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Cluedo

Cluedo, known as Clue in North America, is a murder mystery game for three to six players (depending on editions) that was devised in 1943 by British board game designer Anthony E. Pratt. The game was first manufactured by Waddingtons in the United Kingdom in 1949. Since then, it has been relaunched and updated several times, and it is currently owned and published by the American game and toy company Hasbro.

The object of the game is to determine who murdered the game's victim, where the crime took place, and which weapon was used. Each player assumes the role of one of the six suspects and attempts to deduce the correct answer by strategically moving around a game board representing the rooms of a mansion and collecting clues about the circumstances of the murder from the other players.

Numerous games, books, a film, television series, and theatre adaptations have been released as part of the Cluedo franchise. Several spinoffs have been released, featuring various extra characters, weapons, rooms, or a different gameplay. The original game is marketed as the "Classic Detective Game", and the various spinoffs are all distinguished by different slogans.

In 2008, Cluedo: Discover the Secrets was created (with changes to the board, gameplay, and characters) as a modern spin-off, but was criticised in the media and by fans of the original game. Cluedo: The Classic Mystery Game was then introduced in 2012, returning to Pratt's classic formula but also adding several variations.

History
Holed up in his home in Birmingham, England, during air raids on the city during World War II, Anthony E. Pratt, an English musician and factory worker, recalled the murder mystery games played by some of his clients at private music gigs as well as the detective fiction popular at the time, most notably Agatha Christie. In 1944, Pratt applied for a patent of his invention of a murder/mystery-themed game, originally named Murder! Shortly thereafter, Pratt and his wife, Elva Pratt (1913–1990), who had helped design the game, presented it to Waddingtons' executive Norman Watson, who immediately purchased it and provided its trademark name of Cluedo (a play on "clue" and "Ludo", the Latin word for "I play" and the name of a popular board game based on Pachisi). The design of the house in the game is reputed to be based on what was the Tudor Close Hotel in Rottingdean, Brighton and Hove, with early editions of the game being titled "Murder at Tudor Close".

Although the patent was granted in 1947, postwar shortages postponed the game's official United Kingdom launch until 1949. It was simultaneously licensed to Parker Brothers in the United States for publication, where it was renamed Clue, as the name "Ludo" was not widely known there, Pachisi-style games having been published under other names and brands, so the play on words would not have been generally understood.

There were several differences between the original game concept and the one initially published in 1949. In particular, Pratt's original design calls for 10 characters, one of whom was to be designated the victim by random drawing prior to the start of the game. These 10 included the eliminated Mr. Brown, Mr. Gold, Miss Grey, and Mrs. Silver. The characters of Nurse White and Colonel Yellow were renamed Mrs. White and Colonel Mustard for the actual release. The game allowed for play of up to eight remaining characters, providing for nine suspects in total. Originally there were 11 rooms, including the eliminated gun room and cellar. In addition, there were nine weapons, including the unused bomb, syringe, shillelagh (walking stick/cudgel), fireplace poker, and the later used axe and poison. Some of these unused weapons and characters appeared later in spin-off versions of the game.

Some gameplay aspects were different as well. Notably, the remaining playing cards were distributed into the rooms to be retrieved, rather than dealt directly to the players. Players also had to land on another player in order to make suggestions about that player's character through the use of special tokens, and once exhausted, a player could no longer make suggestions. There were other minor differences, all of which were later updated by the game's initial release and remain essentially unchanged in the standard Classic Detective Game editions of the game.

The methodology used in the early versions of Cluedo is remarkably similar to a traditional, if little known, American card game the king of hearts has five sons. However, Pratt himself said his inspiration was a murder mystery parlour game he used to play with friends in which youngsters "would congregate in each other's homes for parties at weekends. We'd play a stupid game called Murder, where guests crept up on each other in corridors and the victim would shriek and fall on the floor". The country house mystery was a popular subgenre of "cosy" English detective fiction in the 1920s and 1930s; stories were set in a residence of the gentry isolated by circumstances such as a snowstorm with the suspects gathered for a weekend house party.

Marketing
Cluedo was originally marketed as "The Great New Detective Game" upon its launch in 1949 in North America. A deal was quickly struck to license "The Great New Sherlock Holmes Game" from the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle estate. Advertising at the time suggested players would take on the guise of "Sherlock Holmes following the path of the criminal", but no depictions of Holmes appear in the advertising or on the box. From 1950 until the 1960s, the game was marketed as "The Great Detective Game", at which time it became the "Parker Brothers Detective Game". With the launch of the US 1972 edition, a television commercial showed Holmes and Watson engaged in a particularly competitive game. Adjusting with the times, in 1979 US television commercials a detective, resembling a bumbling Inspector Clouseau from the popular Pink Panther film franchise, looks for clues. In 1986, the marketing slogan added "Classic Detective Game" which persists through the last 2002/2003 edition.

In the UK, Cluedo was marketed as "The Great Detective Game" from the mid-1950s until 2000, when it was rebranded as the "Classic Detective Game". However, in the mid-1950s Waddingtons also adopted a Sherlock Holmes-type detective to adorn their box covers for a brief time, though unlike in the US editions, there was no acknowledgement that the character was actually the famous detective. In the 1980s, as in the US, Sherlock Holmes also appeared in TV advertising of the time, along with other classic detectives such as Sam Spade.

Equipment
The game consists of a board which shows the rooms, corridors, and secret passages of an English country house called Tudor Mansion (named Tudor Close, Tudor Hall, Arlington Grange, Boddy Manor or Boddy Mansion in some editions) in Hampshire, England, in 1926. The game box also includes several coloured playing pieces to represent characters, miniature murder weapon props, two six-sided dice, three sets of cards (describing the aforementioned rooms, characters, or weapons), Solution Cards and an envelope (or a mirror in some editions) to contain one card from each set of cards and a Detective's Notes pad on which are printed lists of rooms, weapons, and characters, so players can keep detailed notes during the game.

Characters
The murder victim in the game was known as "Dr. Black" in the UK edition and "Mr. Boddy" in North American versions. The current UK and North American editions of the game, released by Hasbro in 2023, refer to him as "Boden 'Boddy' Black Jr."

Players' tokens are typically plastic pawns or figurines; the standard edition of Cluedo has six of these suspects:

 * Miss Scarlett (the second "t" was dropped in North American versions after 1963 and added back in 2016), the stock femme fatale character. She is represented by a red token/figurine.

 * Colonel Mustard, a retired military officer with a distinguished career. He is represented by a yellow token/figurine.

 * Mrs. White, the chief domestic servant, typically the housekeeper or cook (known as "Chef White" as of the 2023 edition  ). She is represented by a white token/figurine.
 * In the 2016 edition Mrs. White was replaced by Dr. Orchid, a young biologist and adopted daughter of the victim, represented by a pink token. Dr. Orchid was replaced by Chef White in the 2023 UK and North American editions.

 * Reverend Green (known as Mayor Green as of the 2023 edition  ), the local clergyman. He is represented by a green token/figurine.
 * Known as Mr. Green in North American editions, initially a middle-aged businessman with possible criminal connections turned into a young and handsome playboy.

 * Mrs. Peacock, a stylish widowed socialite (known as "Solicitor Peacock" in the 2023 editions  ). She is represented by a blue token/figurine.

 * Professor Plum, an intelligent yet absent-minded academic. He is represented by a purple token/figurine.

Weapons
The weapon icons are typically made of unfinished pewter (except the rope, which may be plastic or string); special editions have included gold-plated, brass-finished, and sterling silver versions. Early versions of the game included lead piping that was made from actual lead, and which was replaced with a steel version in later editions.

 * Candlestick
 * Dagger (Knife in North American editions)
 * Lead piping (Lead pipe in North American editions)
 * Revolver (first depicted in the UK as a Dreyse M1907 semi-automatic pistol, and in North America as a Colt M1911 pistol)
 * Rope
 * Spanner (Wrench in North American editions)

Rooms
There are nine rooms in the mansion where the murder can take place, laid out around the edge of the square game board. They consist of the hall, the lounge, the dining room, the kitchen, the ballroom, the conservatory, the billiard room, the library, and the study. Each of the four corner rooms contains a secret passage that leads to the room on the opposite diagonal corner of the map. The centre room (often referred to as the cellar or the stairs) is inaccessible to the players, but contains the solution envelope and is not otherwise used during gameplay. Each suspect token has a designated start space marked at the edge of the board. The corridor areas are marked out as square spaces through which the tokens move horizontally or vertically.

Rules
At the beginning of the play, three cards—one suspect, one room, and one weapon—are chosen at random and put into a special envelope, so that no one can see them. These cards represent the solution. The remainder of the cards are distributed among the players.

Players are instructed to assume the token/suspect nearest them. In older versions, the play begins with Miss Scarlett and proceeds clockwise. In modern versions, all players roll the die/dice and the highest total starts the game, with play again proceeding clockwise. Players roll the die/dice and move along the board's corridor spaces, or into the rooms accordingly.

The objective of the game is to deduce the details of the murder, i.e. the cards in the envelope. There are six characters, six murder weapons, and nine rooms, leaving the players with 324 possibilities. As soon as a player enters a room, they may make a suggestion as to the details, naming a suspect, the room they are in, and the weapon. For example: "I suspect Professor Plum, in the Dining Room, with the candlestick". The player's suggestions must include the room they are currently in and may not be made in the corridors. The tokens for the suggested suspect and weapon are immediately moved into that room if they are not both already present. Players may include themselves and weapons/rooms for which they hold cards in their suggestions.

Once a player makes a suggestion, the others are called upon to disprove it. If the player to their left holds any of the three named cards, that player must privately show one (and only one) of the cards to the current player. Otherwise, the process continues clockwise around the table until either one player disproves the accusation, or no one can do so. A player's turn normally ends once their suggestion is completed.

A player who believes they have determined the correct elements may make an accusation on their turn. The accusation can include any room, not necessarily the one occupied by the player (if any), and may be made immediately following a suggestion. The accusing player privately checks the three cards in the envelope. If they match the accusation, the player shows them to everyone and wins; if not, the player returns them to the envelope and may not move nor make suggestions/accusations for the remainder of the game. However, the other players can move their tokens into rooms when making suggestions and they must continue to privately show cards to disprove the suggestions. A player who makes a false accusation while blocking the door to a room must move into that room so others can enter and leave. If all players except one make false accusations, the remaining player wins by default.

If a player's suggestion has brought another player's token into a room, the second player may make their own suggestion in the room when their turn comes up, if desired. If not, they may move out of the room, and if able to reach another room, make a suggestion therein, as usual. In the American version, players are not allowed to make suggestions repeatedly by remaining in one room; if they wish to make a second suggestion, they must first spend a turn out of the room.

Choice of playing piece
The first opportunity is to choose the initial playing piece.

Mrs. Peacock has an immediate advantage of starting one space closer to the first room than any of the other players. Professor Plum can move to the study, and then take the secret passage to the Kitchen, the hardest room to reach.

Traditionally, Miss Scarlett had the advantage of moving first. This has been eliminated with the implementation of the high-roll rule in modern versions.

Navigating the board
The next opportunity is the choice of initial rooms to enter. Again Mrs. Peacock has an advantage in that she is closest to the Conservatory, a corner room with a secret passage, enabling a player on their turn to move immediately to another room and make a suggestion after rolling the dice. Miss Scarlett has a similar advantage to the Lounge. Making as many suggestions as possible maximises how much information a player can gain, which is advantageous. Therefore, moving into a new room as frequently as possible is one way to meet this goal. Players should make good use of the secret passages. Following the shortest path between rooms then is a good choice, even if a player already holds the card representing that room in their hand. As mentioned earlier, blocking the passage of another player prevents them from attaining rooms from which to make suggestions.

Making suggestions
Each player begins the game with three to six cards in their hand, depending on the number of players. Keeping track of which cards are shown to each player is important in deducing the solution. Detective Notes are supplied with the game to help make this task easier. The pads can keep not only a history of which cards are in a player's hand but also which cards have been shown by another player. It can also be useful in deducing which cards the other players have shown one another. For example, if Miss Scarlett disproves Rev. Green's accusation that Mrs. Peacock did the crime in the Ballroom with the Candlestick, a player with both the Ballroom and Mrs. Peacock cards in their hand can then deduce that Miss Scarlett has the Candlestick.

A player makes a suggestion to learn which cards may be eliminated from suspicion, but in some cases, it may be advantageous for a player to include one of their own cards in a suggestion. This technique can be used for both forcing a player to reveal a different card as well as misleading other players into believing a specific card is suspect. Therefore, moving into a room already held in the player's hand may work to their advantage. Suggestions may also be used to thwart a player's opponent. Since every suggestion results in a suspect token being re-located to the suggested room, a suggestion may be used to prevent another player from achieving their intended destination, preventing them from suggesting a particular room, especially if that player appears to be getting close to a solution.

Notetaking
One reason the game is enjoyed by many ages and skill levels is that the complexity of note-taking can increase as a player becomes more skillful. Beginners may simply mark off the cards they have been shown; more advanced players will keep track of who has and who does not have a particular card, possibly with the aid of an additional grid. Expert players may keep track of each suggestion made, knowing that the player who answers it must have at least one of the cards named, which one can be deduced by later events. One can also keep track of which cards a given player has seen, in order to minimise information revealed to that player and/or to read into that player's suggestions.

Editions
Parker Brothers and Waddingtons each produced their own unique editions between 1949 and 1992. Hasbro purchased both companies in the early 1990s and continued to produce unique editions for each market until 2002/2003 when the current edition of Cluedo/Clue was first released. At this time, Hasbro produced a unified product across markets. The game was then localised with regional differences in spelling and naming conventions.

During Cluedo's long history, eight unique Clue editions were published in North America (1949, 1956/1960, 1960/1963, 1972, 1986, 1992, 1996, and 2002), including miniaturised "travel" editions. However, only three distinct editions of Cluedo were released in the UK – the longest of which lasted 47 years from its introduction in 1949 until its first successor in 1996. The eighth North American and fourth UK editions constitute the current shared game design. International versions occasionally developed their own unique designs for specific editions, although most drew on the designs and art from either the US or UK editions, and in some cases mixing elements from both, while localising others – specifically suspect portraits.

In July 2008, Hasbro released a revamped look for Clue in a reinvention called "Clue: Discover the Secrets". This new version of the game offered major changes to the gameplay and to the characters and their backstories.

In July 2016, Hasbro replaced Mrs. White with a new character, Dr. Orchid, represented by an orchid pink piece. In this current standard edition, Mrs. Peacock has a new game-opening opportunity as her starting square is one step closer to the billiard room (with 9steps instead of 10). The squared-off door to the Conservatory makes the room harder for Rev. Green to reach as an opening move and increases the distance between the Ballroom and the Conservatory (from 4steps to 5).

While the suspects' appearance and interior design of Dr. Black's/Mr. Boddy's mansion changed with each edition, the weapons underwent relatively minor changes, with the only major redesign occurring in the fourth 1972 US edition, which was adopted by the second 1996 UK edition and remains the standard configuration across all Classic Detective Game versions since. The artwork for the previous US editions tended to reflect the current popular style at the time they were released. The earlier UK editions were more artistically stylised themes. From 1972 on, the US editions presented lush box cover art depicting the six suspects in various candid poses within a room of the mansion. The UK would finally adopt this style only in its third release in 2000, prior to which Cluedo boxes depicted basic representations of the contents. Such lavish box art illustrations have become a hallmark of the game since copied for the numerous licensed variants which pay homage to Clue.

Cluedo: Discover the Secrets
In August 2008, Hasbro redesigned and updated the board, characters, weapons, and rooms. Changes to the rules of gameplay were made, some to accommodate the new features.

The suspects have new names and backgrounds, as well as differing abilities that may be used during the game. The revolver is now a pistol, the lead pipe and spanner/wrench have been removed, and a baseball bat, axe, dumbbell, trophy, and poison have been added. The nine rooms have changed to (in clockwise order): Hall, Guest House, Dining Room, Kitchen, Patio, Spa, Theatre, Living Room, and Observatory.

There is also a second deck of cards—the Intrigue cards. In this deck, there are two types of cards, Keepers and Clocks. Keepers are special abilities; for example, "You can see the card". There are eight clocks—the first seven drawn do nothing—whoever draws the eighth is killed by the murderer and out of the game.

The player must move to the indoor swimming pool in the centre of the board to make an accusation. This adds some challenge versus the ability to make accusations from anywhere in the original game.

The most significant change to gameplay is that once the suspect cards have been taken, the remaining cards are dealt so that all players have an even number of cards (rather than dealt out so that "one player may have a slight advantage"). This means that depending on the number of players a number of cards are left over. These cards are placed face down in the middle and are not seen unless a player takes a turn in the pool room to look at them.

The changes to the game have been criticised in the media, and by fans of the game, for unnecessarily altering classic cultural icons.

, Hasbro no longer sells the game via its website, but they do continue to sell a version of it as part of their Grab & Go travel series. Notably, it plays identically to standard classic rules but visually continues to use the new Discover the Secrets room layout, and two of the new weapons, as well as other design artwork. However, the Intrigue cards are no longer a part of the game.

Clue/Cluedo: The Classic Mystery Game
Clue/Cluedo is a digital adaptation based on the official Hasbro board game developed by Marmalade Game Studio for iOS and Android mobile devices as well as Steam and Nintendo Switch. The object of the game is to determine who killed the game's victim Dr. Black (or Mr. Boddy). The player, as one of the six suspects, will ask questions and take notes. The overall goal is to solve the crime first.

Notable editions

 * Clue "Master Detective" (1988), an expanded version of the game featuring 12 rooms, 10 characters, and eight weapons with support for up to 10 players. In addition to the regular cast, Clue Master Detective adds Miss Peach, Monsieur Brunette, Madame Rose, and Sergeant Gray to the list of suspects. It also added poison and a horseshoe to the assortment of weapons. The fountain, the gazebo, the courtyard, and the carriage house were added to the list of rooms. This game is currently published in the USA by Winning Moves Games USA.
 * Cluedo: 50th Anniversary (1999), also released as Clue: 50th Anniversary in the United States in 1998, this standard edition came in a "deluxe" format with the option to play with an extra murder weapon, a bottle of poison. This edition was also issued in a miniaturised Cluedo European travel version. Drew Struzan provided artwork for the game, which was originally created for the US 1996 edition and additionally used for The Limited Gift Edition and the US Clue Card Game, but he did not create the Rev. Green portrait used in the Cluedo editions.
 * Clue "Nostalgia Edition" (2003, 2007) is a retro Nostalgia edition of the game, essentially a re-issue of the 1963 design in a wooden box. A custom version of the game was also released in the US by Restoration Hardware as Wooden Box Clue with different cover art. In the UK it was released under the Cluedo brand, and was an official re-issue of the original 1949 Waddingtons' design.
 * Clue "Vintage Edition" (2005, 2009), also released as Cluedo "Vintage Edition", is a re-formatted nostalgia edition into a "vintage" bookshelf collection along with a series of other popular board games. In the Cluedo version, they continued to use the 1963 design and adapted it for the UK market for the first time with localised characters and naming conventions.

Franchise
The board game spawned a franchise, which has included a 1985 feature film, a 1997 musical, a 2011 mini-series, numerous books and several video games.

Worldwide differences
Besides some rule differences listed above, some versions label the characters, weapons, rooms and in some instances the game itself differently.

In Canada and the U.S., the game is known as Clue. It was retitled because the traditional British board game Ludo, on which the name is based, was less well known there than its American variant Parcheesi.

The North American versions of Clue also replace the character "Reverend Green" from the original Cluedo with "Mr. Green". This is the only region to continue to make such a change. Minor changes include "Miss Scarlett" with her name spelled with one 't', the spanner being called a wrench, and the dagger being renamed a knife. In the 2016 U.S. edition, the knife was changed to a dagger. Until 2003, the lead piping was known as the lead pipe only in the North American edition.

In some international versions of the game (mostly the Spanish-language ones), the colours of some pieces are different, so as to correspond with the changes to each suspect's unique foreign name variations. In some cases, rooms and weapons are changed in addition to other regional variances.

In South America, it is licensed and sold under several names. It is marketed as [sic] in Brazil.

Recognition
Games magazine included Clue in their Top 100 Games of 1980, praising it as "still the classic detective game", Top 100 Games of 1981 ("[the] characters in this 32-year-old game have become household words"), and Top 100 Games of 1982 ("Millions love this classic mystery game").

title: Cluedo


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Talk:Tomahawk (missile family)

Launch Weight
what is the total launch weight? does the missile mass figure include the warhead as it seems to make a big difference

Question
Can someone get an answerfor me? What is the future of BGM-109 Tomahawk? Is there any improvements that can be made on it?

Spain
I think Spain has acquired a number of tomahawk recently so I think the Spanish Navy should be mentioned as operator (as July 21st 2005, see http://www.elpais.es for the news)
 * At the present (Dec 2006) Spain (as the Netherlands) is in the process of adquisition, but don´t have them onboard any warship (or at least don't have notice). More links: Defensa article, Terra article. Please anyone update the article if the criteria is that authorized countries are listed, or whenever the Tomahawks are delivered and loaded.

Acquiring the missiles is one thing. For the surface ships, the launching system will be the VLS Mk 41 system. For Foreign sales, these systems are restricted down to capable of launching supporting only the missile type the navy has at that time. Therefore the Mk41 system will need some modification to support the missile in addition to the Tomahawk Weapon Control System being added to the ships. To my knowledge that is not yet done. Suspect eventually the newer German ships will acquire and add this capability.

Operational history - Gulf War
The information is not totally correct. I was there onboard the Paul F Foster at the time as a Tomahawk FC. First of all the Foster did not launch the first salvo, it launched a single missile fired as part of the first salvo (from various ships). I also realize that it states the Foster was the first, as per the cited source. But the official reply given by the USN, and as told to us at the time when they higher ups and manufacture reps came on board, was that the Paul F Foster was the first to fire a Tomahawk from the Persian Gulf, and that the submarine was the first to fire a Tomahawk from the Red Sea. Due to time zone differences and from different satellites, they were officially unable to determine which of the two was the first one fired.

Unofficially, we (all us Tomahawk FC's onboard the Foster) knew otherwise. When they told us that, we all turned and looked at each other but did not say anything at the time. As we knew better. The first missile to be launched was supposed to be from the USS Missouri to honor the battleship. Followed briefly seconds later by the submarine in the Red Sea to give sub's their due.

However, shortly before the start of the war, when ships that had Tomahawks were warming up the missiles needed in the first salvo by stabilizing the onboard gyro and uploading all the plan data into the missile etc, we received a radio call. The USS Missouri missile failed to warm up, and they would not be able to bring another Tomahawk up online in time, so had sent out a call if any other ship had a missile it could use for that specific plan and target. Our ship the Paul F Foster responded that we could. We had one missile that was scheduled to be towards the end of the first wave salvo, and another one scheduled early in the second wave shortly after. Both of those Tomahawks were already warmed up and stabilized and we were just about to start uploading all the plan data into the second one. But it being in the second wave, we had time to use another Tomahawk for that scheduled launch so it could be used to be the first missile fired in the Persian Gulf salvo. By the time all that got approved from upper command for us to take the place, etc, and for us to receive the plan number and get that uploaded into the missile, and us actually firing the Tomahawk, we ended up firing it actually a bit late. Can not recall specifically, but something like half a minute later than it was scheduled to be. As it was a several hour flight, this was not big issue. However, we knew we launched it a bit late, and now instead of it being launched a few seconds before the submarines, likely was fired a few seconds after the submarines was. And we were pretty sure the upper command knew this as well but were being generous. Kevin "Hawk" Fisher (talk) 13:50, 4 November 2023 (UTC)

"Kit 2" listed at Redirects for discussion
The redirect [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Kit_2&redirect=no Kit 2] has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at  until a consensus is reached. Steel1943 (talk) 23:17, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Tomahawk (missile family)


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Brahms (disambiguation)

Johannes Brahms (1833–1897) was a German composer and pianist.

Brahms may also refer to:

 * Brahms (surname), a list of notable people with the surname
 * Brahms (crater), a crater on Mercury
 * 1818 Brahms, main-belt asteroid
 * Brahms, 2015 French graphic novel by Jul Maroh
 * Brahms: The Boy II, a 2020 horror film

title: Brahms (disambiguation)


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Purcell (disambiguation)

Henry Purcell (1659–1695) was an English composer.

Purcell may also refer to:

Places

 * Purcell, Indiana, an unincorporated community in Johnson Township, Knox County, Indiana
 * Purcell, Missouri, a city in Jasper County, Missouri, United States
 * Purcell, Oklahoma, a city in and the county seat of McClain County, Oklahoma, United States
 * Purcell School, a specialist music school in Hertfordshire, England
 * Purcell Mountains, a component of the Columbia Mountains, British Columbia, Canada

People with the surname

 * Purcell (surname)

Other uses

 * Purcell (architects), formerly Purcell Miller Tritton, a British architectural firm founded in 1947

title: Purcell (disambiguation)


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Wagner (disambiguation)

Richard Wagner (1813–1883) was a German composer.

Wagner may also refer to:

People

 * Wagner (surname), including a list of people
 * Wagner (given name), a list of people
 * Wágner, a given name and surname, including a list of people
 * Wagner (singer), Brazilian singer and participant in The X Factor (Wagner Fiuza-Carrilho)
 * Wágner (footballer, born 1945), Brazilian football manager and former midfielder (Wágner Canotilho)
 * Wagner (footballer, born 1966), Brazilian football forward (Antonio Wagner de Moraes)
 * Wágner (footballer, born 1973), Brazilian football striker (Wágner Pires de Almeida)
 * Wagner (footballer, born 1978), Brazilian football manager and former attacking midfielder (Wagner Santos Lago)
 * Wágner (footballer, born 1985), Brazilian football attacking midfielder (Wágner Ferreira dos Santos)
 * Wágner (footballer, born 1987), Brazilian football forward (Wágner de Andrade Borges)
 * Wágner (footballer, born 1989), Brazilian football centre-back (Wágner Luiz Fogolari)
 * Wagner (footballer, born 1991), Brazilian football attacking midfielder (Wagner Ricardo Silva da Silva)

United States

 * Wagner (community), Wisconsin, an unincorporated community
 * Wagner, Montana, an unincorporated village
 * Wagner, South Dakota, a city
 * Wagner, Wisconsin, a town
 * Wagner Township, Clayton County, Iowa
 * Wagner Township, Aitkin County, Minnesota
 * Wagner Lake, a lake in Minnesota

Canada

 * Wagner, Alberta, a hamlet

Outer space

 * Wagner (crater), on the planet Mercury
 * 3992 Wagner, a main-belt asteroid

Fictional characters

 * Wagner, in Christopher Marlowe's play Doctor Faustus, Goethe's Faust and Gounod's opera Faust
 * Wagner, a shaman in the video game Fire Emblem: Fūin no Tsurugi
 * Wagner, a dragon in the video game Odin Sphere
 * Wagner, a pig in the Finnish comic strip Viivi & Wagner
 * Kurt Wagner, a.k.a. Nightcrawler (comics), a character in the Marvel universe

Business

 * Nestlé Wagner, a frozen pizza brand
 * Wagner Manufacturing Company, an cookware and metal products maker (1891–1952)
 * Wagner Motorcycle Company, an American manufacturer (1901–1914)

Military

 * Wagner Group, a Russian paramilitary organisation
 * USS Wagner, a destroyer escort

Schools

 * Wagner College, a private liberal arts college on Staten Island, New York City
 * Wagner Seahawks, the athletic program of Wagner College
 * Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, New York University
 * Karen Wagner High School, a high school in San Antonio, Texas
 * W.P. Wagner High School, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

Other uses

 * Wagner (mini-series), a 1983 television series about Richard Wagner

title: Wagner (disambiguation)


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House of Medici

The House of Medici was an Italian banking family and political dynasty that first consolidated power in the Republic of Florence under Cosimo de' Medici during the first half of the 15th century. The family originated in the Mugello region of Tuscany, and prospered gradually until it was able to fund the Medici Bank. This bank was the largest in Europe during the 15th century and facilitated the Medicis' rise to political power in Florence, although they officially remained citizens rather than monarchs until the 16th century.

The Medici produced four popes of the Catholic Church—Pope Leo X (1513–1521), Pope Clement VII (1523–1534), Pope Pius IV (1559–1565) and Pope Leo XI (1605)—and two queens of France—Catherine de' Medici (1547–1559) and Marie de' Medici (1600–1610). In 1532, the family acquired the hereditary title Duke of Florence. In 1569, the duchy was elevated to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany after territorial expansion. The Medici ruled the Grand Duchy from its inception until 1737, with the death of Gian Gastone de' Medici. The grand duchy witnessed degrees of economic growth under the early grand dukes, but was bankrupt by the time of Cosimo III de' Medici (r. 1670–1723).

The Medicis' wealth and influence was initially derived from the textile trade guided by the wool guild of Florence, the Arte della Lana. Like other families ruling in Italian signorie, the Medici dominated their city's government, were able to bring Florence under their family's power, and created an environment in which art and humanism flourished. The Italian Renaissance was inspired by the Medici along with other families of Italy, such as the Visconti and Sforza in Milan, the Este in Ferrara, the Borgia and Della Rovere in Rome, and the Gonzaga in Mantua.

The Medici Bank, from when it was created in 1397 to its fall in 1494, was one of the most prosperous and respected institutions in Europe, and the Medici family was considered the wealthiest in Europe for a time. From this base, they acquired political power initially in Florence and later in wider Italy and Europe. They were among the earliest businesses to use the general ledger system of accounting through the development of the double-entry bookkeeping system for tracking credits and debits.

The Medici family have claimed to have funded the invention of the piano and opera,  financed the construction of Saint Peter's Basilica and Santa Maria del Fiore, and were patrons of Brunelleschi, Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, Machiavelli, Galileo, and Francesco Redi, among many others in the arts and sciences. They were also protagonists of the Counter-Reformation, from the beginning of the Reformation through the Council of Trent and the French Wars of Religion.

History
The Medici family came from the agricultural Mugello region north of Florence, and they are first mentioned in a document of 1230. The origin of the name is uncertain. Medici is the plural of medico, meaning "medical doctor". The dynasty began with the founding of the Medici Bank in Florence in 1397.

Rise to power
For most of the 13th century, the leading banking centre in Italy was Siena. But in 1298, one of the leading banking families of Europe, the Bonsignoris, went bankrupt, and the city of Siena lost its status as the banking centre of Italy to Florence. Until the late 14th century, the leading family of Florence was the House of Albizzi. In 1293, the Ordinances of Justice were enacted; effectively, they became the constitution of the Republic of Florence throughout the Italian Renaissance. The city's numerous luxurious palazzi were becoming surrounded by townhouses built by the prospering merchant class.

The main challengers to the Albizzi family were the Medici, first under Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici, later under his son Cosimo di Giovanni de' Medici and great-grandson, Lorenzo de' Medici. The Medici controlled the Medici Bank—then Europe's largest bank—and an array of other enterprises in Florence and elsewhere. In 1433, the Albizzi managed to have Cosimo exiled. The next year, however, a pro-Medici Signoria (civic government) led by Tommaso Soderini, Oddo Altoviti and Lucca Pitti was elected and Cosimo returned. The Medici became the city's leading family, a position they would hold for the next three centuries. Florence remained a republic until 1537, traditionally marking the end of the High Renaissance in Florence, but the instruments of republican government were firmly under the control of the Medici and their allies, save during intervals after 1494 and 1527. Cosimo and Lorenzo rarely held official posts but were the unquestioned leaders.

The Medici family was connected to most other elite families of the time through marriages of convenience, partnerships, or employment, so the family had a central position in the social network: several families had systematic access to the rest of the elite families only through the Medici, perhaps similar to banking relationships. Some examples of these families include the Bardi, Altoviti, Ridolfi, Cavalcanti and the Tornabuoni. This has been suggested as a reason for the rise of the Medici family.

Members of the family rose to some prominence in the early 14th century in the wool trade, especially with France and Spain. Despite the presence of some Medici in the city's government institutions, they were still far less notable than other outstanding families such as the Albizzi or the Strozzi. One Salvestro de' Medici was speaker of the woolmakers' guild during the Ciompi revolt of 1378–82, and one Antonio de' Medici was exiled from Florence in 1396. Involvement in another plot in 1400 caused all branches of the family to be banned from Florentine politics for twenty years, with the exception of two.

15th century
Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici (c. 1360–1429), son of Averardo de' Medici (1320–1363), increased the wealth of the family through his creation of the Medici Bank, and became one of the richest men in the city of Florence. Although he never held any political office, he gained strong popular support for the family through his support for the introduction of a proportional system of taxation. Giovanni's son Cosimo the Elder, Pater Patriae (father of the country), took over in 1434 as gran maestro (the unofficial head of the Florentine Republic).

The Medici additionally benefited from the discovery of vast deposits of alum in Tolfa in 1461. Alum is essential as a mordant in the dyeing of certain cloths and was used extensively in Florence, where the main industry was textile manufacturing. Before the Medici, the Turks were the only exporters of alum, so Europe was forced to buy from them until the discovery in Tolfa. Pius II granted the Medici family a monopoly on the mining there, making them the primary producers of alum in Europe.

Three successive generations of the Medici—Cosimo, Piero, and Lorenzo—ruled over Florence through the greater part of the 15th century. They clearly dominated Florentine representative government without abolishing it altogether. These three members of the Medici family had great skills in the management of so "restive and independent a city" as Florence. When Lorenzo died in 1492, however, his son Piero proved quite incapable of responding successfully to challenges caused by the French invasion of Italy in 1492, and within two years, he and his supporters were forced into exile and replaced with a republican government.

Piero de' Medici (1416–1469), Cosimo's son, was only in power for five years (1464–1469). He was called "Piero the Gouty" because of the gout that pained his foot and led to his death. Unlike his father, Piero had little interest in the arts. Due to his illness, he mostly stayed at home bedridden, and therefore did little to further the Medici control of Florence while in power. As such, Medici rule stagnated until the next generation, when Piero's son Lorenzo took over.

Lorenzo de' Medici (1449–1492), called "the Magnificent", was more capable of leading and ruling a city, but he neglected the family banking business, which led to its ultimate ruin. To ensure the continuance of his family's success, Lorenzo planned his children's future careers for them. He groomed the headstrong Piero II to follow as his successor in civil leadership; Giovanni (future Pope Leo X) was placed in the church at an early age; and his daughter Maddalena was provided with a sumptuous dowry to make a politically advantageous marriage to a son of Pope Innocent VIII that cemented the alliance between the Medici and the Roman branches of the Cybo and Altoviti families.

The Pazzi conspiracy of 1478 was an attempt to depose the Medici family by killing Lorenzo with his younger brother Giuliano during Easter services; the assassination attempt ended with the death of Giuliano and an injured Lorenzo. The conspiracy involved the Pazzi and Salviati families, both rival banking families seeking to end the influence of the Medici, as well as the priest presiding over the church services, the Archbishop of Pisa, and even Pope Sixtus IV to a degree. The conspirators approached Sixtus IV in the hopes of gaining his approval, as he and the Medici had a long rivalry themselves, but the pope gave no official sanction to the plan. Despite his refusal of official approval, the pope nonetheless allowed the plot to proceed without interfering, and, after the failed assassination of Lorenzo, also gave dispensation for crimes done in the service of the church. After this, Lorenzo adopted his brother's illegitimate son Giulio de' Medici (1478–1535), the future Pope Clement VII. Lorenzo's son Piero II took over as the head of Florence after Lorenzo's death. The Medici were expelled from Florence from 1494 to 1512 after Piero acceded to all of the demands of invader Charles VIII of France.

16th century
The exile of the Medici lasted until 1512, after which the "senior" branch of the family—those descended from Cosimo the Elder—were able to rule until the assassination of Alessandro de' Medici, first Duke of Florence, in 1537. This century-long rule was interrupted only on two occasions (between 1494–1512 and 1527–1530), when anti-Medici factions took control of Florence. Following the assassination of Duke Alessandro, power passed to the "junior" Medici branch—those descended from Lorenzo the Elder, the youngest son of Giovanni di Bicci, starting with his great-great-grandson Cosimo I "the Great".

Cosimo the Elder and his father started the Medici foundations in banking and manufacturing—including a form of franchises. The family's influence grew with its patronage of wealth, art, and culture. Ultimately, it reached its zenith in the papacy and continued to flourish for centuries afterward as Dukes of Florence and Tuscany. At least half, probably more, of Florence's people were employed by the Medici and their foundational branches in business.

Medici popes
The Medici briefly became leaders of Western Christendom through their two famous 16th century popes, Leo X and Clement VII. Both also served as de facto political rulers of Rome, Florence, and large swaths of Italy known as the Papal States. They were generous patrons of the arts who commissioned masterpieces such as Raphael's Transfiguration and Michelangelo's The Last Judgment; however, their reigns coincided with troubles for the Vatican, including Martin Luther's Protestant Reformation and the infamous sack of Rome in 1527.

Leo X's fun-loving pontificate bankrupted Vatican coffers and accrued massive debts. From Leo's election as pope in 1513 to his death in 1521, Florence was overseen, in turn, by Giuliano de' Medici, Duke of Nemours, Lorenzo de' Medici, Duke of Urbino, and Giulio de' Medici, the latter of whom became Pope Clement VII.

Clement VII's tumultuous pontificate was dominated by a rapid succession of political crises—many long in the making—that resulted in the sack of Rome by the armies of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V in 1527 and rise of the Salviati, Altoviti and Strozzi as the leading bankers of the Roman Curia. From the time of Clement's election as pope in 1523 until the sack of Rome, Florence was governed by the young Ippolito de' Medici (future cardinal and vice-chancellor of the Holy Roman Church), Alessandro de' Medici (future duke of Florence), and their guardians. In 1530, after allying himself with Charles V, Pope Clement VII succeeded in securing the engagement of Charles V's daughter Margeret of Austria to his illegitimate nephew (reputedly his son) Alessandro de' Medici. Clement also convinced Charles V to name Alessandro as Duke of Florence. Thus began the reign of Medici monarchs in Florence, which lasted two centuries.

After securing Alessandro de' Medici's dukedom, Pope Clement VII married off his first cousin, twice removed, Catherine de' Medici, to the son of Emperor Charles V's arch-enemy, King Francis I of France—the future King Henry II. This led to the transfer of Medici blood, through Catherine's daughters, to the royal family of Spain through Elisabeth of Valois, and the House of Lorraine through Claude of Valois.

In 1534, following a lengthy illness, Pope Clement VII died—and with him the stability of the Medici's "senior" branch. In 1535, Ippolito Cardinal de' Medici died under mysterious circumstances. In 1536, Alessandro de' Medici married Charles V's daughter, Margaret of Austria; however, the following year he was assassinated by a resentful cousin, Lorenzino de' Medici. The deaths of Alessandro and Ippolito enabled the Medici's "junior" branch to lead Florence.

Medici Dukes
Another outstanding figure of the 16th-century Medici family was Cosimo I, who rose from relatively modest beginnings in the Mugello to attain supremacy over the whole of Tuscany. Against the opposition of Catherine de' Medici, Pope Paul III and their allies, he prevailed in various battles to conquer Florence's hated rival Siena and found the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. Cosimo purchased a portion of the island of Elba from the Republic of Genoa and based the Tuscan navy there. He died in 1574, succeeded by his eldest surviving son Francesco, whose death without male heirs led to the succession of his younger brother, Ferdinando, in 1587. Francesco married Johanna of Austria, and with his consort produced Eleonora de' Medici, Duchess of Mantua, and Marie de' Medici, Queen of France and Navarre. Through Marie, all succeeding French monarchs (bar the Napoleons) were descended from Francesco.

Ferdinando eagerly assumed the government of Tuscany. He commanded the draining of the Tuscan marshlands, built a road network in southern Tuscany and cultivated trade in Livorno. To augment the Tuscan silk industry, he oversaw the planting of mulberry trees along the major roads (silk worms feed on mulberry leaves). In foreign affairs, he shifted Tuscany away from Habsburg hegemony by marrying the first non-Habsburg marriage candidate since Alessandro, Christina of Lorraine, a granddaughter of Catherine de' Medici. The Spanish reaction was to construct a citadel on their portion of the island of Elba. To strengthen the new Franco-Tuscan alliance, he married his niece, Marie, to Henry IV of France. Henry explicitly stated that he would defend Tuscany from Spanish aggression, but later reneged, after which Ferdinando was forced to marry his heir, Cosimo, to Maria Maddalena of Austria to assuage Spain (where Maria Maddalena's sister Margaret was the incumbent Queen consort). Ferdinando also sponsored a Tuscan expedition to the New World with the intention of establishing a Tuscan colony, an enterprise that brought no result for permanent colonial acquisitions.

Despite all of these incentives for economic growth and prosperity, the population of Florence at the dawn of the 17th century was a mere 75,000, far smaller than the other capitals of Italy (i.e., Rome, Milan, Venice, Palermo, and Naples). Francesco and Ferdinando, due to lax distinction between Medici and Tuscan state property, are thought to have been wealthier than their ancestor, Cosimo de' Medici, the founder of the dynasty. The Grand Duke alone had the prerogative to exploit the state's mineral and salt resources, and the fortunes of the Medici were directly tied to the Tuscan economy.

17th century

Ferdinando, although no longer a cardinal, exercised much influence at successive conclaves. In 1605, Ferdinando succeeded in getting his candidate, Alessandro de' Medici, elected Pope Leo XI. He died the same month, but his successor, Pope Paul V, was also pro-Medici. Ferdinando's pro-papal foreign policy, however, had drawbacks. Tuscany was overrun with religious orders, not all of whom were obliged to pay taxes. Ferdinando died in 1609, leaving an affluent realm; his inaction in international affairs, however, would have long-reaching consequences down the line.

In France, Marie de' Medici was acting as regent for her son, Louis XIII. Louis repudiated her pro-Habsburg policy in 1617. She lived the rest of her life deprived of any political influence.

Ferdinando's successor, Cosimo II, reigned for less than 12 years. He married Maria Maddalena of Austria, with whom he had his eight children, including Margherita de' Medici, Ferdinando II de' Medici, and an Anna de' Medici. He is most remembered as the patron of astronomer Galileo Galilei, whose 1610 treatise, Sidereus Nuncius, was dedicated to him. Cosimo died of consumption (tuberculosis) in 1621.

Cosimo's elder son, Ferdinando, was not yet of legal maturity to succeed him, thus Maria Maddalena and his grandmother, Christina of Lorraine, acted as regents. Their collective regency is known as the Turtici. Maria Maddelana's temperament was analogous to Christina's, and together they aligned Tuscany with the papacy, re-doubled the Tuscan clergy, and allowed the heresy trial of Galileo Galilei to occur. Upon the death of the last Duke of Urbino (Francesco Maria II), instead of claiming the duchy for Ferdinando, who was married to the Duke of Urbino's granddaughter and heiress, Vittoria della Rovere, they permitted it to be annexed by Pope Urban VIII. In 1626, they banned any Tuscan subject from being educated outside the Grand Duchy, a law later overturned, but resurrected by Maria Maddalena's grandson, Cosimo III. Harold Acton, an Anglo-Italian historian, ascribed the decline of Tuscany to the Turtici regency.

Grand Duke Ferdinado was obsessed with new technology, and had a variety of hygrometers, barometers, thermometers, and telescopes installed in the Palazzo Pitti. In 1657, Leopoldo de' Medici, the Grand Duke's youngest brother, established the Accademia del Cimento, organized to attract scientists to Florence from all over Tuscany for mutual study.

Tuscany participated in the Wars of Castro (the last time Medicean Tuscany proper was involved in a conflict) and inflicted a defeat on the forces of Pope Urban VIII in 1643. The war effort was costly and the treasury so empty because of it that when the Castro mercenaries were paid for, the state could no longer afford to pay interest on government bonds, with the result that the interest rate was lowered by 0.75%. At that time, the economy was so decrepit that barter trade became prevalent in rural market places.

Ferdinando died on 23 May 1670 afflicted by apoplexy and dropsy. He was interred in the Basilica of San Lorenzo, the Medici's necropolis. At the time of his death, the population of the grand duchy was 730,594; the streets were lined with grass and the buildings on the verge of collapse in Pisa.

Ferdinando's marriage to Vittoria della Rovere produced two children: Cosimo III de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and Francesco Maria de' Medici, Duke of Rovere and Montefeltro. Upon Vittoria's death in 1694, her allodial possessions, the Duchies of Rovere and Montefeltro, passed to her younger son.

18th century: the fall of the dynasty

Cosimo III married Marguerite Louise d'Orléans, a granddaughter of Henry IV of France and Marie de' Medici. An exceedingly discontented pairing, this union produced three children, notably Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici, Electress Palatine, and the last Medicean Grand Duke of Tuscany, Gian Gastone de' Medici.

Johann Wilhelm, Elector Palatine, Anna Maria Luisa's spouse, successfully requisitioned the dignity Royal Highness for the Grand Duke and his family in 1691, despite the fact that they had no claim to any kingdom. Cosimo frequently paid the Holy Roman Emperor, his nominal feudal overlord, exorbitant dues, and he sent munitions to the emperor during the Battle of Vienna.

The Medici lacked male heirs, and by 1705, the grand ducal treasury was virtually bankrupt. In comparison to the 17th century, the population of Florence declined by 50%, and the population of the grand duchy as a whole declined by an estimated 40%. Cosimo desperately tried to reach a settlement with the European powers, but Tuscany's legal status was very complicated: the area of the grand duchy formerly comprising the Republic of Siena was technically a Spanish fief, while the territory of the old Republic of Florence was thought to be under imperial suzerainty. Upon the death of his first son, Cosimo contemplated restoring the Florentine republic, either upon Anna Maria Luisa's death, or on his own, if he predeceased her. The restoration of the republic would entail resigning Siena to the Holy Roman Empire, but, regardless, it was vehemently endorsed by his government. Europe largely ignored Cosimo's plan. Only Great Britain and the Dutch Republic gave any credence to it, and the plan ultimately died with Cosimo III in 1723.

On 4 April 1718, Great Britain, France and the Dutch Republic (also later, Austria) selected Don Carlos of Spain, the elder child of Elisabeth Farnese and Philip V of Spain, as the Tuscan heir. By 1722, the electress was not even acknowledged as heiress, and Cosimo was reduced to spectator at the conferences for Tuscany's future. On 25 October 1723, six days before his death, Grand Duke Cosimo disseminated a final proclamation commanding that Tuscany stay independent: Anna Maria Luisa would succeed uninhibited to Tuscany after Gian Gastone, and the grand duke reserved the right to choose his successor. However, these portions of his proclamation were completely ignored, and he died a few days later.

Gian Gastone despised the electress for engineering his catastrophic marriage to Anna Maria Franziska of Saxe-Lauenburg; while she abhorred her brother's liberal policies, he repealed all of his father's anti-Semitic statutes. Gian Gastone revelled in upsetting her. On 25 October 1731, a Spanish detachment occupied Florence on behalf of Don Carlos, who disembarked in Tuscany in December of the same year. The Ruspanti, Gian Gastone's decrepit entourage, loathed the electress, and she them. Duchess Violante of Bavaria, Gian Gastone's sister-in-law, tried to withdraw the grand duke from the sphere of influence of the Ruspanti by organising banquets. His conduct at the banquets was less than regal; he often vomited repeatedly into his napkin, belched, and regaled those present with socially inappropriate jokes. Following a sprained ankle in 1731, he remained confined to his bed for the rest of his life. The bed, often smelling of faeces, was occasionally cleaned by Violante.

In 1736, following the War of the Polish Succession, Don Carlos was disbarred from Tuscany, and Francis III of Lorraine was made heir in his stead. In January 1737, the Spanish troops withdrew from Tuscany, and were replaced by Austrians.

Gian Gastone died on 9 July 1737, surrounded by prelates and his sister. Anna Maria Luisa was offered a nominal regency by the Prince de Craon until the new grand duke could peregrinate to Tuscany, but declined. Upon her brother's death, she received all the House of Medici's allodial possessions.

Anna Maria Luisa signed the Patto di Famiglia ("family pact") on 31 October 1737. In collaboration with the Holy Roman Emperor and Grand Duke Francis of Lorraine, she willed all the personal property of the Medici to the Tuscan state, provided that nothing was ever removed from Florence.

The "Lorrainers", as the occupying forces were called, were popularly loathed, but the regent, the Prince de Craon, allowed the electress to live unperturbed in the Palazzo Pitti. She occupied herself with financing and overseeing the construction of the Basilica of San Lorenzo, started in 1604 by Ferdinando I, at a cost to the state of 1,000 crowns per week.

The electress donated much of her fortune to charity: £4,000 a month. On 19 February 1743, she died, and the grand ducal line of the House of Medici died with her. The Florentines grieved her, and she was interred in the crypt that she helped to complete, San Lorenzo.

The extinction of the main Medici dynasty and the accession in 1737 of Francis Stephen, Duke of Lorraine and husband of Maria Theresa of Austria, led to Tuscany's temporary inclusion in the territories of the Austrian crown. The line of the Princes of Ottajano, an extant branch of the House of Medici who were eligible to inherit the grand duchy of Tuscany when the last male of the senior branch died in 1737, could have carried on as Medici sovereigns but for the intervention of Europe's major powers, which allocated the sovereignty of Florence elsewhere.

As a consequence, the grand duchy expired and the territory became a secundogeniture of the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty. The first grand duke of the new dynasty, Francis I, was a great-great-great-grandson of Francesco I de' Medici, thus he continued the Medicean Dynasty on the throne of Tuscany through the female line. The Habsburgs were deposed in favor of the House of Bourbon-Parma in 1801 (themselves deposed in 1807), but were later restored at the Congress of Vienna. Tuscany became a province of the United Kingdom of Italy in 1861. However, several extant branches of the House of Medici survive, including the Princes of Ottajano, the Medici Tornaquinci, and the Verona Medici Counts of Caprara and Gavardo. (see Medici family tree)

Legacy
The greatest accomplishments of the Medici were in the sponsorship of art and architecture, mainly early and High Renaissance art and architecture. The Medici were responsible for a high proportion of the major Florentine works of art created during their period of rule. Their support was critical, since artists generally began work on their projects only after they had received commissions. Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici, the first patron of the arts in the family, aided Masaccio and commissioned Filippo Brunelleschi for the reconstruction of the Basilica of San Lorenzo, Florence in 1419. Cosimo the Elder's notable artistic associates were Donatello and Fra Angelico. In later years the most significant protégé of the Medici family was Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564), who produced work for a number of family members, beginning with Lorenzo the Magnificent, who was said to be extremely fond of the young Michelangelo and invited him to study the family collection of antique sculpture. Lorenzo also served as patron to Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) for seven years. Indeed, Lorenzo was an artist in his own right and an author of poetry and song; his support of the arts and letters is seen as a high point in Medici patronage.

After Lorenzo's death the puritanical Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola rose to prominence, warning Florentines against excessive luxury. Under Savonarola's fanatical leadership many great works were "voluntarily" destroyed in the Bonfire of the Vanities (February 7, 1497). The following year, on 23 May 1498, Savonarola and two young supporters were burned at the stake in the Piazza della Signoria, the same location as his bonfire. In addition to commissions for art and architecture, the Medici were prolific collectors and today their acquisitions form the core of the Uffizi museum in Florence. In architecture, the Medici were responsible for some notable features of Florence, including the Uffizi Gallery, the Boboli Gardens, the Belvedere, the Medici Chapel and the Palazzo Medici.

Later, in Rome, the Medici popes continued in the family tradition of patronizing artists in Rome. Pope Leo X would chiefly commission works from Raphael, whereas Pope Clement VII commissioned Michelangelo to paint the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel just before the pontiff's death in 1534. Eleanor of Toledo, a princess of Spain and wife of Cosimo I the Great, purchased the Pitti Palace from Buonaccorso Pitti in 1550. Cosimo in turn patronized Vasari, who erected the Uffizi Gallery in 1560 and founded the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno – ("Academy of the Arts of Drawing") in 1563. Marie de' Medici, widow of Henry IV of France and mother of Louis XIII, is the subject of a commissioned cycle of paintings known as the Marie de' Medici cycle, painted for the Luxembourg Palace by court painter Peter Paul Rubens in 1622–23.

Although none of the Medici themselves were scientists, the family is well known to have been the patrons of the famous Galileo Galilei, who tutored multiple generations of Medici children and was an important figurehead for his patron's quest for power. Galileo's patronage was eventually abandoned by Ferdinando II, when the Inquisition accused Galileo of heresy. However, the Medici family did afford the scientist a safe haven for many years. Galileo named the four largest moons of Jupiter after four Medici children he tutored, although the names Galileo used are not the names currently used.

Main genealogical table
The table below shows the origins of the Medici:

This extract shows the branch that gave rise to the celebrated branch of the Medici descending from Giovanni "di Bicci", who founded the Medici fortunes:

This is the branch of Cosimo's brother, Lorenzo, called the "Popolano" Branch, which gave rise to the Grand-Dukes of Tuscany:

Coats of arms
The origin of the Medici coat of arms is not recorded. One unproven story traces their ancestry to a knight of Charlemagne's, Averardo, who defeated a giant, Mugello. In reward, Charlemagne is said to have rewarded Averardo with the shield mauled by the giant, with the dents in the shape of balls, and the giant's lands in Mugello.

The simplest, though also unproven, theory suggests that the balls represented coins copied from the coat of arms of the Guild of Moneychangers (Arte del Cambio) to which the Medici belonged. That shield was red strewn with Byzantine coins (bezants). The number of balls also varied with time, as shown below. It has also been argued that these coins referenced the three coins or golden balls associated with St. Nicholas, particularly as the saint was invoked by Italian bankers as they took oaths.

As an Italian vocabulary word, "medici" means "medical doctors" and identifications with the family members as physicians may be found among their names as early as the eleventh century. Fanciful stories depict the images as pills or cupping glasses, a late-medieval medical instrument used to draw blood. Pills did not exist until much later and bloodletting was not a common practice at the time of the first Medici coat of arms. Art historian Rocky Ruggiero suggests plausibly however, that the images may represent whole ripe blood oranges that typically are grown in Italy. Although knowledge of vitamins did not exist at the time, the benefit of oranges for certain diseases was recognized and their association with recommendations by medical doctors suggests to Ruggiero that this likely is the imagery intended in the coats of arms for the Medici family.

Alternatively, it has been suggested that the Medici coat of arms was initially inspired by symbols drawn from Etruscan votive sculpture, examples of which feature an oval dome with balls (echoing the forms of the Medici shield), as well as six balls within a triangle (as found in the alternative, triangular version of the Medici emblem). This particular influence offers an explanation for the red hue of the Medici balls, the colour of the terracotta sculpture. It would also have reflected the family's interest in Etruscan art and culture. In addition, the notion of Etruscan votive sculpture would have chimed with the participation of the Medici in the religious custom of offering up votive statues, a practice that recalled the ancient Etruscan convention of donating sculptures in the hope of, or gratitude for, divine favour. Such favours would have included the wish for a strong and healthy family, both for the supplicant and their descendants.

title: House of Medici


text:
Hanlon's razor

Hanlon's razor is an adage or rule of thumb that states:
 * Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

It is a philosophical razor that suggests a way of eliminating unlikely explanations for human behavior. It is probably named after Robert J. Hanlon, who submitted the statement to Murphy's Law Book Two (1980). Similar statements have been recorded since at least the 18th century.

Origin
The adage was a submission credited in print to Robert J. Hanlon of Scranton, Pennsylvania, in a compilation of various jokes related to Murphy's law published in Arthur Bloch's Murphy's Law Book Two: More Reasons Why Things Go Wrong! (1980).

A similar quotation appears in Robert A. Heinlein's novella Logic of Empire (1941). The character Doc in the story describes the "devil theory" fallacy, explaining, "You have attributed conditions to villainy that simply result from stupidity."

Hanlon's razor became well known after its inclusion in the Jargon File, a glossary of computer programmer slang, in 1990. Later that year, the Jargon File editors noted lack of knowledge of the term's derivation and the existence of a similar epigram by William James, although this was possibly intended as a reference to William James Laidlay. In 1996, the Jargon File entry on Hanlon's Razor noted the existence of the phrase in Heinlein's novella, with speculation that Hanlon's Razor might be a corruption of "Heinlein's Razor". The link to Murphy's law was described in a pair of 2001 blog entries by Quentin Stafford-Fraser, citing emails from Joseph E. Bigler. In 2002, the Jargon File entry noted the same. The Jargon File now calls it a "Murphyism".

The name was inspired by Occam's razor.

Other variations of the idea
A variation appears in The Wheels of Chance (1896) by H.G. Wells:"There is very little deliberate wickedness in the world. The stupidity of our selfishness gives much the same results indeed, but in the ethical laboratory it shows a different nature."A similar quote is also misattributed to Napoleon. Andrew Roberts, in his biography of Winston Churchill, quotes from Churchill's correspondence with King George VI in February 1943 regarding disagreements with Charles De Gaulle: His 'insolence ... may be founded on stupidity rather than malice.

Douglas W. Hubbard quoted Hanlon's razor and added "a clumsier but more accurate corollary ...: 'Never attribute to malice or stupidity that which can be explained by moderately rational individuals following incentives in a complex system.'"

title: Hanlon's razor


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Satellite temperature measurement

Satellite temperature measurements are inferences of the temperature of the atmosphere at various altitudes as well as sea and land surface temperatures obtained from radiometric measurements by satellites. These measurements can be used to locate weather fronts, monitor the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, determine the strength of tropical cyclones, study urban heat islands and monitor the global climate. Wildfires, volcanos, and industrial hot spots can also be found via thermal imaging from weather satellites.

Weather satellites do not measure temperature directly. They measure radiances in various wavelength bands. Since 1978 microwave sounding units (MSUs) on National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration polar orbiting satellites have measured the intensity of upwelling microwave radiation from atmospheric oxygen, which is related to the temperature of broad vertical layers of the atmosphere. Measurements of infrared radiation pertaining to sea surface temperature have been collected since 1967.

Satellite datasets show that over the past four decades the troposphere has warmed and the stratosphere has cooled. Both of these trends are consistent with the influence of increasing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases.

Principles
Satellites measure radiances in various wavelength bands, which must then be mathematically inverted to obtain indirect inferences of temperature. The resulting temperature profiles depend on details of the methods that are used to obtain temperatures from radiances. As a result, different groups that have analyzed the satellite data have produced differing temperature datasets.

The satellite time series is not homogeneous. It is constructed from a series of satellites with similar but not identical sensors. The sensors also deteriorate over time, and corrections are necessary for orbital drift and decay. Particularly large differences between reconstructed temperature series occur at the few times when there is little temporal overlap between successive satellites, making intercalibration difficult.

Surface measurements
Infrared radiation can be used to measure both the temperature of the surface (using "window" wavelengths to which the atmosphere is transparent), and the temperature of the atmosphere (using wavelengths for which the atmosphere is not transparent, or measuring cloud top temperatures in infrared windows).

Satellites used to retrieve surface temperatures via measurement of thermal infrared in general require cloud-free conditions. Some of the instruments include the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR), Along Track Scanning Radiometers (AASTR), Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS), the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS), and the ACE Fourier Transform Spectrometer (ACE‐FTS) on the Canadian SCISAT-1 satellite.

Weather satellites have been available to infer sea surface temperature (SST) information since 1967, with the first global composites occurring during 1970. Since 1982, satellites have been increasingly utilized to measure SST and have allowed its spatial and temporal variation to be viewed more fully. For example, changes in SST monitored via satellite have been used to document the progression of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation since the 1970s.

Over land the retrieval of temperature from radiances is harder, because of inhomogeneities in the surface. Studies have been conducted on the urban heat island effect via satellite imagery. By using the fractal technique, Weng, Q. et al. characterized the spatial pattern of urban heat island. Use of advanced very high resolution infrared satellite imagery can be used, in the absence of cloudiness, to detect density discontinuities (weather fronts) such as cold fronts at ground level. Using the Dvorak technique, infrared satellite imagery can be used to determine the temperature difference between the eye and the cloud top temperature of the central dense overcast of mature tropical cyclones to estimate their maximum sustained winds and their minimum central pressures.

Along Track Scanning Radiometers aboard weather satellites are able to detect wildfires, which show up at night as pixels with a greater temperature than 308 K. The Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer aboard the Terra satellite can detect thermal hot spots associated with wildfires, volcanoes, and industrial hot spots.

The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder on the Aqua satellite, launched in 2002, uses infrared detection to measure near-surface temperature.

Stratosphere measurements
Stratospheric temperature measurements are made from the Stratospheric Sounding Unit (SSU) instruments, which are three-channel infrared (IR) radiometers. Since this measures infrared emission from carbon dioxide, the atmospheric opacity is higher and hence the temperature is measured at a higher altitude (stratosphere) than microwave measurements.

Since 1979 the Stratospheric sounding units (SSUs) on the NOAA operational satellites have provided near global stratospheric temperature data above the lower stratosphere. The SSU is a far-infrared spectrometer employing a pressure modulation technique to make measurement in three channels in the 15 μm carbon dioxide absorption band. The three channels use the same frequency but different carbon dioxide cell pressure, the corresponding weighting functions peaks at 29 km for channel 1, 37 km for channel 2 and 45 km for channel 3.

The process of deriving trends from SSUs measurement has proved particularly difficult because of satellite drift, inter-calibration between different satellites with scant overlap and gas leaks in the instrument carbon dioxide pressure cells. Furthermore since the radiances measured by SSUs are due to emission by carbon dioxide the weighting functions move to higher altitudes as the carbon dioxide concentration in the stratosphere increase. Mid to upper stratosphere temperatures shows a strong negative trend interspersed by transient volcanic warming after the explosive volcanic eruptions of El Chichón and Mount Pinatubo, little temperature trend has been observed since 1995. The greatest cooling occurred in the tropical stratosphere consistent with enhanced Brewer-Dobson circulation under greenhouse gas concentrations increase.

Lower stratospheric cooling is mainly caused by the effects of ozone depletion with a possible contribution from increased stratospheric water vapor and greenhouse gases increase. There has been a decline in stratospheric temperatures, interspersed by warmings related to volcanic eruptions. Global Warming theory suggests that the stratosphere should cool while the troposphere warms. The long term cooling in the lower stratosphere occurred in two downward steps in temperature both after the transient warming related to explosive volcanic eruptions of El Chichón and Mount Pinatubo, this behavior of the global stratospheric temperature has been attributed to global ozone concentration variation in the two years following volcanic eruptions. Since 1996 the trend is slightly positive due to ozone recovery juxtaposed to a cooling trend of 0.1K/decade that is consistent with the predicted impact of increased greenhouse gases.

The table below shows the stratospheric temperature trend from the SSU measurements in the three different bands, where negative trend indicated cooling.

Microwave Sounding Unit (MSU) measurements
From 1979 to 2005 the microwave sounding units (MSUs) and since 1998 the Advanced Microwave Sounding Units on NOAA polar orbiting weather satellites have measured the intensity of upwelling microwave radiation from atmospheric oxygen. The intensity is proportional to the temperature of broad vertical layers of the atmosphere. Upwelling radiance is measured at different frequencies; these different frequency bands sample a different weighted range of the atmosphere.

Figure 3 (right) shows the atmospheric levels sampled by different wavelength reconstructions from the satellite measurements, where TLS, TTS, and TTT represent three different wavelengths.

Other microwave measurements
A different technique is used by the Aura spacecraft, the Microwave Limb Sounder, which measure microwave emission horizontally, rather than aiming at the nadir.

Temperature measurements are also made by GPS radio occultation. This technique measures the refraction of the radio waves transmitted by GPS satellites as they propagate in the Earth's atmosphere, thus allowing vertical temperature and moisture profiles to be measured.

Temperature measurements on other planets
Planetary science missions also make temperature measurements on other planets and moons of the solar system, using both infrared techniques (typical of orbiter and flyby missions of planets with solid surfaces) and microwave techniques (more often used for planets with atmospheres). Infrared temperature measurement instruments used in planetary missions include surface temperature measurements taken by the Thermal Emission Spectrometer (TES) instrument on Mars Global Surveyor and the Diviner instrument on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter; and atmospheric temperature measurements taken by the composite infrared spectrometer instrument on the NASA Cassini spacecraft.

Microwave atmospheric temperature measurement instruments include the Microwave Radiometer on the Juno mission to Jupiter.

title: Satellite temperature measurement