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User talk:God of athesim

Hello there God of athesim, welcome to the 'pedia! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. If you ever need editing help visit How does one edit a page and experiment at Sandbox. If you need pointers on how we title pages visit Naming conventions or how to format them visit our manual of style. If you have any other questions about the project then check out Help or add a question to the Village pump. BTW, thanks for starting the list of noted Jews, I wikified it for you. Cheers! --maveric149

title: User talk:God of athesim


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Associative array

In computer science, an associative array, map, symbol table, or dictionary is an abstract data type that stores a collection of (key, value) pairs, such that each possible key appears at most once in the collection. In mathematical terms, an associative array is a function with finite domain. It supports 'lookup', 'remove', and 'insert' operations.

The dictionary problem is the classic problem of designing efficient data structures that implement associative arrays. The two major solutions to the dictionary problem are hash tables and search trees. It is sometimes also possible to solve the problem using directly addressed arrays, binary search trees, or other more specialized structures.

Many programming languages include associative arrays as primitive data types, while many other languages provide software libraries that support associative arrays. Content-addressable memory is a form of direct hardware-level support for associative arrays.

Associative arrays have many applications including such fundamental programming patterns as memoization and the decorator pattern.

The name does not come from the associative property known in mathematics. Rather, it arises from the association of values with keys. It is not to be confused with associative processors.

Operations
In an associative array, the association between a key and a value is often known as a "mapping"; the same word may also be used to refer to the process of creating a new association.

The operations that are usually defined for an associative array are:

 * Insert or put
 * add a new $$(key, value)$$ pair to the collection, mapping the key to its new value. Any existing mapping is overwritten. The arguments to this operation are the key and the value.

 * Remove or delete
 * remove a $$(key, value)$$ pair from the collection, unmapping a given key from its value. The argument to this operation is the key.

 * Lookup, find, or get
 * find the value (if any) that is bound to a given key. The argument to this operation is the key, and the value is returned from the operation. If no value is found, some lookup functions raise an exception, while others return a default value (such as zero, null, or a specific value passed to the constructor).

Associative arrays may also include other operations such as determining the number of mappings or constructing an iterator to loop over all the mappings. For such operations, the order in which the mappings are returned is usually implementation-defined.

A multimap generalizes an associative array by allowing multiple values to be associated with a single key. A bidirectional map is a related abstract data type in which the mappings operate in both directions: each value must be associated with a unique key, and a second lookup operation takes a value as an argument and looks up the key associated with that value.

Properties
The operations of the associative array should satisfy various properties: where  and   are keys,   is a value,   is an associative array, and   creates a new, empty associative array.
 * , where  is an exception or default value
 * , where  is an exception or default value

Example
Suppose that the set of loans made by a library is represented in a data structure. Each book in a library may be checked out by one patron at a time. However, a single patron may be able to check out multiple books. Therefore, the information about which books are checked out to which patrons may be represented by an associative array, in which the books are the keys and the patrons are the values. Using notation from Python or JSON, the data structure would be:

A lookup operation on the key "Great Expectations" would return "John". If John returns his book, that would cause a deletion operation, and if Pat checks out a book, that would cause an insertion operation, leading to a different state:

Implementation
For dictionaries with very few mappings, it may make sense to implement the dictionary using an association list, which is a linked list of mappings. With this implementation, the time to perform the basic dictionary operations is linear in the total number of mappings. However, it is easy to implement and the constant factors in its running time are small.

Another very simple implementation technique, usable when the keys are restricted to a narrow range, is direct addressing into an array: the value for a given key k is stored at the array cell A[k], or if there is no mapping for k then the cell stores a special sentinel value that indicates the lack of a mapping. This technique is simple and fast, with each dictionary operation taking constant time. However, the space requirement for this structure is the size of the entire keyspace, making it impractical unless the keyspace is small.

The two major approaches for implementing dictionaries are a hash table or a search tree.

Hash table implementations
The most frequently used general-purpose implementation of an associative array is with a hash table: an array combined with a hash function that separates each key into a separate "bucket" of the array. The basic idea behind a hash table is that accessing an element of an array via its index is a simple, constant-time operation. Therefore, the average overhead of an operation for a hash table is only the computation of the key's hash, combined with accessing the corresponding bucket within the array. As such, hash tables usually perform in O(1) time, and usually outperform alternative implementations.

Hash tables must be able to handle collisions: the mapping by the hash function of two different keys to the same bucket of the array. The two most widespread approaches to this problem are separate chaining and open addressing. In separate chaining, the array does not store the value itself but stores a pointer to another container, usually an association list, that stores all the values matching the hash. By contrast, in open addressing, if a hash collision is found, the table seeks an empty spot in an array to store the value in a deterministic manner, usually by looking at the next immediate position in the array.

Open addressing has a lower cache miss ratio than separate chaining when the table is mostly empty. However, as the table becomes filled with more elements, open addressing's performance degrades exponentially. Additionally, separate chaining uses less memory in most cases, unless the entries are very small (less than four times the size of a pointer).

Self-balancing binary search trees
Another common approach is to implement an associative array with a self-balancing binary search tree, such as an AVL tree or a red–black tree.

Compared to hash tables, these structures have both strengths and weaknesses. The worst-case performance of self-balancing binary search trees is significantly better than that of a hash table, with a time complexity in big O notation of O(log n). This is in contrast to hash tables, whose worst-case performance involves all elements sharing a single bucket, resulting in O(n) time complexity. In addition, and like all binary search trees, self-balancing binary search trees keep their elements in order. Thus, traversing its elements follows a least-to-greatest pattern, whereas traversing a hash table can result in elements being in seemingly random order. Because they are in order, tree-based maps can also satisfy range queries (find all values between two bounds) whereas a hashmap can only find exact values. However, hash tables have a much better average-case time complexity than self-balancing binary search trees of O(1), and their worst-case performance is highly unlikely when a good hash function is used.

A self-balancing binary search tree can be used to implement the buckets for a hash table that uses separate chaining. This allows for average-case constant lookup, but assures a worst-case performance of O(log n). However, this introduces extra complexity into the implementation and may cause even worse performance for smaller hash tables, where the time spent inserting into and balancing the tree is greater than the time needed to perform a linear search on all elements of a linked list or similar data structure.

