text:
Jean le Rond d'Alembert

Jean-Baptiste le Rond d'Alembert (16 November 1717 – 29 October 1783) was a French mathematician, mechanician, physicist, philosopher, and music theorist. Until 1759 he was, together with Denis Diderot, a co-editor of the Encyclopédie. D'Alembert's formula for obtaining solutions to the wave equation is named after him. The wave equation is sometimes referred to as d'Alembert's equation, and the fundamental theorem of algebra is named after d'Alembert in French.

Early years
Born in Paris, d'Alembert was the natural son of the writer Claudine Guérin de Tencin and the chevalier Louis-Camus Destouches, an artillery officer. Destouches was abroad at the time of d'Alembert's birth. Days after birth his mother left him on the steps of the church. According to custom, he was named after the patron saint of the church. D'Alembert was placed in an orphanage for foundling children, but his father found him and placed him with the wife of a glazier, Madame Rousseau, with whom he lived for nearly 50 years. She gave him little encouragement. When he told her of some discovery he had made or something he had written she generally replied,

"You will never be anything but a philosopher—and what is that but an ass who plagues himself all his life, that he may be talked about after he is dead."

Destouches secretly paid for the education of Jean le Rond, but did not want his paternity officially recognised.

Studies and adult life
D'Alembert first attended a private school. The chevalier Destouches left d'Alembert an annuity of 1,200 livres on his death in 1726. Under the influence of the Destouches family, at the age of 12 d'Alembert entered the Jansenist Collège des Quatre-Nations (the institution was also known under the name "Collège Mazarin"). Here he studied philosophy, law, and the arts, graduating as baccalauréat en arts in 1735.

In his later life, d'Alembert scorned the Cartesian principles he had been taught by the Jansenists: "physical promotion, innate ideas and the vortices". The Jansenists steered d'Alembert toward an ecclesiastical career, attempting to deter him from pursuits such as poetry and mathematics. Theology was, however, "rather unsubstantial fodder" for d'Alembert. He entered law school for two years, and was nominated avocat in 1738.

He was also interested in medicine and mathematics. Jean enrolled first as Jean-Baptiste Daremberg and subsequently changed his name, perhaps for reasons of euphony, to d’Alembert.

Later, in recognition of d'Alembert's achievements, Frederick the Great of Prussia proposed the name "d'Alembert" for a suspected (but non-existent) moon of Venus, however d'Alembert refused the honor.

Career

In July 1739 he made his first contribution to the field of mathematics, pointing out the errors he had detected in Analyse démontrée (published 1708 by Charles-René Reynaud) in a communication addressed to the Académie des Sciences. At the time L'analyse démontrée was a standard work, which d'Alembert himself had used to study the foundations of mathematics. D'Alembert was also a Latin scholar of some note and worked in the latter part of his life on a translation of Tacitus, for which he received wide praise including that of Denis Diderot.

In 1740, he submitted his second scientific work from the field of fluid mechanics Mémoire sur la réfraction des corps solides, which was recognised by Clairaut. In this work d'Alembert theoretically explained refraction.

In 1741, after several failed attempts, d'Alembert was elected into the Académie des Sciences. He was later elected to the Berlin Academy in 1746 and a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1748.

In 1743, he published his most famous work, Traité de dynamique, in which he developed his own laws of motion.

When the Encyclopédie was organised in the late 1740s, d'Alembert was engaged as co-editor (for mathematics and science) with Diderot, and served until a series of crises temporarily interrupted the publication in 1757. He authored over a thousand articles for it, including the famous Preliminary Discourse. D'Alembert "abandoned the foundation of Materialism" when he "doubted whether there exists outside us anything corresponding to what we suppose we see." In this way, d'Alembert agreed with the Idealist Berkeley and anticipated the transcendental idealism of Kant.

In 1752, he wrote about what is now called D'Alembert's paradox: that the drag on a body immersed in an inviscid, incompressible fluid is zero.

In 1754, d'Alembert was elected a member of the Académie des sciences, of which he became Permanent Secretary on 9 April 1772.

In 1757, an article by d'Alembert in the seventh volume of the Encyclopedia suggested that the Geneva clergymen had moved from Calvinism to pure Socinianism, basing this on information provided by Voltaire. The Pastors of Geneva were indignant, and appointed a committee to answer these charges. Under pressure from Jacob Vernes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and others, d'Alembert eventually made the excuse that he considered anyone who did not accept the Church of Rome to be a Socinianist, and that was all he meant, and he abstained from further work on the encyclopaedia following his response to the critique.

He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1781.

Music theories
D'Alembert's first exposure to music theory was in 1749 when he was called upon to review a Mémoire submitted to the Académie by Jean-Philippe Rameau. This article, written in conjunction with Diderot, would later form the basis of Rameau's 1750 treatise Démonstration du principe de l'harmonie. D'Alembert wrote a glowing review praising the author's deductive character as an ideal scientific model. He saw in Rameau's music theories support for his own scientific ideas, a fully systematic method with a strongly deductive synthetic structure.

Two years later, in 1752, d'Alembert attempted a fully comprehensive survey of Rameau's works in his Eléments de musique théorique et pratique suivant les principes de M. Rameau. Emphasizing Rameau's main claim that music was a mathematical science that had a single principle from which could be deduced all the elements and rules of musical practice as well as the explicit Cartesian methodology employed, d'Alembert helped to popularise the work of the composer and advertise his own theories. He claims to have "clarified, developed, and simplified" the principles of Rameau, arguing that the single idea of the  was not sufficient to derive the entirety of music. D'Alembert instead claimed that three principles would be necessary to generate the major musical mode, the minor mode, and the identity of octaves. Because he was not a musician, however, d'Alembert misconstrued the finer points of Rameau's thinking, changing and removing concepts that would not fit neatly into his understanding of music.

Although initially grateful, Rameau eventually turned on d'Alembert while voicing his increasing dissatisfaction with J. J. Rousseau's Encyclopédie articles on music. This led to a series of bitter exchanges between the men and contributed to the end of d'Alembert and Rameau's friendship. A long preliminary discourse d'Alembert wrote for the 1762 edition of his Elémens attempted to summarise the dispute and act as a final rebuttal.

D'Alembert also discussed various aspects of the state of music in his celebrated Discours préliminaire of Diderot's Encyclopédie. D'Alembert claims that, compared to the other arts, music, "which speaks simultaneously to the imagination and the senses," has not been able to represent or imitate as much of reality because of the "lack of sufficient inventiveness and resourcefulness of those who cultivate it." He wanted musical expression to deal with all physical sensations rather than merely the passions alone. D'Alembert believed that modern (Baroque) music had only achieved perfection in his age, as there existed no classical Greek models to study and imitate. He claimed that "time destroyed all models which the ancients may have left us in this genre." He praises Rameau as "that manly, courageous, and fruitful genius" who picked up the slack left by Jean-Baptiste Lully in the French musical arts.

Personal life
D'Alembert was a participant in several Parisian salons, particularly those of Marie Thérèse Rodet Geoffrin, of the marquise du Deffand and of Julie de Lespinasse. D'Alembert became infatuated with Julie de Lespinasse, and eventually took up residence with her.

Death
He suffered bad health for many years and his death was as the result of a urinary bladder illness. As a known unbeliever,  D'Alembert was buried in a common unmarked grave.

Legacy
In France, the fundamental theorem of algebra is known as the d'Alembert/Gauss theorem, as an error in d'Alembert's proof was caught by Gauss.

He also created his ratio test, a test to determine if a series converges.

The D'Alembert operator, which first arose in D'Alembert's analysis of vibrating strings, plays an important role in modern theoretical physics.

While he made great strides in mathematics and physics, d'Alembert is also famously known for incorrectly arguing in Croix ou Pile that the probability of a coin landing heads increased for every time that it came up tails. In gambling, the strategy of decreasing one's bet the more one wins and increasing one's bet the more one loses is therefore called the D'Alembert system, a type of martingale.

In South Australia, a small inshore island in south-western Spencer Gulf was named Ile d'Alembert by the French explorer, Nicolas Baudin during his expedition to New Holland. The island is better known by the alternative English name of Lipson Island. The island is a conservation park and seabird rookery.

Fictional portrayal
Diderot portrayed d'Alembert in Le rêve de D'Alembert (D'Alembert's Dream), written after the two men had become estranged. It depicts d'Alembert ill in bed, conducting a debate on materialist philosophy in his sleep.

D'Alembert's Principle, a 1996 novel by Andrew Crumey, takes its title from D'Alembert's principle in physics. Its first part describes d'Alembert's life and his infatuation with Julie de Lespinasse.

List of works

 * Mémoire sur le calcul intégral (1739), prima opera pubblicata
 * Traité de l'équilibre et du mouvement des fluides (1744)
 * Réflexions sur la cause générale des vents (1746)
 * Recherches sur les cordes vibrantes (1747)
 * Essai d'une nouvelle théorie de la résistance des fluides (1752)
 * Essai sur les éléments de philosophie (1759)
 * Éloges lus dans les séances publiques de l'Académie française (1779)
 * Opuscules mathématiques (8 tomi 1761-1780)
 * Œuvres complètes, Éditions CNRS, 2002. ISBN 2-271-06013-3
 * Encyclopédie ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, Flammarion, 1993. ISBN 2-08-070426-5
 * Éloges lus dans les séances publiques de l'Académie française (1779)
 * Opuscules mathématiques (8 tomi 1761-1780)
 * Œuvres complètes, Éditions CNRS, 2002. ISBN 2-271-06013-3
 * Encyclopédie ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, Flammarion, 1993. ISBN 2-08-070426-5

title: Jean le Rond d'Alembert


text:
120s BC

This article concerns the period 129 BC – 120 BC.

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

title: 120s BC


text:
130s BC

This article concerns the period 139 BC – 130 BC.

title: 130s BC


text:
Talk:Quedlinburg

Untitled
Helga -- there is no such word as Patrician in English for the nobility (also a questionable word) in German-speaking countries in this time period. Patrician doesn't work. Sometimes, you can use leading families, but that is also something very specific. Try sticking to "Important" families. Also, one "pays" homage. And there is no such thing in English as whatever you are translating as land lien -- what ARE you talking about? if you mean fief, say so...but be very careful, as it's again, a very specific transaction. Finally -- this single Reichstag was not that important in the way you think it was. At any (and most) such meetings, people paid homage to the king. That's one of the reasons the king held them! JHK

Question
It is questionable that Quedlinburg was anything other than a territory. Yes, the last Abessess was a Princess of the Holy Roman Empire, but some counts also obtained this title and it did not change the status of their territory. I have never seen any evidence or proof or factual history showing it was a territory. The 1815 treaty suggests, Quedlinburg was subsumed under the principality of Halberstadt, not becoming a part of a principality of Quedlinburg. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.211.19.194 (talk) 17:54, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

As this is a page about Quedlinburg there is absolute right to single out this Reichstag.
Of course these things happen(ed) all the time, but this one was the most glamorous of that particular century and rulers from all over Europe and the Byzantine attended it, which was not really "normal", usually a Reichstag would have the Dukes and Counts and Princes of the "nation" in question (in this case Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation) attending but not foreign rulers. Plus, it happened in Quedlinburg - and thus for a page about the town it is really worth mentioning.

removed from article because of unclear language
ssepp(talk) 16:23, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
 * 994 as a market established Quedlinburg was in the 10.-12. cent. the prefered place for the german kinks to celebrat eastern
 * With 1200 half-timbred buildings it's one of the tallest monument sites in Germany.

Quacks?
Is there any merit to mentioning https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Quacks_of_Quedlinburg on this page? If so, how and where? -Irrevenant [ talk ] 04:55, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

title: Talk:Quedlinburg


text:
140s BC

This article concerns the period 149 BC – 140 BC.

title: 140s BC


text:
150s BC

This article concerns the period 159 BC – 150 BC.

title: 150s BC


text:
Julius Nepos

Julius Nepos (died 9 May 480), or simply Nepos, ruled as Roman emperor of the West from 24 June 474 to 28 August 475. After losing power in Italy, Nepos retreated to his home province of Dalmatia, from which he continued to claim the western imperial title, with recognition from the Eastern Roman Empire, until he was murdered in 480. Though Nepos' successor in Italy, Romulus Augustulus ((r. 475 – 476)), is traditionally deemed the last western Roman emperor, Nepos is regarded by some historians as the true last emperor of the west, being the last widely recognised claimant to the position.

A native of Dalmatia, Nepos began his career as the semi-autonomous governor of the province, succeeding his uncle Marcellinus, a prominent general, as magister militum ('master of troops') of Dalmatia. After the death of the western emperor Anthemius ((r. 467 – 472)), who had been appointed by the eastern emperor Leo I ((r. 457 – 474)), as well as Anthemius' successor Olybrius ((r. undefined – undefined)472), Leo sought to assert his authority in the west, granting Nepos command of an army in December 473 to attack Italy and depose Glycerius ((r. 473 – 474)), who had been proclaimed emperor by the Burgundian general Gundobad. Nepos left for Italy in the spring of 474, backed by Leo's successor Zeno, and landed with his army at Portus, near Rome. Nepos swiftly deposed Glycerius and was crowned western emperor in Rome on 24 June 474. He was the last emperor to be crowned in the city until Charlemagne in the ninth century. Whether the original intention of the invasion was to install Nepos as western emperor is unclear, but in any event, he was quickly recognised as the legitimate western emperor by Zeno.

Nepos worked to restore the prestige and authority of the Western Empire, though mostly unsuccessfully. He may have repelled a Visigothic attack on Italy and managed to once more reduce the Burgundians into foederati. Nepos focused most of his attention on reasserting imperial control and authority in Gaul, but the Western Empire could no longer project enough strength to halt Visigothic conquests in the region. The failure to defeat the Visigoths in Gaul, and Zeno's brief overthrow in Constantinople by the usurper Basiliscus, weakened Nepos' already shaky position in Italy. In 475, Nepos' newly appointed magister militum Orestes revolted and marched on Ravenna, capital of the Western Empire. Unable to deal with Orestes' forces, Nepos fled back to Dalmatia and two months later, Orestes proclaimed his young son Romulus Augustulus as emperor.

Although no longer in control of Italy, Nepos never renounced his claim to the Western Empire and continued to be recognised as the legitimate western emperor by the Eastern Empire. In 476, the barbarian general Odoacer deposed Romulus Augustulus and became the first king of Italy. Nepos repeatedly petitioned Zeno, who by then had defeated Basiliscus, for help in regaining control of Italy, though all he achieved was nominal recognition by Odoacer, who minted coins in Nepos' name but otherwise mostly ignored him. In 480, Nepos was murdered by two of his generals, Ovida and Viator, perhaps in Diocletian's Palace, possibly while planning an expedition of his own to recover Italy.

Geopolitical background
The idea that the Roman Empire had grown too large to efficiently be managed by one emperor, and was more appropriately governed by two co-ruling emperors, had become established by the time of emperor Diocletian ((r. undefined – undefined)284–305) in the late 3rd century. Throughout the 4th century, various different divisions were made until the empire was firmly and permanently divided into western and eastern spheres of imperial administration from the death of emperor Theodosius I ((r. undefined – undefined)379–395) in 395. Though modern historians typically use the terms Western Roman Empire and Eastern Roman Empire to describe the new political situation, the Romans themselves never considered the empire to have been formally divided, still viewing it as a single unit, although most often having two rulers rather than one. The Western Roman Empire was more rural than the east, with fewer people and a less stable economy. Throughout the 5th century, it experienced an increasing number of Germanic barbarian invasions and settlements and a period of decline. In 410, the Visigoths under Alaric I had sacked Rome; in 455, the last western emperor of the Theodosian dynasty, Valentinian III ((r. undefined – undefined)425–455), was deposed and murdered. That same year, Rome was sacked again, this time by the Vandals under Gaiseric, who captured Valentinian's widow, Licinia Eudoxia, and two of his daughters, Eudocia and Placidia. The Western Roman army gradually became increasingly reliant on barbarian mercenaries. After Valentinian's murder, the most powerful barbarian generals, such as Ricimer, became politically dominant, ruling through proclaiming puppet emperors. In the time between the death of Valentinian and the accession of Julius Nepos, a period of less than twenty years, seven different emperors ruled the west and effective imperial control was only exercised in Italy, Raetia and some regions of Gaul.

Ancestry and family
Julius Nepos was a native of the Roman province of Dalmatia. Dalmatia, although politically, economically and geographically oriented towards the Western Roman Empire, had formally been under the authority of the Eastern Roman Empire since 437, when the western emperor Valentinian III had ceded it to the east. In practical terms, the province was often more or less autonomous. Nepos was the son of Nepotianus (died 465), a general who served under the western emperor Majorian ((r. undefined – undefined)457–461). The nephew of the magister militum ('master of troops', a high-ranking military officer) Marcellinus (died 468), being the son of one of Marcellinus' sisters. Nepos may have been part of a prominent local Roman family in Dalmatia. This is supported by memorial inscriptions from four roughly contemporary individuals; Aelia Nepotes, Aelia Nepos, another Julius Nepos and Nepotes, having been identified from Dalmatia.

Nepos' uncle Marcellinus was a prominent late Roman general, having fought the Vandals in several campaigns and playing a notable role in momentarily fending off Vandal attempts at controlling Sardinia. In 461, after the murder of Emperor Majorian by Ricimer, Marcellinus appears to have planned to invade Italy to depose Ricimer's puppet emperor Libius Severus ((r. undefined – undefined)461–465), but he was dissuaded from this course of action by the eastern emperor Leo I. Nepos married a Roman noblewoman whose name is not recorded, but who was related to the eastern empress Verina, possibly a niece of Leo I.

By the time of his death, Marcellinus had been a semi-autonomous governor in Dalmatia, and after his death, Nepos inherited this position. Nepos is first attested on 1 June 473, when he is described as magister militum Dalmatiae, although it is possible that he had held that rank ever since Marcellinus' death. Nepos might have held this position until he became emperor in 474, by which point he had also become a patrician.

Appointment
After the death of the western emperor Anthemius ((r. undefined – undefined)467–472) as well as his successor Olybrius ((r. undefined – undefined)472), who had not been recognised in the east, Leo I, the sole remaining Roman emperor, maintained that he had the right to select the new western emperor. At first, Leo did not act on this right, perhaps because he had no suitable candidates to promote or because of the violent end of Anthemius, who had been previously appointed by Leo I. In March 473, the Burgundian king Gundobad, nephew of Ricimer, appointed the comes domesticorum (commander of the palace guard) Glycerius as western emperor. Angered by this, Leo appointed Nepos as the commander of an army to attack Italy and depose Glycerius. Why Leo waited so long to appoint Nepos is not known, but by this time the winter meant that Nepos could not take action against Glycerius for a few months. By appointing Nepos to lead the invasion, Leo not only sought to assert his authority in the west but perhaps also hoped to rid himself of a possible rival in the east. After the political situation in Constantinople had stabilised sufficiently in the aftermath of Leo I's death on 18 January 474, Nepos left for Italy in the spring of 474, with the backing of the new eastern emperor Zeno.

Emperor in Italy (474–475)
Nepos and his force sailed from Constantinople and landed at Portus, near Rome, where he was promptly proclaimed Caesar, per the procedure preceding elevation to the rank of Augustus (emperor). On 24 June, having deposed Glycerius, Nepos was proclaimed the western Augustus in Rome. Nepos thus accomplished the exact intervention into Italy that had been planned by his uncle Marcellinus some years prior. Nepos was the last emperor to be crowned in Rome until the coronation of Charlemagne in 800. Glycerius put up no resistance against Nepos, and his life was spared; he was consecrated as bishop of Salona, the provincial capital of Dalmatia. It is not clear if Nepos becoming emperor had been Zeno's plan, but in any event, Zeno swiftly recognised him as the legitimate western emperor. His rule was likewise accepted by the Roman Senate and the people of Italy.

Few records of Nepos' reign survive, and little is known of his activities. He is known to have issued coins throughout Italy, such as at Rome, Ravenna and Mediolanum. Coinage minted in northern Gaul in his name indicates that his rule was accepted by the Roman general Syagrius, who ruled a more-or-less autonomous province of his own there. Nepos also issued symbolic coins of Zeno and his junior colleague Leo II, indicating his close ties and gratitude to the eastern court. Nepos worked to restore imperial prestige. Through his initial efforts, a Visigothic attack on Italy appears to have been repelled and the Burgundians were once again made into foederati (barbarian allies of the empire). It appears that Nepos mainly directed his efforts to attempting to restore and consolidate imperial authority in Gaul. The remaining imperial territories in Gaul were at the time being invaded by Euric, king of the Visigoths, who hoped to take control of the province of Aquitania Prima. To combat the threat, Nepos appointed Ecdicius, a son of the former western emperor Avitus ((r. undefined – undefined)455–456) as patrician and magister militum. Per the surviving writings of contemporary Gallo-Roman authors, such as Sidonius Apollinaris, Nepos' accession was enthusiastically accepted in the remaining imperial possessions in Gaul. Ecdicius successfully managed to relieve a Visigothic siege of Arles in 474. Still, he was less successful in 475 as there simply were not enough remaining military resources to achieve victory. Even after Ecdicius had proven unable to defeat the Visigoths, the threat of imperial invasion made Euric willing to negotiate with Nepos. In the spring of 475, Nepos sent as his ambassadors to Euric a group of Roman bishops, which included Epiphanius of Pavia, who had previously brokered peace between Ricimer and emperor Anthemius. Although Epiphanius and his delegation apparently achieved peace, a second delegation, consisting of the bishops Leontius of Arles, Faustus of Riez, Graecus of Marseilles, and Basilius of Aix, was sent later in 475, possibly tasked with working out the concrete terms of the peace treaty. The Romans in Gaul, including Sidonius Apollinaris, were shocked to learn that the peace had involved ceding the Auvergne region to the Visigoths in turn for them leaving the rest of what remained under imperial control in Gaul alone. Nepos' failure to actually defeat the Visigoths, combined with Zeno's overthrow in Constantinople in early 475 by the usurper Basiliscus, weakened Nepos' position, which had been shaky in Italy from the very beginning.

In his foreign policy, Nepos also had to deal with the Vandals, who ruled North Africa, and their renewed and increased pirate attacks throughout the Mediterranean. Because of the weak position of the western empire, Nepos was forced to recognise Vandal rule over the territories they had already taken in Africa and throughout the Mediterranean, such as the islands of Sardinia and Corsica, the Balearics, and parts of Sicily.

After the failure of Nepos' efforts in Gaul, he dismissed Ecdicius and replaced him as magister militum with Orestes, a distinguished officer who had once served as notarius (secretary) to the Hunnic king Attila. Nepos tasked Orestes with leading another army against the Visigoths, and against the Burgundians, who were rebelling, in southern Gaul. Orestes' army included many foederati troops, whom he learned were upset with the emperor for refusing their requests to be granted land. With the backing of this army, Orestes disobeyed Nepos' orders and instead marched on Ravenna, the capital of the western empire. Hoping to maintain control, Nepos recalled Ecdicius from Gaul, but he was unable to arrive in time. On 28 August 475, Orestes entered Ravenna with his army, and Nepos escaped across the Adriatic Sea to Salona in Dalmatia, having ruled in Italy for only 14 months. On 31 October, Orestes proclaimed his young son, Romulus Augustulus, as emperor.

Exile in Dalmatia (475–480)
Little is known of Nepos' later activities in Dalmatia due to the scarcity of surviving sources. Nepos never renounced his claim to the Western Empire and continued to be recognised in the east instead of Romulus Augustulus. Throughout his time in exile, Nepos hoped to regain control of Italy. On 4 September 476, Romulus Augustulus was deposed by the barbarian general Odoacer, who became the first King of Italy. Odoacer sent Romulus' western imperial regalia to Zeno in the east, and swore allegiance to him, ruling without further imperial successors in the west. Odoacer considered the Roman Empire from this point on as only requiring a single emperor, ruling from Constantinople. At the same time, an embassy from Nepos arrived in Constantinople, congratulating Zeno on regaining Constantinople from Basiliscus and requesting his assistance in restoring Nepos to power in Italy. Zeno responded to the ambassadors sent by Odoacer, members of the Roman Senate, that they had killed one east-supported emperor (Anthemius) and driven one out (Nepos) and that they would do well in receiving Nepos back as their ruler. Zeno also stated that Odoacer would do best in receiving the rank of patrician, which he had requested, not from Zeno, but from the legal western ruler, Nepos, although Zeno promised to grant the rank if Nepos would not. Zeno also urged Odoacer to accept Nepos back as emperor in Italy. Although Zeno and Verina, who remained influential at court, officially supported Nepos' restoration and continued to regard him as the western emperor, he was not granted the necessary military support or funding to retake Italy. Odoacer only nominally accepted Nepos' rule, resuming the production of gold coins in the name of Nepos at Italian mints, but taking no serious action to restore his throne. Coins of both Nepos and Zeno were minted in Italy, and Odoacer perhaps provided Nepos with a pension, but in practice ignored him. In 477 or 478, Nepos again petitioned Zeno to help him retake Italy. Also in 477, some of the remaining imperial possessions in southern Gaul rebelled against Odoacer, probably intending to fight for the restoration of Nepos. Zeno received embassies from both Odoacer and Gaul, but was forced to support Odoacer given that supporting the Gallic rebels against Odoacer would have amounted to declaring war on Odoacer, which Zeno was not prepared to do.

In 479, Nepos' hopes may have been ignited when Theodoric, the king of the Ostrogoths, offered to pledge his troops to fight for Nepos' claim. Nepos was murdered on 9 May 480, at his villa near Salona, possibly the same building as Diocletian's Palace, by members of his retinue, the comites Ovida and Viator. It is possible that the former emperor Glycerius, whom Nepos had deposed, also played a leading role in the murder, possibly as the instigator. If Glycerius was not the instigator, it is possible that the murder was caused by Nepos in 480 actively beginning to prepare his forces for a real attempt at recovering Italy militarily, and that his supporters in Dalmatia were unwilling to embark on such an adventure. Though the chroniclers of the time wrote of Nepos' violent and unexpected death, it was given little attention and no actions were taken against his murderers for quite some time. Only in late 481 or 482 did Odoacer invade Dalmatia and put Ovida, who had become the ruler of the province, to death, using Nepos' murder as a pretext to conquer the province for himself. The eastern empire made no attempt to stop him. After Nepos' death, Odoacer recognised Zeno as his new suzerain and Zeno did not appoint a new western emperor, becoming the first proper sole Roman emperor of the entire empire since the death of Theodosius I in 395 (though he continued to only effectively control the eastern provinces).

Legacy
Nepos' successor in Italy, Romulus Augustulus, is typically regarded as the last western Roman emperor, though several historians argue that this distinction is better applied to Nepos, given that he continued to rule in Dalmatia with the imperial title and the full recognition, although not the full military support, of the eastern empire, until he was murdered in 480. Romulus Augustulus, by strange coincidence, shares the name of both the founder of Rome (Romulus) and its first emperor (Augustus), which may, in addition to being the last western emperor to rule Italy, have contributed to him being viewed as the last emperor over Nepos. Nepos shares a similar coincidence, in that he shares his first name, Julius, with Julius Caesar, Augustus' adoptive father and predecessor as authoritarian ruler of the Roman state.

By the time of Nepos' death in 480, the Western Roman Empire was gone, and Nepos had, in the words of the Roman historian Ralph W. Mathisen, become an "unwanted anachronism"; a hindrance to Odoacer who wished to expand into Dalmatia himself and an embarrassment to Zeno, who could not offer him his full support. Though his death was seen as marking the end of the line of emperors in the west, it was barely acknowledged at the time. By the next century, eastern Roman historians no longer recognised Nepos' reign in Dalmatia from 475 to 480 as a legitimate continuation of his imperial reign: the 6th-century eastern historians Marcellinus Comes, Procopius and Jordanes all considered the child emperor, Romulus Augustulus, to have been the last western emperor.

title: Julius Nepos


text:
5 BC

5 BC was a common year starting on Monday or Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar (the sources differ, see leap year error for further information) and a leap year starting on Saturday of the Proleptic Julian calendar. In the Roman world, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Augustus and Sulla (or, less frequently, year 749 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 5 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

 * March – Probable nova in the constellation Aquila.
 * c. December – Probable supernova in the constellation Capricornus.

Births

 * January 15 – Guang Wu, Chinese emperor of the Han Dynasty (d. AD 57)
 * Aemilia Lepida, Roman noblewoman and fiancee of Claudius (d. AD 43)
 * Lucius Vitellius the Elder, Roman consul and governor of Syria (d. AD 51)
 * The birthdates of John the Baptist and Jesus are not generally known, but 5 BC is often assumed to be the date. The spring Passover feast (often around April 21) has been cited as a possible date for the birth of Christ, assuming that this had relevance to being a Messiah claimant, or that his birthday might have been related to Passover. Others theologically tie his birth to Sukkot, the fall Feast of Tabernacles.
 * John the Baptist (d. c. AD 30)
 * Biblically between 16 September - 23 September – Jesus (Sukkot - The Feast of Tabernacles)
 * as of a Church decision in 336AD 25 December – Jesus

Deaths

 * Acme (enslaved woman), Jewish slave and personal maid in the service of the Empress Livia Drusilla, wife of Augustus
 * Curia, Roman noblewoman and wife of Quintus Lucretius Vespillo

title: 5 BC


text:
6 BC

Year 6 BC was a common year starting on Sunday or Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar (the sources differ, see leap year error for further information) and a common year starting on Friday of the Proleptic Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Balbus and Vetus (or, less frequently, year 748 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 6 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

 * Tiberius retires to Rhodes, to the annoyance of Emperor Augustus. He is recalled to Rome years later, in AD 4, becoming Augustus' adopted son and heir following the deaths of Lucius and Gaius Caesar.

Births

 * Unknown – Possible birthdate of Jesus
 * Chilon of Sparta

Deaths

 * Lady Ban (or Ban Jieyu), Chinese concubine and poet (b. 48 BC)
 * Cleopatra Selene II, Ptolemaic princess of Egypt (approximate date)
 * Feng Yuan (or Zhaoyi), Chinese concubine of the Han Dynasty
 * Liu Xiang, Chinese scholar, editor of Shan Hai Jing and compiler of Lienü zhuan, father of Liu Xin (b. 77 BC)
 * Soseono, Korean queen of Goguryeo (b. 67 BC)

title: 6 BC


text:
Andrew Sarris

Andrew Sarris (October 31, 1928 – June 20, 2012) was an American film critic. He was a leading proponent of the auteur theory of film criticism.

Early life
Sarris was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Greek immigrant parents, Themis (née Katavolos) and George Andrew Sarris, and grew up in Ozone Park, Queens. After attending John Adams High School in South Ozone Park (where he overlapped with Jimmy Breslin), he graduated from Columbia University in 1951 and then served for three years in the U.S. Army Signal Corps, during the Korean War, before moving to Paris for a year, where he became a friend of Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut. Upon returning to New York's Lower East Side, Sarris briefly pursued graduate studies at his alma mater and Teachers College, Columbia University before turning to film criticism as a vocation.

Career
After initially writing for Film Culture, he moved to The Village Voice where his first piece—a laudatory review of Psycho—was published in 1960. Later he remembered, "The Voice had all these readers—little old ladies who lived on the West Side, guys who had fought in the Spanish Civil War—and this seemed so regressive to them, to say that Hitchcock was a great artist". Around this time, he returned to Paris where he was present at the premiere of such French New Wave films such as Truffaut's Shoot the Piano Player (1960) and Godard's A Woman Is a Woman (1961). The experience expanded his view of film criticism: "To show you the dividing line in my thinking, when I did a Top Ten list for the Voice in 1958, I had a Stanley Kramer film on the list and I left off both Vertigo and Touch of Evil". He continued to write film criticism regularly until 2009 for The New York Observer, and was a professor of film at Columbia University (where he earned an M.A. in English in 1998), teaching courses in international film history, American cinema, and Alfred Hitchcock until his retirement in 2011. Sarris was a co-founder of the National Society of Film Critics.

Notes on the Auteur Theory
Sarris is generally credited with popularizing the auteur theory in the United States and coining the term in his 1962 essay, "Notes on the Auteur Theory," which critics writing in Cahiers du Cinéma had inspired. Sarris wrote the highly influential book The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929–1968 (1968), an opinionated assessment of films of the sound era, organized by director. The book would influence many other critics and help raise awareness of the role of the film director and, in particular, of the auteur theory. In The American Cinema, Sarris lists what he termed the "pantheon" of the 14 greatest film directors who had worked in the United States: the Americans Robert Flaherty, John Ford, D. W. Griffith, Howard Hawks, Buster Keaton, and Orson Welles; the Germans/Austrians Fritz Lang, Ernst Lubitsch, F. W. Murnau, Max Ophüls, and Josef von Sternberg; the British Charles Chaplin and Alfred Hitchcock; and the French Jean Renoir. He also identified second—and third—tier directors, downplaying the work of Billy Wilder, David Lean, and Stanley Kubrick, among others. In his 1998 book You Ain't Heard Nothing Yet: The American Talking Film, History and Memory 1927–1949, Sarris upgraded the status of Billy Wilder to pantheon level and apologized for his earlier harsh assessment in The American Cinema.

For many years, he wrote for both NY Film Bulletin and The Village Voice. During this part of his career, he was often seen as a rival to The New Yorker's Pauline Kael, who had originally attacked the auteur theory in her essay "Circles and Squares." Speaking of his long-time critical feuds with Kael, Sarris says that, oddly, "We made each other. We established a dialectic."

Legacy
In 2001, film scholar and critic Emanuel Levy edited Citizen Sarris, American Film Critic: Essays in Honor of Andrew Sarris, a collection of 39 essays by notable critics (Dave Kehr, Todd McCarthy, Gerald Perry) and filmmakers (Martin Scorsese, John Sayles, Peter Bogdanovich, Curtis Hanson) alongside fans of Sarris's works.

Film critics such as J. Hoberman, Kenneth Turan, Armond White, Michael Phillips, and A. O. Scott have cited him as an influence. His career is discussed in For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism, first with other critics discussing how he brought the auteur theory from France, and then by Sarris himself explaining how he applied that theory to his original review of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. In 1997, Camille Paglia described Sarris as her third favorite critic, praising "his acute columns during the high period of The Village Voice."

Personal life
Sarris married fellow film critic Molly Haskell in 1969; they lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. He died at St. Luke's Hospital in Manhattan on June 20, 2012, from an infection developed after a fall.

In The New York Observer, Sarris wrote "When people have asked me to name the greatest film of all time—in my humble opinion, of course—my instant answer has been unvarying for the past 30 years or so: Max Ophüls’ Madame de… (1953)." He added that "I usually answer questions about the greatest film of all time by immediate throwing in my own two runners-up: Mizoguchi's Ugetsu Monogatari (1953) and Renoir's La Règle du Jeu (1939). Then, if I can grasp the questioner's lapels long enough (much like Coleridge's crazed Ancient Mariner), I rattle off the rest off my all-time-ten-greatest-list: Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo (1958), John Ford's The Searchers (1956), Orson Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), Luis Buñuel’s Belle de Jour (1967), F. W. Murnau's Sunrise (1927), Charles Chaplin's Modern Times (1936) and Buster Keaton's The General (1927)."

Criticism
Sarris's method of ranking directors in The American Cinema has been criticized as elitist and subjective. Those who do not make the cut of his 1968 Pantheon category were sorted under categorical headings listed in the table of contents that descend as follows: The Far Side of Paradise, Expressive Esoterica, Fringe Benefits, Less Than Meets The Eye, Lightly Likable, Strained Seriousness, Oddities, One-Shots, and Newcomers, Subjects for Further Research, Make Way for the Clowns!, and Miscellany.

Criticism of the auteur theory often stems from a misunderstanding of its "dogmatic" nature. Endlessly reviewing and revising his opinions, Sarris defended his original article "Notes on Auteur Theory" in The American Cinema stating: "the article was written in what I thought was a modest, tentative, experimental manner, it was certainly not intended as the last word on the subject". He further stated that the auteur theory should not be considered a theory at all but rather "a collection of facts", and "a reminder of movies to be resurrected, of genres to be redeemed, of directors to be rediscovered."

Works

 * The Films of Josef Von Sternberg
 * The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929–1968
 * Interviews with Film Directors
 * Confessions of a Cultist
 * The Primal Screen
 * Politics and Cinema
 * The John Ford Movie Mystery
 * You Ain't Heard Nothin' Yet: The American Talking Film – History and Memory, 1927–1949
 * Cahiers du Cinéma in English (editor) New York: Cahiers Publishing Co., Inc., 1966-
 * Citizen Sarris: Essays in Honor of Andrew Sarris. Baltimore: Scarecrow Press, 2000.

title: Andrew Sarris


text:
7 BC

Year 7 BC was a common year starting on Saturday or Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar (the sources differ, see leap year error for further information) and a common year starting on Thursday of the Proleptic Julian calendar. In the Roman world, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Tiberius and Piso (or, less frequently, year 747 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 7 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

 * May 7 – Emperor Ai succeeds to the throne of Han China.
 * Augustus' second census of the Roman Empire reports a total of 4,233,000 citizens. However, the specific criteria of the census are still not clear.
 * Rome is divided in 14 administrative regions.
 * Rome is divided in 14 administrative regions.

Births

 * Possible birthdate of Jesus, according to appearance of a very bright triple conjunction of the royal star Jupiter and Saturn in the sign of Pisces (land in the west) in May until December of that year since 854 years, with a retrogradation and stationing in November 12, 7 BC.

Deaths

 * April 17 – Cheng, Chinese emperor of the Han dynasty (b. 51 BC)
 * Aristobulus IV, Jewish prince of Judea (b. 31 BC)
 * Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Greek historian (approximate date)
 * Geumwa of Dongbuyeo, Korean king
 * Zhao Hede, Chinese consort of the Han dynasty

title: 7 BC


text:
8 BC

Year 8 BC was either a common year starting on Friday or Saturday or a leap year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar (the sources differ, see leap year error for further information) and a common year starting on Wednesday of the Proleptic Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Censorinus and Gaius Asinius (or, less frequently, year 746 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 8 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

 * King Maroboduus becomes ruler of the Marcomanni and fights against the Roman Empire's expansion in Bohemia.
 * Arminius, son of a Cheruscan chieftain, is taken as a hostage to Rome, where he receives a military education.
 * After 20 years, Emperor Augustus initiates his second census of the Roman Empire.
 * Sextilis, the eighth month of the early Julian calendar, is renamed Augustus (August) by a decree of the Roman Senate in honor of Augustus.

Births

 * Wang, Chinese empress of the Han dynasty (d. AD 23)

Deaths

 * November 27 – Horace, Roman lyric poet and writer (b. 65 BC)
 * Gaius Maecenas, Roman politician and advisor (b. 70 BC)
 * Polemon I, Roman client king of the Bosporan Kingdom
 * Xu, Chinese empress of the Han dynasty

title: 8 BC


text:
9 BC

Year 9 BC was either a common year starting on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday or a leap year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar (the sources differ, see leap year error for further information) and a leap year starting on Monday of the Proleptic Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Drusus and Crispinus (or, less frequently, year 745 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 9 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

 * January 30 – The Ara Pacis ("Altar of Augustan Peace"), voted for by the Senate four years earlier, is dedicated.
 * Pannonia is incorporated into the Roman Empire as part of Illyria.
 * Nero Claudius Drusus, Emperor Augustus' stepson, begins a campaign against the Marcomanni, but dies soon after, due to a fall from his horse.
 * Livy completes compilation of his Ab Urbe Condita Libri, 142 books covering the history of Rome since its foundation down to 9 BC (approximate date).
 * Accession of Aretas IV Philopatris as King of the Nabataeans (modern Jordan).

Births

 * Claudius Livius Fresius (d. AD 57)
 * Ping, Chinese emperor of the Han dynasty (d. AD 6)
 * Quintus Asconius Pedianus, Roman historian (d. AD 76)

Deaths

 * Nero Claudius Drusus, son of Livia and stepson of Augustus (b. 38 BC)

title: 9 BC


text:
340s BC

This article concerns the period 349 BC – 340 BC.

title: 340s BC


text:
Talk:Madrid

Historical Notation
the return to the basics of solidarity and sound mind, enough with frivolity and wimsy. after years of contemplating the who's who and whats what to no discovery or too late to bring solidarity of sound unity through the introduction of the european community and the reverting back to the old mappings of the old glamor of the ballrooms and chandeliers with open arms and straight forward realness of the times reflecting on the history of discovery over the waters of the oceans and new lands now lost but found again in a new brighter light of the older views remembering the old capital and the dys of the riding of the houses in gallent display of acheivement as we accept that which was given to us the green of the three and the ring newly Fashioned Form. No need to change the names and run with the new name but do plan to state each individually in reverse letter order for the new millenium. year 2022

Jennifer in San Francisco, World nick name poison JennyFlower JenniferRoddick (talk) 21:32, 15 September 2022 (UTC)

 * Should be removed. Xx236 (talk) 13:12, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

Lead section
I think that there is a tad too much namedropping of organizations and buildings in the introductory section. They are not essential to presenting the topic, and, in any case, they might be circunvented by a generic statement backed up by a secondary source. Do you agree on a trimming?--Asqueladd (talk) 13:29, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Royal Palaces
This page says that: The King of Spain, the country's head of state, has his official residence in the Zarzuela Palace. That confused me - I though the Royal Palace on Calle de Bailén was the official one. The Zarzuela Palace page says that: ''the Zarzuela Palace is the residence and working offices of the reigning monarch of Spain, although the official residence of the Spanish royal family is the Royal Palace of Madrid. The Zarzuela Palace is on the outskirts of Madrid''. As others might be confuused too, I added that distinction to this page, taking the information directly from the Zarzuela Palace page. I phrased it as:

'The Zarzuela Palace, on the outskirts of Madrid, is the residence and working offices of the reigning monarch of Spain (King Felipe VI), although the official residence of the Spanish royal family is the Royal Palace of Madrid.'

I also added line breaks to the section, to distinguish the information about royal, presidential and parliamentary buildings. I didn't change the words.

Someone reverted my edit immediately. Does anyone else consider my edit to be no clear improvement?

Ministry (talk) 17:35, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

It was founded in 109.118.105.102 (talk) 19:03, 24 October 2023 (UTC)
 * La Zarzuela complex is for all purposes the formal residence of the currently-reigning Bourbon family since 1963, (meaning indeed "official" to some) and the building in which most protocolary (but not all) events pertaining the government role of the ruling monarch take place, as a proper "seat of power". As whether labelling it as official or not inline (given that you might find indeed crappy sources labelling the Royal Palace also as the "official" residence), I personally don't care (after all, the official descriptor and its dichotomy with "non-official" is perhaps extraneous to reality and not relevant in this context), but La Zarzuela is the main protocolary building and labelling it as non-official is asinine. The Royal Palace hardly features any role other than some events in which little soldiers with saber are required and the esplanade next to the Royal Palace is used. All in all, it can be summed up as La Zarzuela complex being the working offices (so much that, akin to Moncloa for government, Zarzuela is used as a metonymy for Royal House) and formal residence of the Monarch and their family (and the only one worthy of mention as a seat of power in the article).--Asqueladd (talk) 12:49, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

Che ne so io 95.235.32.33 (talk) 19:37, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Climate classification
Madrid isn’t cold enough anymore, to be designated as cold semi arid  https://www.mindat.org/climate-BSk.html דולב חולב (talk) 09:48, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

 * And with its vegetation and 4 seasons like conditions, it might be more of a Dsa climate. But again not cold enough for it. דולב חולב (talk) 09:57, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The main criteria for BSk designation is to have an annual mean temperature below 18 C (mean daily temp row in colorful boxes).
 * This way Madrid would be BSk with no doubt, a doubtable case would be Oran which is between 17 and 18.PAper GOL (talk) 20:35, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes…. But if the place is wet enough, it would have a wetter climate classification right? דולב חולב (talk) 14:22, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I was talking about cold/hot difference which you mentioned in the first comment.
 * Madrid is halfway between BSk and Csa.PAper GOL (talk) 14:31, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Madrid is the only European capital with semi-arid climate?
@Uness232 Even though there are areas of the Athens Metropolitan Area that are classified as hot semi-arid, the city center is Mediterranean, something that does not occur in Madrid, since the center of Madrid is cold semi-arid. Most of the Madrid metropolitan area is cold semi-arid, while in Athens it is Mediterranean. In the article, it specifically refers to the city's climate and not its metropolitan area, since for the latter there is the article of Climate of Madrid. Farell37 (talk) 15:11, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

 * @Farell37 This is true, but my point problematizes these absolute statements; Athens, if thought of as a metropolitan area, also has a semi-arid climate. You might not be thinking in those lines, but there's nothing stopping people from considering the metropolitan area (indeed the climate section on Athens article covers the metropolitan area not just the city boundaries).
 * Either way, a claim like would need a reliable source. Uness232 (talk) 16:19, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Even with all that said we still have an half-Asian case that is Nicosia. Isn’t it better to not have such statement here?PAper GOL (talk) 21:34, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It is important to keep in mind that Nicosia is not entirely located in Europe. Part of it is in Europe, while another part is in Asia. With regard to the climate context, it is much more appropriate to take Europe's geography into account than its geopolitics, as climate is an area of atmospheric sciences and geography. Making Nicosia part of Europe generates many controversies. Farell37 (talk) 21:50, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Madrid


text:
Samizdat

Samizdat (самиздат) was a form of dissident activity across the Eastern Bloc in which individuals reproduced censored and underground makeshift publications, often by hand, and passed the documents from reader to reader. The practice of manual reproduction was widespread, because typewriters and printing devices required official registration and permission to access. This was a grassroots practice used to evade official Soviet censorship.

Name origin and variations
Etymologically, the word samizdat derives from sam (сам 'self, by oneself') and izdat (издат, an abbreviation of издательство, izdatel′stvo 'publishing house'), and thus means 'self-published'. Ukrainian has a similar term: samvydav (самвидав), from sam 'self' and vydavnytstvo 'publishing house'.

The Russian poet Nikolay Glazkov coined a version of the term as a pun in the 1940s when he typed copies of his poems and included the note Samsebyaizdat (Самсебяиздат, "Myself by Myself Publishers") on the front page.

Tamizdat refers to literature published abroad (там, tam 'there'), often from smuggled manuscripts.

The Polish term for this phenomenon coined around 1980 was drugi obieg, or the "second circuit" of publishing.

Techniques
Sergo Anastasi Mikoyan claimed that decades prior to the early 1960s, offices and stores had to submit papers with examples of their typewriters' typeface to local KGB branches so that any printed text could be traced back to the source, to prosecute those who had used the typewriter to produce material deemed illegal. With the introduction of photocopying machines, the KGB's Fifth Directorate and Agitprop Department required individuals to get authorization to use printing office photocopiers to prevent the mass production of unapproved material, though restrictions could be bypassed by bribing employees.

Privately owned typewriters were considered the most practical means of reproducing samizdat during this time due to these copy machine restrictions. Usually, multiple copies of a single text would be simultaneously made on carbon paper or tissue paper, which were inexpensive and relatively easy to conceal. Copies would then be passed around within trusted networks.

Physical form
Samizdat distinguishes itself not only by the ideas and debates that it helped spread to a wider audience but also by its physical form. The hand-typed, often blurry and wrinkled pages with numerous typographical errors and nondescript covers helped to separate and elevate Russian samizdat from Western literature. The physical form of samizdat arose from a simple lack of resources and the necessity to be inconspicuous.

In time, dissidents in the USSR began to admire these qualities for their own sake, the ragged appearance of samizdat contrasting sharply with the smooth, well-produced appearance of texts passed by the censor's office for publication by the State. The form samizdat took gained precedence over the ideas it expressed and became a potent symbol of the resourcefulness and rebellious spirit of the inhabitants of the Soviet Union. In effect, the physical form of samizdat itself elevated the reading of samizdat to a prized clandestine act.

Readership
Samizdat originated from the dissident movement of the Russian intelligentsia, and most samizdat directed itself to a readership of Russian elites. While circulation of samizdat was relatively low, at around 200,000 readers on average, many of these readers possessed positions of cultural power and authority. Furthermore, with the simultaneous censorship of information and necessity of absorbing information to know how to censor it, many government officials became readers of samizdat. Although the general public at times came into contact with samizdat, most of the public lacked access to the few expensive samizdat texts in circulation and expressed discontent with the highly censored reading material made available by the state.

The purpose and methods of samizdat may contrast with the purpose of the concept of copyright.

History
Self-published and self-distributed literature has a long history in Russia. Samizdat is unique to the post-Stalin USSR and other countries with similar systems. Faced with the state's powers of censorship, society turned to underground literature for self-analysis and self-expression.

Samizdat books and editions
The first full-length book to be distributed as samizdat was Boris Pasternak's 1957 novel Doctor Zhivago. Although the literary magazine Novy Mir had published ten poems from the book in 1954, a year later the full text was judged unsuitable for publication and entered samizdat circulation.

Certain works, though published legally by the State-controlled media, were practically impossible to find in bookshops and libraries, and found their way into samizdat: for example Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's novel One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich was widely distributed via samizdat.

At the outset of the Khrushchev Thaw in the mid-1950s USSR poetry became very popular. Writings of a wide variety of poets circulated among the Soviet intelligentsia: known, prohibited, repressed writers as well as those young and unknown. A number of samizdat publications carried unofficial poetry, among them the Moscow magazine Sintaksis (1959–1960) by writer Alexander Ginzburg, Vladimir Osipov's Boomerang (1960), and Phoenix (1961), produced by Yuri Galanskov and Alexander Ginzburg. The editors of these magazines were regulars at impromptu public poetry readings between 1958 and 1961 on Mayakovsky Square in Moscow. The gatherings did not last long, for soon the authorities began clamping down on them. In the summer of 1961, several meeting regulars were arrested and charged with "anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda" (Article 70 of the RSFSR Penal Code), putting an end to most of the magazines.

Not everything published in samizdat had political overtones. In 1963, Joseph Brodsky was charged with "social parasitism" and convicted for being nothing but a poet. His poems circulated in samizdat, with only four judged as suitable for official Soviet anthologies. In the mid-1960s an unofficial literary group known as SMOG (a word meaning variously one was able, I did it, etc.; as an acronym the name also bore a range of interpretations) issued an almanac titled The Sphinxes (Sfinksy) and collections of prose and poetry. Some of their writings were close to the Russian avant-garde of the 1910s and 1920s.

The 1965 show trial of writers Yuli Daniel and Andrei Sinyavsky, charged with anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda, and the subsequent increased repression, marked the demise of the Thaw and the beginning of harsher times for samizdat authors. The trial was carefully documented in a samizdat collection called The White Book (1966), compiled by Yuri Galanskov and Alexander Ginzburg. Both writers were among those later arrested and sentenced to prison in what was known as Trial of the Four. In the following years some samizdat content became more politicized and played an important role in the dissident movement in the Soviet Union.

Samizdat periodicals

The earliest samizdat periodicals were short-lived and mainly literary in focus:  Sintaksis (1959–1960), Boomerang (1960), and Phoenix (1961). From 1964 to 1970, communist historian Roy Medvedev regularly published The Political Journal (Политический дневник, or political diary), which contained analytical materials that later appeared in the West.

The longest-running and best-known samizdat periodical was A Chronicle of Current Events (Хроника текущих событий). It was dedicated to defending human rights by providing accurate information about events in the USSR. Over 15 years, from April 1968 to December 1982, 65 issues were published, all but two appearing in English translation. The anonymous editors encouraged the readers to utilize the same distribution channels in order to send feedback and local information to be published in subsequent issues.

The Chronicle was distinguished by its dry, concise style and punctilious correction of even the smallest error. Its regular rubrics were "Arrests, Searches, Interrogations", "Extra-judicial Persecution", "In Prisons and Camps", "Samizdat update", "News in brief", and "Persecution of Religion". Over time, sections were added on the "Persecution of the Crimean Tatars", "Persecution and Harassment in Ukraine", "Lithuanian Events", and so on.

The Chronicle editors maintained that, according to the 1936 Soviet Constitution, then in force, their publication was not illegal. The authorities did not accept the argument. Many people were harassed, arrested, imprisoned, or forced to leave the country for their involvement in the Chronicle's production and distribution. The periodical's typist and first editor Natalya Gorbanevskaya was arrested and put in a psychiatric hospital for taking part in the August 1968 Red Square protest against the invasion of Czechoslovakia. In 1974, two of the periodical's close associates (Pyotr Yakir and Victor Krasin) were persuaded to denounce their fellow editors and the Chronicle on Soviet television. This put an end to the periodical's activities, until Sergei Kovalev, Tatyana Khodorovich and Tatyana Velikanova openly announced their readiness to resume publication. After being arrested and imprisoned, they were replaced, in turn, by others.

Another notable and long-running (about 20 issues in the period of 1972–1980) publication was the refusenik political and literary magazine "Евреи в СССР" (Yevrei v SSSR, Jews in the USSR), founded and edited by Alexander Voronel and, after his imprisonment, by Mark Azbel and Alexander Luntz.

The late 1980s, which were marked by an increase in informal organizations, saw a renewed wave of samizdat periodicals in the Soviet Union. Publications that were active during that time included Glasnost (edited by Sergei Grigoryants), Ekspress-khronika (Express-Chronicle, edited by Alexander Podrabinek), Svobodnoye slovo ("Free word", by the Democratic Union formed in May 1988), Levyi povorot ("Left turn", edited by Boris Kagarlitsky), Otkrytaya zona ("Open zone") of Club Perestroika, Merkurii ("Mercury", edited by Elena Zelinskaya) and Khronograph ("Chronograph", put out by a number of Moscow activists).

Not all samizdat trends were liberal or clearly opposed to the Soviet regime and the literary establishment. "The Russian Party... was a very strange element of the political landscape of Leonid Brezhnev's era—feeling themselves practically dissidents, members of the Russian Party with rare exceptions took quite prestigious official positions in the world of writers or journalists," wrote Oleg Kashin in 2009.

Genres
Samizdat covered a large range of topics, mainly including literature and works focused on religion, nationality, and politics. The state censored a variety of materials such as detective novels, adventure stories, and science fiction in addition to dissident texts, resulting in the underground publication of samizdat covering a wide range of topics. Though most samizdat authors directed their works towards the intelligentsia, samizdat included lowbrow genres in addition to scholarly works.

Hyung-Min Joo carried out a detailed analysis of an archive of samizdat (Архив Самиздата, Arkhiv Samizdata) by Radio Liberty, sponsored by the US Congress and launched in the 1960s, and reported that of its 6,607 items, 1% were literary, 17% nationalist, 20% religious, and 62% political, noting that as a rule, literary works were not collected there, so their 1% (only 73 texts) are not representative of their real share of circulation.

Literary
In its early years, samizdat defined itself as a primarily literary phenomenon that included the distribution of poetry, classic unpublished Russian literature, and famous 20th century foreign literature. Literature played a key role in the existence of the samizdat phenomenon. For instance, the USSR's refusal to publish Boris Pasternak's epic novel, Doctor Zhivago led to the novel's subsequent underground publication. Likewise, the circulation of Alexander Solzhenitsyn's famous work about the gulag system, The Gulag Archipelago, promoted a samizdat revival during the mid-1970s. However, because samizdat by definition placed itself in opposition to the state, samizdat works became increasingly focused on the state's violation of human rights, before shifting towards politics.

Political
The majority of samizdat texts were politically focused. Most of the political texts were personal statements, appeals, protests, or information on arrests and trials. Other political samizdat included analyses of various crises within the USSR, and suggested alternatives to the government's handling of events.

No unified political thought existed within samizdat; rather, authors debated from a variety of perspectives. Samizdat written from socialist, democratic and Slavophile perspectives dominated the debates. Socialist authors compared the current state of the government to the Marxist ideals of socialism and appealed to the state to fulfil its promises. Socialist samizdat writers hoped to give a "human face" to socialism by expressing dissatisfaction with the system of censorship. Many socialists put faith in the potential for reform in the Soviet Union, especially because of the political liberalization which occurred under Dubček in Czechoslovakia. However, the Soviet Union invasion of a liberalizing Czechoslovakia, in the events of "Prague Spring", crushed hopes for reform and stymied the power of the socialist viewpoint. Because the state proved itself unwilling to reform, samizdat began to focus on alternative political systems.

Within samizdat, several works focused on the possibility of a democratic political system. Democratic samizdat possessed a revolutionary nature because of its claim that a fundamental shift in political structure was necessary to reform the state, unlike socialists, who hoped to work within the same basic political framework to achieve change. Despite the revolutionary nature of the democratic samizdat authors, most democrats advocated moderate strategies for change. Most democrats believed in an evolutionary approach to achieving democracy in the USSR, and they focused on advancing their cause along open, public routes, rather than underground routes.

In opposition to both democratic and socialist samizdat, Slavophile samizdat grouped democracy and socialism together as Western ideals that were unsuited to the Eastern European mentality. Slavophile samizdat brought a nationalistic Russian perspective to the political debate and espoused the importance of cultural diversity and the uniqueness of Slavic cultures. Samizdat written from the Slavophile perspective attempted to unite the USSR under a vision of a shared glorious history of Russian autocracy and Orthodoxy.

Consequently, the fact that the USSR encompassed a diverse range of nationalities and lacked a singular Russian history hindered the Slavophile movement. By espousing frequently racist and anti-Semitic views of Russian superiority, through either purity of blood or the strength of Russian Orthodoxy, the Slavophile movement in samizdat alienated readers and created divisions within the opposition.

Religious
Predominantly Orthodox, Catholic, Baptist, Pentecostalist, and Adventist groups authored religious samizdat texts. Though a diversity of religious samizdat circulated, including three Buddhist texts, no known Islamic samizdat texts exist. The lack of Islamic samizdat appears incongruous with the large percentage of Muslims who resided in the USSR.

National
Jewish samizdat advocated for the end of repression of Jews in the USSR and some expressed a desire for aliyah, the ability to leave Russia for an Israeli homeland. The aliyah movement also broached broader topics of human rights and freedoms of Soviet citizens. However, a divide existed within Jewish samizdat between more militant authors who advocated Jewish emigration and wrote mostly in politically-focused periodicals, and those who argued that Jews should remain in the USSR to inculcate Jewish consciousness and culture, writing in periodicals centered on cultural-literary information.

Crimean Tatars, Volga Germans, and Meskhetian Turks also created samizdat literature, protesting the state's refusal to allow them to return to their homelands following Stalin's death. Descriptions in the samizdat literature of Crimean Tatars, Volga Germans, and Meskhetian Turks documenting the political injustices borne by those peoples are dominated by references to "genocide" and "concentration camps". Ukrainian samizdat opposed the assumed superiority of Russian culture over the Ukrainian and condemned the forced assimilation of Ukrainians to the Russian language.

Contraband audio
Ribs, "music on the ribs", "bone records", or roentgenizdat (roentgen- from the Russian term for X-ray, named for Wilhelm Röntgen) were homemade phonograph records, copied from forbidden recordings that were smuggled into the country. Their content was Western rock and roll, jazz, mambo, and other music, and music by banned emigres, such as Pyotr Leshchenko and Alexander Vertinsky. They were sold and traded on the black market.

Each disc is a thin, flexible plastic sheet recorded with a spiral groove on one side, playable on a normal phonograph turntable at 78 RPM. They were made from an inexpensive, available material: used X-ray film (hence the name roentgenizdat). Each large rectangular sheet was trimmed into a circle and individually recorded using an improvised recording lathe. The discs and their limited sound quality resemble the mass-produced flexi discs and may have been inspired by it.

Magnitizdat (magnit- from magnitofon, the Russian word for tape recorder) is the distribution of sound recordings on audio tape, often of bards, Western artists, and underground music groups. Magnitizdat replaced roentgenizdat, as it was cheaper and more efficient method of reproduction that resulted in higher quality copies.

Further influence
After Bell Labs changed its UNIX licence in 1979 to make dissemination of the source code illegal, the 1976 Lions book which contained the source code had to be withdrawn, but illegal copies of it circulated for years. The act of copying the Lions book was often referred to as samizdat.

In hacker and computer jargon, the term samizdat was used for the dissemination of needed and hard to obtain documents or information.

Notable samizdat periodicals

 * A-YA
 * Bulletin "V"
 * Chronicle of Current Events
 * Chronicle of the Catholic Church in Lithuania
 * Phoenix
 * Sintaksis

title: Samizdat


text:
Coefficient

In mathematics, a coefficient is a multiplicative factor involved in some term of a polynomial, a series, or an expression. It may be a number (dimensionless), in which case it is known as a numerical factor. It may also be a constant with units of measurement, in which it is known as a constant multiplier. In general, coefficients may be any expression (including variables such as $a$, $b$ and $c$). When the combination of variables and constants is not necessarily involved in a product, it may be called a parameter.

For example, the polynomial $$2x^2-x+3$$ has coefficients 2, −1, and 3, and the powers of the variable $$x$$ in the polynomial $$ax^2+bx+c$$ have coefficient parameters $$a$$, $$b$$, and $$c$$.

The Constant coefficient, also known as constant term or simply constant is the quantity not attached to variables in an expression. For example, the constant coefficients of the expressions above are the number 3 and the parameter c, respectively. The coefficient attached to the highest degree of the variable in a polynomial is referred to as the leading coefficient. For example, in the expressions above, the leading coefficients are 2 and a, respectively.

In the context of differential equations, an equation can often be written as equating to zero a polynomial in the unknown functions and their derivatives. In this case, the coefficients of the differential equation are the coefficients of this polynomial, and are generally non-constant functions. A coefficient is a constant coefficient when it is a constant function. For avoiding confusion, the coefficient that is not attached to unknown functions and their derivative is generally called the constant term rather the constant coefficient. In particular, in a linear differential equation with constant coefficient, the constant term is generally not supposed to be a constant function.

Terminology and definition
In mathematics, a coefficient is a multiplicative factor in some term of a polynomial, a series, or any expression. For example, in the polynomial $$7x^2-3xy+1.5+y,$$ with variables $$x$$ and $$y$$, the first two terms have the coefficients 7 and −3. The third term 1.5 is the constant coefficient. In the final term, the coefficient is 1 and is not explicitly written.

In many scenarios, coefficients are numbers (as is the case for each term of the previous example), although they could be parameters of the problem—or any expression in these parameters. In such a case, one must clearly distinguish between symbols representing variables and symbols representing parameters. Following René Descartes, the variables are often denoted by $x$, $y$, ..., and the parameters by $a$, $b$, $c$, ..., but this is not always the case. For example, if $y$ is considered a parameter in the above expression, then the coefficient of $x$ would be $−3y$, and the constant coefficient (with respect to $x$) would be $1.5 + y$.

When one writes $$ax^2+bx+c,$$ it is generally assumed that $x$ is the only variable, and that $a$, $b$ and $c$ are parameters; thus the constant coefficient is $c$ in this case.

Any polynomial in a single variable $x$ can be written as $$a_k x^k + \dotsb + a_1 x^1 + a_0$$ for some nonnegative integer $$k$$, where $$a_k, \dotsc, a_1, a_0$$ are the coefficients. This includes the possibility that some terms have coefficient 0; for example, in $$x^3 - 2x + 1$$, the coefficient of $$x^2$$ is 0, and the term $$0x^2$$ does not appear explicitly. For the largest $$i$$ such that $$a_i \ne 0$$ (if any), $$a_i$$ is called the leading coefficient of the polynomial. For example, the leading coefficient of the polynomial $$4x^5 + x^3 + 2x^2$$ is 4. This can be generalised to multivariate polynomials with respect to a monomial order, see.

Linear algebra
In linear algebra, a system of linear equations is frequently represented by its coefficient matrix. For example, the system of equations $$ \begin{cases} 2x + 3y = 0 \\ 5x - 4y = 0 \end{cases},$$ the associated coefficient matrix is $$\begin{pmatrix} 2 & 3 \\ 5 & -4 \end{pmatrix}. $$ Coefficient matrices are used in algorithms such as Gaussian elimination and Cramer's rule to find solutions to the system.

The leading entry (sometimes leading coefficient) of a row in a matrix is the first nonzero entry in that row. So, for example, in the matrix $$ \begin{pmatrix} 1 & 2 & 0 & 6\\ 0 & 2 & 9 & 4\\ 0 & 0 & 0 & 4\\ 0 & 0 & 0 & 0 \end{pmatrix}, $$ the leading coefficient of the first row is 1; that of the second row is 2; that of the third row is 4, while the last row does not have a leading coefficient.

Though coefficients are frequently viewed as constants in elementary algebra, they can also be viewed as variables as the context broadens. For example, the coordinates $$(x_1, x_2, \dotsc, x_n)$$ of a vector $$v$$ in a vector space with basis $$\lbrace e_1, e_2, \dotsc, e_n \rbrace $$ are the coefficients of the basis vectors in the expression $$ v = x_1 e_1 + x_2 e_2 + \dotsb + x_n e_n .$$

title: Coefficient


text:
Talk:Espoo

Centres
5 centres officially ... and tehre were mentioned 3 by name. what are the other two, and do they really need a separate page each..? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zisa (talk • contribs) 14:03, 3 May 2002 (UTC)

 * More than five these days. I put the names up and wannabe-links to each. Not sure if they need separate pages, though, might be best to just move the information to a list on the main Espoo page? // Janka — Preceding undated comment added 23:18, 28 March 2003 (UTC)

 * Otaniemi already has a separate page but was not mentioned here... Not official division though, but part of "greater Tapiola", so not sure how to link here. // User:Spoo — Preceding undated comment added 18:40, 20 October 2003 (UTC)

The section "Famous people from Espoo"
I am removing the section "Famous people from Espoo" as I think most of the people listed are only of interest to a very restricted audience and not really relevant to an article on the city. Besides, the list is redundant with Category:People from Espoo. Some related discussion is at Talk:Helsinki --KFP (talk | contribs) 12:36, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

About major districts of Espoo
I would propose to add Suvikumpu (Solhöjden) to Suur-Tapiola. Tellervo 07:35, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

The Los Angeles of Finland?
The text "This decentralised nature has led to Espoo being jocularly called "Finland's only highway with city privileges". Another soubriquet is "Los Angeles of Finland", meaning it has no city center but a number of local centers." keeps getting reinserted to the article, I see. Can someone explain why it is? There are no sources for this statement and it doesn't seem worthy of mention. Opinions? --KFP (talk | contribs) 20:33, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

 * Never heard of "la of finland" i think somebody only calls it to a "la of finland" but well it has over 5 or more "local centres" but never heard of la of finland i could say dat it is only "rumour" i think —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arttuh2010 (talk • contribs) 17:01, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Metalocalypse
If anyone has ever seen Metalocalypse you will perhaps know that Espoo is the setting for the 1st season episode known as Dethtroll. It can be found here. The episode's choice of setting was more than likely made due to the fact that Children of Bodom are from here, but as they are not mentioned in the episode, while Espoo is, I find it reasonable that this information be written into this article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.23.56.4 (talk) 19:58, 26 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't think Espoo being briefly mentioned one time in some American cartoon is notable enough to include here. In fact, it isn't even apparent that it is a reference to this city. J I P  | Talk 06:40, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:FC Honka Espoo.svg
The image Image:FC Honka Espoo.svg is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here. In particular, for each page the image is used on, it must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page. Please check

 * That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's description page for the use in this article.
 * That this article is linked to from the image description page.

This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Media copyright questions. --01:03, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Shooting section?
I propose to remove the section about the shooting from the article. We already have a separate article covering the incident and it doesn't really merit a section in this article. Espoo is a fairly large city and this is certainly not the first multiple homicide there. The fact that it happened today doesn't change this. --KFP (talk | contribs) 14:14, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

 * I agree. It's a major event for the people involved and for the shopping centre, but doesn't seem like one in the history of the city. I think a link to the shooting article in See also should remain, at least for now, though. Revelian (talk) 16:48, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Marcus Grönholm
I think that Marcus Grönholm is born in Kauniainen, not in Espoo, isn`t it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.166.77.170 (talk) 19:47, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

"Meant original to"?

 * The manor hosts a restaurant and club rooms, partly with original furniture open to the public, but meant original to Kaisankoti sanatory and old people's home located on ground of the manor.

What on Earth is "meant original to" supposed to mean? Perhaps "originally meant for"? Was this written by a Finn who doesn't understand English has different sentence structures than Finnish? J I P | Talk 22:51, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Espoo. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20141029190516/http://vrk.fi/default.aspx?docid=8639&site=3&id=0 to http://vrk.fi/default.aspx?docid=8639&site=3&id=0

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 23:15, 26 July 2017 (UTC)

Espoo is bilingual
It only says that Finnish is the official language in the infobox 84.248.215.80 (talk) 10:09, 11 August 2022 (UTC)

 * I might have mistaken the "(official)" for something else, I'm not sure 84.248.215.80 (talk) 10:11, 11 August 2022 (UTC)

Additional citations?
The template "this article needs additional citations for verification" was added in October 2018 when the article had seven citations. It now has eighty-three. Isn't it time the template were removed? J I P | Talk 00:51, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Yes, it should be removed by now. Finlandestonia (talk) 19:11, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Espoo


text:
Talk:Four Freedoms (software)

How about an inherently disambiguated name such as Four Freedoms of software or Four Freedoms of free software? It really isn't necessary to always parenthetically disambiguate terms. Who wants to type Four Freedoms each time they want to make a direct link? BTW, is this term always capitalized in English? --maveric149

Or even better, why have a separate article at all? The idea was created wholly by Stallman, and only exists in the context of the FSF, so it sould simply be part of the article about the FSF. Let's not pretend that these have anything to do with the field of software in general. -- Lee Daniel Crocker

Yup, I second that. Just because something happens to have a name does not warrant an encyclopedia article. I would put it into free software though, to describe RMS's notion of freedom. AxelBoldt

title: Talk:Four Freedoms (software)