising therapy, including drug therapy, and working closely with heart surgeons.
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]: Electrocardiography (ECG or EKG) is a transthoracic interpretation of the electrical activity of the heart over time captured and externally recorded by skin electrodes [Aswini Kumar, M.D., "ECG - simplified," LifeHugger , http://pn.lifehugger.com/doc/120/ecg-100-steps]. It is a noninvasive recording produced by an electrocardiographic device. The etymology of the word is derived from the Greek electro, because it is related to electrical activity, cardio, Greek for heart, and graph, a Greek root meaning "to write".
The ECG works mostly by detecting and amplifying the tiny electrical changes on the skin that are caused when the heart muscle "depolarises" during each heart beat. At rest, each heart muscle cell has a charge across its outer wall, or cell membrane. Reducing this charge towards zero is called de-polarisation, which activates the mechanisms in the cell that cause it to contract. During each heartbeat a healthy heart will have an orderly progression of a wave of depolarisation that is triggered by the cells in the sinoatrial node, spreads out through the atrium, passes through "intrinsic conduction pathways" and then spreads all over the ventricles. This is detected as tiny rises and falls in the voltage between two electrodes placed either side of the heart which is displayed as a wavy line either on a screen or on paper. This display indicates the overall rhythm of the heart and weaknesses in different parts of the heart muscle.
Usually more than 2 electrodes are used and they can be combined into a number of pairs. (For example: Left arm (LA),right arm (RA) and left leg (LL) electrodes form the pairs: LA+RA, LA+LL, RA+LL) The output from each pair is known as a lead. Each lead is said to look at the heart from a different angle. Different types of ECGs can be referred to by the number of leads that are recorded, for example 3-lead, 5-lead or 12-lead ECGs (sometimes simply "a 12-lead"). A 12-lead ECG is one in which 12 different electrical signals are recorded at approximately the same time and will often be used as a one-off recording of an ECG, typically printed out as a paper copy. 3- and 5-lead ECGs tend to be monitored continuously and viewed only on the screen of an appropriate monitoring device, for example during an operation or whilst being transported in an ambulance. There may, or may not be any permanent record of a 3- or 5-lead ECG depending on the equipment used.
It is the best way to measure and diagnose abnormal rhythms of the heart [Braunwald, E. (ed.), Heart Disease: A Textbook of Cardiovascular Medicine , 5th Ed. (Philadelphia, PA: W. B. Saunders Co., 1997), p. 108], particularly abnormal rhythms caused by damage to the conductive tissue that carries electrical signals, or abnormal rhythms caused by electrolyte imbalances ["The clinical value of the ECG in noncardiac conditions," Chest , 125 (4): 1561-76 (2004)]. In a myocardial infarction (MI), the ECG can identify if the heart muscle has been damaged in specific areas, though not all areas of the heart are covered ["Part 8: Stabilization of the Patient With Acute Coronary Syndromes," in 2005 American Heart Association Guidelines for Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation and Emergency Cardiovascular Care-Circulation , 112: IV. 89 - IV. 110 (2005)]. The ECG cannot reliably measure the pumping ability of the heart, for which ultrasound-based (echocardiography) or nuclear medicine tests are used. It is possible to be in cardiac arrest with a normal ECG signal (a condition known as pulseless electrical activity).
History. Alexander Muirhead is reported to have attached wires to a feverish patient's wrist to obtain a record of the patient's heartbeat while studying for his Doctor of Science (in electricity) in 1872 at St Bartholomew's Hospital [Ronald M. Birse, rev. Patricia E. Knowlden, "Alexander Muirhead, 1848-1920," in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004) [http://0-www.oxforddnb.com.innopac.up.ac.za/view/article/37794]; original source of Muirhead's biography written by his wife, Elizabeth, published by Oxford: Blackwell, and privately printed 1926]. This activity was directly recorded and visualized using a Lippmann capillary electrometer by the British physiologist John Burdon Sanderson [Burdon, Sanderson J., "Experimental results relating to the rhythmical and excitatory motions of the ventricle of the frog heart," Proc Roy Soc Lond 27: 410–14 (1878)]. The first to systematically approach the heart from an electrical point-of-view was Augustus Waller, working in St Mary's Hospital in Paddington, London [Waller A. D., "A demonstration on man of electromotive changes accompanying the heart's beat," J Physiol (Lond) 8: 229–34 (1887)]. His electrocardiograph machine consisted of a Lippmann capillary electrometer fixed to a projector. The trace from the heartbeat was projected onto a photographic plate which was itself fixed to a toy train. This allowed a heartbeat to be recorded in real time. In 1911 he still saw little clinical application for his work.
An initial breakthrough came when Willem Einthoven, working in Leiden, Netherlands, used the string galvanometer that he invented in 1903 ["Einthoven's String Electrovanometer," September 29, 1927, http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2435435]. This device was much more sensitive than both the capillary electrometer that Waller used and the string galvanometer that had been invented separately in 1897 by the French engineer Clément Ader [Einthoven, W., "Un nouveau galvanometre," Arch Neerl Sc Ex Nat 6: 625 (1901)]. Rather than using today's self-adhesive electrodes Einthoven's subjects would immerse each of their limbs into containers of salt solutions from which the ECG was recorded. Einthoven assigned the letters P, Q, R, S and T to the various deflections, and described the electrocardiographic features of a number of cardiovascular disorders. In 1924, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for his discovery [Cooper, J., "Electrocardiography 100 years ago: Origins, pioneers, and contributors," N Engl J Med 315 (7): 461–4 (1986)].
Though the basic principles of that era are still in use today, there have been many advances in electrocardiography over the years. The instrumentation, for example, has evolved from a cumbersome laboratory apparatus to compact electronic systems that often include computerized interpretation of the electrocardiogram [Mark, Jonathan B., Atlas of Cardiovascular Monitoring (New York: Churchill Livingstone, 1998)].
~ page 44 ~
Map of "The Illyrian Wars," by Megistias, with data from Wilkes, J. J., The Illyrians (1992); Hammond, N. G. L., A History of Greece to 322 B.C. (1986); map from NASA.* Illyria Act I, Signature iii - (13)
Ancient country, northwestern Balkan Peninsula, southeastern Europe. It was inhabited from the 10th century BC by the Illyrians, an Indo-European people who later practiced piracy on Roman shipping. After a series of wars with Rome, it was defeated in 168 BC and established as the Roman province of Illyricum. When the Roman Empire was divided in AD 395, Illyria east of the Drina River became part of the Eastern Empire. It was occupied by the Slavs from the 6th century, and its name changed in the 8th–11th centuries to Arbëri and finally to Albania. *[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
The era in which we observe Illyrian kingdoms begins approximately at 400 BC and ends at 167 BC [Wilkes, John J., The Illyrians (Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 1995), p. 298]. The Autariatae under Pleurias (337 B.C.) were considered to have been a kingdom [Lewis, David Malcolm, Boardman, John, The Cambridge Ancient History , Vol. 6: "The Fourth Century B.C." Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 785]. The Kingdom of the Ardiaei began at 230 BC and ended at 167 BC [Wilkes, John J., History of the Provinces of the Roman Empire (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), p. 13]. The most notable Illyrian kingdoms and dynasties were those of Bardyllis of the Dardani and of Agron of the Ardiaei who created the last and best-known Illyrian kingdom [Kipfer, Barbara Ann, Encyclopedic Dictionary of Archaeology (Springer, 2000, p. 251]. Agron ruled over the Ardiaei and had extended his rule to other tribes as well [Hammond, Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière, Studies Concerning Epirus and Macedonia before Alexander (Hakkert, 1993), p. 104]. As for the Dardanians, they always had separate domains from the rest of the Illyrians [Papazoglu, Fanula, The Central Balkan Tribes in Pre-Roman Times: Triballi, Autariatae, Dardanians, Scordisci and Moesians (Hakkert, 1978), p. 216].
The Illyrian kingdoms were composed of small areas within region of Illyria. The exact extent of even the most prominent ones remains unknown [Berranger, Danièle, Cabanes, Pierre, Berranger-Auserve, Danièle, Épire, Illyrie, Macédoine: mélanges offerts au professeur Pierre Cabanes (Presses Univ Blaise Pascal, 2007), p. 136]. Only the Romans ruled the entire region. The internal organization of the south Illyrian kingdoms points to imitation of their neighboring Greek kingdoms and influence from the Greek and Hellenistic world in the growth of their urban centers [Wilkes (1995), p. 237]. Polybius gives as an image of society within an Illyrian kingdom as peasant infantry fought under aristocrats which he calls in Greek Polydynastae (Greek: Πολυδυνάστες) where each one controlled a town within the kingdom [Wilkes (1995), p. 127]. The monarchy was established on hereditary lines and Illyrian rulers used marriages as a means of alliance with other powers [Wilkes (1995), p. 167]. Pliny (23–79 AD) writes that the people that formed the nucleus of the Illyrian kingdom were 'Illyrians proper' or Illyrii Proprie Dicti [Wilkes (1995), p. 216]. They were the Taulantii, the Pleraei, the Endirudini, Sasaei, Grabaei and the Labeatae. These later joined to form the Docleatae.
Alban Hills, 2006, author Renato Clementi.* Alban Hills Act I, Signature iii - (14)
Ridgetop site of the ruins of the ancient centre of Zapotec culture, located near Oaxaca, Mex. Construction at the site began around the 8th century BC. Monte Albán reached its height AD 250–700. The site contains great plazas, truncated pyramids, a tlachtli court for an ancient ballgame, underground passageways, and about 170 tombs, the most elaborate yet uncovered in the New World. The great plaza atop the highest hill is flanked by four platforms; two temples standon the platform to the south. In its final phase, Monte Albán was inhabited by the Mixtec. *[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
The Alban Hills (Italian Colli Albani ) are the site of a quiescent volcanic complex in Italy, located 20 km (12 mi) southeast of Rome and about 24 kilometres (15 mi) north of Anzio.
The dominant peak (but not the highest) is Monte Cavo. There are two small calderas which contain lakes, Lago Albano and Lake Nemi. The rock of the hills is called Peperino ( lapis albanus ) a particular Tuff, a combination of ash and small rocks that is useful for construction, and provides a mineral-rich substrate for grape vines.
The area was inhabited by the Aequi during the 5th to 3rd centuries BC. The ancient Romans called them Albanus Mons. On the summit was the sanctuary of Jupiter Latiaris, in which the consuls celebrated the Feriae Latinae, and several generals celebrated victories here when they were not accorded regular triumphs in Rome. The temple has not survived, but the Via Triumphalis leading up to it may still be seen. The hills, especially around the shores of the lakes, have been popular since prehistoric times, from the 9th to 7th century BC there were numerous villages (see the legendary Alba Longa and Tusculum). In Roman times these villages were inhabited as a way to escape the heat and crowds of Rome, and there are many villas and country houses.
A classic-styled modern label from a bottle of Moxie brand cream soda. Scanned July 2007.* Moxie Act I, Signature iii - (15)
Main Entry: mox£ie
Pronunciation: ‚mäk-s‡
Function: noun
Etymology: from Moxie, a trademark for a soft drink
Date: 1930
1 : energy, pep 2 : courage, determination 3 : know-how, expertise
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
History. Moxie originated as a patent medicine called "Moxie Nerve Food [Mark Pendergrast: For God, Country and Coca-Cola (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1993)]," which was created around 1876 by Dr. Augustin Thompson. Thompson claimed that it contained an extract from a rare, unnamed South American plant, which had supposedly been discovered by a friend of his, Lieutenant Moxie [ ibid ], who had used it as a panacea. Moxie, he claimed, was especially effective against "paralysis, softening of the brain, nervousness, and insomnia [ibid]."
After a few years, Thompson added soda water to the formula and changed the product's name to "Beverage Moxie Nerve Food." By 1884 he was selling Moxie both in bottles and in bulk as a soda fountain syrup. He marketed it as "a delicious blend of bitter and sweet, a drink to satisfy everyone's taste [Anne Cooper Funderburg, Sundae Best: A History of Soda Fountains (Popular Press, 2001), pp. 67–68, http://books.google.com/?id=Wr_yPYvkNWwC]."
A lawsuit was filed in 1907 by the Moxie Nerve Food Company of New England against the Modox Company and others, alleging that they had copied the ingredients of Moxie and were using the name "Modox [Modox drink website, http://www.drinkmodox.com/]," which closely resembled "Moxie," and were infringing upon patents and trademarks ["Moxie Nerve Food Company of New England v. Modox Co. et al., Circuit Court, District of Rhode Island, February 20, 1907," in The Federal Reporter , v. 151-152 (West Publishing Co., 1907), pp. 493-509]. The suit was dismissed by the judge, who said the court could not protect the legitimate part of the plaintiff's business in this case. In a later case in New York, the Moxie Nerve Food Company won a lawsuit against Modox, which subsequently went out of business [www.drinkmodox.com].
President Calvin Coolidge was known to favor the drink, and Boston Red Sox slugger Ted Williams endorsed it on radio and in print. The company also marketed a beverage called "Ted's Root Beer" in the early sixties. Author E. B. White once claimed that “Moxie contains gentian root, which is the path to the good life ["Make Mine Moxie," Perspective (Cambridge, MA, November, 2001), http://www.digitas.harvard.edu/ ~perspy/old/issues/2001/nov/backpage.html]." Currently, one of the ingredients of Moxie is "Gentian Root Extractives," which may contribute to the drink's unique flavor ["Moxie For Mine: More About Moxie the Drink," http://www.bdragon.com/moxie/moxie.shtml ].
The brand suffered a significant decline in sales during the 1930s, which is thought to have been caused by the company's decision to expand its sugar reserves at the expense of its popular advertising campaign.
Due to competition from Coca Cola, demand for Moxie has waned in recent years, although the brand persists in New England. Sugar-free Diet Moxie was introduced in 1962.
Moxie today. The Moxie brand was purchased in 1966 by the Monarch Beverage Company of Atlanta. In 2007 Monarch sold it to its current owner, Cornucopia Beverages Inc. of Bedford, New Hampshire, which is owned by the Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Northern New England, a subsidiary of the Kirin Brewery Company, based in Tokyo [10^ Paiste, Denis, "Moxie, same taste, new owner," New Hampshire Union Leader (Union Leader Corporation), April 6, 2007, p. B3, http://newenglandpride.blogspot.com/2007/04/cornucopia-beverages-acquires- mox ie.html: "Cornucopia Beverages, a unit of Bedford-based Coca-Cola Co. of Northern New England Inc., has acquired the Moxie brand from Atlanta-based Monarch Beverage Co at undisclosed terms. Cornucopia previously bottled Moxie under license from Monarch. 'There's really nothing to compare it to. It's not a cola, and it's not a root beer; it's its own little niche,' Moxie brand manager Justin Conroy said in a telephone interview. He said no immediate changes are planned as a result of the brand purchase. Last year, the Moxie brand sold about 450,000 192-ounce cases, equivalent to 7.2 million 12-ounce cans. The drink is bottled in Londonderry/New Hampshire, Worcester/ Massachusetts, and Catawissa/Pennsylvania. Conroy said 75 percent of production ships from Londonderry. Tracing its roots to Maine-born Dr. Augustin Thompson, Moxie was first marketed as a carbonated soft drink in 1884. Today, the soft drink is available in regular, diet and energy drink versions. It is Maine's official state soft drink. The Moxie page on the Monarch Beverage Co. Web site states that Moxie was first marketed in 1876 as a medicine. Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Northern New England Inc. is a subsidiary of Tokyo-based Kirin Brewery Co. Ltd. The firm bottles Coca-Cola brands under authority of the Coca-Cola company and also has license rights for Cadbury Schweppes brands, Dr. Pepper, Sunkist and Canada Dry"].
Cornucopia cites increasing requests for Moxie from fans across the country in its decision to step up efforts to distribute the product. In 2007 it launched pilot sales in Florida and organized a sampling event at the Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville, Connecticut.
The Catawissa Bottling Company in Catawissa, Pennsylvania, is one of six bottlers in the United States that produce Moxie. Catawissa has produced it since 1945 [11^ Abelson, Jenn (August 5, 2007), "Can a bitter taste find sweet life again? Unique N.E. soda Moxie thirsting for a revival," The Boston Globe, http://www.boston.com/business/articles /2007/08/05/can_a_bitter_taste_find_sw eet_life_again/]. One of the Moxie Teens - "Arizona."
Moxie Girlz is a line of fashion dolls introduced by MGA Entertainment in 2009. These dolls are targeted at girls ages 6 to 15. The four original 10.6-inch dolls are named Lexa, Bria, Avery, and Sophina, with the newest being Merin [http://www.flickr.com/photos/venivididolli/4211315400/] (from Art-titude , Edition 2). The Moxie dolls are reminiscent of Bratz, having the distinct pop on/off feet and long hair, but with features consisting of large eyes and proportioned noses and mouths fitting to their head-size.
MGA Entertainment (Micro-Games America Entertainment) is a manufacturer of children's toys and entertainment products founded in 1997. Its products include the Bratz fashion doll line and Yummi-Land. MGA is headquartered at 16300 Roscoe Boulevard in the Lake Balboa area of the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles, California, United States [http://www.mgae.com/international.asp; http://www.lakebalboanc.org/].
Products. Introduced in 2001, Bratz is MGA's most successful product line, with various spin-offs from the original teenage dolls, including miniature versions (Lil' Bratz), kid versions (Bratz Kidz) baby dolls (Bratz Babyz), pets (Bratz Petz), tiny baby dolls with pets (Lil Angelz), two feature films (Bratz: The Movie and Bratz Girls Really Rock) and numerous DVDs and soundtracks. The Kidz and Lil Angelz have been renamed to "4*Ever" due to a lawsuit.
In 2009, a new doll line named Moxie Girlz was introduced. These Moxie girls are similar, but legally distinct, from the Bratz line of dolls. This is to circumvent the ruling from the lawsuit described below.
Lawsuit. On July 17, 2008, the U.S. District Court in Riverside ruled against MGA Entertainment and for Mattel Inc. in a battle over the creation rights of the Bratz doll line. The jury in the case determined that Carter Bryant, creator of the Bratz doll line, had violated his exclusivity contract and had designed the dolls while he was still working at Mattel. Mattel was awarded $100 million US in damages, far less than the $1 billion they were seeking [Colker, David, "Mattel wins important verdict in Bratz dolls case," Los Angeles Times , July 18, 2008, http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/la-fi-bratz18-2008jul18,0,5325580.story].
On December 3, 2008, U.S. District Judge Stephen Larson granted an injunction requested by Mattel, which effectively banned MGA from manufacturing and selling Bratz dolls, though he allowed MGA to continue selling Bratz through the end of the 2008 holiday season ["Barbie beats back Bratz," CNN Money , December 4, 2008, http://money.cnn.com/2008/12/04/news /companies/bratz_dolls.ap/]. Larson determined that all of MGA's Bratz produced from 2001 through 2008, except for the Kidz and Lil Angelz lines, infringed on Mattel's intellectual property. Larson allowed MGA to continue to manufacture the Kidz and Lil Angelz lines, provided that they not be promoted under the Bratz brand. He also stipulated that MGA must, at their own cost, remove all Bratz merchandise from retailers' shelves, reimburse retailers for said merchandise, and turn all recalled product over to Mattel for disposal. In addition, MGA was to destroy all marketing materials, molds, and other materials that had been used in the manufacture and sale of Bratz [Colker, David, "Bad day for the Bratz in L.A. court," Los Angeles Times , December 4, 2008, http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2008/12/bad-day-for-the.html]. MGA immediately filed for a permanent stay of the injunction and, on February 11, 2009, was granted a stay through at least the end of 2009.
On December 10, 2009, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit granted MGA an immediate stay of the injunction, effectively halting the recall of Bratz product, which was to have begun on January 21, 2010. In their initial ruling, the Court found Larson's previous ruling to be unusually "draconian," questioned why Mattel had simply been handed ownership of the entire franchise rather than be awarded a stake in the ownership of the franchise or a share of the royalties from future Bratz sales, and ordered MGA and Mattel into mediation.
~ page 45 ~
Hohenstaufen dynasty Act I, Signature iii - (16)
German dynasty that ruled the Holy Roman Empire (1138–1208, 1212–54). It was founded by Count Frederick (died 1105), who built Staufen Castle and was appointed duke of Swabia as Frederick I (1079). Hohenstaufen emperors included Frederick I Barbarossa (r. 1155–90), Henry VI (r. 1191–97), and Frederick II (r. 1220–50). The dynasty continued the struggle with the papacy begun under their predecessors. See also Guelphs and Ghibellines.
~ page 46 ~
Aeolus, keeper of the winds (digital enhancement of an old marble representaiton) June 4, 2005, from nl.wikipedia Afbeelding: Aeolus1.jpg, author Ed Stevenhagen (Overleg).* Aeolus Act I, Signature iii - (17)
Greek god of the winds. In the Odyssey Homer represents Aeolus as the mortal ruler of the floating island of Aeolia. He gives Odysseus a favourable wind for his voyage and a bag in which the unfavourable winds are confined, but Odysseus's careless companions open the bag, releasing the winds and driving their ship back to shore. Later writers depicted Aeolus as a minor god rather than a human being. The Aeolian harp is named for him. *[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Aeolus or Eolus [Chaucer's Eolus (Weever, Jacqueline, Chaucer Name Dictionary , s.v. "Eolus," (Garland Publishing, 1996), http://www.columbia.edu /dlc/garland/deweever/E/eolus.htmde] (Greek: Αˈολος Aiolos [ájjolos], Modern Greek: [ˈe.o.los] (listen)) was the ruler of the winds in Greek mythology. In fact this name was shared by three mythic characters. These three personages are often difficult to tell apart, and even the ancient mythographers appear to have been perplexed about which Aeolus was which. Diodorus Siculus made an attempt to define each of these three (although it is clear he also became muddled), and his opinion is followed here [Schmitz, Leonhard, "Aeolus (1), (2), and (3)", in Smith, William, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1864), 1, pp. 35, http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/0044.html]. Briefly, the first Aeolus was a son of Hellen and eponymous founder of the Aeolian race; the second was a son of Poseidon, who led a colony to islands in the Tyrrhenian Sea; and the third Aeolus was a son of Hippotes who is mentioned in Odyssey book 10 as Keeper of the Winds who gives Odysseus a tightly closed bag full of the captured winds so he could sail easily home to Ithaca on the gentle West Wind. All three men named Aeolus appear to be connected genealogically, although the precise relationship, especially regarding the second and third Aeolus, is often ambiguous.
Minos stands in judgement in Dante's Inferno, as drawn by Gustave Doré 1861-1865. The caption reads: "There Minos stands (Canto V., line 4)."* Minos Act I, Signature iii - (18)
In Greek legend, a king of Crete, the son of Zeus and Europa. He gained the throne with the aid of Poseidon and also became ruler of the Aegean islands. His wife Pasiphaë fell in love with a bull and gave birth to the Minotaur, which was imprisoned in the Labyrinth. Minos waged war against Athens and exacted a tribute of youths and maidens to feed the Minotaur until Theseus killed the monster with the aid of Minos's daughter Ariadne. Minos was killed in Sicily when boiling water was poured over him as he was taking a bath. Many scholars now consider that Minos was a royal or dynastic title for the priestly rulers of Bronze Age, or Minoan, civilization in Knossos (Minoan means “of Minos”).
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
In the Aeneid of Virgil, Minos was the judge of those who had been given the death penalty on a false charge - Minos sits with a gigantic urn, and decides whether a soul should go to Elysium or Tartarus with the help of a silent jury. Radamanthus, his brother, is a judge at Tartarus who decides upon suitable punishments for sinners there [Aeneid VI , 568–572)].
In Dante's The Divine Comedy , Minos sits at the entrance to the second circle in the Inferno, which is the beginning of proper Hell. Here, he judges the sins of each soul and assigns it to its rightful punishment by indicating the circle to which it must descend. He does this by circling his tail around his body the appropriate number of times. He can also speak, to clarify the soul's location within the circle indicated by the wrapping of his tail [ Inferno V, 4–24; XXVII, 124–127].
Solzhenitsyn boards a train in Vladivostok after returning to Russia from exile. Photo by Mikhail Evstafiev.* Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr Act I, Signature iii - (19) born Dec. 11, 1918, Kislovodsk, Russia
died August 3, 2008
Russian novelist and historian. He fought in World War II but was arrested in 1945 for criticizing Joseph Stalin. He spent eight years in prisons and labour camps and three more in enforced exile. With One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1962), based on his labour-camp experiences, he emerged as an eloquent opponent of government repression. He was forced to publish later works abroad, including The First Circle (1968), Cancer Ward (1968), and August 1914 (1971). Publication of the first volume of The Gulag Archipelago (1973), one of the greatest works in Russian prose, resulted in his being charged with treason. Expelled from the Soviet Union in 1974, he lived in the U.S., enjoying worldwide fame, until 1994, when he returned home. In the late 1980s glasnost brought renewed access to his work in Russia but also a loss of interest in it and in the prophetic role he claimed for himself in Russian history. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970.
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Imprisonment. In February 1945, while serving in East Prussia, Solzhenitsyn was arrested for writing derogatory comments in letters to a friend, Nikolai Vitkevich ["Koka", a boyhood friend and fellow officer: Scammell, Michael, Solzhenitsyn: A Biography (London: Paladin, 1986), pp. 76-77, 153], about the conduct of the war by Joseph Stalin, whom he called "Oosatiy" ("the whiskered one,")[Current Biography, 1969] "Khozyain" ("the master"), and "Balabos", (Odessa Yiddish for "the master") [Moody, Christopher, Solzhenitsyn (Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1973), p. 6]. He was accused of anti-Soviet propaganda under Article 58 paragraph 10 of the Soviet criminal code, and of "founding a hostile organization" under paragraph 11 [Scammell (1986), p. 152-154; Björkegren, Hans, and Kaarina Eneberg, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: A Biography (Henley-on-Thames: Aiden Ellis, 1973), Introduction]. Solzhenitsyn was taken to the Lubyanka prison in Moscow, where he was beaten and interrogated. On July 7, 1945, he was sentenced in his absence by Special Council of the NKVD to an eight-year term in a labor camp. This was the normal sentence for most crimes under Article 58 at the time [Moody (1973), p. 7]. The first part of Solzhenitsyn's sentence was served in several different work camps; the "middle phase," as he later referred to it, was spent in a sharashka (i.e., a special scientific research facility run by Ministry of State Security), where he met Lev Kopelev, upon whom he based the character of Lev Rubin in his book The First Circle , published in a self-censored or “distorted” version in the West in 1968 (an English translation of the full version was eventually published by Harper Perennial in October 2009) [Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr I. (retrieved January 06, 2010), Harpercollins.com., http://www.harpercollins.com/books/9780061479014/In_the_First_Circle/index.as px]. In 1950, he was sent to a "Special Camp" for political prisoners. During his imprisonment at the camp in the town of Ekibastuz in Kazakhstan, he worked as a miner, bricklayer, and foundry foreman. His experiences at Ekibastuz formed the basis for the book One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich . While there he had a tumor removed, although his cancer was not diagnosed at the time.
In March 1953, after the expiration of Solzhenitsyn's sentence, he was sent to internal exile for life at Kok-Terek in southern Kazakhstan, as was common for political prisoners. His undiagnosed cancer spread until, by the end of the year, he was close to death. However, in 1954, he was permitted to be treated in a hospital in Tashkent, where his tumor went into remission. His experiences there became the basis of his novel Cancer Ward and also found an echo in the short story "The right hand." It was during this decade of imprisonment and exile that Solzhenitsyn abandoned Marxism and developed the philosophical and religious positions of his later life; this turn has some interesting parallels to Dostoevsky's time in Siberia and his quest for faith a hundred years earlier.
Solzhenitsyn gradually turned into a philosophically-minded Christian as a result of his experience in prison and the camps [ GA , part IV, Daniel J. Mahoney, "Hero of a Dark Century," National Review , September 1, 2008, pp. 47–50; "Beliefs," in Ericson-Klimoff, The Soul and Barbed Wire: An Introduction to Solzhenitsyn (ISI Books, 2008), pp. 177–205]. He repented for some of his actions as a Red Army captain, and in prison compared himself to the perpetrators of the Gulag: "I remember myself in my captain's shoulder boards and the forward march of my battery through East Prussia, enshrouded in fire, and I say: 'So were we any better?'" His transformation is described at some length in the fourth part of The Gulag Archipelago ("The Soul and Barbed Wire"). The narrative poem The Trail (written without benefit of pen or paper in prison and camps between 1947 and 1952) and the twenty-eight poems composed in prison, forced-labor camp, and exile also provide crucial material for understanding Solzhenitsyn's intellectual and spiritual odyssey during this period. These "early" works, largely unknown in the West, were published for the first time in Russian in 1999 and excerpted in English in 2006 [Solzhenitsyn, Proterevshi glaza: sbornik (Moscow: Nash dom — L’age d’Homme , 1999); Edward E. Ericson, Jr., Daniel J. Mahoney, eds., The Solzhenitsyn Reader: New and Essential Writings , 1947–2005 (ISI Books, 2006)].
~ page 47 ~ From his book De arte venandi cum avibus ("The art of hunting with birds). From a manuscript in Biblioteca Vaticana , Pal. lat 1071), late 13th century.* Frederick II Act I, Signature iii - (20)
German Friedrich born Dec. 26, 1194, Jesi, Ancona, Papal States
died Dec. 13, 1250, Castel Fiorentino, Apulia, Kingdom of Sicily
King of Sicily (1197–1250), duke of Swabia (1228–35), German king (1212–50), and Holy Roman Emperor (1220– 50). The grandson of Frederick I Barbarossa, he became king of Sicily at age three but did not gain control over the strife-ridden country until 1212. He defeated his rival Otto IV in 1214, and though the planned union of Sicily and Germany alarmed the pope (1220), he negotiated a compromise and was crowned emperor. A delay in departing for the Sixth Crusade brought excommunication (1227), later revoked. By 1229 Frederick was king of Jerusalem. On his return he quelled a rebellion in Germany led by his son Henry, who had allied with the Lombard League. Seeing Frederick as a growing threat to papal authority, Gregory IX excommunicated him again in 1239; the emperor responded by invading the Papal States. He tried and failed (1245) to negotiate peace with Innocent IV, and his struggle with the papacy continued. By the time of his death Frederick had lost much of central Italy, and his support in Germany was uncertain. *[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Frederick II (December 26, 1194 – December 13, 1250), of the Hohenstaufen dynasty, was an Italian pretender to the title of King of the Romans from 1212 and unopposed holder of that monarchy from 1215. As such, he was King of Germany, of Italy, and of Burgundy. He was also King of Sicily from his mother's inheritance. He was Holy Roman Emperor (Emperor of the Romans) from his papal coronation in 1220 until his death. His original title was King of Sicily, which he held as Frederick I from 1198 to his death. His other royal titles, accrued for a brief period of his life, were King of Cyprus and Jerusalem by virtue of marriage and his connection with the Sixth Crusade. He was raised and lived most of his life in Sicily, with his mother, Constance, being the daughter of Roger II of Sicily. His empire was frequently at war with the Papal States, so it is unsurprising that he was excommunicated twice and often vilified in chronicles of the time. Pope Gregory IX went so far as to call him the Antichrist. He was known in his own time as Stupor mundi ("wonder of the world") and was said to speak six languages: Latin, Sicilian, German, French, Greek and Arabic [Giovanni Villani, Cronica, Book VI , e. 1. (Rose E. Selfe's English translation)]. By contemporary standards, Frederick was a ruler very much ahead of his time, being an avid patron of science and the arts. He was patron of the Sicilian School of poetry. His royal court in Palermo, from around 1220 to his death, saw the first use of a literary form of an Italo-Romance language, Sicilian. The poetry that emanated from the school predates the use of the Tuscan idiom as the preferred language of the Italian peninsula by at least a century. The school and its poetry were well known to Dante and his peers and had a significant influence on the literary form of what was eventually to become the modern Italian language.
Early years. Born in Jesi, near Ancona, Frederick was the son of the emperor Henry VI. He was known as the puer Apuliae (son of Apulia) [Ernst Kantorowicz, Kaiser Friedrich II , Two volumes (Stuttgart: Nachdruck der Ausgabe aus den 20er Jahren , 1985-86)]. Some chronicles say that his mother, the forty-year-old Constance, gave birth to him in a public square in order to forestall any doubt about his origin. Frederick was baptised in Assisi.
In 1196 at Frankfurt am Main the infant Frederick was elected King of the Germans. His rights in Germany were disputed by Henry's brother Philip of Swabia and Otto of Brunswick. At the death of his father in 1197, the two-year- old Frederick was in Italy travelling towards Germany when the bad news reached his guardian, Conrad of Spoleto. Frederick was hastily brought back to his mother Constance in Palermo, Sicily.
Constance of Sicily had been in her own right queen of Sicily; she had Frederick made King of Sicily and established herself as regent. In Frederick's name she dissolved Sicily's ties to Germany and the Empire that had been created by her marriage, sending home his German counsellors (notably Markward von Annweiler and Gualtiero da Pagliara) and renouncing his claims to the German throne and empire.
Upon Constance's death in 1198, Pope Innocent III succeeded as Frederick's guardian. Frederick's tutor during this period was Cencio, who would become Pope Honorius III [http://www.fiu.edu/~mirandas/bios1193.htm#Cencio]. Frederick was crowned King of Sicily on 17 May 1198.
Emperor. Otto of Brunswick had been crowned Holy Emperor by Pope Innocent III in 1209. In September 1211 at the Diet of Nuremberg Frederick was elected in absentia as German King by a rebellious faction backed by Innocent, who had fallen out with Otto and excommunicated him. Frederick was elected once again in 1212 and crowned 9 December 1212 in Mainz; yet another coronation ceremony took place in 1215. Frederick's authority in Germany remained tenuous, however, and he was recognized only in southern Germany; in northern Germany, the center of Guelph power, Otto continued to hold the reins of royal and imperial power despite his excommunication. But Otto's decisive military defeat at Bouvines forced him to withdraw to the Guelph hereditary lands where, virtually without supporters, he died in 1218. The German princes, supported by Innocent III, again elected Frederick king of Germany in 1215, and he was crowned king in Aachen on 23 July 1215 by one of the three German archbishops. It was not until another five years had passed and only after further negotiations between Frederick, Innocent III, and Honorius III — who succeeded to the papacy after Innocent's death in 1216 — that Frederick was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in Rome by Honorius III on 22 November 1220. At the same time Frederick's oldest son Henry took the title of King of the Romans.
Unlike most Holy Roman emperors, Frederick spent few years in Germany. In 1218 he helped Philip II of France and Eudes III, Duke of Burgundy to bring an end to the War of Succession in France Champagne by invading Lorraine, capturing and burning Nancy, capturing Theobald I, Duke of Lorraine and forcing him to withdraw his support from Erard of Brienne. After his coronation in 1220, Frederick remained either in the Kingdom of Sicily or on Crusade until 1236, when he made his last journey to Germany. He returned to Italy in 1237 and stayed there for the remaining thirteen years of his life, represented in Germany by his son Conrad.
In the Kingdom of Sicily, he built on the reform of the laws begun at the Assizes of Ariano in 1140 by his grandfather Roger II. His initiative in this direction was visible as early as the Assizes of Capua (1220) but came to fruition in his promulgation of the Constitutions of Melfi (1231, also known as Liber Augustalis ), a collection of laws for his realm that was remarkable for its time and was a source of inspiration for a long time after. It made the Kingdom of Sicily an absolutist monarchy; it also set a precedent for the primacy of written law. With relatively small modifications, the Liber Augustalis remained the basis of Sicilian law until 1819. Self-portrait, c. 1567; Museo del Prado, Madrid* Titian Act I, Signature iii - (21)
orig. Tiziano Vecellio born 1488/90, Pieve di Cadore, Republic of Venice
died Aug. 27, 1576, Venice
Italian painter active in Venice. As a young man he was taught by the Bellini family and worked closely with Giorgione. His early works are so similar in style to Giorgione's as to be indistinguishable, but soon after Giorgione's early death Titian established himself as the leading painter of the Republic of Venice. Among his most important religious paintings is the revolutionary and monumental Assumption (1516–18) for Santa Maria dei Frari , in which the Virgin ascends to heaven in a blaze of colour accompanied by a semicircle of angels. Titian was also interested in mythological themes, and his many depictions of Venus display his work's sheer beauty and inherent eroticism. Bacchus and Ariadne (1520–23), with its pagan abandon, is one of the greatest works of Renaissance art. Titian was sought after for his psychologically penetrating portraits, which include portrayals of leading Italian aristocrats, religious figures, and Emperor Charles V. He reached the height of his powers in The Rape of Europa (c. 1559–62), one of several paintings done for Philip II of Spain. He was recognized as supremely gifted in his lifetime, and his reputation has never declined.
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Two of Titian's works in private hands have been up for sale. One of these works, Diana and Actaeon , was recently purchased by the London Gallery and the National Galleries of Scotland on February 2, 2009 for ₤50 million ($71 million). The galleries had until December 31, 2008 to make the purchase before the work would be offered to private collectors, but the deadline was extended. The other painting, Diana and Callisto , will be up for sale for the same amount until 2012 before it is offered to private collectors.
The sale has created controversy with politicians who said "the money, some of which came from government funds, could have been spent more wisely during a deepening recession." The Scottish government offered ₤12.5 million and ₤10 million came from the National Heritage Memorial Fund. The rest of the monies came from the National Galleries in London and from private donations [http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090202/en_nm/us_titian_2]. On February 11, 2009, an argument about Titian's age at death arose between British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and Leader of the Opposition David Cameron at Prime Minister's Questions , where Cameron was attempting to ridicule Brown's general factual accuracy. This debate spilt over onto Titian's entry on Wikipedia, when an editor from Conservative Party HQ altered Titian's dates to substantiate David Cameron's claim and then directed the BBC to the article for them to use as verification ["Tories Admit to Wiki-alteration," BBC News , February 11, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7884121.stm]. Cameron later apologized and said the staff member had been "disciplined [ Press Association/The Independent , February 12, 2009, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/cameron-apologises-over-wikiped ia-change-1607488.html]." The precise date of Titian's birth is uncertain (see above).
The reference was to Brown's comment on 30 January 2009 to the World Economic Forum in Davos:
This is the first financial crisis of the global age, and there is no clear map that has been set out from past experience to deal with it. I'm reminded of the story of Titian, who's the great painter who reached the age of 90, finished the last of his nearly 100 brilliant paintings, and he said at the end of it, "I'm finally beginning to learn how to paint," and that is where we are [BBC, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/davos/7862203.stm. Titian in fact painted well over 100 paintings; Terisio Pignatti's catalogue (Rizzoli, 1979, English trans.) lists 646, though many of these will be workshop versions. Vasari said his works were "without number"].
~ page 48 ~ pons asinorum Act I, Signature iii - (22)
Main Entry: pons asi£no£rum
Pronunciation: ‚pänz-ƒa-s„-‚n‹r-„m, -‚n•r-
Function: noun
Etymology: New Latin, literally, asses' bridge, name applied to the proposition that the base angles of an isosceles triangle are equal
Date: 1751: a critical test of ability or understanding; also: stumbling block. Illustration from London, British Library, MS Royal 14 C VII, folio 123, marriage of Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor and Isabella Plantagenet (scanned from Four Gothic Kings , Elizabeth Hallam, ed.)* Isabella of England Act I, Signature iii - (23)
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
It was at a friendly meeting at Rieti where Pope Gregory IX suggested to Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, that he marry princess Isabella, a sister of Henry III of England. At first Frederick II was concerned to lose his French allies; but when he realised that an English marriage would end English support for his opponents, he agreed. The betrothal was formalized in London on February 1235.
The beautiful Isabella was about twenty-one years old when she set out to marry the twice-widowed Emperor Frederick II, who was forty. On her way through Cologne, she delighted the local women when she removed the traditionally worn veil so that they could see her face.
The marriage between Isabella and Frederick took place in the Cathedral of Worms on 15 or 20 July 1235; in the ceremony, she was also crowned Holy Roman Empress, Queen of Germany and Sicily. Her dowry was 30,000 marcs of silver (a considerable sum by that time) and she was granted with the castle of Monte Sant'Angelo by her husband upon her her marriage.
However, as soon as she was married she was introduced to the secluded harem life attended by black eunuchs. Their marriage had been a political match, and she was allowed to keep only two of her English women-attendants; the others were sent home.
Isabella lived in retirement at Noventa where her husband regularly visited her. When her brother, Richard, Earl of Cornwall, returned from the crusades, he was allowed to visit her, although Isabella was not allowed to be present at the official reception. While the imperial court resided at Foggia, Isabella gave birth to her last child and died. According to Thomas Costain, Frederick buried her beside one of his Saracen mistresses and his previous wife, Yolande of Jerusalem, in the Cathedral of Bari.
finis coronat opus Act I, Signature iii - (24) Main Entry: fi£nis co£ro£nat opus
Pronunciation: ƒf‡-nis-k•-ƒr‹-ƒnät-‚‹-ƒp˜s
Usage: foreign term
Etymology: Latin: the end crowns the work.
~ page 49 ~
16th-century Guildhouses at the Grote Markt .* Antwerp Act I, Signature iii - (25)
French Anvers
Flemish Antwerpen
City (pop., 2000 est.: 446,500), capital of Antwerp province, Belgium. One of the world's major seaports, it is located 55 mi (88 km) southeast of the North Sea. Because it lies in the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium, it plays the role of unofficial capital of Flanders. It received municipal rights in 1291 and became a member of the Hanseatic League by 1315. As a distribution centre for Spanish and Portuguese trade, it became the commercial and financial capital of Europe in the 16th century. Following destructive invasions it went into decline but began to revive after Napoleon's improvement of the harbour c. 1803. It was part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands (1815–30), then was ceded to Belgian nationalists. Its current economic life centres around shipping, port-related activities, and major manufacturing.
*[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]:
Origin of the name. According to folklore, and as celebrated by the statue in front of the town hall, the city got its name from a legend involving a mythical giant called Antigoon who lived near the river Scheldt. He exacted a toll from those crossing the river, and for those who refused, he severed one of their hands and threw it into the river Scheldt. Eventually, the giant was slain by a young hero named Brabo, who cut off the giant's own hand and flung it into the river. Hence the name Antwerpen, from Dutch hand werpen —akin to Old English hand and wearpan (= to throw), that has changed to today's warp [http://www.belgiumview.com/belgiumview/tl1/view0000599.php4].
In favour of this folk etymology is the fact that hand-cutting was indeed practised in Europe, the right hand of a man who died without issue being cut off and sent to the feudal lord as proof of main-morte . However, John Lothrop Motley argues that Antwerp's name derives from an 't werf (on the wharf) [Room, Adrian, Placenames of the World (McFarland & Company, 1997), p. 32]. Aan 't werp (at the warp) is also possible. This 'warp' (thrown ground) would be a man made hill, just high enough to remain dry at high tide, whereupon a farm would be built. Another word for werp is pol (hence polders).
The most prevailing theory is that the name originated in the Gallo-Roman period and comes from the Latin antverpia . Antverpia would come from Ante (before) Verpia (deposition, sedimentation), indicating land that forms by deposition in the inside curve of a river. Note that the river Scheldt, before a transition period between 600 to 750, followed a different track. This must have coincided roughly with the current ringway south of the city, situating the city within a former curve of the river [ Antwerp Tourist Information , http://www.viatrip.com/articles/Antwerp_Tourist_Information.htm: Meredith Booney, "The name 'Antwerp' has been linked to the word " aanwerp " (alluvial mound), which was the geographical feature in the early settlement period in this place].
[See also U. LeGuin, The Lathe of Heaven .]
Crusades Act I, Signature iii - (26)
Military expeditions, beginning in the late 11th century, that were organized by Western Christians in response to centuries of Muslim wars of expansion. Their objectives were to check the spread of Islam, to retake control of the Holy Land, to conquer pagan areas, and to recapture formerly Christian territories. The Crusades were seen by many of their participants as a means of redemption and expiation for sins. Between 1095, when the First Crusade was launched by Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, and 1291, when the Latin Christians were finally expelled from their kingdom in Syria, there were numerous expeditions to the Holy Land, to Spain, and even to the Baltic; the Crusades continued for several centuries after 1291, usually as military campaigns intended to halt or slow the advance of Muslim power or to conquer pagan areas. The Crusaders initially enjoyed success, founding a Christian state in Palestine and Syria, but the continued growth of Islamic states ultimately reversed those gains. By the 14th century the Ottoman Turks had established themselves in the Balkans and would penetrate deeper into Europe despite repeated efforts to repulse them. Crusades were also called against heretics (the Albigensian Crusade, 1209– 29) and various rivals of the popes, and the Fourth Crusade (1202–04) was diverted against the Byzantine Empire. Crusading declined rapidly during the 16th century with the advent of the Protestant Reformation and the decline of papal authority. The Crusades constitute a controversial chapter in the history of Christianity, and their excesses have been the subject of centuries of historiography. Historians have also concentrated on the role the Crusades played in the expansion of medieval Europe and its institutions, and the notion of “crusading” has been transformed from a religio-military campaign into a modern metaphor for zealous and demanding struggles to advance the good (“crusades for”) and to oppose perceived evil (“crusades against”).
End Notes Ready Reference Library from Encyclopædia Britannica Ready Reference 2005 CD-ROM (unless otherwise indicated). Copyright 1994-2003 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. *[Image & caption credit and text (if indicated): courtesy of Wikipedia].
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