Other trees
Associative arrays may also be stored in unbalanced binary search trees or in data structures specialized to a particular type of keys such as radix trees, tries, Judy arrays, or van Emde Boas trees, though the relative performance of these implementations varies. For instance, Judy trees have been found to perform less efficiently than hash tables, while carefully selected hash tables generally perform more efficiently than adaptive radix trees, with potentially greater restrictions on the data types they can handle. The advantages of these alternative structures come from their ability to handle additional associative array operations, such as finding the mapping whose key is the closest to a queried key when the query is absent in the set of mappings.

Ordered dictionary
The basic definition of a dictionary does not mandate an order. To guarantee a fixed order of enumeration, ordered versions of the associative array are often used. There are two senses of an ordered dictionary:

 * The order of enumeration is always deterministic for a given set of keys by sorting. This is the case for tree-based implementations, one representative being the container of C++.
 * The order of enumeration is key-independent and is instead based on the order of insertion. This is the case for the "ordered dictionary" in .NET Framework, the LinkedHashMap of Java and Python.

The latter is more common. Such ordered dictionaries can be implemented using an association list, by overlaying a doubly linked list on top of a normal dictionary, or by moving the actual data out of the sparse (unordered) array and into a dense insertion-ordered one.

Language support
Associative arrays can be implemented in any programming language as a package and many language systems provide them as part of their standard library. In some languages, they are not only built into the standard system, but have special syntax, often using array-like subscripting.

Built-in syntactic support for associative arrays was introduced in 1969 by SNOBOL4, under the name "table". TMG offered tables with string keys and integer values. MUMPS made multi-dimensional associative arrays, optionally persistent, its key data structure. SETL supported them as one possible implementation of sets and maps. Most modern scripting languages, starting with AWK and including Rexx, Perl, PHP, Tcl, JavaScript, Maple, Python, Ruby, Wolfram Language, Go, and Lua, support associative arrays as a primary container type. In many more languages, they are available as library functions without special syntax.

In Smalltalk, Objective-C, .NET, Python, REALbasic, Swift, VBA and Delphi they are called dictionaries; in Perl, Ruby and Seed7 they are called hashes; in C++, C#, Java, Go, Clojure, Scala, OCaml, Haskell they are called maps (see map (C++), unordered_map (C++), and ); in Common Lisp and Windows PowerShell, they are called hash tables (since both typically use this implementation); in Maple and Lua, they are called tables. In PHP, all arrays can be associative, except that the keys are limited to integers and strings. In JavaScript (see also JSON), all objects behave as associative arrays with string-valued keys, while the Map and WeakMap types take arbitrary objects as keys. In Lua, they are used as the primitive building block for all data structures. In Visual FoxPro, they are called Collections. The D language also supports associative arrays.

Permanent storage
Many programs using associative arrays will need to store that data in a more permanent form, such as a computer file. A common solution to this problem is a generalized concept known as archiving or serialization, which produces a text or binary representation of the original objects that can be written directly to a file. This is most commonly implemented in the underlying object model, like .Net or Cocoa, which includes standard functions that convert the internal data into text. The program can create a complete text representation of any group of objects by calling these methods, which are almost always already implemented in the base associative array class.

For programs that use very large data sets, this sort of individual file storage is not appropriate, and a database management system (DB) is required. Some DB systems natively store associative arrays by serializing the data and then storing that serialized data and the key. Individual arrays can then be loaded or saved from the database using the key to refer to them. These key–value stores have been used for many years and have a history as long as that of the more common relational database (RDBs), but a lack of standardization, among other reasons, limited their use to certain niche roles. RDBs were used for these roles in most cases, although saving objects to a RDB can be complicated, a problem known as object-relational impedance mismatch.

After approximately 2010, the need for high-performance databases suitable for cloud computing and more closely matching the internal structure of the programs using them led to a renaissance in the key–value store market. These systems can store and retrieve associative arrays in a native fashion, which can greatly improve performance in common web-related workflows.

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

title: Associative array


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Wikipedia talk:History standards/Archive

Maybe for nicknames, we should just automatically create a page for the nickname and redirect to the number? e.g., Philip the Fair (redirect to Philip IV of France)...JHK

What's wrong with using italics for genera and species? It's a standard I've seen elsewhere. --corvus13 Why is the genera bit here? Surely all the Kings and Queens are Homo sapiens? :D Dave McKee

The genera bit is for the archaeologists and palaentologists among us who are likely to be working in this field: those of likely to draw a distinction between Homo sapiens and Homo neanderthalis, for example, because that is their timescale... There's nothing wrong with using italics, in my view; but for reasons of consistency with our colleagues working in Biology, etc, we should try and use something which is in keeping. sjc

To all these rules: who says? Wouldn't it be better to model this page after rules to consider? --LMS
 * indeed. Have done.

-- Larry: It was just an outline to try and get some sort of consensus established on systems of nomenclature in History. It is becoming a useful focal point. sjc

Hi Everybody --

I have a quick comment about adding articles and what to call them. We are rapidly heading into an area where I foresee a great big train wreck coming on. I know that we all want to get as much written as quickly as possible. However, I think that enthusiasm is often given precedence to careful thought as far as what the entries should be called. This is especially true for biographical articles. For most of the period between late antiquity and the High Middle Ages, the majority of people didn't have last names per se . Moreover, there are WAY LOTS (so to speak) of famous people with the same name -- not surprising, when we think about the fact that most important families used "leading names," names that associated them with their particular family.

Most recent case in point is Fr. Jonat's Eadgyth, aka Edith (I'm only using this example b/c it's from today). Frankly, the first Edith I think of wasn't alfred's granddaughter, but Harold Godwinson's (and Hardrada's, I think) wife and (I also think) the daughter of Leofric and Godiva/Godgyfu. Somebody else might have thought of another one. There are a BUNCH of Ediths/Eadgyths/Eadgyfus out there. Can we please try to decide how we are going to separate them BEFORE we just throw them onto the site? PLEASE!! Thanks -- JHK

Especially for the minor characters of history (younger sons, wives, dull monarchs) I don't see that there's anything wrong with a name page with multiple entries. --MichaelTinkler

 * not entirely opposed -- except that I think we also need to do one of those combined name thingies, so that you can get there by typing any of the possible spellings...JHK

Also, check out just plain Alexander.

Can history be truly NPOV?
The point and ideal of Wikipedia is to create an encyclopædic body of knowledge which is both comprehensive and written from the Neutral Point of View or NPOV. Subjects, however, such as politics, religion and philosophy are problematic in this respect; to a greater extent in this respect than any of these is the subject of history.

History deals extensively (both on the macro and micro level) with conflict and upheaval of one sort or another; it tends not to overly concern itself (rightly or wrongly) with societies and states which are in a state of balance or inertia. For a take on this, the immortal line spoken by Orson Welles in the persona of Harry Lime in the film version of The Third Man speaks volumes: "In Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock...". Considerably more history has been written and produced on the subject of a few of the major players in Renaissance Italy alone than the entirety of Swiss history.

This manifest and constant focus in particular areas is itself unbalanced and inherently non-neutral in its nature. Is this imbalance rectifiable within the context of Wikipedia? Probably not. If anything, Wikipedia tends to attract as contributors particular individuals who write from a perspective which they would like to think is NPOV; the reality is of course that one writes entirely from within one's own perspective and mindset of social context and references.

A writer on the subject of as outwardly uncontroversial a subject as the history of English place names is adding weight and significance to the primacy of English language; a writer on the subject of English kings and queens adds weight to a traditionalist view of the monarchy and credence to a particular form of history. If history is to be neutral in this respect, and to be written from a neutral point of view, the argumentum ad absurdem is that everybody who ever lived deserves an article. This of course is frankly unfeasible and unrealistic.

Social historians are sadly and inevitably always outnumbered by historians of facts, dates and battles. This is a direct consequence of the fact that looking up dates is a comparatively simple task relative to the monumental effort which is required to unearth even the vestiges of the ostensibly mundane lives of the off-stage and undocumented behaviour of a disparate group of individuals. We have therefore to accept that content-wise and contextually much of the history to be found herein is explicitly non-NPOV from the very simplest of outsets.

Without labouring a point, history deals with conflicts between sides in which propaganda and ideological manipulation are inextricably a part of the process of the conflict. In these situations even the basics of semantics are problematic, and a sea of shifting sands on which the historian treads ever at peril. During the establishment of the state of Israel, for example, the Jewish settlers were depicted as the terrorists; now it is the erstwhile and formerly indigenous population to whom the term is applied, when some atrocity is committed. Over the period of fifty years the term has turned full circle.

Articles on history will also be thoroughly revealing of nationalistic preference or bias. How possible is it really to write a NPOV article about the Battle of Waterloo, which really was one of the principal crossroads (or had Napoleon prevailed, carrefours) of modern European history? For the English writer of history, it will be a glorious triumph of Wellington's superior tactics, roast beef and two vegetables; for a French writer of history, it will be a depressing defeat engendered by the incompetence of Napoleon and his chosen generals in the field in not pressing home the advantage. Is there a middle NPOV to be drawn between these extremes? To say that it was neither one thing nor the other is to miss the central salient point of history: that history is written by the victors at the expense of the vanquished. In this respect, history is never, ever, neutral.

If we are indeed to write history in a direction more compatible with NPOV we need to address these central areas of deficit with rigour. We need fewer kings and queens and dates and more detailed social history; accounts of battles should be written from the perspective of both sides where practicable; both content and semantics and language of articles should be written with a due care and caution for ethnocentric, sexual and social bias.

A healthy contribution to history studies would be an approach that looks less at the destination or conclusions in history, but the journey or method of history. A fresh exploration of the process of formulating history would illuminate the challenges that POV presents to a truer representation of the past.

What we need is a discovery of the philosophy of history.

Rather than discuss "he said this" it might be interesting to really examine how we come to accept as truth (see epistemology) that he really said it. How do we authenticate and verify something that has happened in the past? What makes us assume that history and truth are synonymous?

Judgment (see axiology) has also played a role in how histories have been passed down. Especially when we are looking at a history that is more social than natural, "good guys and bad guys" tend to vie for sympathies. If even perhaps as an extension of biological "survival of the fittest" where one side wins the fight and therefore win the right to preserve "our story" while destroying "their story," history is very often more a product of propoganda, disseminating an idealogical view to the discredit of any competing views. But, surely we can appreciate that, while "we" feel we are the good guys, "they" feel they are the good guys, too. Hence we might be uncovering a tendency to appeal to some higher moral compass to observe a universal right, and naturally write our story in alignment with that observation.


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Symbolism (arts)

Symbolism was a late 19th-century art movement of French and Belgian origin in poetry and other arts seeking to represent absolute truths symbolically through language and metaphorical images, mainly as a reaction against naturalism and realism.

In literature, the style originates with the 1857 publication of Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal. The works of Edgar Allan Poe, which Baudelaire admired greatly and translated into French, were a significant influence and the source of many stock tropes and images. The aesthetic was developed by Stéphane Mallarmé and Paul Verlaine during the 1860s and 1870s. In the 1880s, the aesthetic was articulated by a series of manifestos and attracted a generation of writers. The term "symbolist" was first applied by the critic Jean Moréas, who invented the term to distinguish the Symbolists from the related Decadents of literature and art.

Etymology
The term symbolism is derived from the word "symbol" which derives from the Latin symbolum, a symbol of faith, and symbolus, a sign of recognition, in turn from classical Greek σύμβολον symbolon, an object cut in half constituting a sign of recognition when the carriers were able to reassemble the two halves. In ancient Greece, the symbolon was a shard of pottery which was inscribed and then broken into two pieces which were given to the ambassadors from two allied city states as a record of the alliance.

Precursors and origins
Symbolism was largely a reaction against naturalism and realism, anti-idealistic styles which were attempts to represent reality in its gritty particularity, and to elevate the humble and the ordinary over the ideal. Symbolism was a reaction in favour of spirituality, imagination, and dreams. Some writers, such as Joris-Karl Huysmans, began as naturalists before becoming symbolists; for Huysmans, this change represented his increasing interest in religion and spirituality. Certain of the characteristic subjects of the Decadents represent naturalist interest in sexuality and taboo topics, but in their case this was mixed with Byronic romanticism and the world-weariness characteristic of the fin de siècle period.

The Symbolist poets have a more complex relationship with Parnassianism, a French literary style that immediately preceded it. While being influenced by hermeticism, allowing freer versification, and rejecting Parnassian clarity and objectivity, it retained Parnassianism's love of word play and concern for the musical qualities of verse. The Symbolists continued to admire Théophile Gautier's motto of "art for art's sake", and retained – and modified – Parnassianism's mood of ironic detachment. Many Symbolist poets, including Stéphane Mallarmé and Paul Verlaine, published early works in Le Parnasse contemporain, the poetry anthologies that gave Parnassianism its name. But Arthur Rimbaud publicly mocked prominent Parnassians and published scatological parodies of some of their main authors, including François Coppée – misattributed to Coppée himself – in L'Album zutique.

One of Symbolism's most colourful promoters in Paris was art and literary critic (and occultist) Joséphin Péladan, who established the Salon de la Rose + Croix. The Salon hosted a series of six presentations of avant-garde art, writing and music during the 1890s, to give a presentation space for artists embracing spiritualism, mysticism, and idealism in their work. A number of Symbolists were associated with the Salon.

The Symbolist Manifesto

Jean Moréas published the Symbolist Manifesto ("Le Symbolisme") in Le Figaro on 18 September 1886 (see 1886 in poetry). The Symbolist Manifesto names Charles Baudelaire, Stéphane Mallarmé, and Paul Verlaine as the three leading poets of the movement. Moréas announced that symbolism was hostile to "plain meanings, declamations, false sentimentality and matter-of-fact description", and that its goal instead was to "clothe the Ideal in a perceptible form" whose "goal was not in itself, but whose sole purpose was to express the Ideal."
 * Ainsi, dans cet art, les tableaux de la nature, les actions des humains, tous les phénomènes concrets ne sauraient se manifester eux-mêmes; ce sont là des apparences sensibles destinées à représenter leurs affinités ésotériques avec des Idées primordiales.

 * (Thus, in this art movement, representations of nature, human activities and all real life events don't stand on their own; they are rather veiled reflections of the senses pointing to archetypal meanings through their esoteric connections.)

In a nutshell, as Mallarmé writes in a letter to his friend Henri Cazalis, 'to depict not the thing but the effect it produces'.

In 1891, Mallarmé defined Symbolism as follows, "To name an object is to suppress three-quarters of the delight of the poem, which consists in the pleasure of guessing little by little; to suggest is, that is the dream. It is the perfect use of this mystery that constitutes the symbol: to evoke an object, gradually in order to reveal a state of the soul or, inversely, to choose an object and from it identify a state of the soul, by a series of deciphering operations... There must always be enigma in poetry."

While describing the pre-World War I friendship, which defied the pervasive anti-German sentiment and revanchism of the Belle Époque, between French symbolists Paul Verlaine and Stéphane Mallarmé and young and aspiring German symbolist poet Stefan George, Michael and Erika Metzger have written, "For the Symbolists, the pursuit of 'art for art's sake', was a highly serious – nearly a sacred – function, since beauty, in and of itself, stood for a higher meaning beyond itself. In their ultimate higher striving, the French Symbolists are not far from the Platonic ideals of the Good, the True, and the Beautiful, and this idealistic aspect was undoubtedly what appealed to George far more than the Estheticism, the Bohemianism, and the apparent Nihilism so often superficially associated with this group."

Techniques

The symbolist poets wished to liberate techniques of versification in order to allow greater room for "fluidity", and as such were sympathetic with the trend toward free verse, as evident in the poems of Gustave Kahn and Ezra Pound. Symbolist poems were attempts to evoke, rather than primarily to describe; symbolic imagery was used to signify the state of the poet's soul. T. S. Eliot was influenced by the poets Jules Laforgue, Paul Valéry and Arthur Rimbaud who used the techniques of the Symbolist school, though it has also been said that 'Imagism' was the style to which both Pound and Eliot subscribed (see Pound's Des Imagistes). Synesthesia was a prized experience; poets sought to identify and confound the separate senses of scent, sound, and colour. In Baudelaire's poem Correspondences (which mentions forêts de symboles ("forests of symbols") and is considered the touchstone of French Symbolism):

Doux comme les hautbois, verts comme les prairies, – Et d'autres, corrompus, riches et triomphants,
 * ''Il est des parfums frais comme des chairs d'enfants,

Ayant l'expansion des choses infinies, Comme l'ambre, le musc, le benjoin et l'encens, Qui chantent les transports de l'esprit et des sens.''

calm like oboes, green like meadows – And others, rotten, heady, and triumphant,
 * (There are fragrances that are fresh like children's skin,

having the expansiveness of infinite things, like amber, musk, benzoin, and incense, which sing of the raptures of the soul and senses.)

and Rimbaud's poem Voyelles:

 * A noir, E blanc, I rouge, U vert, O bleu : voyelles…
 * (A black, E white, I red, U green, O blue: vowels…)

– both poets seek to identify one sense experience with another. The earlier Romanticism of poetry used symbols, but these symbols were unique and privileged objects. The symbolists were more extreme, investing all things, even vowels and perfumes, with potential symbolic value. "The physical universe, then, is a kind of language that invites a privileged spectator to decipher it, although this does not yield a single message so much as a superior network of associations." Symbolist symbols are not allegories, intended to represent; they are instead intended to evoke particular states of mind. The nominal subject of Mallarmé's "Le cygne" ("The Swan") is of a swan trapped in a frozen lake. Significantly, in French, cygne is a homophone of signe, a sign. The overall effect is of overwhelming whiteness; and the presentation of the narrative elements of the description is quite indirect:

Va-t-il nous déchirer avec un coup d’aile ivre Ce lac dur oublié que hante sous le givre Le transparent glacier des vols qui n’ont pas fui! Un cygne d’autrefois se souvient que c’est lui Magnifique mais qui sans espoir se délivre…'' Will it tear us up with a drunken wingbeat This hard forgotten lake that lurks beneath the frost, The transparent glacier of flights not taken with a blow from a drunken wing? A swan of long ago remembers that it is he Magnificent but without hope, who breaks free…)
 * ''Le vierge, le vivace, et le bel aujourd'hui
 * (The virgin, lively, and beautiful today –

Paul Verlaine and the poètes maudits
Of the several attempts at defining the essence of symbolism, perhaps none was more influential than Paul Verlaine's 1884 publication of a series of essays on Tristan Corbière, Arthur Rimbaud, Stéphane Mallarmé, Marceline Desbordes-Valmore, Gérard de Nerval, and "Pauvre Lelian" ("Poor Lelian", an anagram of Paul Verlaine's own name), each of whom Verlaine numbered among the poètes maudits, "accursed poets."

Verlaine argued that in their individual and very different ways, each of these hitherto neglected poets found genius a curse; it isolated them from their contemporaries, and as a result these poets were not at all concerned to avoid hermeticism and idiosyncratic writing styles. They were also portrayed as at odds with society, having tragic lives, and often given to self-destructive tendencies. These traits were not hindrances but consequences of their literary gifts. Verlaine's concept of the poète maudit in turn borrows from Baudelaire, who opened his collection Les fleurs du mal with the poem Bénédiction, which describes a poet whose internal serenity remains undisturbed by the contempt of the people surrounding him.

In this conception of genius and the role of the poet, Verlaine referred indirectly to the aesthetics of Arthur Schopenhauer, the philosopher of pessimism, who maintained that the purpose of art was to provide a temporary refuge from the world of strife of the will.

Philosophy
Schopenhauer's aesthetics represented shared concerns with the symbolist programme; they both tended to consider Art as a contemplative refuge from the world of strife and will. As a result of this desire for an artistic refuge, the symbolists used characteristic themes of mysticism and otherworldliness, a keen sense of mortality, and a sense of the malign power of sexuality, which Albert Samain termed a "fruit of death upon the tree of life." Mallarmé's poem Les fenêtres expresses all of these themes clearly. A dying man in a hospital bed, seeking escape from the pain and dreariness of his physical surroundings, turns toward his window but then turns away in disgust from

Vautré dans le bonheur, où ses seuls appétits Mangent, et qui s'entête à chercher cette ordure Pour l'offrir à la femme allaitant ses petits, …''
 * ''… l'homme à l'âme dure

Wallowing in happiness, where only his appetites Feed, and who insists on seeking out this filth To offer to the wife suckling his children, …)
 * (… the hard-souled man,

and in contrast, he "turns his back on life" (tourne l’épaule à la vie) and he exclaims:

– Que la vitre soit l'art, soit la mysticité – A renaître, portant mon rêve en diadème, Au ciel antérieur où fleurit la Beauté!''
 * ''Je me mire et me vois ange! Et je meurs, et j'aime

– Whether the mirror might be art, or mysticism – To be reborn, bearing my dream as a crown, Under that former sky where Beauty flourishes!)
 * (I look at myself and I seem like an angel! and I die, and I love

Symbolists and decadents
The symbolist style has frequently been confused with the Decadent movement, the name derived from French literary critics in the 1880s, suggesting the writers were self indulgent and obsessed with taboo subjects. While a few writers embraced the term, most avoided it. Jean Moréas' manifesto was largely a response to this polemic. By the late 1880s, the terms "symbolism" and "decadence" were understood to be almost synonymous. Though the aesthetics of the styles can be considered similar in some ways, the two remain distinct. The symbolists were those artists who emphasized dreams and ideals; the Decadents cultivated précieux, ornamented, or hermetic styles, and morbid subject matters. The subject of the decadence of the Roman Empire was a frequent source of literary images and appears in the works of many poets of the period, regardless of which name they chose for their style, as in Verlaine's "Langueur":

Qui regarde passer les grands Barbares blancs En composant des acrostiches indolents D'un style d'or où la langueur du soleil danse.''
 * ''Je suis l'Empire à la fin de la Décadence,
 * (I am the Empire at the endgame of decadence, watching the great pale barbarians passing by, all the while composing lazy acrostic poems in a gilded style where the languishing sun dances.)

Periodical literature

A number of important literary publications were founded by symbolists or became associated with the style. The first was La Vogue initiated in April 1886. In October of that same year, Jean Moréas, Gustave Kahn, and Paul Adam began the periodical Le Symboliste. One of the most important symbolist journals was Mercure de France, edited by Alfred Vallette, which succeeded La Pléiade; founded in 1890, this periodical endured until 1965. Pierre Louÿs initiated La conque, a periodical whose symbolist influences were alluded to by Jorge Luis Borges in his story Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote. Other symbolist literary magazines included La Revue blanche, La Revue wagnérienne, La Plume and La Wallonie.

Rémy de Gourmont and Félix Fénéon were literary critics associated with symbolism. The symbolist and decadent literary styles were satirized by a book of poetry, Les Déliquescences d'Adoré Floupette, published in 1885 by Henri Beauclair and Gabriel Vicaire.

Visual arts

Symbolism in literature is distinct from symbolism in art although the two were similar in many aspects. In painting, symbolism can be seen as a revival of some mystical tendencies in the Romantic tradition, and was close to the self-consciously morbid and private decadent movement.

There were several rather dissimilar groups of Symbolist painters and visual artists, which included Paul Gauguin, Gustave Moreau, Gustav Klimt, Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis, Jacek Malczewski, Odilon Redon, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, Henri Fantin-Latour, Gaston Bussière, Edvard Munch, Fernand Khnopff, Félicien Rops, and Jan Toorop. Symbolism in painting was even more widespread geographically than symbolism in poetry, affecting Mikhail Vrubel, Nicholas Roerich, Victor Borisov-Musatov, Martiros Saryan, Mikhail Nesterov, Léon Bakst, Elena Gorokhova in Russia, as well as Frida Kahlo in Mexico, Elihu Vedder, Remedios Varo, Morris Graves and David Chetlahe Paladin in the United States. Auguste Rodin is sometimes considered a symbolist sculptor.

The symbolist painters used mythological and dream imagery. The symbols used by symbolism are not the familiar emblems of mainstream iconography but intensely personal, private, obscure and ambiguous references. More a philosophy than an actual style of art, symbolism in painting influenced the contemporary Art Nouveau style and Les Nabis.

Music
Symbolism had some influence on music as well. Many symbolist writers and critics were early enthusiasts of the music of Richard Wagner, an avid reader of Schopenhauer.

The symbolist aesthetic affected the works of Claude Debussy. His choices of libretti, texts, and themes come almost exclusively from the symbolist canon. Compositions such as his settings of Cinq poèmes de Charles Baudelaire, various art songs on poems by Verlaine, the opera Pelléas et Mélisande with a libretto by Maurice Maeterlinck, and his unfinished sketches that illustrate two Poe stories, The Devil in the Belfry and The Fall of the House of Usher, all indicate that Debussy was profoundly influenced by symbolist themes and tastes. His best known work, the Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune, was inspired by Mallarmé's poem, L'après-midi d'un faune.

The symbolist aesthetic also influenced Aleksandr Scriabin's compositions. Arnold Schoenberg's Pierrot Lunaire takes its text from German translations of the symbolist poems by Albert Giraud, showing an association between German expressionism and symbolism. Richard Strauss's 1905 opera Salomé, based on the play by Oscar Wilde, uses a subject frequently depicted by symbolist artists.

Prose fiction
Symbolism's style of the static and hieratic adapted less well to narrative fiction than it did to poetry. Joris-Karl Huysmans' 1884 novel À rebours (English title: Against Nature or Against the Grain) explored many themes that became associated with the symbolist aesthetic. This novel, in which very little happens, catalogues the psychology of Des Esseintes, an eccentric, reclusive antihero. Oscar Wilde was influenced by the novel as he wrote Salome, and Huysman's book appears in The Picture of Dorian Gray: the titular character becomes corrupted after reading the book.

Paul Adam was the most prolific and representative author of symbolist novels. Les Demoiselles Goubert (1886), co-written with Jean Moréas, is an important transitional work between naturalism and symbolism. Few symbolists used this form. One exception was Gustave Kahn, who published Le Roi fou in 1896. In 1892, Georges Rodenbach wrote the short novel Bruges-la-morte, set in the Flemish town of Bruges, which Rodenbach described as a dying, medieval city of mourning and quiet contemplation: in a typically symbolist juxtaposition, the dead city contrasts with the diabolical re-awakening of sexual desire. The cynical, misanthropic, misogynistic fiction of Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly is sometimes considered symbolist, as well. Gabriele d'Annunzio wrote his first novels in the symbolist manner.

Theatre

The characteristic emphasis on an internal life of dreams and fantasies have made symbolist theatre difficult to reconcile with more recent trends. Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam's drama Axël (rev. ed. 1890) is a definitive symbolist play. In it, two Rosicrucian aristocrats become enamored of each other while trying to kill each other, only to agree to commit suicide mutually because nothing in life could equal their fantasies. From this play, Edmund Wilson adopted the title Axel's Castle for his influential study of the symbolist literary aftermath.

Maurice Maeterlinck, also a symbolist playwright, wrote The Blind (1890), The Intruder (1890), Interior (1891), Pelléas and Mélisande (1892), and The Blue Bird (1908). Eugénio de Castro is considered one of the introducers of Symbolism in the Iberian Peninsula. He wrote Belkiss, "dramatic prose-poem" as he called it, about the doomed passion of Belkiss, The Queen of Sheba, to Solomon, depicting in an avant-garde and violent style the psychological tension and recreating very accurately the tenth century BC Israel. He also wrote King Galaor and Polycrates' Ring, being one of the most prolific Symbolist theoriticians.

Lugné-Poe (1869–1940) was an actor, director, and theatre producer of the late nineteenth century. Lugné-Poe "sought to create a unified nonrealistic theatre of poetry and dreams through atmospheric staging and stylized acting". Upon learning about symbolist theatre, he never wanted to practice any other form. After beginning as an actor in the Théâtre Libre and Théâtre d'Art, Lugné-Poe grasped on to the symbolist movement and founded the Théâtre de l'Œuvre where he was manager from 1892 until 1929. Some of his greatest successes include opening his own symbolist theatre, producing the first staging of Alfred Jarry's Ubu Roi (1896), and introducing French theatregoers to playwrights such as Ibsen and Strindberg.

The later works of the Russian playwright Anton Chekhov have been identified by essayist Paul Schmidt as being much influenced by symbolist pessimism. Both Konstantin Stanislavski and Vsevolod Meyerhold experimented with symbolist modes of staging in their theatrical endeavors.

Drama by symbolist authors formed an important part of the repertoire of the Théâtre de l'Œuvre and the Théâtre d'Art.

Effect
Among English-speaking artists, the closest counterpart to symbolism was aestheticism. The Pre-Raphaelites were contemporaries of the earlier symbolists, and have much in common with them. Symbolism had a significant influence on modernism (Remy de Gourmont considered the Imagists were its descendants) and its traces can also be detected in the work of many modernist poets, including T. S. Eliot, Wallace Stevens, Conrad Aiken, Hart Crane, and W. B. Yeats in the anglophone tradition and Rubén Darío in Hispanic literature. The early poems of Guillaume Apollinaire have strong affinities with symbolism. Early Portuguese Modernism was heavily influenced by Symbolist poets, especially Camilo Pessanha; Fernando Pessoa had many affinities to Symbolism, such as mysticism, musical versification, subjectivism and transcendentalism.

Edmund Wilson's 1931 study Axel's Castle focuses on the continuity with symbolism and several important writers of the early twentieth century, with a particular emphasis on Yeats, Eliot, Paul Valéry, Marcel Proust, James Joyce, and Gertrude Stein. Wilson concluded that the symbolists represented a dreaming retreat into "things that are dying–the whole belle-lettristic tradition of Renaissance culture perhaps, compelled to specialize more and more, more and more driven in on itself, as industrialism and democratic education have come to press it closer and closer.''"

After the beginning of the 20th century, symbolism had a major effect on Russian poetry even as it became less and less popular in France. Russian symbolism originally began as an emulation of the French original, but then, under the influence of Vyacheslav Ivanov, it radically diverged until it became something unrecognizable. Steeped in the doctrines of Eastern Orthodoxy and the Christian mystical philosophy of Vladimir Solovyov, it began the careers of several major poets such as Alexander Blok, Andrei Bely, Boris Pasternak, and Marina Tsvetaeva. Bely's novel Petersburg (1912) is considered the greatest example of Russian symbolist prose.

Primary influences on the style of Russian Symbolism were the irrationalistic and mystical poetry and philosophy of Fyodor Tyutchev and Solovyov, the novels of Fyodor Dostoyevsky, the operas of Richard Wagner, the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche, French symbolist and decadent poets (such as Stéphane Mallarmé, Paul Verlaine and Charles Baudelaire), and the dramas of Henrik Ibsen.

The style was largely inaugurated by Nikolai Minsky's article The Ancient Debate (1884) and Dmitry Merezhkovsky's book On the Causes of the Decline and on the New Trends in Contemporary Russian Literature (1892). Both writers promoted extreme individualism and the act of creation. Merezhkovsky was known for his poetry as well as a series of novels on god-men, among whom he counted Christ, Joan of Arc, Dante, Leonardo da Vinci, Napoleon, and (later) Hitler. His wife, Zinaida Gippius, also a major poet of early symbolism, opened a salon in St Petersburg, which came to be known as the "headquarters of Russian decadence". Andrei Bely's Petersburg (novel) a portrait of the social strata of the Russian capital, is frequently cited as a late example of Symbolism in 20th century Russian literature.

In Romania, symbolists directly influenced by French poetry first gained influence during the 1880s, when Alexandru Macedonski reunited a group of young poets associated with his magazine Literatorul. Polemicizing with the established Junimea and overshadowed by the influence of Mihai Eminescu, Romanian symbolism was recovered as an inspiration during and after the 1910s, when it was exampled by the works of Tudor Arghezi, Ion Minulescu, George Bacovia, Mateiu Caragiale, Tristan Tzara and Tudor Vianu, and praised by the modernist magazine Sburătorul.

The symbolist painters were an important influence on expressionism and surrealism in painting, two movements which descend directly from symbolism proper. The harlequins, paupers, and clowns of Pablo Picasso's "Blue Period" show the influence of symbolism, and especially of Puvis de Chavannes. In Belgium, symbolism became so popular that it came to be known as a national style, particularly in landscape painting: the static strangeness of painters like René Magritte can be considered as a direct continuation of symbolism. The work of some symbolist visual artists, such as Jan Toorop, directly affected the curvilinear forms of art nouveau.

Many early motion pictures also employ symbolist visual imagery and themes in their staging, set designs, and imagery. The films of German expressionism owe a great deal to symbolist imagery. The virginal "good girls" seen in the cinema of D. W. Griffith, and the silent film "bad girls" portrayed by Theda Bara, both show the continuing influence of symbolism, as do the Babylonian scenes from Griffith's Intolerance. Symbolist imagery lived on longest in horror film: as late as 1932, Carl Theodor Dreyer's Vampyr showed the obvious influence of symbolist imagery; parts of the film resemble tableau vivant re-creations of the early paintings of Edvard Munch.

Precursors

 * William Blake (1757–1827) English poet and artist (Songs of Innocence)
 * Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840) German painter (Wanderer above the Sea of Fog)
 * Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish essayist, historian and philosopher (Sartor Resartus)
 * Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837) Russian poet and writer (Eugene Onegin)
 * Prosper Mérimée (1803–1870) French novelist
 * Đorđe Marković Koder (1806–1891) Serbian poet (Romoranka)
 * Gérard de Nerval (1808–1855) French poet
 * Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly (1808–1889) French writer
 * Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849) American poet and writer (The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket)
 * Mikhail Lermontov (1814–1841) Russian poet and writer (A Hero of Our Time)
 * Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867) French poet (Les Fleurs du mal)
 * Gustave Flaubert (1821–1880) French writer (Madame Bovary)
 * Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828–1882) English poet and painter (Beata Beatrix)
 * Christina Rossetti (1830–1894) English poet

Authors
Armenian
 * Misak Metsarents (1886–1908)
 * Levon Shant (1869–1951)
 * Siamanto (1878–1915)
 * Daniel Varujan (1884–1915)
 * Vahan Terian ( 1885–1920)
 * Gostan Zarian ( 1885–1969)
 * Diran Chrakian (1885–1921)
 * Yeghishe Charents (1897–1937)

Belgian
 * Albert Giraud (1860–1929)
 * Charles van Lerberghe (1861-1907)
 * Maurice Maeterlinck (1862–1949)
 * Albert Mockel (1866–1945)
 * Georges Rodenbach (1855–1898)
 * Emile Verhaeren (1855–1916)

Czech
 * Otokar Březina (1868–1929)
 * Viktor Dyk (1877–1931)
 * Karel Hlaváček (1874–1898)
 * Jiří Mahen (1882–1939)
 * Antonín Sova (1864–1928)

Dutch
 * Marcellus Emants (1848-1923)
 * Louis Couperus (1863–1923)
 * J. H. Leopold (1865–1925)

English
 * Edmund Gosse (1849–1928)
 * William Ernest Henley (1849–1903)
 * Arthur Symons (1865–1945)
 * Renée Vivien (1877–1909)

French
 * Paul Adam (1862–1920)
 * Albert Aurier (1865–1892)
 * Léon Bloy (1846–1917)
 * Early Henri Barbusse (1873–1935)
 * Henri Cazalis (1840–1909)
 * Georges Duhamel (1884–1966)
 * Paul Fort (1872–1960)
 * Rémy de Gourmont (1858–1915)
 * Nicolette Hennique (born 1886)
 * Joris-Karl Huysmans (1848-1907)
 * Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam (1838–1889)
 * Alfred Jarry (1873–1907)
 * Gustave Kahn (1859–1936)
 * Jules Laforgue (1860–1887), Uruguayan (wrote in French)
 * Comte de Lautréamont (1846–1870), Uruguayan (wrote in French)
 * Jean Lorrain (1855–1906)
 * Stéphane Mallarmé (1842–1898)
 * Alexandre Mercereau (1884–1945)
 * Oscar Milosz (1877–1939) Lithuanian (wrote in French)
 * Jean Moréas (1856–1910) Greek (wrote in French)
 * Saint-Pol-Roux (1861–1940)
 * Émile Nelligan (1879–1941) Canadian (wrote in Quebec French)
 * Germain Nouveau (1851–1920)
 * Rachilde (1860–1953)
 * Henri de Régnier (1864–1936)
 * Arthur Rimbaud (1854–1891)
 * Jules Romains (1885–1972)
 * Albert Samain (1858–1900)
 * Marcel Schwob (1867–1905)
 * Paul Valéry (1871–1945)
 * Paul Verlaine (1844–1896)
 * Francis Vielé-Griffin (1863–1937)
 * Charles Vildrac (1882–1971)

Georgian
 * Valerian Gaprindashvili (1888–1941)
 * Paolo Iashvili (1894–1937)
 * Sergo Kldiashvili (1893–1986)
 * Giorgi Leonidze (1899–1966)
 * Kolau Nadiradze (1895–1991)
 * Grigol Robakidze (1880–1962)
 * Titsian Tabidze (1895–1937)
 * Sandro Tsirekidze (1894–1923)

German and Austrian
 * Stefan George (1868–1933) German
 * Hugo von Hofmannsthal (1874–1929) Austrian
 * Alfred Kubin (1877–1959) Austrian
 * Gustav Meyrink (1868–1932) Austrian
 * Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926) Austro-Bohemian
 * Arthur Schnitzler (1862–1931) Austrian

Irish language See Also: Modern literature in Irish
 * Patrick Pearse (1879 - 1916)
 * Máirtín Ó Direáin (1910 - 1988)

Polish See Also: Young Poland movement
 * Stanisław Korab-Brzozowski (1876–1901)
 * Antoni Lange (1861–1929)
 * Tadeusz Miciński (1873–1918)

Portuguese and Brasilian
 * Manuel da Silva Gaio (1861–1934)
 * João da Cruz e Sousa (1861–1898) Brazilian
 * Raul Brandão (1867–1930)
 * Alberto Osório de Castro (1868–1946)
 * Eugénio de Castro (1869–1944)
 * Alphonsus de Guimaraens (1870–1921) Brazilian
 * António Nobre (1867–1900)
 * Camilo Pessanha (1867–1926)
 * Augusto Gil (1873–1929)
 * Mário de Sá-Carneiro (1890–1916)

Russian
 * Innokenty Annensky (1855–1909)
 * Konstantin Balmont (1867–1942)
 * Andrei Bely (1880–1934)
 * Marina Tsvetaeva (1892-1941)
 * Alexander Blok (1880–1921)
 * Valery Bryusov (1873–1924)
 * Georgy Chulkov (1879–1939)
 * Zinaida Gippius (1869–1945)
 * Vyacheslav Ivanov (1866–1949)
 * Fyodor Sologub (1863–1927)
 * Vladimir Solovyov (1853–1900)
 * Dmitry Merezhkovsky (1865–1941)
 * Teffi (1872–1952)
 * Maximilian Voloshin (1877–1932)

Scottish Gaelic
 * Fr. Allan MacDonald (1859 - 1905)
 * Sorley MacLean (1911 - 1996)
 * Deòrsa Mac Iain Dheòrsa (1915 - 1984)

Serbian
 * Svetozar Ćorović (1875–1919)
 * Jovan Dučić (1871–1943)
 * Petar Kočić (1877–1916)
 * Veljko Petrović (poet) (1884–1967)
 * Vladislav Petković Dis (1880–1917)
 * Sima Pandurović (1883–1960)
 * Milan Rakić (1876–1938)
 * Isidora Sekulić (1877–1958)
 * Jovan Skerlić (1877–1914)
 * Borisav Stanković (1876–1927)
 * Aleksa Šantić (1868–1924)

Others
 * Josip Murn Aleksandrov (1879–1901) Slovene
 * George Bacovia (1881–1957) Romanian
 * Jurgis Baltrušaitis (1873–1944) Lithuanian
 * Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986), Argentine
 * Mateiu Caragiale (1885–1936) Romanian
 * Dimcho Debelyanov (1887–1916) Bulgarian
 * Viktors Eglītis (1877–1945) Latvian
 * Ady Endre (1877–1919) Hungarian
 * Dumitru Karnabatt (1877–1949) Romanian
 * Ivan Krasko (1876–1958) Slovak
 * Stuart Merrill (1863–1915) American
 * Giovanni Pascoli (1855–1912) Italian

Influence in English literature
English language authors who influenced or were influenced by symbolism include:

 * Conrad Aiken (1889–1973)
 * Max Beerbohm (1872–1956)
 * Christopher Brennan - (1870-1932)
 * Roy Campbell (1900-1957)
 * Hart Crane (1899–1932)
 * Olive Custance (1874–1944)
 * Ernest Dowson (1867–1900)
 * T. S. Eliot (1888–1965)
 * James Elroy Flecker (1884–1915)
 * John Gray (1866–1934)
 * George MacDonald (1824–1905)
 * Arthur Machen (1863–1947)
 * Katherine Mansfield (1888–1923)
 * Edith Sitwell (1887–1964)
 * Clark Ashton Smith (1893–1961)
 * George Sterling (1869–1926)
 * Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
 * Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837–1909)
 * Francis Thompson (1859–1907)
 * J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973)
 * Rosamund Marriott Watson (1860–1911)
 * Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
 * W. B. Yeats (1865–1939)

Symbolist visual artists
French
 * Edmond Aman-Jean (1858–1936)
 * Émile Bernard (1868–1941)
 * Gaston Bussière (painter) (1862–1929)
 * Eugène Carrière (1849–1906)
 * Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (1824–1898)
 * Maurice Denis (1870-1943)
 * Henri Fantin-Latour (1836–1904)
 * Charles Filiger (1863–1928)
 * Paul Gauguin (1848–1903)
 * Charles Guilloux (1866–1946)
 * Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer (1865–1953)
 * Pierre Félix Masseau (1869-1937)
 * Edgar Maxence (1871–1954)
 * Gustave Moreau (1826–1898)
 * Gustav-Adolf Mossa (1883–1971)
 * Alphonse Osbert (1857–1939)
 * Armand Point (1861–1932)
 * Ary Renan (1857–1900)
 * Odilon Redon (1840–1916)
 * Alexandre Séon (1855–1917)

Russian See Also: Russian Symbolism and the Blue Rose group.
 * Léon Bakst (1866–1924)
 * Alexandre Benois (1870–1960)
 * Ivan Bilibin (1876–1942)
 * Victor Borisov-Musatov (1870–1905)
 * Konstantin Bogaevsky (1872–1943)
 * Wassily Kandinsky (early works) (1866–1944)
 * Mikhail Nesterov (1862–1942)
 * Nicholas Roerich (1874–1947)
 * Konstantin Somov (1869–1939)
 * Viktor Vasnetsov (1848–1926)
 * Mikhail Vrubel (1856–1910)

Belgian
 * Félicien Rops (1855–1898)
 * Fernand Khnopff (1858–1921)
 * James Ensor (1860–1949)
 * Égide Rombaux (1865–1942)
 * Léon Frédéric (1865–1940)
 * William Degouve de Nuncques (1867–1935)
 * Jean Delville (1867–1953)
 * Léon Spilliaert (1882–1946)

Romanian

 * Octavian Smigelschi (1866–1912) Austro-Hungarian born, culturally Romanian
 * Mihail Simonidi (1870–1933)
 * Lascăr Vorel (1879–1918)
 * Apcar Baltazar (1880–1909)
 * Ion Theodorescu-Sion (1882–1939)

German
 * Eugen Bracht (1842–1921)
 * Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach (1851–1913)
 * Fritz Erler (1868–1940)
 * Ludwig Fahrenkrog (1867–1952)
 * Fidus (1868–1948)
 * Otto Greiner (1869–1916)
 * Ludwig von Hofmann (1861–1945)
 * Max Klinger (1857 – July 1920)
 * