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Caucasus

The Caucasus, or Caucasia , is a transcontinental region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically been considered as a natural barrier between Eastern Europe and West Asia.

Mount Elbrus in Russia, Europe's highest mountain, is situated in the Western Caucasus. On the southern side, the Lesser Caucasus includes the Javakheti Plateau and the Armenian highlands, part of which is in Turkey.

The Caucasus is divided into the North Caucasus and South Caucasus, although the Western Caucasus also exists as a distinct geographic space within the North Caucasus. The Greater Caucasus mountain range in the north is mostly shared by Russia and Georgia as well as the northernmost parts of Azerbaijan. The Lesser Caucasus mountain range in the south is occupied by several independent states, mostly by Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, but also extending to parts of northeastern Turkey, and northern Iran.

The region is known for its linguistic diversity: aside from Indo-European and Turkic languages, the Kartvelian, Northwest Caucasian, and Northeast Caucasian language families are indigenous to the area.

Origin of the name
Pliny the Elder's Natural History (77–79 AD) derives the name of the Caucasus from a Scythian name, Croucasis, which supposedly means 'shimmering with snow'. German linguist Paul Kretschmer notes that the Latvian word kruvesis also means 'frozen mud'.

Isidore of Seville's Etymologies ( c.  625 AD) also says the name means shining white like snow:

"Thus, toward the east, where it rises to greater height, it is called Caucasus, due to the whiteness of its snow, for in an eastern language, caucasus means “white,” that is, shining white with a very thick snow cover. For the same reason the Scythians, who live next to this mountain range, call it Croacasim, for among them whiteness or snow is called casim. 3. The Taurus range is likewise called the Caucasus by many."

In the Tale of Past Years (1113 AD), it is stated that Old East Slavic Кавкасийскыѣ горы (Kavkasijskyě gory) came from Ancient Greek Καύκασος (Kaúkasos), which, according to M. A. Yuyukin, is a compound word that can be interpreted as the 'mountain of the seagull(s)' (καύ-: καύαξ, καύηξ, -ηκος, κήξ, κηϋξ 'a kind of seagull' + the reconstructed *κάσος 'mountain' or 'rock' richly attested both in place and personal names).

In Georgian tradition, the term Caucasus is derived from Caucas (კავკასოსი Ḳavḳasosi), the son of the Biblical Togarmah and legendary forefather of Nakh peoples.

According to German philologists Otto Schrader and Alfons A. Nehring, the Ancient Greek word Καύκασος (Kaukasos) is connected to Gothic hauhs 'high' as well as Lithuanian kaũkas 'hillock' and kaukarà 'hill, top', Russian куча 'heap'. British linguist Adrian Room claims that *kau- also means 'mountain' in Pelasgian, though this is speculative given that Pelasgian is so poorly known.

Toponyms
The term Caucasus is not only used for the mountains themselves but also includes Ciscaucasia (which is part of the Russian Federation) and Transcaucasia. According to Alexander Mikaberidze, Transcaucasia is a "Russo-centric" term.

The Transcaucasus region and Dagestan were the furthest points of Parthian and later Sasanian expansions, with areas to the north of the Greater Caucasus range practically impregnable. The mythological Mount Qaf, the world's highest mountain that ancient Iranian lore shrouded in mystery, was said to be situated in this region. The region is also one of the candidates for the location of Airyanem Vaejah, the apparent homeland of the Iranians of Zoroaster. In Middle Persian sources of the Sasanian era, the Caucasus range was referred to as Kaf Kof. The term resurfaced in Iranian tradition later on in a variant form when Ferdowsi, in his Shahnameh, referred to the Caucasus mountains as Kōh-i Kāf. "Most of the modern names of the Caucasus originate from the Greek Kaukasos (Lat., Caucasus) and the Middle Persian Kaf Kof".

"The earliest etymon" of the name Caucasus comes from Kaz-kaz, the Hittite designation of the "inhabitants of the southern coast of the Black Sea".

It was also noted that in Nakh Ков гас (Kov gas) means "gateway to steppe".

Endonyms and exonyms
The modern endonym for the region is usually similar in many languages, and is generally between Kavkaz and Kaukaz.

 * Кавказ Kavkaz
 * Къаукъаз/с Kʺaukʺaz/s
 * القوقاز al-Qawqāz
 * Կովկաս Kovkas
 * Кавказ Kawkaz
 * Qafqaz
 * Кавказ Kawkaz
 * კავკასია K'avk'asia
 * Kaukasien
 * Káfkasos
 * Кавказ Kawkaz
 * Кавказ Kavkaz
 * Къавкъаз Qawqaz
 * Qefqasya, Qefqas
 * Ккавкказ Kkawkkaz
 * Къавкъаз K'awk'az
 * K'avk'acia
 * Кавказ/Каукази Kavkaz/Kaukazi
 * Qafqāz
 * Кавказ Kavkaz
 * Qawqaz Kavkaz
 * Kafkas/Kafkasya
 * Кавказ Kavkaz

Political geography
The North Caucasus region is known as the Ciscaucasus, whereas the South Caucasus region is commonly known as the Transcaucasus.

The Ciscaucasus contains most of the Greater Caucasus mountain range. It consists of Southern Russia, mainly the North Caucasian Federal District's autonomous republics and the Krais in Southern Russia, and the northernmost parts of Georgia and Azerbaijan. The Ciscaucasus lies between the Black Sea to its west, the Caspian Sea to its east, and borders the Southern Federal District to its north. The two Federal Districts are collectively referred to as "Southern Russia".

The Transcaucasus borders the Greater Caucasus range and Southern Russia to its north, the Black Sea and Turkey to its west, the Caspian Sea to its east, and Iran to its south. It contains the Lesser Caucasus mountain range and surrounding lowlands. All of Armenia, Azerbaijan (excluding the northernmost parts), and Georgia (excluding the northernmost parts) are in the South Caucasus.

The watershed along the Greater Caucasus range is considered by some sources to be the dividing line between Europe and Southwest Asia. According to that, the highest peak in the Caucasus, Mount Elbrus (5,642 meters) located in western Ciscaucasus, is considered the highest point in Europe. The Kuma-Manych Depression, the geologic depression that divides the Russian Plain from the North Caucasus foreland is often regarded by classical and non-British sources as the natural and historical boundary between Europe and Asia. Another opinion is that the rivers Kura and Rioni mark this border, or even that of the river Aras.

The Caucasus is a linguistically, culturally and geographically diverse region. The nation states that compose the Caucasus today are the post-Soviet states Georgia (including Adjara and Abkhazia), Azerbaijan (including Nakhchivan), Armenia, and the Russian Federation. The Russian divisions include Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia, North Ossetia–Alania, Kabardino–Balkaria, Karachay–Cherkessia, Adygea, Krasnodar Krai, and Stavropol Krai, in clockwise order.

Two territories in the region claim independence but are recognized as such by only a handful of entities: Abkhazia, and South Ossetia. Abkhazia and South Ossetia are largely recognized by the world community as part of Georgia.

Demographics
The region has many different languages and language families. There are more than 50 ethnic groups living in the region. No fewer than three language families are unique to the area. In addition, Indo-European languages, such as East Slavic, Armenian and Ossetian, and Turkic languages, such as Azerbaijani, Kumyk language and Karachay–Balkar, are spoken in the area. Russian is used as a lingua franca most notably in the North Caucasus.

The peoples of the northern and southern Caucasus mostly are Shia Muslims, Sunni Muslims, Eastern Orthodox Christians or Armenian Christians.

History
Located on the peripheries of Turkey, Iran, and Russia, the region has been an arena for political, military, religious, and cultural rivalries and expansionism for centuries. Throughout its history, the Caucasus was usually incorporated into the Iranian world. At the beginning of the 19th century, the Russian Empire conquered the territory from Qajar Iran.

Prehistory
The territory of the Caucasus region was inhabited by Homo erectus since the Paleolithic Era. In 1991, early Hominini fossils dating back 1.8 million years were found at the Dmanisi archaeological site in Georgia. Scientists now classify the assemblage of fossil skeletons as the subspecies Homo erectus georgicus.

The site yields the earliest unequivocal evidence for the presence of early humans outside the African continent; and the Dmanisi skulls are the five oldest hominins ever found outside Africa.

Antiquity
Kura–Araxes culture from about 4000 BC until about 2000 BC enveloped a vast area approximately 1,000 km by 500 km, and mostly encompassed, on modern-day territories, the Southern Caucasus (except western Georgia), northwestern Iran, the northeastern Caucasus, eastern Turkey, and as far as Syria.

Under Ashurbanipal (669–627 BC), the boundaries of the Assyrian Empire reached as far as the Caucasus Mountains. Later ancient kingdoms of the region included Armenia, Albania, Colchis and Iberia, among others. These kingdoms were later incorporated into various Iranian empires, including Media, the Achaemenid Empire, Parthia, and the Sassanid Empire, who would altogether rule the Caucasus for many hundreds of years. In 95–55 BC, under the reign of Armenian king Tigranes the Great, the Kingdom of Armenia included Kingdom of Armenia, vassals Iberia, Albania, Parthia, Atropatene, Mesopotamia, Cappadocia, Cilicia, Syria, Nabataean kingdom, and Judea. By the time of the first century BC, Zoroastrianism had become the dominant religion of the region; however, the region would go through two other religious transformations. Owing to the strong rivalry between Persia and Rome, and later Byzantium. The Romans first arrived in the region in the 1st century BC with the annexation of the kingdom of Colchis, which was later turned into the province of Lazicum. The next 600 years was marked by a conflict between Rome and Sassanid Empire for the control of the region. In western Georgia the eastern Roman rule lasted until the Middle Ages.

Middle Ages
As the Arsacid dynasty of Armenia (an eponymous branch of the Arsacid dynasty of Parthia) was the first nation to adopt Christianity as state religion (in 301 AD), and Caucasian Albania and Georgia had become Christian entities, Christianity began to overtake Zoroastrianism and pagan beliefs. With the Muslim conquest of Persia, large parts of the region came under the rule of the Arabs, and Islam penetrated into the region.

In the 10th century, the Alans (proto-Ossetians) founded the Kingdom of Alania, that flourished in the Northern Caucasus, roughly in the location of latter-day Circassia and modern North Ossetia–Alania, until its destruction by the Mongol invasion in 1238–39.

During the Middle Ages Bagratid Armenia, Kingdom of Tashir-Dzoraget, Kingdom of Syunik and Principality of Khachen organized local Armenian population facing multiple threats after the fall of antique Kingdom of Armenia. Caucasian Albania maintained close ties with Armenia and the Church of Caucasian Albania shared same Christian dogmas with the Armenian Apostolic Church and had a tradition of their Catholicos being ordained through the Patriarch of Armenia.

In the 12th century, the Georgian king David the Builder drove the Muslims out from Caucasus and made the Kingdom of Georgia a strong regional power. In 1194–1204 Georgian Queen Tamar's armies crushed new Seljuk Turkish invasions from the south-east and south and launched several successful campaigns into Seljuk Turkish-controlled Southern Armenia. The Georgian Kingdom continued military campaigns in the Caucasus region. As a result of her military campaigns and the temporary fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1204, Georgia became the strongest Christian state in the whole Near East area, encompassing most of the Caucasus stretching from Northern Iran and Northeastern Turkey to the North Caucasus.

The Caucasus region was conquered by the Ottomans, Turco-Mongols, local kingdoms and khanates, as well as, once again, Iran.

Modern period
Up to and including the early 19th century, most of the Southern Caucasus and southern Dagestan all formed part of the Persian Empire. In 1813 and 1828 by the Treaty of Gulistan and the Treaty of Turkmenchay respectively, the Persians were forced to irrevocably cede the Southern Caucasus and Dagestan to Imperial Russia. In the ensuing years after these gains, the Russians took the remaining part of the Southern Caucasus, comprising western Georgia, through several wars from the Ottoman Empire.

In the second half of the 19th century, the Russian Empire also conquered the North Caucasus. In the aftermath of the Caucasian Wars, the Russian military perpetrated an ethnic cleansing of Circassians, expelling this indigenous population from its homeland. Between the 1850s and World War I, about a million North Caucasian Muslims arrived in the Ottoman Empire as refugees.

Having killed and deported most of Armenians of Western Armenia during the Armenian genocide, the Turks intended to eliminate the Armenian population of Eastern Armenia. During the 1920 Turkish–Armenian War, 60,000 to 98,000 Armenian civilians were estimated to have been killed by the Turkish army.

In the 1940s, around 480,000 Chechens and Ingush, 120,000 Karachay–Balkars and Meskhetian Turks, thousands of Kalmyks, and 200,000 Kurds in Nakchivan and Caucasus Germans were deported en masse to Central Asia and Siberia by the Soviet security apparatus. About a quarter of them died.

The Southern Caucasus region was unified as a single political entity twice – during the Russian Civil War (Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic) from 9 April 1918 to 26 May 1918, and under the Soviet rule (Transcaucasian SFSR) from 12 March 1922 to 5 December 1936. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia became independent nations.

The region has been subject to various territorial disputes since the collapse of the Soviet Union, leading to the First Nagorno-Karabakh War (1988–1994), the East Prigorodny Conflict (1989–1991), the War in Abkhazia (1992–93), the First Chechen War (1994–1996), the Second Chechen War (1999–2009), Russo-Georgian War (2008), and the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War (2020).

Mythology
In Greek mythology, the Caucasus was one of the pillars supporting the world. After presenting man with the gift of fire, Prometheus (or Amirani in the Georgian version) was chained there by Zeus, to have his liver eaten daily by an eagle as punishment for defying Zeus's wish to keep the "secret of fire" from humans.

In Persian mythology, the Caucasus might be associated with the mythic Mount Qaf which is believed to surround the known world. It is the battlefield of Saoshyant and the nest of the Simurgh.

The Roman poet Ovid placed the Caucasus in Scythia and depicted it as a cold and stony mountain which was the abode of personified hunger. The Greek hero Jason sailed to the west coast of the Caucasus in pursuit of the Golden Fleece, and there met Medea, a daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis.

Later folklore
The Caucasus has a rich folklore tradition. This tradition has been preserved orally—necessitated by the fact that for most of the languages involved there was no alphabet until the early twentieth century—and only began to be written down in the late nineteenth century. One important tradition is that of the Nart sagas, which tell stories of a race of ancient heroes called the Narts. These sagas include such figures as Satanaya, the mother of the Narts, Sosruquo a shape changer and trickster, Tlepsh a blacksmith god, and Batradz, a mighty hero. The folklore of the Caucasus shows ancient Iranian Zoroastrian influence, involve battles with ancient Goths, Huns and Khazars, and contain many connections with ancient Indian, Norse Scandinavian, and Greek cultures.

Links between Greek mythology and subsequent folklore
Caucasian folklore contains many links with the myths of the ancient Greeks. There are resemblances between the mother goddess Satanaya and the Greek goddess of love Aphrodite. The story of how the trickster Nart Sosruquo, became invulnerable parallels that of the Greek hero Achilles. The ancient Greek Amazons may be connected to a Caucasian "warrior Forest-Mother, Amaz-an".

Caucasian legends include stories involving giants similar to Homer's Polyphemus story. In these stories, the giant is almost always a shepherd, and he is variously a one-eyed rock-throwing cannibal, who lives in a cave (the exit of which is often blocked by a stone), kills the hero's companions, is blinded by a hot stake, and whose flock of animals is stolen by the hero and his men, all motifs which (along with still others) are also found in the Polyphemus story. In one example from Georgia, two brothers, who are being held prisoner by a giant one-eyed shepherd called "One-eye", take a spit, heat it up, stab it into the giant's eye, and escape.

There are also links with the ancient Greek myth of Prometheus. Many legends, widespread in the Caucasus, contain motifs shared with the Prometheus story. These motifs include: a giant hero, his conflict with God or gods, the stealing of fire and giving it to men, being chained, and being tormented by a bird who pecks at his liver (or heart). The Adyge/Circassian Nart Nasran, the Georgian Amirani, the Chechen Pkharmat, and the Abkhazian Abrskil, are examples of such Prometheus-like figures.

Ecology
The Caucasus is an area of great ecological importance. The region is included in the list of 34 world biodiversity hotspots. It harbors some 6400 species of higher plants, 1600 of which are endemic to the region. Its wildlife includes Persian leopards, brown bears, wolves, bison, marals, golden eagles and hooded crows. Among invertebrates, some 1000 spider species are recorded in the Caucasus. Most of arthropod biodiversity is concentrated on Great and Lesser Caucasus ranges.

The region has a high level of endemism and a number of relict animals and plants, the fact reflecting presence of refugial forests, which survived the Ice Age in the Caucasus Mountains. The Caucasus forest refugium is the largest throughout the Western Asian (near Eastern) region. The area has multiple representatives of disjunct relict groups of plants with the closest relatives in Eastern Asia, southern Europe, and even North America. Over 70 species of forest snails of the region are endemic. Some relict species of vertebrates are Caucasian parsley frog, Caucasian salamander, Robert's snow vole, and Caucasian grouse, and there are almost entirely endemic groups of animals such as lizards of genus Darevskia. In general, species composition of this refugium is quite distinct and differs from that of the other Western Eurasian refugia.

The natural landscape is one of mixed forest, with substantial areas of rocky ground above the treeline. The Caucasus Mountains are also noted for a dog breed, the Caucasian Shepherd Dog (Rus. Kavkazskaya Ovcharka, Geo. Nagazi). Vincent Evans noted that minke whales have been recorded from the Black Sea.

Energy and mineral resources
The Caucasus has many economically important minerals and energy resources, such as gold, silver, copper, iron ore, manganese, tungsten, zinc, oil, natural gas, and coal (both anthracite coal and brown).

Sport
Krasnaya Polyana is a popular centre of mountain skiing and a snowboard venue. The 2015 European Games is the first in the history of the European Games to be held in Azerbaijan.

Mountain-skiing complexes include:
 * Alpika-Service
 * Mountain roundabout
 * Rosa Hutor
 * Tsaghkadzor Ski Resort in Armenia
 * Shahdag Winter Complex in Azerbaijan

The 2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix (motor racing) was the first in the history of Formula One to be held in Azerbaijan. The 2017 World Rugby Under 20 Championship was held in Georgia. In 2017 the U-19 Europe Championship (Football) was held in Georgia. In 2019 the UEFA European Under-19 Championship was held in Armenia.

Tourism-related links

 * Tourism in Armenia
 * Tourism in Azerbaijan
 * Tourism in Georgia
 * Tourism in Russia

title: Caucasus


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Wilhelm Busch

Heinrich Christian Wilhelm Busch (14 April 1832 – 9 January 1908) was a German humorist, poet, illustrator, and painter. He published wildly innovative illustrated tales that remain influential to this day.

Busch drew on the tropes of folk humour as well as a profound knowledge of German literature and art to satirize contemporary life, any kind of piety, Catholicism, Philistinism, religious morality, bigotry, and moral uplift.

His mastery of drawing and verse became deeply influential for future generations of comic artists and vernacular poets. Among many notable influences, The Katzenjammer Kids was inspired by Busch's Max and Moritz. Today, the Wilhelm Busch Prize and the Wilhelm Busch Museum help maintain his legacy. The 175th anniversary of his birth in 2007 was celebrated throughout Germany. Busch remains one of the most influential poets and artists in Western Europe, being called the "Forefather of Comics".

Family background

Johann Georg Kleine, Wilhelm Busch's maternal grandfather, settled in the small village of Wiedensahl, where in 1817 he bought a thatched half-timbered house where Wilhelm Busch was to be born 15 years later. Amalie Kleine, Johann's wife and Wilhelm Busch's grandmother, kept a shop where Busch's mother Henriette assisted while her two brothers attended high school. When Johann Georg Kleine died in 1820, his widow continued to run the shop with Henriette.

At the age of 19 Henriette Kleine married surgeon Friedrich Wilhelm Stümpe. Henriette became widowed at the age of 26, with her three children to Stümpe dying as infants. About 1830 Friedrich Wilhelm Busch, the illegitimate son of a farmer, settled in Wiedensahl after completing a business apprenticeship in the nearby village of Loccum. He took over the Kleine shop in Wiedensahl, which he completely modernised. He married Henriette Kleine Stümpe.

Childhood
Wilhelm Busch was born on 14 April 1832,  the first of seven children to Henriette Kleine Stümpe and Friedrich Wilhelm Busch. His six siblings followed shortly after: Fanny (1834), Gustav (1836), Adolf (1838), Otto (1841), Anna (1843), and Hermann (1845); all survived childhood. His parents were ambitious, hard-working and devout Protestants who later, despite becoming relatively prosperous, could not afford to educate all three sons. Busch's biographer Berndt W. Wessling suggested that Friedrich Wilhelm Busch invested heavily in the education of his sons partly because his own illegitimacy held significant stigma in rural areas.

The young Wilhelm Busch was a tall child, with a delicate physique. The coarse boyishness of his later protagonists, "Max and Moritz" was not his own. He described himself in autobiographical sketches and letters as sensitive and timid, someone who "carefully studied fear", and who reacted with fascination, compassion, and distress when animals were killed in the autumn. He described the "transformation to sausage" as "dreadfully compelling", leaving a lasting impression; pork nauseated him throughout his life.

In the autumn of 1841, after the birth of his brother Otto, Busch's education was entrusted to the 35-year-old clergyman, Georg Kleine, his maternal uncle at Ebergötzen, where 100 children were taught within a space of 66 sqm. This probably through lack of space in the Busch family home, and his father's desire for a better education than the small local school could provide. The nearest convenient school was located in Bückeburg, 20 km from Wiedensahl. Kleine, with his wife Fanny Petri, lived in a rectory at Ebergötzen, while Busch was lodged with an unrelated family. Kleine and his wife were responsible and caring, exercised a substitute parental role, and provided refuge for him in future unsuccessful times.

Kleine's private lessons for Busch also were attended by Erich Bachmann, the son of a wealthy Ebergötzen miller. Both became friends, according to Busch the strongest friendship of his childhood. This friendship was echoed in the 1865 story, Max and Moritz. A small pencil portrait by the 14-year-old Busch depicted Bachmann as a chubby, confident boy, and showed similarities with Max. Busch portrayed himself with a "cowlick", in the later "Moritzian" perky style.

Kleine was a philologist, his lessons not held in contemporary language, and it is not known for certain all subjects Busch and his friend were taught. Busch did learn elementary arithmetic from his uncle, although science lessons might have been more comprehensive, as Kleine, like many other clergymen, was a beekeeper, and published essays and textbooks on the subject, – Busch demonstrated his knowledge of bee-keeping in his future stories. Drawing, and German and English poetry, were also taught by Kleine.

Busch had little contact with his natural parents during this period. At the time, the 165 km journey between Wiedensahl and Ebergötzen took three days by horse. His father visited Ebergötzen two to three times a year, while his mother stayed in Wiedensahl to look after the other children. The 12-year-old Busch visited his family once; his mother at first did not recognize him. Some Busch biographers think that this early separation from his parents, especially from his mother, resulted in his eccentric bachelorhood. In the autumn of 1846, Busch moved with the Kleines to Lüthorst, where, on 11 April 1847, he was confirmed.

Study
In September 1847 Busch began studying mechanical engineering at Hannover Polytechnic. Busch's biographers are not in agreement as to why his Hanover education ended; most believe that his father had little appreciation of his son's artistic inclination. Biographer Eva Weissweiler suspects that Kleine played a major role, and that other possible causes were Busch's friendship with an innkeeper, Brümmer, political debates in Brümmer's tavern, and Busch's reluctance to believe every word of the Bible and catechism.

Busch studied for nearly four years at Hanover, despite initial difficulties in understanding the subject matter. A few months before graduation he confronted his parents with his aspiration to study at the Düsseldorf Art Academy. According to Bush's nephew Hermann Nöldeke, his mother supported this inclination. His father eventually acquiesced and Busch moved to Düsseldorf in June 1851, where, to his disappointment at not being admitted to the advanced class, he entered preparatory classes. Busch's parents had his tuition fees paid for one year, so in May 1852 he traveled to Antwerp to continue study at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts under Josephus Laurentius Dyckmans. He led his parents to believe that the academy was less regimented than Düsseldorf, and had the opportunity to study Old Masters. At Antwerp he saw for the first time paintings by Peter Paul Rubens, Adriaen Brouwer, David Teniers, and Frans Hals. The pictures aroused his interest, but made him doubt his own skills. Eventually, in 1853, after suffering heavily from typhus, he abandoned his Antwerp studies and returned penniless to Wiedensahl.

Munich
Busch was ravaged by disease, and for five months spent time painting and collecting folk tales, legends, songs, ballads, rhymes, and fragments of regional superstitions. Busch's biographer, Joseph Kraus, saw these collections as useful additions to folklore, as Busch noted the narrative background to tales and the idiosyncrasies of storytellers. Busch tried to release the collections, but as a publisher could not be found at the time, they were issued after his death. During the Nazi era Busch was known as an "ethnic seer".

After Busch had spent six months with his uncle Kleine at Lüthorst, he expressed a desire to continue to study in Munich. This request caused a rift with his father who, however, eventually funded this move; – see for comparison Busch's illustrated story of Painter Klecksel. Busch's expectations of the Munich Academy of Fine Arts were not met. His life became aimless; there were occasional return visits to Lüthorst, but contact with his parents had been broken off. In 1857 and 1858, as his position seemed to be without prospects, he contemplated emigration to Brazil to keep bees.

Busch made contact with the artist association, Jung München (Young Munich), met several notable Munich artists, and wrote and provided cartoons for the Jung München newspaper. Kaspar Braun, who published the satirical newspapers, Münchener Bilderbogen (Picture Sheets from Munich) and Fliegende Blätter (Flying Leaves), proposed a collaboration with Busch. This association provided Busch with sufficient funds to live. An existing self-caricature suggests that at this time he had an intense relationship with a woman from Ammerland. His courtship with a seventeen-year-old merchant's daughter, Anna Richter, whom Busch met through his brother Gustav, ended in 1862. Busch's biographer, Diers, suggests that her father probably refused to entrust his daughter to an almost unknown artist without regular income.

In his early Munich years Busch's attempts to write libretti, which are almost forgotten today, were unsuccessful. Up to 1863 he worked on two or three major works; the third was composed by Georg Kremplsetzer. Busch's Liebestreu und Grausamkeit, a romantic opera in three acts, Hansel und Gretel, and Der Vetter auf Besuch, an opera buffa of sorts, were not particularly successful. There was a dispute between Busch and Kremplsetzer during the staging of Der Vetter auf Besuch, leading to the removal of Busch's name from the production; the piece was renamed, Singspiel von Georg Kremplsetzer. However, German composer Elsa Laura Wolzogen set several of his poems to music.

In 1873 Busch returned several times to Munich, and took part in the intense life of the Munich Art Society as an escape from provincial life. In 1877, in a last attempt to be a serious artist, he took a studio in Munich. He left Munich abruptly in 1881, after he disrupted a variety show and subsequently made a scene through the effects of alcohol. The 1878 nine episode illustrated tale Eight Sheets in the Wind describes how humans behave like animals when drunk. Busch's biographer Weissweiler felt the story was only superficially funny and harmless, but was a study on addiction and its induced state of delusion.

Publication of Max and Moritz
Between 1860 and 1863 Busch wrote more than one hundred articles for the Münchener Bilderbogen and Fliegende Blätter, but he felt his dependence on publisher Kaspar Braun had become constricting. Busch appointed Dresden publisher Heinrich Richter, the son of Saxon painter Ludwig Richter, as his new publisher – Richter's press up to that time was producing children's books and religious Christian devotional literature. Busch could choose themes, although Richter raised some concerns regarding four suggested illustrated tales that were proposed. However, some were published in the 1864 as Bilderpossen, proving a failure. Busch then offered Richter the manuscripts of Max and Moritz, waiving any fees. Richter rejected the manuscript as sales prospects seemed poor. Busch's former publisher, Braun, purchased the right to Max and Moritz for 1,000 gulden, corresponding to approximately double the annual wage of a craftsman.

For Braun the manuscript was fortuitous. Initially the sales of Max and Moritz were slow, but sales figures improved after the 1868 second edition. Overall there were 56 editions and more than 430,000 copies sold up to Busch's death in 1908. Despite at first being ignored by critics, teachers in the 1870s described Max and Moritz as frivolous and an undesirable influence on the moral development of young people.

Frankfurt
Increasing economic success allowed Busch to visit Wiedensahl more frequently. Busch had decided to leave Munich, as only few relatives lived there and the artist association was temporarily disbanded. In June 1867 Busch met his brother Otto for the first time, in Frankfurt. Otto was working as a tutor to the family of a wealthy banker and industrialist, Kessler. Busch became friends with Kessler's wife, Johanna, a mother of seven and an influential art and music patron of Frankfurt. She regularly opened salons at her villa, frequented by artists, musicians, and philosophers. She believed Busch to be a great painter, a view supported by Anton Burger, a leading painter of the Kronberger Malerkolonie, the Kronberg-based group of painters. While his humorous drawings did not appeal to her, she supported his painting career. At first she established an apartment and studio for Busch in her villa, later providing him with an apartment nearby. Motivated by Kessler's support and admiration, and introduction to the cultural life of Frankfurt, the 'Frankfurter Years' were the most artistically productive for Busch. At this time he and Otto discovered the philosophical works of Arthur Schopenhauer.

Busch did not remain in Frankfurt. Toward the end of the 1860s he alternated between Wiedensahl and Lüthorst, and Wolfenbüttel where his brother Gustav lived. The association with Johanna Kessler lasted five years, and after his return to Wiedensahl in 1872 they communicated by letter. This contact was interrupted between 1877 and 1891, after which it was revived with the help of Kessler's daughters.

Later life
Biographer Weissweiler does not dismiss the possibility that Busch's increasing alcohol dependence hindered self-criticism. He refused invitations to parties, and publisher Otto Bassermann sent him to Wiedensahl to keep his alcohol problem undetected from those around him. Busch was also a heavy smoker, resulting in symptoms of severe nicotine poisoning in 1874. He began to illustrate drunkards more often.

Dutch writer Marie Anderson corresponded with Busch. More than fifty letters were exchanged between January and October 1875 in which they discussed philosophy, religion, and ethics. Although only one Anderson letter survives, Busch's letters are in manuscripts. They met in Mainz in October 1875, after which he returned to Bassermann at Heidelberg in a "horrible mood". According to several people at the time, Busch's failure to find a wife was responsible for his conspicuous behaviour. There is no evidence that Busch had a close relationship with any woman after that with Anderson.

Busch lived with his sister Fanny's family after her husband Pastor Hermann Nöldeke's death in 1879. His nephew Adolf Nöldeke remembers that Busch wanted to move back to Wiedensahl with the family. Busch renovated the house, which Fanny looked after even though Busch was a rich man, and became "father" to his three young nephews. She would, however, have preferred to live in a more urban area for the education of her sons. For Fanny and her three sons, Busch could not replace their former idyllic life. The years around 1880 were psychically and emotionally exhausting for Busch, who was still reliant on alcohol. He would not invite visitors to Wiedensahl; because of this Fanny lost contact with her friends in the village, and whenever she questioned his wishes, Busch became furious. Even his friends Otto Friedrich Bassermann, Franz von Lenbach, Hermann Levi and Wilhelm von Kaulbach were not welcome at the house; he would meet them in Kassel or Hanover.

Busch stopped painting in 1896 and signed over all publication rights to Bassermann Verlag for 50,000 gold marks. Busch, now aged 64, felt old. He needed spectacles for writing and painting, and his hands trembled slightly. In 1898, together with his aging sister Fanny Nöldeke, he accepted Bassermann's suggestion to move into a large parsonage in Mechtshausen. Busch read biographies, novels and stories in German, English and French. He organized his works and wrote letters and poems. Most of the poems from the collections Schein und Sein and Zu guter Letzt were written in 1899. The following years were eventless for Busch.

He developed a sore throat in early January 1908, and his doctor detected a weak heart. During the night of 8–9 January 1908 Busch slept uneasily, taking camphor, and a few drops of morphine as a tranquilizer. Busch died the following morning before his physician, called by Otto Nöldeke, came to assist.

Work
During the Frankfurt period Busch published three self-contained illustrated satires. Their anti-clerical themes proved popular during the Kulturkampf. Busch's satires typically did not address political questions, but exaggerated churchiness, superstition, and philistine double standards. This exaggeration made at least two of the works historically erroneous. The third illustrated satire, Father Filucius (Pater Filucius), described by Busch as an "allegorical mayfly", has greater historical context.

Max and Moritz
In German, Eine Bubengeschichte in sieben Streichen, Max and Moritz is a series of seven illustrated stories concerning the mischievous antics of two boys, who are eventually ground up and fed to ducks.

Saint Antonius of Padua and Helen Who Couldn't Help It
In Saint Antonius of Padua (Der Heilige Antonius von Padua) Busch challenges Catholic belief. It was released by the publisher Moritz Schauenburg at the time Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma of papal infallibility that was harshly criticized by Protestants. The publisher's works were heavily scrutinized or censored, and the state's attorney in Offenburg charged Schauenberg with "vilification of religion and offending public decency through indecent writings" – a decision which affected Busch. Scenes of Antonius accompanied by a pig being admitted to heaven, and the devil being shown as a half-naked ballet dancer seducing Antonius, were deemed controversial. The district court of Düsseldorf subsequently banned Saint Antonius. Schauenburg was acquitted on 27 March 1871 in Offenburg, but in Austria distribution of the satire was prohibited until 1902. Schauenburg refused to publish further Busch satires to avoid future accusations.

Busch's following work, Helen Who Couldn't Help It (Die fromme Helene), was published by Otto Friedrich Bassermann, a friend whom Busch met in Munich. Helen Who Couldn't Help It, which was soon translated into other European languages, satirizes religious hypocrisy and dubious morality:

Ein guter Mensch gibt gerne acht, Ob auch der andre was Böses macht; Und strebt durch häufige Belehrung Nach seiner Beß'rung und Bekehrung

A saintly person likes to labor For the correction of his neighbor, And sees, through frequent admonition, To his improvement through contrition.

Or: A good person likes to pay attention, if the other has evil intention, and strives by frequent didactic incursion, after his improvement and conversion.

Many details from Helen Who Couldn't Help It criticize the way of life of the Kesslers. Johanna Kessler was married to a much older man and entrusted her children to governesses and tutors, while she played an active role in the social life of Frankfurt.

Schweigen will ich vom Theater Wie von da, des Abends spät, Schöne Mutter, alter Vater Arm in Arm nach Hause geht

Zwar man zeuget viele Kinder, Doch man denket nichts dabei. Und die Kinder werden Sünder, Wenn's den Eltern einerlei.

Then again, the pen would rather Spare the Stage, whose thrills excite Handsome mother, honest father, As they amble home at night

Couples couple and redouble With a blithe and thoughtless air, But the children get in trouble If the parents do not care.

The character of Mr. Schmock – the name based on the Yiddish insult "schmuck" – shows similarities with Johanna Kessler's husband, who was uninterested in art and culture.

In the second part of Helen Who Couldn't Help It Busch attacks Catholic pilgrimages. The childless Helen goes on a pilgrimage, accompanied by her cousin and Catholic priest Franz. The pilgrimage is successful, as later Helen gives birth to twins, who resemble Helen and Franz. Franz is later killed by a jealous valet, Jean, for his interest in female kitchen staff. The now widowed Helen is left with only a rosary, prayer book, and alcohol. Drunk, she falls into a burning oil lamp. Finally, Nolte coins a moral phrase, echoing the philosophy of Schopenhauer:

Das Gute — dieser Satz steht fest — Ist stets das Böse, was man läßt!

The good (I am convinced, for one) Is but the bad, one leaves undone.

Pater Filucius (Father Filucius) is the only illustrated satire of this period suggested by the publisher. Also aimed at anti-Catholic taste and buyers, it criticizes the Jesuit Order. Kraus felt it was the weakest of all three anti-clerical works. Some satires refer to contemporary events, such as Monsieur Jacques à Paris during the Siege of 1870 (Monsieur Jacques à Paris während der Belagerung von 1870). Busch biographer Michaela Diers declares the story "tasteless work, drawing on anti-French emotions and mocking the misery of French people in Paris, which is occupied by Prussian troops". It depicts an increasingly desperate French citizen who at first eats a mouse during the German siege, then amputates his dog's tail to cook it, and finally invents an explosion pill which kills his dog and two fellow citizens. Weissweiler believes that Busch wrote with irony. In Eginhard and Emma (1864), a fictional family story that takes place in the Charlemagne era, he criticizes the Holy Roman Empire and calls for a German empire in its place; in The Birthday or the Particularists (Der Geburtstag oder die Partikularisten) he satirizes the anti-Prussian sentiments of his Hanover countrymen.

Critique of the Heart
Busch did not write illustrated tales for a while, but focused on the literary Kritik des Herzens (Critique of the Heart), wanting to appear more serious to his readers. Contemporary reception for the collection of 81 poems was mainly poor; it was criticized for its focus on marriage and sexuality. His long-time friend Paul Lindau called it "very serious, heartfelt, charming poems". Dutch writer Marie Anderson was one of few people who enjoyed his Kritik des Herzens, and she even planned to publish it in a Dutch newspaper.

Adventures of a Bachelor
Notwithstanding the hiatus after moving from Frankfurt, the 1870s were one of Busch's most productive decades. In 1874 he produced the short illustrated tale, Diddle-Boom! (Dideldum!).

Following in 1875, was the Knopp Trilogy, about the life of Tobias Knopp: Adventures of a Bachelor (Abenteuer eines Junggesellen), Mr. and Mrs. Knopp (Herr und Frau Knopp) (1876), and "Julie" (Julchen) (1877). The antagonists of the trilogy are not pairs of nuisances as with Max and Moritz or Jack Crook, Bird of Evil (Hans Huckebein, der Unglücksrabe). Without pathos, Busch makes Knopp become aware of his mortality:

Rosen, Tanten, Basen, Nelken Sind genötigt zu verwelken; Ach — und endlich auch durch mich Macht man einen dicken Strich.

April, cousins, maidens, May Irretrievably decay; And I also, soon enough, Shall be cancelled and crossed off.

In the first part of the trilogy, Knopp is depressed and will look for a wife. He visits his old friends and their wives, whom he finds in unenviable relationships. Still not convinced that the life of a bachelor is one for him, he returns home, and without further ado proposes to his housekeeper. The following marriage proposal is, according to Busch biographer Joseph Kraus, one of the shortest in the history of German literature:

"Mädchen", spricht er, "sag mir ob..." Und sie lächelt: "Ja, Herr Knopp!"

"Wench," he stammers, "if I were..." And she smiles: "With pleasure, Sir!"

According to Wessling, Busch became skeptical of marriage after writing the story. To Marie Anderson he wrote: "I will never marry(...) I am already in good hands with my sister".

Last works
Among Busch's last works were the stories, Clement Dove, the Poet Thwarted (Balduin Bählamm, der verhinderte Dichter) (1883) and Painter Squirtle (Maler Klecksel) (1884), both of which focus on artistic failure, and indirectly his own failure. Both stories begin with a preface, which, for biographer Joseph Kraus, were bravura pieces of "Komische Lyrik" — German comic poetry. Clement Dove ridicules the bourgeois amateur poet circle of Munich, "The Crocodiles" (Die Krokodile), and their prominent members Emanuel Geibel, Paul von Heyse, and Adolf Wilbrandt. Painter Squirtle criticizes the bourgeois art connoisseur who believes the worth of art is gauged by its price.

Mit scharfen Blick nach Kennerweise Seh ich zunächst mal nach dem Preise, Und bei genauerer Betrachtung Steigt mit dem Preise auch die Achtung. Ich blicke durch die hohle Hand, Ich blinzle, nicke: "Ah, scharmant!" Das Kolorit, die Pinselführung, Die Farbentöne, die Gruppierung, Dies Lüster, diese Harmonie, Ein Meisterwerk der Phantasie.

For just a minute comment lags, While secretly I note the tags. (I emulate the trade's elect: High price engenders high respect.) I form a spyglass with my hand, I squint, I nod, I back-step: "Grand!" What feeling, both naive and deep! What broad authoritative sweep! The thrill transmitted as one traces That lattice-work of patterned spaces! Those economical designs Of trailing asymptotic lines!

The prose play Edwards Dream (Eduards Traum) was released in 1891, composed of several small grouped episodes, rather than one linear storyline. The work received mixed reception. Joseph Kraus felt it was the peak of the life works by Busch, his nephews called it a masterwork of world literature, and the publisher of a critical collective edition spoke of a narrative style that is not found in contemporary literature. Eva Weissweiler saw in the play Busch's attempt to prove himself in the novella genre, believing that everything that angered or insulted him, and his accompanying emotional depths, are apparent in the story. The 1895 story The Butterfly (Der Schmetterling) parodies themes and motifs and ridicules the religious optimism of a German romanticism that contradicted Busch's realistic anthropology influenced by Schopenhauer and Charles Darwin. Its prose is more stringent in narrative style when compared to Edwards Dream. Both were not popular amongst readers, because of their unfamiliar style.

Painting
Busch felt his painting skills could not compete with those of the Dutch masters. He regarded few of his paintings as finished, often stacking them one on top of the other in damp corners of his studio, where they stuck together. If the pile of paintings became too high, he burnt some in his garden. Since only a few remaining paintings are dated, categorizing them is difficult. His doubts regarding his skills are expressed in his choice of materials. His ground was usually chosen carelessly. Sometimes he used uneven cardboard or poorly-prepared spruce-wood boards. One exception is a portrait of Johanna Kessler, on a canvas support measuring 63 cm by 53 cm, one of his largest paintings. Most of his works, even landscapes, are small. As Busch used poor grounds and colours, most are heavily darkened and have an almost monochrome effect.

Many pictures depict the countryside at Wiedensahl and Lüthorst. They include pollarded willows, cottages in cornfields, cowherds, autumn landscapes, and meadows with streams. A particular feature is the use of red jackets, found in about 280 of 1000 Busch paintings and drawings. The muted or bright red coats are worn usually by a small figure, depicted from behind. The paintings generally represent typical villages. Portraits of the Kesslers, and a series of other portraits depicting Lina Weissenborn in the mid-1870s, are exceptions. A painting of a 10-year-old girl from a Jewish family at Lüthorst portrays her as serious, and having dark, oriental features.

The influence of Dutch painters is clearly visible in Busch's work. "Hals diluted and shortened(...) but still Halsian", wrote Paul Klee after visiting a Busch memorial exhibition in 1908. A strong influence on Busch was Adriaen Brouwer, whose themes were farming and inn life, rustic dances, card players, smokers, drunkards, and rowdies. He dismissed the techniques of Impressionism with its strong preoccupation with the effect of light, and used new colours, such as Aniline Yellow, and photographs, as an aid. The landscapes from the mid-1880s show the same broad brushstrokes as seen in the paintings of the young Franz von Lenbach. Busch refused to exhibit work even though he was befriended by many artists of the Munich School, which would have allowed him to do so; it was not until near the end of his life that he presented his paintings to the public.

Themes, technique, and style
Busch biographer Joseph Kraus divided his work into three periods. He points out, however, that this classification is a simplification, as some works by their nature may be of a later or earlier period. All three periods show Busch's obsession with German middle class life. His peasants are devoid of sensitivity and village life is marked by a vivid lack of sentiment.

From 1858 to 1865 Busch chiefly worked for the Fliegenden Blätter and the Münchener Bilderbogen.

The period from 1866 to 1884 is characterized by his major illustrated stories, such as Helen Who Couldn't Help It. These stories are different in theme from works of his earlier period. The life of his characters start well, but disintegrate, as in Painter Squirtle (Maler Klecksel); someone sensitive who becomes a pedant. Others concern recalcitrant children or animals, or make the great or significant foolish and ridiculous. The early stories follow the pattern of children's books of orthodox education, such as those by Heinrich Hoffmann's Struwwelpeter, that aim to teach the devastating consequences of bad behaviour. Busch did not assign value to his work, as he once explained to Heinrich Richter: "I look at my things for what they are, as Nuremberg trinkets [toys], as Schnurr Pfeiferen [worthless and useless things] whose value is to be found not in its artistic content, but in public demand (...)".

From 1885 until his death in 1908 his work was dominated by prose and poems. The 1895 prose text Der Schmetterling contains autobiographical accounts. Peter's enchantment by the witch Lucinde, of whom he regards himself a slave, is possibly in reference to Johanna Kessler. Peter, like Busch, returns to his birthplace. It is similar in style to the romantic travel story that Ludwig Tieck established with his 1798 Franz Sternbalds Wanderungen. Busch plays with its traditional forms, motifs, pictures, literary topics, and form of narration.

Technique
Publisher Kaspar Braun, who commissioned Busch's first illustrations, had established the first workshop in Germany to use wood engraving. This letterpress printing technique was developed by English graphic artist Thomas Bewick near the end of the eighteenth century and became the most widely used reproduction system for illustrations over the years. Busch insisted on first making the drawings, afterward writing the verse. Surviving preparatory drawings show line notes, ideas, and movement, and physiognomy studies.

Then the draft was transferred by pencil on white-primed panels of hardwood end grain. Not only was it hard work, but the quality of the printing block was crucial. Everything left white on the block, around Busch's drawn lines, was cut from the plate by skilled engravers. Wood engraving allows a finer differentiation than woodcut and the potential tonal values are of almost the quality of intaglio printing, such as copper engraving. Sometimes the result was not satisfactory, leading Busch to rework or reproduce plates. The wood engraving technique did not allow for fine lines, which is why Busch's drawing, especially in his illustrated tales up to the mid-1870s, are boldly drawn, giving his work its particular characteristic.

From the mid-1870s Busch's illustrations were printed using zincography. With this technique there was no longer any danger that a wood engraver could change the character of his drawings. The originals were photographed and transferred onto a photosensitive zinc plate. This process allowed for the application of a clear, free pen-drawn ink line, and was a much faster printing method. Busch's use of zincography began with Mr. and Mrs. Knopp.

Language
The effect of Busch's illustrations is enhanced by his forthright verse, with taunts, derision, ironic twists, exaggeration, ambiguity, and startling rhymes. His language had an influence on the humorous poetry of Erich Kästner, Kurt Tucholsky, Joachim Ringelnatz, and Christian Morgenstern. The contrast in his later work between comic illustration and its seemingly serious accompanying text – already demonstrated in his earlier Max and Moritz – is shown in Widow Bolte's mawkish dignity, which is disproportionate to the loss of her chickens:

Fließet aus dem Aug', ihr Tränen! All mein Hoffen, all mein Sehnen, Meines Lebens schönster Traum Hängt an diesem Apfelbaum!"

Flow, my tears, then, scoring, burning, All my comfort, hope, and yearning, All I dreamt might come to be Dangles from this apple tree!"

Many of Brusch's couplets, part of contemporary common usage, give the impression of weighty wisdom, but in his hands become only apparent truths, hypocrisy, or platitudes. His use of onomatopoeia is a characteristic of his work: "Allez-oop-da" — Max and Moritz steal fried chickens with a fishing rod down a chimney — "reeker-rawker"; "at the plank from bank to bank"; "rickle-rackle", "hear the millstones grind and crackle"; and "tinkly-clinket" as Eric the cat rips a chandelier from a ceiling in Helen Who Couldn't Help It. Busch uses names he gives characters to describe their personality. "Studiosus Döppe" (Young Bumbel) has little mental ability; "Sauerbrots" (Sourdough) would not be of a cheerful disposition; and "Förster Knarrtje" (Forester Knarrtje) could hardly be a socialite.

Many of his picture stories use verses with trochee structure: Master Lampel's gentle powers Failed with rascals such as ours The overweighting of the stressed syllables strengthens the humour of the lines. Busch also uses dactyls, where one accented syllable is followed by two unaccented syllables, as in his Plisch und Plum, where they underline the pedantic and solemn words with which teacher Bokelmann educates his pupils. They create tension in the Sourdough chapter from Adventures of a Bachelor, through the alternation of trochees and dactyls. Busch often synchronizes format and content in his poems, as in Fips the Monkey, where he uses the epic hexameter in a speech about wisdom.

In both his illustrations and poems Busch uses familiar fables, occasionally appropriating their morality and stories, spinning them to illustrate a very different and comic "truth", and bringing to bear his pessimistic view of the world and human condition. While traditional fables follow the typical philosophy of differentiating between good and evil behaviour, Busch combines both.

Canings and other cruelties
It is not unusual to see thrashing, tormenting, and caning in Busch's works. Sharp pencils pierced through models, housewives fall onto kitchen knives, thieves are spiked by umbrellas, tailors cut their tormentors with scissors, rascals are ground in corn mills, drunkards burn, and cats, dogs, and monkeys defecate while being tormented. Frequently Busch has been called a sadist by educators and psychologists. Tails that are burnt, pulled off, trapped, stretched, or eaten is seen by Weissweiler as not aggression against animals, but a phallic allusion to Busch's undeveloped sexual life. Such graphic text and imagery in cartoon form was not unusual at the time, and publishers, the public, or censors found it not particularly noteworthy. Topics and motifs for his early work were derived from eighteenth- and nineteenth-century popular literature, the gruesome endings of which he often softened.

Caning, a common aspect of nineteenth-century teaching, is prevalent in many of his works, for example Meister Druff in Adventures of a Bachelor and Lehrer Bokelmann in Plish and Plum, where it is shown as an almost sexual pleasure in applying punishment. Beatings and humiliation are found in his later work too; biographer Gudrun Schury described this as Busch's life-motif.

In the estate of Busch there is the note, "Durch die Kinderjahre hindurchgeprügelt" (Beaten through the childhood years), however there is no evidence that Busch was referring to himself. He couldn't recall any beating from his father. His uncle Kleine beat him once, not with the conventional rattan stick, but symbolically with dried dahlia stalks, this for stuffing cow hairs into a village idiot's pipe. Weissweiler observes that Busch probably saw canings at his village school, where he went for three years, and quite possibly he also received this punishment. In Abenteuer eines Junggesellen Busch illustrates a form of nonviolent progressive education that fails in one scene, and caning in the following scene; the canings that ensued indicate Busch's pessimistic picture of life, which has its roots in the Protestant ethic of the nineteenth century, in which he believed that humans are inherently evil and will never master their vices. Civilisation is the aim of education, but it can only mask human instincts superficially. Gentleness only leads to a continuation of human misdeeds, therefore punishment is required, even if one retains an unrepentant character, becomes a trained puppet, or in extreme cases, dies.

Antisemitism
The Panic of 1873 led to growing criticism of high finance and the spread of radical Antisemitism, which in the 1880s became a broad undercurrent. These criticisms saw a separation of capital into what was construed as "raffendes" (speculative capital), and what constituted "constructive" creative production capital. The "good", "native", and "German" manufacturer was praised by Antisemitic agitators, such as Theodor Fritsch, who opposed what he saw as "'rapacious' 'greedy', 'blood-sucking', 'Jewish' financial capitalism in the form of 'plutocrats' and 'usurers'". Busch was thought to have embraced those stereotypes. Two passages are often underlined, one in Helen Who Couldn't Help It:

Und der Jud mit krummer Ferse, Krummer Nas' und krummer Hos' Schlängelt sich zur hohen Börse Tiefverderbt und seelenlos.

And the Hebrew, sly and craven, Round of shoulder, nose, and knee, Slinks to the Exchange, unshaven And intent on usury

Robert Gernhardt defended Busch by stating that Jews are satirized only in three passages, of which the oldest is an illustration of a text by another author, published in 1860. He stated that Busch's Jewish figures are merely stereotypical, one of a number of stereotypes, such as the "limited Bavarian farmer" and the "Prussian tourist". Joseph Kraus shares the same view, and uses a couplet from Eight Sheets in the Wind (Die Haarbeutel), in which profit-seeking people are:

Vornehmlich Juden, Weiber, Christen, Die dich ganz schrecklich überlisten. [Mainly Jews, women, Christians / Who outwit you terribly]

Most often wenches, Christians, Jews, Who would much sooner see you lose

Although Gernhardt felt that Jews for Busch were alien, the Jewish conductor Hermann Levi befriended him, suggesting that Busch had a slight bias towards Jews.

Biographies
The first biography on Busch, Über Wilhelm Busch und seine Bedeutung (About Wilhelm Busch and His Importance), was released in 1886. The painter Eduard Daelen, also a writer, echoed Busch's anti-Catholic bias, putting him on equal footing with Leonardo da Vinci, Peter Paul Rubens, and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, and uncritically quoting correspondences. Even Busch and his friends were embarrassed. Literary scholar Friedrich Theodor Vischer attacked Daelen's biography and called him the "envious eunuch of the desiccated Philistine". After reading this biography Johannes Proelß posted an essay in the Frankfurter Zeitung, which contained many biographical falsehoods – as a response to this, Busch wrote two articles in the same newspaper. Published in October and December 1886, the autobiographical essay Regarding Myself (Was mich betrifft) includes basic facts, and some description of his troubles; analysts see within the essay a deep identity crisis. Busch revised his autobiography over the following years. The last such essay was published under the title, From Me About Me (Von mir über mich), which includes fewer biographical details and less reflection on bitterness and amusement than Regarding Myself.

Legacy
Busch celebrated his 70th birthday at his nephew's house in Hattorf am Harz. More than 1,000 congratulatory messages were sent to Mechtshausen from around the world. Wilhelm II praised the poet and artist, whose "exquisite works are full of genuine humour and are everlasting for the German people". The Austrian Alldeutsche Vereinigung (Pan-German Association) repealed the ban on Der heilige Antonius von Padua. Verlag Braun & Schneider, who owned the rights of Max and Moritz, gave Busch (around €200,000 or $270,000), which was donated to two hospitals in Hanover.

Since then, on the anniversary dates of his birth and death, he has been celebrated frequently. During the 175th anniversary in 2007, there were numerous re-publications of Busch works. Deutsche Post issued stamps depicting the Busch character Hans Huckebein – itself the inspiration for the nickname of the never-built Focke-Wulf Ta 183 German jet fighter design of 1945 – and the German Republic minted a 10 Euro silver coin faced with his portrait. Hanover declared 2007 the "Wilhelm Busch Year", with images featuring Busch works erected within the city centre.

The Wilhelm Busch Prize is awarded annually for satirical and humorous poetry. The Wilhelm Busch Society, active since 1930, aims to "(...) collect, scientifically revise, and promote Wilhelm Busch's works with the public". It supports the development of caricature and satirical artwork as a recognized branch of the visual arts. It is an advocate of the Wilhelm Busch Museum. Memorials are located in places he lived, including Wiedensahl, Ebergötzen, Lüthorst, Mechtshausen, and Hattorf am Harz.

On 15 April 2012, Google celebrated Wilhelm Busch’s 180th Birthday with a doodle.

Influence on comics
Andreas C. Knigge described Busch as the "first virtuoso" of illustrated stories. From the second half of the twentieth century he was considered the "Forefather of Comics". His early illustrations differ from those of the colleagues of Kaspar Braun. They show an increasing focus on protagonists, are less detailed in drawing and atmosphere, and develop from a dramatic understanding of the whole story. All Busch's illustrated tales have a plot that firstly describes the circumstance, then a resulting conflict, then solution. Plots are developed through consecutive scenes, similar to film storyboards. Busch conveys an impression of movement and action, at times strengthened through a change of perspective. According to Gert Ueding, his depiction of movement is unique.

One of Busch's notable stories is Der Virtuos (1865), which describes the life of a pianist who plays privately for an excited listener. Satirizing the self-publicizing artist's attitude and his overblown adoration, it varies from Busch's other stories as each scene does not contain prose, but is defined with music terminology, such as "Introduzione", "Maestoso", and "Fortissimo vivacissimo". As the scenes increase in tempo, each part of his body and lappet run around. The penultimate scene again depicts the pianist's movements, with score sheets floating above the grand piano on which musical notes are dancing. Over the years graphic artists have been fascinated by Der Virtuos. August Macke, in a letter to gallery owner Herwarth Walden, described Busch as the first Futurist, stating how well he captured time and movement. Similar pioneering scenes are in Bilder zur Jobsiade (1872). Job fails to answer rather easy questions set by twelve clergy, who shake their heads in synchronicity. Each scene is a movement study that presages Eadweard Muybridge's photography. Muybridge began his work in 1872, not released until 1893.

"Moritzian" influence
Busch's greatest success, both within Germany and internationally, was with Max and Moritz: Up to the time of his death it was translated into English, Danish, Hebrew, Japanese, Latin, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Hungarian, Swedish, and Walloonian. Several countries banned the story – about 1929 the Styrian school board prohibited sales of Max and Moritz to teens under eighteen. By 1997 more than 281 dialect and language translations had been produced.

Some early "Moritzian" comic strips were heavily influenced by Busch in plot and narrative style. Tootle and Bootle (1896), borrowed so much content from Max and Moritz that it was described as a pirate edition. The true "Moritzian" recreation is The Katzenjammer Kids by German artist Rudolph Dirks, published in the New York Journal from 1897. It was published though William Randolph Hearst's suggestion that a pair of siblings following the pattern of "Max and Moritz" should be created. The Katzenjammer Kids is regarded as one of the oldest, continuous comic strips.

German "Moritzian"-inspired stories include Lies und Lene; die Schwestern von Max und Moritz (Hulda Levetzow, F. Maddalena, 1896), Schlumperfritz und Schlamperfranz (1922), Sigismund und Waldemar, des Max und Moritz Zwillingspaar (Walther Günther, 1932), and Mac und Mufti (Thomas Ahlers, Volker Dehs, 1987). These are shaped by observations of the First and Second World Wars, while the original is a moral story. In 1958 the Christian Democratic Union used the Max and Moritz characters for a campaign in North Rhine-Westphalia, the same year that the East German satirical magazine Eulenspiegel used them to caricature black labour. In 1969 Max and Moritz "participated" in late 1960s student activism.

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title: Wilhelm Busch


text:
Quirinal Hill

The Quirinal Hill (Collis Quirinalis; Quirinale ) is one of the Seven Hills of Rome, at the north-east of the city center. It is the location of the official residence of the Italian head of state, who resides in the Quirinal Palace; by metonymy "the Quirinal" has come to stand for the Italian president. The Quirinal Palace has an extension of 1.2 e6ft2.

History
According to Roman legend, the Quirinal Hill was the site of a small village of the Sabines, and king Titus Tatius would have lived there after the peace between Romans and Sabines. These Sabines had erected altars in the honour of their god Quirinus (naming the hill by this god).

Tombs from the 8th century BC to the 7th century BC that confirm a likely presence of a Sabine settlement area have been discovered; on the hill, there was the tomb of Quirinus, which Lucius Papirius Cursor transformed into a temple for his triumph after the third Samnite war. Some authors consider it possible that the cult of the Capitoline Triad (Jove, Minerva, Juno) could have been celebrated here well before it became associated with the Capitoline Hill. The sanctuary of Flora, an Osco-Sabine goddess, was here too.

According to Livy, the hill first became part of the city of Rome, along with the Viminal Hill, during the reign of Servius Tullius, Rome' sixth king, in the 6th century BC.

In 446 BC, a temple was dedicated on the Quirinal in honour of Sancus, and it is possible that this temple was erected over the ruins of another temple. Augustus, too, ordered the building of a temple, dedicated to Mars. On a slope of the Quirinal were the extensive gardens of Sallust.

On the Quirinal Hill Constantine the Great ordered the erection of his baths, the last thermae complex erected in imperial Rome. These are now lost, having been incorporated into Renaissance Rome, with only some drawings from the 16th century remaining.

In the Middle Ages, the Torre delle Milizie and the convent of St. Peter and Domenic were built, and above Constantine's building was erected the Palazzo Pallavicini-Rospigliosi; the two famous colossal marble statues of the Horse Tamers, generally identified as the Dioscuri with horses, which now are in the Piazza Quirinale, were originally in this palazzo. They gave to the Quirinal its medieval name Monte Cavallo, which lingered into the 19th century, when the hill was transformed beyond all recognition by urbanization of an expanding capital of a united Italy. In the same palazzo were also the two statues of river gods that Michelangelo moved to the steps of Palazzo Senatorio on the Capitoline Hill.

According to the political division of the center of Rome, the Hill belongs to the rione Trevi.

Quirinal Palace

The Quirinal Hill is today identified with the Quirinal Palace, the official residence of the President of the Italian Republic in Rome, and one of the symbols of the State. Before the abolition of the Italian monarchy in 1946, it was the residence of the king of Italy, and before 1871 it was, as originally, a residence of the Pope.

The healthy cool air of the Quirinal Hill attracted aristocrats and papal families that built villas where the gardens of Sallust had been in antiquity. A visit to the villa of Cardinal Luigi d'Este in 1573 convinced Pope Gregory XIII to start the building of a summer residence the following year, in an area considered healthier than the Vatican Hill or Lateran: His architects were Flaminio Ponzio and Ottaviano Nonni, called Mascherino; under Pope Sixtus V, works were continued by Domenico Fontana (the main facade on the Piazza) and Carlo Maderno, and by Gian Lorenzo Bernini for Pope Clement XII. Gardens were conceived by Maderno. In the 18th century, Ferdinando Fuga built the long wing called the Manica Lunga, which stretched 360 meters along via del Quirinale. In front lies the sloping Piazza del Quirinale where the pair of gigantic Roman marble "Horse Tamers" representing Castor and Pollux, found in the Baths of Constantine, were re-erected in 1588. In a view etched by Giovanni Battista Piranesi, the vast open space is unpaved. The Quirinal Palace was the residence of the popes until 1870, though Napoleon deported both Pius VI and Pius VII to France, and declared the Quirinal an imperial palace. When Rome was united to the Kingdom of Italy, the Quirinal became the residence of the kings until 1946.

Today, the palace hosts the offices and the apartments of the Head of State and, in its long side along via XX Settembre (the so-called Manica Lunga), the apartments that were furnished for each visit of foreign monarchs or dignitaries.

Several collections are in this Palazzo, including tapestries, paintings, statues, old carriages (carrozze), watches, furniture, and porcelain.

In Piranesi's view, the palazzo on the right is the Palazzo della Sacra Consulta, originally a villa built upon the ruins of the Baths of Constantine, which was adapted by Sixtus V as a civil and criminal court. The present façade was built in 1732–1734 by the architect Ferdinando Fuga on the orders of Pope Clement XII Corsini, whose coat-of-arms, trumpeted by two Fames, still surmounts the roofline balustrade, as in Piranesi's view. It formerly housed Mussolini's ministry of colonial affairs.

Other monuments

The hill is the site of other important monuments and buildings. Many of those built during the baroque period reflect the personal and spiritual aspirations of powerful local families:
 * The church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale was designed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1658–1671), for Cardinal Camillo Pamphilii (nephew of Pope Innocent X); it is one of the most elegant samples of baroque architecture in Rome, with its splendid interior of marble, stuccoes, and gilded decorations.
 * The four fountains (Quattro Fontane) with reclining river gods (1588–93) commissioned by Pope Sixtus V.
 * Borromini's church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane (or San Carlino – originally Chiesa della Santissima Trinità e di San Carlo Borromeo), the first and last work of this architect (the façade was completed after his death) commissioned by the Barberini.
 * The Piazza and Palazzo Barberini, built by Bernini and Maderno, which now houses the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica.
 * Palazzo Volpi di Misurata, across from San Carlino, built in the 18th century.
 * Palazzo Albani del Drago, built by Domenico Fontana and enlarged with an added belvedere, by Alessandro Specchi for the Albani Pope Clement XI; with the decline in the fortunes of Cardinal Alessandro Albani, it was sold to the del Drago, who occupy it still.
 * Palazzo Baracchini, built 1876–83, now housing the Ministry of Defense.
 * The church of San Silvestro al Quirinale, which was described for the first time circa 1000, rebuilt in the 16th century and restructured (façade) in the 19th.
 * The Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum
 * The Palazzo Colonna (17th century), in front of Palazzo Rospigliosi, contains some remains of Caracalla's temple of Serapis
 * The Palazzo della Consulta hosts today the Constitutional Court, and was erected by Ferdinando Fuga for Pope Clement XII directly opposite Palazzo del Quirinale.
 * The Palazzo Pallavicini-Rospigliosi (17th century) built by Giorgio Vasanzio and Carlo Maderno
 * Proximate to the Baths of Constantine and the modern Sacripanti Palace, there is the dome of Titus Claudinanus and his female partner Claudia Vera. The local water pipes are inscribed with the initials of their names, which define Claudia as the "true girl" (in Latin: c(larissima) f(emina)).

title: Quirinal Hill


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Talk:Quirinal Hill

Comment
This is a great entry! Very full and useful, within the constraints of an English editing, which I am happy to provide! You might mention other monuments on the hill which already have a wikipedia existence - Sant'Andrea al Quirinale springs to mind. MichaelTinkler
 * glad you enjoyed it, sorry my english always needs... cooperation :-)
 * i wasn't able to find an article about the church, apart in bernini's one, is there one?
 * Gianfranco

"The Palazzo del Quirinale was the residence of the popes until 1870". This seems puzzling: Did they move into the Vatican only in 1870? - Perhaps the meaning is that the Pal. del Quirinale was Papal property?
 * The Palazzo was a Papal property, indeed, as quite everything in Rome before 1870. It was the residence of the popes from a date I don't remember to 1870. Then it was the residence of the kings of Italy from 1870 to 1946, and is now the residence of the presidents of the Republic. In 1870 popes retired into the Vatican, where is now their residence. --G

The Vatican palace was the official papal residence but that doesn't mean popes actually lived there. Kings of Italy didn't actually live in the Quirinale when it was the official royal residence; instead they lived in a private residence elsewhere. Officially the Quirinale was the papal summer residence until 1870, but popes lived there often for more than just the summer. The liberation of Rome in 1870 however forced popes to live back in the Vatican, where popes had once lived. STÓD/ÉÍRE 01:46 Mar 24, 2003 (UTC)

I am right in thinking that the Vatican Hill is on the opposite side of the river from the seven hills of Rome? Michael Hardy 01:52 Mar 24, 2003 (UTC)

I do not know how to edit references, but footnote number 4 refers to malaria as meaning "bed air" -- methinks it should really be "bad air"... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.243.205.30 (talk) 13:39, 30 October 2015 (UTC)

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Stephen Langton

Stephen Langton (c. 1150 – 9 July 1228) was an English cardinal of the Catholic Church and Archbishop of Canterbury from 1207 until his death in 1228. The dispute between King John of England and Pope Innocent III over his election was a major factor in the crisis which produced the Magna Carta in 1215. Langton is also credited with having divided the Bible into the standard modern arrangement of chapters used today.

Early life and career
His father was Henry Langton, a landowner in Langton by Wragby, Lincolnshire. Stephen Langton may have been born in a moated farmhouse in the village, and was probably educated in his local cathedral school. He could also have been born at Friday Street, Surrey, according to local legend.

Stephen studied at the University of Paris and lectured there on theology until 1206, when Pope Innocent III, with whom he had formed a friendship in Paris, called him to Rome and made him cardinal-priest of San Crisogono, Rome. His piety and learning had already won him prebends in Paris and York and he was recognised as the foremost English churchman.

His brother Simon Langton was elected Archbishop of York in 1215, but that election was quashed by Pope Innocent III. Simon served his brother Stephen as Archdeacon of Canterbury in 1227. Simon and Stephen had another brother named Walter, a knight who died childless.

Archbishop
On the death of Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury, in 1205, the election of a successor encountered difficulties: some of the younger canons of the cathedral chapter elected Reginald, the subprior of Christ Church, Canterbury, as Archbishop while another faction under pressure from King John chose John de Grey, Bishop of Norwich. Both elections were quashed on appeal to Rome, and sixteen canons of the chapter, who had gone to Rome with a mandate to act for the whole chapter, were ordered to proceed to a new election in presence of the Pope. The choice fell upon Langton and he was consecrated by the Pope at Viterbo on 17 June 1207.

There followed a hard political struggle between John of England and Pope Innocent III. The King proclaimed as a public enemy anyone who recognised Stephen as Archbishop. On 15 July 1207, John expelled the Canterbury chapter, which was now unanimous in support of Stephen. In March 1208, Pope Innocent III placed England under an interdict and at the close of 1212, after repeated negotiations had failed, he passed sentence of deposition against John, committing the execution of the sentence to Philip II of France in January 1213.

In May 1213 King John yielded and thus in July, Stephen and his fellow exiles returned to England. Till that moment, he had lived since his consecration at Pontigny Abbey in Burgundy. His first act as Archbishop was to absolve the King, who swore an oath (which he almost immediately violated) guaranteeing that unjust laws should be repealed and the liberties granted by Henry I should be observed.

Stephen now became a leader in the struggle against King John. At a council of churchmen at Westminster on 25 August 1213, to which certain barons were invited, he read the text of the charter of Henry I and called for its renewal. In the sequel, Stephen's energetic leadership and the barons' military strength forced John to grant his seal to Magna Carta (15 June 1215).

Since King John now held his kingdom as a fief of the Holy See the Pope espoused his cause and excommunicated the barons. For refusing to publish the excommunication the king had Stephen suspended from all ecclesiastical functions by the papal commissioners and on 4 November this sentence was confirmed by the Pope, although Stephen appealed to him in person. He was released from suspension the following spring on condition that he keep out of England until peace was restored, and he remained abroad till May 1218. Meanwhile, both Pope Innocent and King John died and all parties in England rallied to the support of Henry III.

Stephen Langton continued under Henry's reign to work for the political independence of England. In 1223 he again appeared as the leader and spokesman of the barons, who demanded that King Henry confirm the charter. He went to France on Henry's behalf to call on Louis VIII of France for the restoration of Normandy, and later he supported Henry against rebellious barons. He obtained a promise from the new pope, Honorius III, that during his lifetime no resident papal legate should be again sent to England, and won other concessions from the same pontiff favourable to the English Church and exalting the see of Canterbury.

Of great importance in the ecclesiastical history of England was a council which Stephen opened at Osney on 17 April 1222; its decrees, known as the Constitutions of Stephen Langton, are the earliest provincial canons which are still recognised as binding in English Church courts.

Death
Stephen Langton died at Slindon, near Chichester, Sussex, on 9 July 1228. He was buried in open ground beside the south transept of Canterbury Cathedral. St Michael's Chapel was later built over this ground (now the Buffs Regimental Chapel), and the head of his tomb projects into the east end of this chapel, under its altar, with the foot outside it.

The "Stephen Langton Trail", devised to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the sealing of Magna Carta, starts in Langton by Wragby and leads to Lincoln Cathedral, where there is an original copy of the charter.

Works
Langton wrote prolifically. His many sermons and his glosses, commentaries, expositions, and treatises on almost all the books of the Old Testament are preserved in manuscript at Lambeth Palace, at Oxford and Cambridge, and in France.

According to F. J. E. Raby, "There is little reason to doubt that Stephen Langton ... was the author" of the famous sequence Veni Sancte Spiritus.

The only other of his works which has been printed, besides a few letters (in The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury, ed. W. Stubbs, ii. London, 1880, Rolls Series, no. 71, appendix to preface) is a Tractatus de translatione Beati Thomae (in J. A. Giles's Thomas of Canterbury, Oxford, 1845), which is probably an expansion of a sermon he preached in 1220, on the occasion of the translation of the relics of Thomas Becket; the ceremony was the most splendid that had ever been seen in England. He also wrote a life of Richard I, and other historical works and poems are attributed to him.

Chapters of the Bible
Classically, scrolls of the books of the Bible have always been divided by blank spaces at the end (petuhoth) or middle (setumoth) of the lines. However, Langton is believed to be the one who divided the Bible into the standard modern arrangement of chapters. While Cardinal Hugo de Sancto Caro is also known to have come up with a systematic division of the Bible (between 1244 and 1248), it is Langton's arrangement of the chapters that remains in use today.

title: Stephen Langton


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Design by contract

Design by contract (DbC), also known as contract programming, programming by contract and design-by-contract programming, is an approach for designing software.

It prescribes that software designers should define formal, precise and verifiable interface specifications for software components, which extend the ordinary definition of abstract data types with preconditions, postconditions and invariants. These specifications are referred to as "contracts", in accordance with a conceptual metaphor with the conditions and obligations of business contracts.

The DbC approach assumes all client components that invoke an operation on a server component will meet the preconditions specified as required for that operation.

Where this assumption is considered too risky (as in multi-channel or distributed computing), the inverse approach is taken, meaning that the server component tests that all relevant preconditions hold true (before, or while, processing the client component's request) and replies with a suitable error message if not.

History
The term was coined by Bertrand Meyer in connection with his design of the Eiffel programming language and first described in various articles starting in 1986  and the two successive editions (1988, 1997) of his book Object-Oriented Software Construction. Eiffel Software applied for trademark registration for Design by Contract in December 2003, and it was granted in December 2004. The current owner of this trademark is Eiffel Software.

Design by contract has its roots in work on formal verification, formal specification and Hoare logic. The original contributions include:
 * A clear metaphor to guide the design process
 * The application to inheritance, in particular a formalism for redefinition and dynamic binding
 * The application to exception handling
 * The connection with automatic software documentation

Description
The central idea of DbC is a metaphor on how elements of a software system collaborate with each other on the basis of mutual obligations and benefits. The metaphor comes from business life, where a "client" and a "supplier" agree on a "contract" that defines, for example, that:

 * The supplier must provide a certain product (obligation) and is entitled to expect that the client has paid its fee (benefit).
 * The client must pay the fee (obligation) and is entitled to get the product (benefit).
 * Both parties must satisfy certain obligations, such as laws and regulations, applying to all contracts.

Similarly, if the method of a class in object-oriented programming provides a certain functionality, it may:

 * Expect a certain condition to be guaranteed on entry by any client module that calls it: the method's precondition—an obligation for the client, and a benefit for the supplier (the method itself), as it frees it from having to handle cases outside of the precondition.
 * Guarantee a certain property on exit: the method's postcondition—an obligation for the supplier, and obviously a benefit (the main benefit of calling the method) for the client.
 * Maintain a certain property, assumed on entry and guaranteed on exit: the class invariant.

The contract is semantically equivalent to a Hoare triple which formalises the obligations. This can be summarised by the "three questions" that the designer must repeatedly answer in the contract:
 * What does the contract expect?
 * What does the contract guarantee?
 * What does the contract maintain?

Many programming languages have facilities to make assertions like these. However, DbC considers these contracts to be so crucial to software correctness that they should be part of the design process. In effect, DbC advocates writing the assertions first. Contracts can be written by code comments, enforced by a test suite, or both, even if there is no special language support for contracts.

The notion of a contract extends down to the method/procedure level; the contract for each method will normally contain the following pieces of information:
 * Acceptable and unacceptable input values or types, and their meanings
 * Return values or types, and their meanings
 * Error and exception condition values or types that can occur, and their meanings
 * Side effects
 * Preconditions
 * Postconditions
 * Invariants
 * (more rarely) Performance guarantees, e.g. for time or space used

Subclasses in an inheritance hierarchy are allowed to weaken preconditions (but not strengthen them) and strengthen postconditions and invariants (but not weaken them). These rules approximate behavioural subtyping.

All class relationships are between client classes and supplier classes. A client class is obliged to make calls to supplier features where the resulting state of the supplier is not violated by the client call. Subsequently, the supplier is obliged to provide a return state and data that does not violate the state requirements of the client.

For instance, a supplier data buffer may require that data is present in the buffer when a delete feature is called. Subsequently, the supplier guarantees to the client that when a delete feature finishes its work, the data item will, indeed, be deleted from the buffer. Other design contracts are concepts of class invariant. The class invariant guarantees (for the local class) that the state of the class will be maintained within specified tolerances at the end of each feature execution.

When using contracts, a supplier should not try to verify that the contract conditions are satisfied—a practice known as offensive programming—the general idea being that code should "fail hard", with contract verification being the safety net.

DbC's "fail hard" property simplifies the debugging of contract behavior, as the intended behaviour of each method is clearly specified.

This approach differs substantially from that of defensive programming, where the supplier is responsible for figuring out what to do when a precondition is broken. More often than not, the supplier throws an exception to inform the client that the precondition has been broken, and in both cases—DbC and defensive programming alike—the client must figure out how to respond to that. In such cases, DbC makes the supplier's job easier.

Design by contract also defines criteria for correctness for a software module:
 * If the class invariant AND precondition are true before a supplier is called by a client, then the invariant AND the postcondition will be true after the service has been completed.
 * When making calls to a supplier, a software module should not violate the supplier's preconditions.

Design by contract can also facilitate code reuse, since the contract for each piece of code is fully documented. The contracts for a module can be regarded as a form of software documentation for the behavior of that module.

Performance implications
Contract conditions should never be violated during execution of a bug-free program. Contracts are therefore typically only checked in debug mode during software development. Later at release, the contract checks are disabled to maximize performance.

In many programming languages, contracts are implemented with assert. Asserts are by default compiled away in release mode in C/C++, and similarly deactivated in C# and Java.

Launching the Python interpreter with "-O" (for "optimize") as an argument will likewise cause the Python code generator to not emit any bytecode for asserts.

This effectively eliminates the run-time costs of asserts in production code—irrespective of the number and computational expense of asserts used in development—as no such instructions will be included in production by the compiler.

Relationship to software testing
Design by contract does not replace regular testing strategies, such as unit testing, integration testing and system testing. Rather, it complements external testing with internal self-tests that can be activated both for isolated tests and in production code during a test-phase.

The advantage of internal self-tests is that they can detect errors before they manifest themselves as invalid results observed by the client. This leads to earlier and more specific error detection.

The use of assertions can be considered to be a form of test oracle, a way of testing the design by contract implementation.

Languages with native support
Languages that implement most DbC features natively include:
 * Ada 2012
 * Ciao
 * Clojure
 * Cobra
 * D
 * Dafny
 * Eiffel
 * Fortress
 * Kotlin
 * Mercury
 * Oxygene (formerly Chrome and Delphi Prism )
 * Racket (including higher order contracts, and emphasizing that contract violations must blame the guilty party and must do so with an accurate explanation )
 * Sather
 * Scala
 * SPARK (via static analysis of Ada programs)
 * Vala
 * VDM

Additionally, the standard method combination in the Common Lisp Object System has the method qualifiers,   and   that allow writing contracts as auxiliary methods, among other uses.

Languages with third-party support
Various libraries, preprocessors and other tools have been developed for existing programming languages without native design by contract support:
 * Ada, via GNAT pragmas for preconditions and postconditions.
 * C
 * DBC for C preprocessor
 * GNU Nana
 * eCv formal verification tools
 * C++:
 * Boost.Contract
 * eCv++ formal verification tools
 * Digital Mars C++ compiler via CTESK extension of C
 * Loki Library provides a mechanism named ContractChecker that verifies a class follows design by contract.
 * DBC C++ Design by contract for C++
 * C# (and other .NET languages), via Code Contracts (a Microsoft Research project integrated into the .NET Framework 4.0)
 * Groovy via GContracts
 * Go via dbc or gocontracts
 * Java:
 * Active:
 * OVal with AspectJ
 * Contracts for Java (Cofoja)
 * Java Modeling Language (JML)
 * Bean Validation (only pre- and postconditions)
 * valid4j
 * SafeR (with safe references)
 * Inactive/unknown:
 * Jtest (active but DbC seems not to be supported anymore)
 * iContract2/JContracts
 * Contract4J
 * jContractor
 * C4J
 * Google CodePro Analytix
 * SpringContracts for the Spring Framework
 * Jass
 * Modern Jass (successor is Cofoja)
 * JavaDbC using AspectJ
 * JavaTESK using extension of Java
 * chex4j using javassist
 * highly customizable java-on-contracts
 * JavaScript, via decorator-contracts, AspectJS (specifically, AJS_Validator), Cerny.js, ecmaDebug, jsContract, dbc-code-contracts or jscategory.
 * Common Lisp, via the macro facility or the CLOS metaobject protocol.
 * Nemerle, via macros.
 * Nim, via macros.
 * Perl, via the CPAN modules Class::Contract (by Damian Conway) or Carp::Datum (by Raphael Manfredi).
 * PHP, via PhpDeal, Praspel or Stuart Herbert's ContractLib.
 * Python, using packages like deal, icontract, PyContracts, dpcontracts, or zope.interface.  A permanent change to Python to support design by contracts was proposed in PEP-316 in 2003, but is deferred.
 * Ruby, via Brian McCallister's DesignByContract, Ruby DBC ruby-contract or contracts.ruby.
 * Rust via the contracts crate.
 * Swift via the cocoapod by Jim Boyd.
 * Tcl, via the XOTcl object-oriented extension.

title: Design by contract


text:
Precondition

In computer programming, a precondition is a condition or predicate that must always be true just prior to the execution of some section of code or before an operation in a formal specification.

If a precondition is violated, the effect of the section of code becomes undefined and thus may or may not carry out its intended work. Preconditions that are missing, insufficient, or not formally proved (or have an incorrect attempted proof), or are not checked statically or dynamically, can give rise to Security problems, particularly in unsafe languages that are not strongly typed.

Often, preconditions are simply included in the documentation of the affected section of code. Preconditions are sometimes tested using guards or assertions within the code itself, and some languages have specific syntactic constructions for doing so.

Example
The factorial function is only defined where its parameter is an integer greater than or equal to zero. So an implementation of the factorial function would have a precondition that its parameter be an integer and that the parameter be greater than or equal to zero. Alternatively the type system of the language may be used to specify that the parameter of the factorial function is a natural number (unsigned integer), which can be formally verified automatically by a compiler's type checker.

In addition where numeric types have a limited range (as they do in most programming languages) the precondition must also specify the maximum value that the parameter may have if overflow is not to occur. (e.g. if an implementation of factorial returns the result in a 64-bit unsigned integer then the parameter must be less than 21 because factorial(21) is larger than the maximum unsigned integer that can be stored in 64 bits). Where the language supports range sub-types (e.g. Ada) such constraints can be automatically verified by the type system. More complex constraints can be formally verified interactively with a proof assistant.

In object-oriented programming
Preconditions in object-oriented software development are an essential part of design by contract. Design by contract also includes notions of postcondition and class invariant.

The precondition for any routine defines any constraints on object state which are necessary for successful execution. From the program developer's viewpoint, this constitutes the routine caller's portion of the contract. The caller then is obliged to ensure that the precondition holds prior to calling the routine. The reward for the caller's effort is expressed in the called routine's postcondition.

Eiffel example
The routine in the following example written in Eiffel takes as an argument an integer which must be a valid value for an hour of the day, i. e., 0 through 23, inclusively. The precondition follows the keyword. It specifies that the argument must be greater than or equal to zero and less than or equal to 23. The tag " " describes this precondition clause and serves to identify it in case of a runtime precondition violation.

Preconditions and inheritance
In the presence of inheritance, the routines inherited by descendant classes (subclasses) do so with their preconditions in force. This means that any implementations or redefinitions of inherited routines also have to be written to comply with their inherited contract. Preconditions can be modified in redefined routines, but they may only be weakened. That is, the redefined routine may lessen the obligation of the client, but not increase it.

title: Precondition