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Antioch

Antioch on the Orontes (Ἀντιόχεια ἡ ἐπὶ Ὀρόντου, ) was a Hellenistic Greek city founded by Seleucus I Nicator in 300 BC. One of the most important Greek cities of the Hellenistic period, it served as the capital of the Seleucid Empire and later as regional capital to both the Roman and Byzantine Empire. During the Crusades, Antioch served as the capital of the Principality of Antioch, one of four Crusader states that were founded in the Levant. Its inhabitants were known as Antiochenes. The modern city of Antakya, in Hatay Province of Turkey, was named after the ancient city, which lies in ruins on the Orontes River and did not overlap in habitation with the modern city.

Antioch was founded near the end of the fourth century BC by Seleucus I Nicator, one of Alexander the Great's generals, as one of the tetrapoleis of Seleucis of Syria. Seleucus encouraged Greeks from all over the Mediterranean to settle in the city. The city's location offered geographical, military, and economic benefits to its occupants; Antioch was heavily involved in the spice trade and lay within close reach of the Silk Road and the Royal Road. The city was the capital of the Seleucid Empire from 240 BC until 63 BC, when the Romans took control, making it the capital of the province of Syria and later of Coele Syria. During the late Hellenistic and Roman Principate periods, Antioch's population may have reached a peak of over 500,000 inhabitants (most generally estimate between 200,000 and 250,000), making the city the third largest in the Roman Empire after Rome and Alexandria and one of the most important cities in the eastern Mediterranean. From the early fourth century, Antioch was the seat of the Count of the Orient, head of the Diocese of the East. The Romans provided the city with walls that encompassed almost 1100 acre, of which one quarter was mountainous, leaving 750 acre – about one-fifth the area of Rome within the Aurelian Walls.

The city was also the main center of Hellenistic Judaism at the end of the Second Temple period. As one of the cities of the pentarchy, Antioch was called "the cradle of Christianity" as a result of its longevity and the pivotal role that it played in the emergence of early Christianity. The Christian New Testament asserts that the name "Christian" first emerged in Antioch. The city declined to relative insignificance during the Middle Ages due to warfare, repeated earthquakes, and a change in trade routes. The city still lends its name to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch, one of the most important modern churches of the Levant and the eastern Mediterranean. The city also attracts Muslim pilgrims who visit the Habib-i Najjar Mosque, which they believe to contain the tomb of Habib the Carpenter, mentioned in the Surah Yā-Sīn of the Quran.

Geography
Two routes from the Mediterranean Sea, lying through the Orontes river gorge and the Belen Pass, converge in the plain of the Antioch Lake, now called Lake Amik, and are met there by
 * 1) the road from the Amanian Gate (Baghche Pass) and western Commagene, which descends the valley of the Karasu to the Afrin River,
 * 2) the roads from eastern Commagene and the Euphratean crossings at Samosata (now Samsat) and Apamea Zeugma (Birejik), which descend the valleys of the Afrin and the Queiq, and
 * 3) the road from the Euphratean ford at Thapsacus, which skirts the fringe of the Syrian steppe. A single route proceeds south in the Orontes valley.

Prehistory
A settlement called "Meroe" pre-dated Antioch. A shrine of the goddess Anat, called by Herodotus the "Persian Artemis", was located here. This site was included in the eastern suburbs of Antioch. There was a village on the spur of Mount Silpius named Io, or Iopolis. This name was always adduced as evidence by Antiochenes (e.g. Libanius) eager to affiliate themselves to the Attic Ionians—an eagerness which is illustrated by the Athenian types used on the city's coins. Io may have been a small early colony of trading Greeks (Javan). John Malalas also mentions an archaic village, Bottia, in the plain by the river.

Foundation by Seleucus I
Alexander the Great is said to have camped on the site of Antioch and dedicated an altar to Zeus Bottiaeus; it lay in the northwest of the future city. This account is found only in the writings of Libanius, a fourth-century orator from Antioch, and may be legend intended to enhance Antioch's status. But the story is not unlikely in itself.

After Alexander's death in 323 BC, his generals, the Diadochi, divided up the territory he had conquered. After the Battle of Ipsos in 301 BC, Seleucus I Nicator won the territory of Syria, and he proceeded to found four "sister cities" in northwestern Syria, one of which was Antioch, a city named in honor of his father Antiochus; according to the Suda, it might be named after his son Antiochus. He is reputed to have built sixteen Antiochs.

Seleucus founded Antioch on a site chosen through ritual means. An eagle, the bird of Zeus, had been given a piece of sacrificial meat and the city was founded on the site to which the eagle carried the offering. Seleucus did this on the 22nd day of the month of Artemísios in the twelfth year of his reign, equivalent to May 300 BC. Antioch soon rose above Seleucia Pieria to become the Syrian capital.

Hellenistic age
The original city of Seleucus was laid out in imitation of the grid plan of Alexandria by the architect Xenarius. Libanius describes the first building and arrangement of this city (i. p. 300. 17).

The citadel was on Mount Silpius and the city lay mainly on the low ground to the north, fringing the river. Two great colonnaded streets intersected in the centre. Shortly afterwards a second quarter was laid out, probably on the east and by Antiochus I Soter, which, from an expression of Strabo, appears to have been the native, as contrasted with the Greek, town. It was enclosed by a wall of its own.

In the Orontes, north of the city, lay a large island, and on this Seleucus II Callinicus began a third walled "city", which was finished by Antiochus III the Great. A fourth and last quarter was added by Antiochus IV Epiphanes (175–164 BC); thenceforth Antioch was known as Tetrapolis. From west to east the whole was about 6 km in diameter and a little less from north to south. This area included many large gardens.

The new city was populated by a mix of local settlers that Athenians brought from the nearby city of Antigonia, Macedonians, and Jews (who were given full status from the beginning). According to ancient tradition, Antioch was settled by 5,500 Athenians and Macedonians, together with an unknown number of native Syrians. This number probably refers to free adult citizens, so that the total number of free Greek settlers including women and children was probably between 17,000 and 25,000.

About 6 km west and beyond the suburb Heraclea lay the paradise of Daphne, a park of woods and waters, in the midst of which rose a great temple to the Pythian Apollo, also founded by Seleucus I and enriched with a cult-statue of the god, as Musagetes, by Bryaxis. A companion sanctuary of Hecate was constructed underground by Diocletian. The beauty and the lax morals of Daphne were celebrated all over the ancient world; and indeed Antioch as a whole shared in both these titles to fame.

Antioch became the capital and court-city of the western Seleucid Empire under Antiochus I, its counterpart in the east being Seleucia; but its paramount importance dates from the battle of Ancyra (240 BC), which shifted the Seleucid centre of gravity from Anatolia, and led indirectly to the rise of Pergamon.

The Seleucids reigned from Antioch. We know little of it in the Hellenistic period, apart from Syria, all our information coming from authors of the late Roman time. Among its great Greek buildings we hear only of the theatre, of which substructures still remain on the flank of Silpius, and of the royal palace, probably situated on the island. It enjoyed a reputation for being "a populous city, full of most erudite men and rich in the most liberal studies", but the only names of distinction in these pursuits during the Seleucid period that have come down to us are Apollophanes, the Stoic, and one Phoebus, a writer on dreams. The nicknames which they gave to their later kings were Aramaic; and, except Apollo and Daphne, the great divinities of north Syria seem to have remained essentially native, such as the "Persian Artemis" of Meroe and Atargatis of Hierapolis Bambyce.

The epithet "Golden" suggests that the external appearance of Antioch was impressive, but the city needed constant restoration owing to the seismic disturbances to which the district has always been subjected. The first great earthquake in recorded history was related by the native chronicler John Malalas. It occurred in 148 BC and did immense damage.

Local politics were turbulent. In the many dissensions of the Seleucid house the population took sides, and frequently rose in rebellion, for example against Alexander Balas in 147 BC, and Demetrius II Nicator in 129 BC. The latter, enlisting a body of Jews, punished his capital with fire and sword. In the last struggles of the Seleucid house, Antioch turned against its feeble rulers, invited Tigranes the Great to occupy the city in 83 BC, tried to unseat Antiochus XIII Asiaticus in 65 BC, and petitioned Rome against his restoration in the following year. Antioch's wish prevailed, and it passed with Syria to the Roman Republic in 64 BC, but remained a civitas libera.

Roman rule before Constantine
The Roman emperors favored the city from the first moments, seeing it as a more suitable capital for the eastern part of the empire than Alexandria could be, because of the isolated position of Egypt. To a certain extent they tried to make it an eastern Rome. Julius Caesar visited it in 47 BC, and confirmed its freedom. A great temple to Jupiter Capitolinus rose on Silpius, probably at the insistence of Octavian, whose cause the city had espoused. A forum of Roman type was laid out. Tiberius built two long colonnades on the south towards Silpius.

Strabo, writing in the reign of Augustus and the first years of Tiberius, states that Antioch is not much smaller than Seleucia and Alexandria; Alexandria had been said by Diodorus Siculus in the mid-first century BC to have 300,000 free inhabitants, which would mean that Antioch was about this size in Strabo's time.

Agrippa and Tiberius enlarged the theatre, and Trajan finished their work. Antoninus Pius paved the great east to west artery with granite. A circus, other colonnades and great numbers of baths were built, and new aqueducts to supply them bore the names of Caesars, the finest being the work of Hadrian. The Roman client, King Herod (most likely the great builder Herod the Great), erected a long stoa on the east, and Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa (c. 63–12 BC) encouraged the growth of a new suburb south of this.

One of the most famous Roman additions to the city was its hippodrome, the Circus of Antioch. This chariot racing venue was probably built in the reign of Augustus, when the city had more than half a million inhabitants; it was modelled on the Circus Maximus in Rome and other circus buildings throughout the empire. Measuring more than 490 m in length and 30 m of width, the Circus could house up to 80,000 spectators.

Zarmanochegas (Zarmarus) a monk of the Sramana tradition of India, according to Strabo and Dio Cassius, met Nicholas of Damascus in Antioch around 13 AD as part of a Mission to Augustus. At Antioch Germanicus died in 19 AD, and his body was burnt in the forum.

An earthquake that shook Antioch in AD 37 caused the emperor Caligula to send two senators to report on the condition of the city. Another quake followed in the next reign.

In 115 AD, during Trajan's travel there during his war against Parthia, the whole site was convulsed by a huge earthquake. The landscape altered, and the emperor himself was forced to take shelter in the circus for several days. He and his successor restored the city, but the population was reduced to less than 400,000 inhabitants and many sections of the city were abandoned.

Commodus (r. 177–192 AD) had Olympic games celebrated at Antioch.

In 256 AD, the town was suddenly raided by the Persians under Shapur I, and many of the people were slain in the theatre. It was recaptured by the Roman emperor Valerian the following year.

Christianity
Antioch was a chief center of early Christianity during Roman times. The city had a large population of Jewish origin in a quarter called the Kerateion, and so attracted the earliest missionaries. Evangelized by, among others, Peter himself, according to the tradition upon which the Patriarchate of Antioch still rests its claim for primacy, its converts were the first to be called Christians. This is not to be confused with Antioch in Pisidia, to which Barnabas and Paul of Tarsus later travelled.

Between 252 and 300 AD, ten assemblies of the church were held at Antioch and it became the seat of one of the five original patriarchates, along with Constantinople, Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Rome (see Pentarchy). Today five churches use the title of patriarch of Antioch for their prime bishops: one Oriental Orthodox (the Syriac Orthodox Church); three Eastern Catholic (the Maronite, Syriac Catholic, and Melkite Greek Catholic Churches); and one Eastern Orthodox (the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch). This title has been maintained though most of them have moved their seat to Damascus. This is somewhat analogous to the manner in which several popes, heads of the Roman Catholic Church remained "Bishop of Rome" even while residing in Avignon, in present-day France, in the fourteenth century. The Maronite Church, which has also moved the seat away to Bkerké, Lebanon, continues the Antiochene liturgical tradition and the use of the Syro-Aramaic language in their liturgies.

Emperor Constantine who had decriminalised Christianity in 313, begun the building of the Domus Aurea or Great Church in 327 which served for the next two centuries as the leading church of Antioch.

John Chrysostom writes that when Ignatius of Antioch was bishop in the city, the dêmos, probably meaning the number of free adult men and women without counting children and slaves, numbered 200,000. In a letter written in 363, Libanius says the city contains 150,000 anthrôpoi (plural of anthropos, human) a word which would ordinarily mean all human beings of any age, sex, or social status, seemingly indicating a decline in the population since the first century. Chrysostom also says in one of his homilies on the Gospel of Matthew, which were delivered between 386 and 393, that in his own time there were 100,000 Christians in Antioch, a figure which may refer to orthodox Christians who belonged to the Great Church as opposed to members of other groups such as Arians and Apollinarians, or to all Christians of any persuasion.

Age of Julian and Valens
When the emperor Julian visited in 362 on a detour to the Sasanian Empire, he had high hopes for Antioch, regarding it as a rival to the imperial capital of Constantinople. Antioch had a mixed pagan and Christian population, which Ammianus Marcellinus implies lived quite harmoniously together. However, Julian's visit began ominously as it coincided with a lament for Adonis, the doomed lover of Aphrodite. Thus, Ammianus wrote, the emperor and his soldiers entered the city not to the sound of cheers but to wailing and screaming.

After being advised that the bones of third-century martyred bishop Babylas were suppressing the oracle of Apollo at Daphne, he made a public-relations mistake in ordering the removal of the bones from the vicinity of the temple. The result was a massive Christian procession. Shortly after that, when the temple was destroyed by fire, Julian suspected the Christians and ordered stricter investigations than usual. He also shut up Constantine's Great Church, before the investigations proved that the fire was the result of an accident.

Julian found much else about which to criticize the Antiochene; Julian had wanted the empire's cities to be more self-managing, as they had been some 200 years before. However, Antioch's city councilmen showed themselves unwilling to shore up Antioch's food shortage with their own resources, so dependent were they on the emperor. Ammianus wrote that the councilmen shirked their duties by bribing unwitting men in the marketplace to do the job for them. Further, Julian was surprised and dismayed when at the city's annual feast of Apollo the only Antiochene present was an old priest clutching a goose, showing the decay of paganism in the town.

The Antiochenes in turn hated Julian for worsening the food shortage with the burden of his billeted troops, wrote Ammianus. The soldiers were often to be found gorged on sacrificial meat, making a drunken nuisance of themselves on the streets while Antioch's hungry citizens looked on in disgust. The Christian Antiochenes and Julian's pagan Gallic soldiers also never quite saw eye to eye.

Julian's piety was distasteful to the Antiochenes, even to those who kept the old religion. Julian's brand of paganism was very much unique to himself, with little support outside the most educated Neoplatonist circles. The irony of Julian's enthusiasm for large scale animal sacrifice could not have escaped the hungry Antiochenes. Julian gained no admiration for his personal involvement in the sacrifices, only the nickname axeman, wrote Ammianus.

The emperor's high-handed, severe methods and his rigid administration prompted Antiochene lampoons about, among other things, Julian's unfashionably pointed beard.

Julian's successor Valens endowed Antioch with a new forum, including a statue of his brother and co-emperor Valentinian I on a central column, and reopened the great church of Constantine, which stood until the Persian sack in 538, by Chosroes.

Theodosius and after
In 387 AD, there was a great sedition caused by a new tax levied by order of Theodosius I, and the city was punished by the loss of its metropolitan status. Theodosius placed Antioch under Constantinople's rule when he divided the Roman Empire. Antioch and its port, Seleucia Pieria, were severely damaged by the great earthquake of 526. Seleucia Pieria, which was already fighting a losing battle against continual silting, never recovered. Justinian I renamed Antioch Theopolis ("City of God") and restored many of its public buildings, but the destructive work was completed in 540 by the Persian king, Khosrau I, who deported the population to a newly built city in Persian Mesopotamia, Weh Antiok Khosrow. Antioch lost as many as 300,000 people. Justinian I made an effort to revive it, and Procopius describes his repairing of the walls; but its glory was past. Another earthquake in 588 destroyed the Domus Aureus of Constantine, whereafter the church of Cassian became the most important church of Antioch.

During the Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628, the Emperor Heraclius confronted the invading Persian army of Khosrow II outside Antioch in 613. The Byzantines were defeated by forces under the generals Shahrbaraz and Shahin Vahmanzadegan at the Battle of Antioch, after which the city fell to the Sassanians, together with much of Syria and eastern Anatolia.

Antioch gave its name to a certain school of Christian thought, distinguished by literal interpretation of the Scriptures and insistence on the human limitations of Jesus. Diodorus of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia were the leaders of this school. The principal local saint was Simeon Stylites, who lived an extremely ascetic life atop a pillar for 40 years some 65 km east of Antioch. His body was brought to the city and buried in a building erected under the emperor Leo. During the Byzantine era, great bathhouses were built in Byzantine centers such as Constantinople and Antioch.

Arab and Byzantine era
In 637, during the reign of the Byzantine emperor Heraclius, Antioch was conquered by Abu Ubayda ibn al-Jarrah of the Rashidun Caliphate during the Battle of the Iron Bridge, marking the beginning of Islamic influence in the region. The city became known in Arabic as أنطاكية. Under the Umayyad Caliphate (661–750 AD), Antioch served as a significant military and administrative center. The Umayyads fortified the city, utilizing it as a base for operations in the region. The city remained an important urban center, with its multicultural population including Christians, Muslims, and Jews living together, although there were periods of tension and conflict. However, since the Umayyad dynasty was unable to penetrate the Anatolian Plateau, Antioch found itself on the frontline of the conflicts between two hostile empires during the next 350 years, so that the city went into a precipitous decline. During the Abbasid period (750–969 AD), Antioch continued to thrive as a hub of commerce and culture. Under the Abbasids, closer relations were developed with Byzantium, but it was not until the Fatimids opened up the Mediterranean for shipping from the end of the fourth/tenth century that the affairs of western Europe and the Near East began to interact once again. The Abbasids placed a strong emphasis on trade, which facilitated economic prosperity in Antioch. The city became known for its diverse markets, contributing to the flow of goods and ideas between the Islamic world and the Byzantine Empire.

The decline of Arab rule in Antioch began in the late 9th century with increasing pressure from the Byzantine forces. The city changed hands several times during the Byzantine-Arab wars, Before finally, in 969 AD, under the Byzantine Emperor Nikephoros II Phokas, the city was captured after the siege of Antioch (968–969) by the Byzantine general Michael Bourtzes and the stratopedarches Peter. It soon became the seat of a doux, the civil governor of the homonymous theme, but also the seat of the somewhat more important Domestic of the Schools of the Orient, the supreme military commander of the imperial forces on the eastern frontier. Sometimes both offices were held by the same person, usually military officers such as Nikephoros Ouranos, or Philaretos Brachamios, who managed to retain the integrity of the eastern borderline after the Seljuk conquest of Anatolia. The size of the Melkite community increased during that time due to immigration from Christians from Fatimid Egypt but also other parts of the Near East and Christians remained the dominant population up to the Crusades.

As the empire disintegrated rapidly before the Komnenian restoration, Dux of Antioch & Domestic of the Schools of the East Philaretos Brachamios held the city until Suleiman ibn Qutalmish, the emir of Rum, captured it from him in 1084. Two years later, Suleiman was killed fighting against Tutush, the brother of the Seljuk Sultan, who annexed the city into the Seljuk Empire. Yagisiyan was appointed governor. He became increasingly independent within the tumultuous years following Malik-Shah's death in 1092.

Crusader era

The Crusaders' Siege of Antioch conquered the city in June 1098 after a siege lasting eight months on their way to Jerusalem. At this time, the bulk of far eastern trade traveled through Egypt, but in the second half of the 12th century Nur ed-Din and later Saladin brought order to Muslim Syria, opening up long-distance trade routes, including to Antioch and on to its new port, St Symeon, which had replaced Seleucia Pieria. However, the Mongol conquests of the 13th century altered the main trade routes from the far east, as they encouraged merchants to take the overland route through Mongol territory to the Black Sea, reducing the prosperity of Antioch. Surrounding the city were a number of Greek, Syrian, Georgian, Armenian, and Latin monasteries.

Consolidation of the Principality
In 1100, Tancred became the regent of Antioch after his uncle and predecessor Bohemond I of Antioch was taken prisoner for three years (1100–03) by Gazi Gümüshtigin of the Danishmends at the Battle of Melitene. Tancred expanded the territory of Antioch by conquering Byzantine Cilicia, Tarsus, and Adana in 1101. In 1107 Bohemond enraged by an earlier defeat, renamed Tancred as the regent of Antioch so he could sail for Europe with the intent of gaining support for an attack against the Greeks.

Bohemond laid siege to Dyrrachium but capitulated in September 1108 and was forced to accede to a peace accord, the Treaty of Devol which stipulated that Bohemond was to hold Antioch for the remainder of his life as the emperor's subject and the Greek patriarch was to be restored to power in the city. However, Tancred refused to honor the Treaty of Deabolis in which Bohemond swore an oath, and it is not until 1156 that it truly became a vassal state of the Byzantine Empire. Six months after the Treaty of Deabolis Bohemond died, and Tancred remained regent of Antioch until his death during a typhoid epidemic in 1112.

After the death of Tancred, the principality passed to Roger of Salerno, who helped rebuild Antioch after an earthquake destroyed its foundations in 1114. With the death of Roger at the Battle of Ager Sanguinis in 1119, the role of regent was assumed by Baldwin II of Jerusalem, lasting until 1126. In 1126 Bohemond II arrived from Apulia to gain regency over Antioch. In 1130 Bohemond was lured into an ambush by Leo I, Prince of Armenia who allied with the Danishmend Gazi Gümüshtigin, and was killed in the subsequent battle.

Antioch was again ruled by a regency, firstly being Baldwin II, after his daughter and Bohemond II's wife, Alice of Antioch attempted to block Baldwin from entering Antioch, but failed when Antiochene nobles such as Fulk of Jerusalem (Alice's brother-in-law) opened up the gates for representatives of Baldwin II. Alice was then expelled from Antioch. With the death of Baldwin in 1131, Alice briefly took control of Antioch and allied herself with Pons of Tripoli and Joscelin II of Edessa in an attempt to prevent Fulk, King of Jerusalem from marching north in 1132; however, this attempt failed. In 1133 the king chose Raymond of Poitiers as a groom for Constance of Antioch, daughter of Bohemund II of Antioch and Alice, princess of Jerusalem. The marriage took place in 1136 between the 21-year-old Raymond and the 9-year-old Constance.

Immediately after assuming control, Raymond was involved in conflicts with the Byzantine Emperor John II Comnenus who had come south to recover Cilicia from Leo of Armenia, and to reassert his rights over Antioch. The engagement lasted until 1137 when emperor John II arrived with an army before the walls of Antioch. Although the basileus did not enter the city, his banner was raised atop the citadel and Raymond was compelled to do homage. Raymond agreed with the emperor that if he was capable of capturing Aleppo, Shaizar, and Homs, he would exchange Antioch for them. John went on to attack Aleppo with the aid of Antioch and Edessa, and failed to capture it, with the Franks withdrawing their support when he moved on to capture Shaizar. John returned to Antioch ahead of his army and entered Antioch, only to be forced to leave when Joscelin II, Count of Edessa rallied the citizens to oust him. After the fall of Edessa in 1144, many Syriac Orthodox Christians came into the city, spreading the veneration of Mor Barsauma among the local population which resulted in the building of a church to the saint in 1156.

Second Crusade
Nur ad-Din Zangi attacked Antioch in both 1147 and 1148 and succeeded during the second venture in occupying most of the territory east of the Orontes but failed to capture Antioch itself. Louis VII of France arrived in Antioch on March 19, 1148 where he was welcomed by the uncle of his spouse Eleanor of Aquitaine, Raymond of Poitiers.

Louis refused to help Antioch defend against the Turks and to lead an expedition against Aleppo, and instead decided to finish his pilgrimage to Jerusalem rather than focus on the military aspect of the Crusades. With Louis quickly leaving Antioch again and the Crusaders returning home in 1149.

With Raymond dead and Bohemond III only five years of age, the principality came under the control of Raymond's widow Constance of Antioch; however, real control lay with Aimery of Limoges. In 1153, Constance chose Raynald of Châtillon and married him in secret without consulting her first cousin and liege lord, Baldwin III, and neither Baldwin nor Aimery of Limoges approved of her choice.

In 1156 Raynald claimed that the Byzantine emperor Manuel I Comnenus had reneged on his promises to pay Raynald a sum of money, and would later attack Cyprus. This caused Manuel I Comnenus to raise an army to Syria. Raynald then surrendered, the emperor insisted on the installation of a Greek Patriarch and the surrender of the citadel in Antioch. The following spring, Manuel made a triumphant entry into the city and established himself as the unquestioned suzerain of Antioch.

In 1160 Raynald was captured by Muslims and held captive for 16 years, with Raynald disposed of for a long time, the patriarch Aimery became the new regent, chosen by Baldwin III. To further consolidate his own claim over Antioch, Manuel chose Maria of Antioch as his bride, daughter of Constanceand Raymond. Antioch remained in crisis until 1163 when Constance asked the Armenia to help maintain her rule, as a result the citizens of Antioch exiled her and installed her son Bohemond III and now brother-in-law to the emperor, as regent.

One year later, Nur ad-Din Zangi captured Bohemond III but was soon released; however, Harem, Syria, which Raynald had recaptured in 1158, was lost again and the frontier of Antioch was permanently placed west of the Orontes.

Third Crusade
While travelling on crusade, Emperor Frederick Barbarossa drowned in the river Saleph. His son, Frederick VI, then led the remnant of the Crusader army south towards Antioch. Subsequently, he arranged for his father's flesh remains to be buried in the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Antioch. Throughout the Third Crusade, Antioch remained neutral; however, with the end of the Third Crusade (1192), they were included in the Treaty of Ramla between Richard and Saladin.

Henry II, Count of Champagne travelled to Lesser Armenia and managed to persuade Leo that in exchange for Antioch, renouncing its overlordship to Lesser Armenia and to release Bohemond, who died in 1201. With the death of Bohemond III there followed a 15-year struggle for power of Antioch, between Tripoli and Lesser Armenia. According to the rules of primogeniture Leo's great nephew Raymond-Roupen was the rightful heir of Antioch, and Leo's position was supported by the pope. On the other hand, however, the city commune of Antioch supported Bohemond IV of Antioch, on the grounds that he was the closest blood relative to the last ruling prince, Bohemond III. In 1207 Bohemond IV installed a Greek patriarch in Antioch, despite the East–West Schism, under the help of Aleppo, Bohemond IV drove Leo out of Antioch.

Fifth Crusade
The calling of the Fifth Crusade strengthened the support of Ayyubid Sultan al-Adil I who supported Raymond-Roupen's claims in Antioch. In 1216 Leo installed Raymond-Roupen as prince of Antioch, ending all military aspect of the struggle between Tripoli and Lesser Armenia, but the citizens again revolted against Raymond-Roupen in c. 1219 and Bohemond of Tripoli was recognised as prince. From 1233 onwards Antioch declined and appeared rarely in records for 30 years, and in 1254 the altercations of the past between Antioch and Armenia were laid to rest when Bohemond VI of Antioch married the then 17‑year‑old Sibylla of Armenia, and Bohemond VI became a vassal of the Armenian kingdom. Effectively, the Armenian kings ruled Antioch while the prince of Antioch resided in Tripoli. The Armenians drew up a treaty with the Mongols, who were now ravaging Muslim lands, and under protection they extended their territory into the lands of the Seljuq dynasty in the north and the Aleppo territory to the south. Antioch was part of this Armeno-Mongol alliance. Bohemond VI managed to retake Lattakieh and reestablished the land bridge between Antioch and Tripoli, while the Mongols insisted he install the Greek patriarch there rather than a Latin one as the Mongols wanted to strengthen ties to the Orthodox Byzantines.

Fall of Antioch
In 1268, Baibars besieged Antioch, capturing the city on May 18. Baibars promised to spare the lives of the inhabitants, but broke his promise and razed the city, killing or enslaving nearly the entire population upon their surrender. Antioch's ruler, Prince Bohemond VI was then left with no territories except the County of Tripoli. Without any southern fortifications and with Antioch isolated it could not withstand the resurgent Muslim forces, and with the fall of the city, the remainder of northern Syria eventually capitulated, ending the Latin presence in Syria. The Mamluk armies killed or enslaved every Christian in Antioch. In 1355 it still had a considerable population, but by 1432 there were only about 300 inhabited houses within its walls, mostly occupied by Turcomans.

Ottoman period
Antioch was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire with the conquest of Syria in 1516. It formed a sub-province (sancak) or tax collectorship (muhassıllık) of the province of Aleppo (Aleppo Eyalet). Beginning in the mid-18th century, the district witnessed an influx of Alawite settlers coming from the Latakia area. The famous Barker family of British consuls had a summer home in Suwaydiyya (today's Samandağ), at the mouth of the Orontes River, in the 19th century. Between 1831 and 1840, Antioch was the military headquarters of Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt during the Egyptian occupation of Syria, and served as a model site for the modernizing reforms he wished to institute.

Archaeology

Few traces of the once great Roman city are visible today aside from the massive fortification walls that snake up the mountains to the east of the modern city, several aqueducts, and the Church of St Peter (St Peter's Cave Church, Cave-Church of St. Peter), said to be a meeting place of an Early Christian community. The majority of the Roman city lies buried beneath deep sediments from the Orontes River, or has been obscured by recent construction.

Between 1932 and 1939, archaeological excavations of Antioch were undertaken under the direction of the "Committee for the Excavation of Antioch and Its Vicinity", which was made up of representatives from the Louvre Museum, the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Worcester Art Museum, Princeton University, Wellesley College, and later (1936) also the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University and its affiliate Dumbarton Oaks.

The excavation team failed to find the major buildings they hoped to unearth, including Constantine's Great Octagonal Church or the imperial palace. However, a great accomplishment of the expedition was the discovery of high-quality Roman mosaics from villas and baths in Antioch, Daphne and Seleucia Pieria.

The principal excavations of Mosaics at Antioch led by Princeton University in March 1932 recovered nearly 300 mosaics. Many of these mosaics were originally displayed as floor mosaics in private homes during the second through sixth centuries AD, while others were displayed in baths and other public buildings. The majority of the Antioch mosaics are from the fourth and fifth centuries, Antioch's golden age, though others from earlier times have survived as well . The mosaics depict a variety of images including animals, plants, and mythological beings, as well as scenes from the daily lives of people living in the area at the time. Each mosaic is bordered by intricate designs and contains bold, vibrant colors.

One mosaic includes a border that depicts a walk from Antioch to Daphne, showing many ancient buildings along the way. The mosaics are now displayed in the Hatay Archaeology Museum in Antakya. A collection of mosaics on both secular and sacred subjects which were once in churches, private homes, and other public spaces now hang in the Princeton University Art Museum and museums of other sponsoring institutions. The non-Islamic coins from the excavations were published by Dorothy B. Waage.

A statue in the Vatican and a number of figurines and statuettes perpetuate the type of its great patron goddess and civic symbol, the Tyche (Fortune) of Antioch – a majestic seated figure, crowned with the ramparts of Antioch's walls and holding wheat stalks in her right hand, with the river Orontes as a youth swimming under her feet. According to William Robertson Smith the Tyche of Antioch was originally a young virgin sacrificed at the time of the founding of the city to ensure its continued prosperity and good fortune.

The northern edge of Antakya has been growing rapidly over recent years, and this construction has begun to expose large portions of the ancient city, which are frequently bulldozed and rarely protected by the local museum.

In April 2016, archaeologists discovered a Greek mosaic showing a skeleton lying down with a wine pitcher and loaf of bread alongside a text that reads: "Be cheerful, enjoy your life", it is reportedly from the third century BC. Described as the "reckless skeleton" or "skeleton mosaic", the mosaic is once thought to have belonged in the dining room of an upper-class home.

Notable people

 * Abba Judan, philanthropist
 * Arcadius of Antioch, Greek grammarian
 * Asclepiades of Antioch, Patriarch of Antioch
 * Saint Barnabas, one of the prominent Christian disciples in Jerusalem
 * Saint Domnius, Bishop of Salona and patron saint of Split
 * George of Antioch, the first to hold the office of ammiratus ammiratorum
 * Ignatius of Antioch, Patriarch of Antioch
 * John Malalas, a Greek chronicler
 * John Chrysostom, (349–407) Patriarch of Constantinople
 * Libanius, 4th century AD, pagan sophist and confidant of Emperor Julian
 * Saint Luke, 1st century AD, Christian evangelist and author of the Gospel of St. Luke and Acts of the Apostles
 * Severus of Antioch, was the Patriarch of Antioch, and the head of the Syriac Orthodox Church
 * Aulus Licinius Archias, Greek poet
 * Tiberius Claudius Pompeianus, Roman politician and general
 * Saint Maron, Patriarch of the Maronite Church

title: Antioch


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San Diego Zoo Safari Park

The San Diego Zoo Safari Park is a zoo in the San Pasqual Valley area of San Diego, California, near Escondido. The park houses more than 3,000 animals representing over 300 species. It also includes a botanical garden with more than one million plants representing over 3,700 species. The park houses a large array of wild and endangered animals from every continent, except Antarctica. Located in a semi-arid climate, the area is noted for its year-round feeling of an African environment.

The zoo is an accredited member of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA), the American Alliance of Museums (AAM), and the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA). Its parent organization, the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, is a private nonprofit conservation organization, and has one of the largest zoological membership associations in the world. The San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance also operates the San Diego Zoo.

History
The San Diego Zoological Society became interested in developing a larger facility in 1964. The initial concept of the park was as a supplementary breeding facility for the San Diego Zoo, which would allow ample space for large animals and herding behaviors of ungulates.

The development proposed would differ significantly from that of a typical zoo in that animals would be exhibited in a naturalistic, spacious environment rather than in cages. In 1964, the park was assessed financially and then moved onto the next phase, with this resulting in three alternative developments—a conservation farm, a game preserve, or a ‘natural environment’ zoo. The natural environment zoo development was chosen over the conservation farm and game preserve even though it was the most expensive option. The estimated initial cost was $1,755,430.

The main purposes of this zoo were to be species conservation, breeding of animals for the San Diego Zoo (as well as trading between zoos) and providing areas where exotic animals arriving to the state of California could be quarantined and monitored. When it came to naming the park, five titles were considered: San Diego Animal Land, San Diego Safari Land, San Diego Wild Animal Safari, or the San Diego Wildlife Park; ultimately, the name chosen was the San Diego Wild Animal Park.

The scheduled opening day of the park was set for April 1, 1972; however, the gates did not open until May 10, 1972. The general layout of the park, designed by Charles Faust, included a large lagoon with a jungle plaza, an African fishing village, an aviary at the entrance of the park and approximately 50,000 plants were to be included in the landscaping. Although the park was scheduled to open in three years from the time of the groundbreaking, the total development of the park was estimated to take ten years.

The first two species to arrive at the park were the nilgai (an antelope from India and Nepal) and the Grant's zebra, native to East Africa. Subsequent species to arrive at the park included the gemsbok, a type of oryx from Southern Africa and Namibia, in addition to Zambian sable antelope, greater kudu, southern and northern white rhinoceros subspecies (which were both in-danger of extinction), the one-horned Indian rhinoceros, as well as ten South African cheetahs, brought to the park for breeding purposes.

When the park first opened, there were many cultural shows and programs, with groups invited from Africa and Asia. There were also many animal encounters and entertainment options available for guests to view various animal ambassador species.

In the summer of 2003, the San Diego Zoological Society and Lowry Park Zoo orchestrated the capture of 11 wild African elephants from the Hlane Royal National Park in Swaziland (since 2018 renamed to Eswatini). The zoos said the animals were scheduled to be killed due to overpopulation. However, In Defense of Animals disputes this, claiming that new fencing costing many times less than the capture and transport would have ended the need to remove any elephants from Swaziland, and that the Save Wild Elephants Coalition reported that there were three other sanctuaries in Africa that had offered to take the elephants. Five of these elephants are now at the park, and cumulatively, they have produced thirteen babies, as of 2013. In March 2012, five elephants were moved to the Reid Park Zoo in Tucson, Arizona, to form a new herd. A bull elephant, two cows, and two baby bulls were moved and, in return, two female elephants that had been together for years. Connie, an Asian elephant, and Shaba, an African elephant, were sent to the San Diego Zoo. Connie died from cancer in July 2012, just five months after the move. Shaba was slowly introduced into the herd in February 2013. On July 12, 2012, Ndulagave birth to Umzula. A male calf named Zuli was the largest elephant born at the park.

The California wildfire season in 2007, which officially started on October 21 that year, burned 600 acre of native chaparral lands within the park and caused the park's temporarily closure. The park moved many of their endangered animals out of danger of the fire. The flames did not reach any of the main enclosures, and no animals were killed or burned by the fire, though the flames could be seen clearly from several of the exhibits. The incidental deaths of a clapper rail and kiang were attributed to indirect effects of the blaze.

On June 30, 2010, the San Diego Zoo board of trustees voted to change the name of the park from the San Diego Wild Animal Park to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park to clarify what it offers, since the difference between the zoo proper and the "animal park" was unclear to some visitors. The name "safari" is supposed to emphasize "the park's spacious enclosures of free-ranging animals" (as opposed to "the closer quarters of the zoo"), encouraging visits to both locations.

In July 2019, the park opened a new exhibit specifically for their rhinoceroses, the Nikhita Khan Rhino Centre (named after animal lover and lawyer Nikhita Khan), debuting as the home for six white rhinos. A few days after the center's opening, one of the rhinos (named Victoria) gave birth to Edward, a male calf, becoming the first rhinoceros in North America to be born via artificial insemination.

In April 2024, the Ellen Trout Zoo's male southern white rhinoceros, Bwana, permanently moved into this zoo to officially join its large crash.

Asian Savanna and African Plains
The park's largest exhibits, covering over 300 acre, are the open-range enclosures. Visitors view various plains habitats from Africa and Asia. Asian Savanna covers 60 acre and displays Indian rhinoceros, Bactrian camels, banteng, gaur, urial, argali, dholes, and several species of Asian deer and antelope such as blackbuck, barasingha, North China sika deer, axis deer, Eld's deer, Indochinese sika deer  Père David's deer, nilgai, white-lipped deer, sambar deer, and Bactrian deer. A number of smaller enclosures visible only from the tram are home to Somali wild ass, Arabian oryx, Rhim gazelle, markhor, Soemmerring's gazelle, and Przewalski's horses. African Plains represents many regions and habitats. East Africa displays African buffalo, southern white rhinoceros, Rothschild's giraffe, reticulated giraffe, fringe-eared oryx, waterbuck, Nile lechwe, red lechwe, impala, Grant's gazelle, Thomson's gazelle, and a lagoon with East African crowned cranes, pink-backed pelicans, Dalmatian pelicans, African sacred ibises and great white pelicans. The North Africa exhibit represents the Sahel and Sahara Desert that houses scimitar-horned oryx, Barbary stag, red-fronted gazelle, Barbary sheep, Dromedary camels, and Ankole-Watusi cattle. The Southern Africa field exhibits Grévy's zebras. The South Africa field exhibit holds Masai giraffes, common eland, sable antelope, gemsbok, springbok, blue wildebeest and ostrich. The Central Africa region features a wooded waterhole with an island for saddle-billed storks, spur-winged geese, Lappet-faced vultures, Goliath herons, Egyptian geese, and Rüppell's vultures. On the shores of the lake are bongo antelope, red river hog, greater kudu, Ugandan kob, roan antelope, and other forest animals.

Species of note in the open enclosures include two subspecies of giraffe, rhinos (it was the last New World zoo to have northern white rhinoceros), vultures, markhor, and many species of antelope, gazelle, and deer. The park houses the largest, most comprehensive collection of hoofed mammals (ungulates) in the world. However, the overall numbers of animals at the park have been greatly reduced.

Tiger Trail
The Sumatran tigers, Denver and Rakan (male), Majel, Cathy, Debbie, and Diana, have three different exhibits, and there is a glass viewing window for visitors. After raising $19.6 million for the new exhibit ground was broken on December 12, 2012. The new exhibit is named the Tull Family Tiger Trail after movie producer Thomas Tull and his wife. Tiger Trail opened May 24, 2014. In August 2017, a Bengal tiger cub named Moka was rescued by border police from a car on the Mexican border and brought to the zoo. The exhibits' matriarch, Delta, was euthanized on July 29, 2018, shortly after her birthday, due to old age. Her daughter, Joanna, succeeded her as the matriarch until June 30, 2021 when she was relocated to the Phoenix Zoo.

On July 12, 2023, Diana gave birth to two Sumatran tigers named Hutan and Puteri. Puteri means "princess" in Malay, the official language of Malaysia — one of few Asian territories where the Sumatran tigers can be found. Hutan is Malay for “forest.

Nairobi Village and Gorilla Forest
Originally a center for cultural events in the park, today Nairobi Village houses numerous exhibits for smaller animals. Among these are meerkats, Rodrigues fruit bats, an African aviary, ring-tailed lemurs, Chilean flamingos, pudú, fennec foxes Kirk's dik-diks, sand cats, yellow-backed duikers, red river hogs, West African crowned cranes, North Sulawesi babirusa, South American coatis, lesser hedgehog tenrecs, black-footed cats, pancake tortoises and white-fronted bee-eaters. A large lagoon is home to numerous species of waterfowl, both foreign and native. Lorikeet Landing and Hidden Jungle display feedable lories and lorikeets, and African birds, respectively. There is a nursery where visitors can watch baby animals being hand-reared as well as a nearby petting corral. Finally, a habitat houses a troop of western lowland gorillas. In 2014, Imami gave birth to Joanne despite a respiratory problem. She and Joanne were treated for 11 days.

In 2019 medical experts collaborated to do cataract surgery on a three-year-old gorilla, Leslie. This was the park's first cataract surgery on a gorilla.

In January 2021, two gorillas were reported to be the first known cases of COVID-19 transmission from humans to apes during the coronavirus pandemic. The gorillas recovered from the virus.

Hidden Jungle
Located in Nairobi Village, this climate-controlled indoor exhibit opened in 1993 and displays tropical African birds and insects. The entrance to the building is a simulated earthen crevasse with displays for stick insects, spiders, scorpions, insects, millipedes, lizards, and snakes. The underground segment opens up to a room representing the rainforest understory, which leads to a second room representing the canopy. On display are long-tailed paradise whydah, purple grenadier, red-crested turaco, African pygmy goose, beautiful sunbird and other birds. Hidden Jungle is the setting of the annual Butterfly Jungle event.

Lion Camp
Opened in October 2004, Lion Camp houses the park's six African lions, Izu, Mina, Oshana and Etosha in a 1 acre exhibit. The park's two other lions, Ernest and Miss Ellen, were moved to the San Diego Zoo. One side of the enclosure is dominated by an artificial rock kopje which has a 40 foot glass viewing window and heated rocks. The path continues along an acacia-studded ravine and leads to a replica observation tent. This has a smaller viewing window as well as a Land Rover for the lions to rest on.

Condor Ridge
Condor Ridge displays endangered North American desert wildlife. The featured species are California condors and desert bighorn sheep. The park is noted for its breeding program; it was the key force in the recovery effort for the birds. It is one of the only places in the world where the public can see the species in captivity) Other species displayed include Aplomado falcons, San Clemente loggerhead shrikes, thick-billed parrots, ocelots, bald eagles, Harris's hawks, squirrels, burrowing owls, prairie dogs, black footed ferrets, magpies, and desert tortoises.

African Woods and African Outpost
Formerly known as Heart of Africa, these are two of the park's major exhibits. Visitors go down a trail which replicates habitats in Africa. The exhibit begins in African Woods with scrub animals - vultures, lesser kudu, and giant eland. It then progresses to the forest (okapi, red-flanked duikers, gerenuk, steenbok, demoiselle cranes, kori bustard, blue cranes, and wattled cranes). The path then leads to African Outpost, which features plains animals - bontebok, warthogs, bat-eared foxes, secretary birds, yellow-billed storks, ground hornbills, cheetahs, and nyala - against a backdrop of the open-range East Africa exhibit. A central lagoon has lesser and greater flamingos, waterfowl, an island with colobus monkeys, and an interpretive research camp on a separate island.

Tours and rides
The park formerly operated a monorail line, the Wgasa Bush Line, which ran clockwise through the Wild Animal Park. The name of the monorail was originally chosen by chief designer Chuck Faust as a profane inside joke, with "WGASA" being an acronym for "who gives a shit anyway". Zoo officials later came up with a backronym for the name, saying that it stood for "World’s Greatest Animal Show Anywhere".

The Monorail line has been retired, partially due to high maintenance costs, and in March 2007 the Journey into Africa attraction, now renamed Africa Tram, opened. The Africa Tram tour runs counterclockwise and brings visitors to the field exhibits to see wildlife from different parts of Africa. In addition, another route is planned to bring visitors through the Asian field exhibits and into eight new ones that will house a variety of African animals from rock hyrax to Hartmann's mountain zebras. The tour uses a wheeled tram that runs on biofuel instead of a monorail.

As well as the tram, the park has also added a tethered balloon ride that allows visitors to see the plains exhibits from 400 ft (~21 giraffes) in the air. The balloon ride is not included in the entrance fee.

Gardens
The park also has extensive botanical gardens, many of which are their own attractions separate from the animal exhibits.

Walkabout Australia
Walkabout Australia is the park's only Australia exhibit. It is 3.6 acres and guests can go inside an exhibit which features western grey kangaroos, red-necked wallabies, Australian brushturkeys, radjah shelducks, freckled ducks and magpie geese. Walkabout Australia also has two southern cassowary exhibits, a Matschie's tree-kangaroo exhibit and an animal ambassador area where guests can meet the safari park's Australian animal ambassadors. Walkabout Australia also has a restaurant and a devil's marbles area. It is also home to the only two platypuses outside of Australia, Birrarung and Eve. The exhibit opened in 2018.

Conservation
The park includes the world's largest veterinary hospital. Adjacent to the hospital is the Institute for Conservation Research, which houses the San Diego Zoo's and Safari Park's Frozen Zoo. The park is Southern California's quarantine center for zoo animals imported into the United States through San Diego.

The safari park was a major factor in the recovery of the California condor. Beginning in 1980, it worked with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Los Angeles Zoo to start a captive breeding program. The last 22 condors were taken into captivity in 1987 To breed the condors quickly, the Safari Park would remove the eggs from the nests to induce the females to lay a second egg. The removed egg hatches in an incubator and is raised with a condor handpuppet to prevent human imprinting, while the second egg is raised by its parents. The first condor born through this process is Siscouc, a male condor, who was the patriarch of the flock (last chick, Kitwon). Now that title goes to Siwon. Captive-bred condors were reintroduced into the wild beginning in 1992, and today their population 500, with 200 in the wild as of November 2020.

On December 14, 2014, Angalifu, a 44-year-old male northern white rhinoceros, died of old age at the park. This left only five northern white rhinos left in the world, including one female at the Safari Park. On November 22, 2015, the park's last northern white rhino, 41-year-old Nola, was euthanized due to bacterial infection and her health rapidly failing.

In June 2019, two young male African elephants named Ingadze and Lutsandvo were sent to Alabama's Birmingham Zoo as part of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums' Species Survival Plan. On 28 July 2019, the zoo announced the birth of Edward, a male Southern White Rhinoceros, the first rhino in North America born through artificial insemination, born to Victoria and Maoto. The second rhino born through artificial insemination, Future, a female southern White rhinoceros, was also born in the park. On August 12, 2018, the zoo announced the birth of Zuli, a male elephant born to Ndula, the largest calf born at the zoo, of 299 pounds. The record was broken six weeks later by Kaia, a female elephant born to Umngani, at 320 pounds.

Awards
The Safari Park has received several awards for its breeding programs and conservation efforts.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: San Diego Zoo Safari Park


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Talk:Joachim II Hector/Archive 1

HJ -- for pity's sake, don't correct grammar unless there is really something to correct. If you want to fix things, try going into your own stuff, removing all the spaces before punctuation marks, adding spaces and articles where appropriate, and perhaps even using transition sentences.

 * I vote for HJ going back and taking out spaces before punctuation marks, myself. When I figured out that some of the wacky commas in her entries came from cutting and pasting genealogical charts, where evidently a comma before a proper name means something, I almost hit the roof. --MichaelTinkler

title: Talk:Joachim II Hector/Archive 1


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Moustapha Akkad

Moustapha al Akkad (مصطفى العقاد; July 1, 1930 – November 11, 2005) was a Syrian-American film producer and director, best known for producing the original series of Halloween films and directing The Message and Lion of the Desert. He was killed along with his daughter Rima Al Akkad Monla in the 2005 Amman bombings.

Early life
Al Akkad was born on July 1, 1930, in Aleppo in the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon. He received his high school degree from the Aleppo American College. His father, then a customs officer, gave him $200 and a copy of the Quran before he left for the United States to study film direction and production at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Akkad spent a further three years studying for a Master's degree at the University of Southern California (USC), where he met the director Sam Peckinpah. Peckinpah became Akkad's mentor in Hollywood and hired him as a consultant for a film about the Algerian War that never made it to the big screen, but he continued to encourage him until he found a job as a producer at CBS.

Career
In 1976, he produced and directed Mohammad, Messenger of God (released as The Message in 1977 in the United States), starring Anthony Quinn and Irene Papas. Akkad faced resistance from Hollywood, which forced him to make the film in Morocco.

While creating Muhammad, Messenger of God, he consulted Islamic clerics, he wanted and tried to be respectful towards Islam and its views on portraying Muhammad. He got the Approval from Al-Azhar University in Egypt but was rejected by the Muslim World League in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The Governments of Kuwait, Libya and Morocco promised to support the film financially, and when it was rejected by the Muslim World League, Kuwait kept its financial support but stopped other kinds of supports. King Hassan II of Morocco gave his full support for the production of the film. The production took one year, Akkad filmed for 6 months in Morocco, but had to stop when the Saudi Government exerted great pressure on the government of Morocco to stop the production. Akkad went to Muammar Gaddafi of Libya for support in order to complete the project, Gaddafi allowed him to move the filming to Libya for the remaining 6 months until the film was finalized.

Akkad saw the film as a way to bridge the gap between the Western and Muslim worlds, stating in a 1976 interview:

"I did the film because it is a personal thing for me ... Being a Muslim myself who lived in the west I felt that it was my obligation my duty to tell the truth about Islam. It is a religion that has a 700 million following, yet it's so little known about which surprised me. I thought I should tell the story that will bring this [history] to the west."

In 1978, he helped make low-budget film history when he produced Halloween. Akkad became best known for his key involvement in the first eight Halloween films, as an executive producer (the only producer to participate in all of these films). The series was highly profitable and hugely influential to subsequent horror films.

In 1980 he directed Lion of the Desert, in which Quinn and Irene Papas were joined by Oliver Reed, Rod Steiger, and John Gielgud. It was about the real-life Bedouin leader Omar Mukhtar (Quinn), who fought Benito Mussolini's Italian troops in the deserts of Libya. The movie is now critically acclaimed, after initially receiving negative publicity in the West for being partially funded by Libya's Muammar Gaddafi, who invested $35 million in the movie. This negative publicity may have been the cause of its relatively poor performance at the box office. Clint Morris describes the movie as: "A grand epic adventure that'll stand as a highpoint in the producing career of Moustapha Akkad." In 1985, his production company Trancas International Films had inked an agreement with Galaxy International releasing in order to release films for a seven-picture agreement worldwide.

In the United Kingdom, Akkad once tried to buy Pinewood Studios from The Rank Organisation and also had a studio at Twickenham. At the time of his death, he was in the process of producing an $80 million movie featuring Sean Connery about Saladin and the Crusades, for which he already had the script, that would be filmed in Jordan. Speaking of the film, he said: "Saladin exactly portrays Islam. Right now, Islam is portrayed as a terrorist religion. Because a few terrorists are Muslims, the whole religion has that image. If there ever was a religious war full of terror, it was the Crusades. But you can't blame Christianity because a few adventurers did this. That's my message."

Death
Akkad and his 34-year-old daughter, Rima Akkad Monla, were killed in the 2005 Amman bombings. They were both in the lobby at the Grand Hyatt Amman on November 9 when a bomb exploded; his daughter died instantly, and Akkad died of his injuries two days later in a hospital. He is buried in the Al-Jadidah Cemetery in Aleppo in Syria.

Akkad was survived by his former wife, Patricia Al Akkad and their sons, Taric and Malek, who helped produce most of the Halloween movies, as well as his widow, Suha Ascha Akkad, and their son Zade.

Legacy
He was honoured by his native city of Aleppo, and the Aleppo City Council has renamed a school and a street after Moustapha Akkad. In 2008, a street in downtown Beirut was renamed after Moustapha Akkad. The 2007 remake of Halloween was dedicated to Moustapha Akkad. The 2018 film Halloween, a direct sequel to the 1978 original film, also features a dedication to Akkad in the end credits.

title: Moustapha Akkad


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Service club

A service club or service organization is a voluntary nonprofit organization where members meet regularly to perform charitable works either by direct hands-on efforts or by raising money for other organizations. A service club is defined firstly by its service mission and secondly by its membership benefits, such as social occasions, networking, and personal growth opportunities that encourage involvement.

Service organizations are not necessarily exclusive of ideological motives, although organizations with such defined motives are more likely to identify themselves through their association. Much like the historical religious organizations that formed the basis for many societal institutions, such as hospitals, service organizations perform many essential services for their community and other worthy causes. In the United States, some of these clubs usually also have a component club organization that is a tax exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

Many of today's service clubs started as social clubs for business networking, but quickly evolved into organizations devoted more to service than to networking, although networking may still be the primary reason many members decided to join.

Historically, most service clubs consist of community-based groups with the same name, goals, membership requirements, and meeting structure. Many of these clubs meet weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly on a recurring established day and time, commonly at mealtime. Most of these clubs started with a single club in a single city but then replicated themselves by organizing similar clubs in other communities. Many of the service club organizations have become worldwide movements, and have obtained official recognition by the United Nations and various governments as non-governmental organizations (NGO).

title: Service club


text:
Melissa Sue Anderson

Melissa Sue Anderson (born September 26, 1962) is an American-Canadian actress. She began her career as a child actress after appearing in several commercials in Los Angeles. Anderson is known for her role as Mary Ingalls in the NBC drama series Little House on the Prairie (1974–1983), for which she received a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series.

She is also known for film roles that include Vivian in Midnight Offerings (1981), Ginny in the slasher film Happy Birthday to Me (1981), and Alex in the ABC Afterschool Special, Which Mother Is Mine? (1979).

Anderson became a naturalized citizen of Canada in 2007. In 2010, she published The Way I See It: A Look Back at My Life on Little House, an autobiographical account of her years acting in Little House on the Prairie.

Early life
Anderson was born on September 26, 1962, in Berkeley, California, the second of two daughters, to James and Marion Anderson. Her sister Maureen is 12 years her senior. When she was seven years old, Anderson's family relocated from the San Francisco Bay Area to Los Angeles. Her parents divorced when she was 13 years old, and she was raised Roman Catholic by her mother. As a young child, Anderson appeared in commercials for Mattel and Sears.

Career
Anderson's show business career began when a dance teacher urged her parents to find an agent for her. After appearing in commercials, she was soon in demand for television roles. Her first came in a 1972 episode of Bewitched titled "Tabitha's First Day of School". Another memorable early role was as Millicent, a girl who kissed Bobby in The Brady Bunch. She also appeared in an episode of Shaft the same year.

At the age of 11, Anderson landed the role of Mary Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie. She would go on to star in the series for eight seasons, beginning in 1974, and leaving after season seven; she later appeared in three episodes of season eight in late 1981.

In 1976, Michael Landon asked Anderson if she would appear in his autobiographical film The Loneliest Runner. Anderson agreed to play Nancy Rizzi, the first girlfriend of John Curtis (based on Landon and played by Lance Kerwin), saying she was very thrilled to have been asked. In 1977, she once again co-starred as the love interest opposite Kerwin in the television film James at 15.

She was nominated for a 1978 Primetime Emmy Award for Best Leading Actress in a Drama Series for her work on Little House on the Prairie and won the Emmy Award for her performance in Which Mother Is Mine?, which aired as an ABC Afterschool Special in 1979. Also in 1979, she played the title role of Dana Lee Gilbert, a North Dakota transfer student to Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley, in CBS's television film Survival of Dana.

In 1980, Anderson earned a 'TP de Oro' Award (considered to be Spain's most prestigious award for television) for 'Best Foreign Actress' for her role in Little House on the Prairie. This followed a successful visit to Spain in 1979 to appear as a guest on RTVE's program, 625 Lineas. In 1981, she earned a Young Artist Award nomination for her performance in the Canadian slasher film Happy Birthday to Me. After leaving Little House, she continued acting in television series like The Equalizer, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, CHiPs and Murder, She Wrote, and was the associate producer for the penultimate television project Michael Landon made before dying: Where Pigeons Go to Die (1990).

In 1998, she was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. In 1999, she starred alongside Heather Langenkamp in the short-lived television series Partners. In 2014, Anderson had an uncredited appearance as Stosh's mother in the neo-noir mystery comedy drama film Veronica Mars (2014).

Other ventures
In 2010, Anderson released an autobiography titled The Way I See It: A Look Back at My Life on Little House. The book, which is primarily based on her life during her years as a child star in Little House on the Prairie, contains behind-the-scenes stories and anecdotes about the show itself, its stars, guest stars, and crew members. The autobiography also covers her pre– and post–Little House career, her side-projects during the Little House years and how her personal life was affected by her career.

Personal life
Anderson married television writer and producer Michael Sloan in 1990. The couple have two children, daughter Piper and son Griffin. The family moved to Montreal in 2002 and became naturalized Canadians on Canada Day in 2007.

title: Melissa Sue Anderson


text:
Talk:San Diego Zoo Safari Park

Marj -- IIRC, it's Przewalski's horse...if that's what you're talking about. But don't hold me to it! JHK

JH -- I verified it at the zoo's website, thanks! And has anybody else noticed how much the Przewalski's horses resemble the clay Chinese horses that were buried with the clay army? Marj Tiefert

Copyright
There may be some copyright infringement in the current revision of the article, as suggested by the following line from the lede:

 * The park is also noted for its California condor breeding program, possibly the most successful program in the country, as well as an amazing collection of rare hornbills.

This should be compared with the following from this site:

 * The park is also noted for its highly successful California Condor breeding program and an amazing collection of rare hornbills.

It will probably be good to go through the article and reword things. modify 15:12, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Wgasa
Shouldn't the myth of calling it Wgasa for the abbreviation "Who Gives A Shit Anyways" be mentioned? It's linked, but that's it.
 * Ahem... who says it's a myth? Sheep81 17:41, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Because the Wgasa Bush Railway is no longer in operation, shouldn't the part in the introduction stating that the "Wgasa Railway explores 700 acres worth of free range exhibits" be removed?

Yes, please feel free to update it with some information about the new tram system Linelor 00:35, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Man this ruins my childhood... The Monorail was the best part of the Wild Animal Park. I remember we went to the park just to ride it. Sometimes more than once. Heh, and the mule dear always just standing on the tracks. Good times. Can't believe its gone... T.T Rogutaan 02:50, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

The part about the "Who gives a [expletive] anyway" shouldn't be included because it has a swear word. I don't think people need (or want) to know that. Duh!

Sure they do. Duh! Anyhow, here's Snopes on the subject: http://www.snopes.com/business/names/wgasa.asp Kostaki mou (talk) 21:42, 5 June 2017 (UTC)

Land Area
There seems to be some inconsistency in the amount of land area of the park. In the description box, it states 700 acres, while on the article it lists 1,800 acres. Which is the accurate figure? Mim37204 18:41, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Zoo

 * Please consider helping to improve not only this article but all the articles under WikiProject Zoos WP:ZOO Scope. We are in desperate need of members.  Zoo Pro  08:07, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Address and location
While the mailing address of the Wild Animal Park does indeed say Escondido, the park itself is located entirely within San Diego city limits. Compare this map, generated using official county GIS data (you can make your own version if you'd like) to the Google Maps image of the park's footprint. Or for that matter look in any San Diego Thomas Guide (maps 1130 and 1131). It's close to Escondido, in some places very close, but it's still completely in the city of San Diego.

The reason the street address says Escondido is due to the peculiarities of the ZIP code system. "Escondido, CA 92027" does not mean the address is located in Escondido. It means it's located in ZIP code 92027, and the ZIP code is named "Escondido". ZIP code 92027 covers land in Escondido, unincorporated portions of the county, and the portion of San Diego containing and surrounding the Wild Animal Park. (The green line on the SANDAG map is the ZIP code boundary.) This is not at all an uncommon phenomenon; I personally live in Bonsall but have a mailing address saying "Vista".

Hope this clears up any confusion. -Branddobbe (talk) 06:24, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

 * Also, I took the mailing address out of the "location" field in the infobox, as none of the other zoo articles I looked at had anything more than city and state. -Branddobbe (talk) 06:29, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * wikipedia is about verifiability. It must be verified by citations. There were three, and still the information was changed back to something that cannot be verified with a citation.--Jojhutton (talk) 11:29, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Why is the name changed?
The Board of directors decided to change the name of the park to San Diego Zoo Safari Park. That vote solidified the name change. They gave no specific date for the official name change to happen, but rather are going to do so gradually, so as to not have to purchase new items, they are going to replace them over time, as they run out of them. As this process has already officially begun, the name of the park on wikipedia will officially be "San Diego Zoo Safari Park".--Jojhutton (talk) 02:55, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I have inquired about this topic at Wikipedia talk:Article titles. Evil saltine (talk) 03:29, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The direction of that discussion is leaning toward retaining the name "San Diego Wild Animal Park" until they actually start to implement the new name - which they have not at this point. Even the Park's website still says "Wild Animal Park"; the term "Safari Park" is not mentioned anywhere on the website that I could find. I think we have jumped the gun on this one, but I'd like to see consensus before any more changes are made. --MelanieN (talk) 23:16, 1 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, they just changed the name at the park's website, so I guess it should stay as San Diego Zoo Safari Park here. --MelanieN (talk) 03:48, 6 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Told ya.--Jojhutton (talk) 23:55, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

New photo needed
The name change has been completed, but the photo still shows the old sign. Anyone have a picture of the new sign? --MelanieN (talk) 02:34, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Animal lists?
I see that someone has apparently started to create lists, by exhibit area, of all the animals in each area of the park. Is that something we feel is appropriate? Similar lists at San Diego Zoo were deleted after discussion at Talk:San Diego Zoo a few months ago. Consensus was that such lists are unencyclopedic, unverified, tend to overwhelm the article, and are all but impossible to keep current as animals are born, acquired, transferred, and die. Comments? --MelanieN (talk) 20:51, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

 * My opinion has not changed on this since the SD Zoo discussion. On the one hand I don't generally delete lists that already exist (though I have been known to put them in a collapsible section or "narratize" them), but otherwise I agree with MelanieN for exactly the stated reasons. Animal lists are guaranteed to be out of date the minute they are updated, and especially in smaller articles they have a tendency to overwhelm the article. Donlammers (talk) 02:40, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Nothing further has been done with the partial lists that were added to the article, and there is no sourcing to support them, so I am going to delete the whole section. --MelanieN (talk) 00:43, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I thought I had taken care of all these list "addback"s in both the zoo and the safari park. Donlammers (talk) 01:24, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Food
Shouldn't the article say something about food? In particular is there any feeding of animals by humans (the staff) or are they left to fend for themselves as in African game reserves? Presumably the former, but in either case the article should say so. Vaughan Pratt (talk) 18:36, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

Location
The Escondido location is the mailing address, not the physical location. Look at the map, it's in San Diego. Enter "San Diego, CA" on Google Maps (map view, not satellite), pan and zoom to the north eastern horn of San Diego and you will see the Safari Park inside of the San Diego boarder. Enter "92027" on Google maps https://www.google.com/maps/place/92027 and you can see that part of 92027 (Escondido) overlaps with the city of San Diego and the Safari Park. It's the US Post Office that says the Safari Park is in Escondido, not the surveyors. The ZSSD (Zoological Society of San Diego) ''operates the San Diego Zoo and the San Diego Zoo Safari Park pursuant to lease agreements with the City of San Diego. The agreements provide that title to the ZSSD’s property and exhibits is vested in the City.'' http://docs.sandiego.gov/councilcomm_agendas_attach/2014/edir_140115_1c1.pdf pg 9 (pdf pg 14) The Safari Park land is leased from the City of San Diego, not Escondido. Jim1138 (talk) 11:23, 4 April 2015 (UTC)
 * You are right, of course. And the text, in the lead sentence, makes that clear. The problem is in the infobox. I tried changing it from "location" to "mailing address" but the infobox code doesn't recognize that. Any suggestions for how to fix it? Should we simply not list anything under "location"? --MelanieN (talk) 14:55, 4 April 2015 (UTC)
 * I added "City of San Diego" followed by "Mailing address". Seems to work. Cheers Jim1138 (talk)
 * Good solution. Thanks, Jim1138! --MelanieN (talk) 13:42, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

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title: Talk:San Diego Zoo Safari Park


text:
Antipater of Sidon

Antipater of Sidon (Greek: Ἀντίπατρος ὁ Σιδώνιος, Antipatros ho Sidonios) was an ancient Greek poet of the 2nd and 1st centuries BC.

Cicero mentions him living in Rome during the time of Quintus Lutatius Catulus, and calls him a brilliant epigrammist, sometimes too fond of imitation. His poems, about 75 of which are preserved in the Greek Anthology, are mostly epitaphs and ecphrastic poems. 96 poems in the Greek Anthology are attributed simply to "Antipater", without an indication of whether they are by Antipater of Sidon or the later Antipater of Thessalonica, and it is difficult to identify which are his.

One of his poems gives one of the earliest known lists of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

"I have set eyes on the wall of lofty Babylon on which is a road for chariots, and the statue of Zeus by the Alpheus, and the hanging gardens, and the Colossus of the Sun, and the huge labour of the high pyramids, and the vast tomb of Mausolus; but when I saw the house of Artemis that mounted to the clouds, those other marvels lost their brilliancy, and I said, 'Lo, apart from Olympus, the Sun never looked on aught so grand.'"

title: Antipater of Sidon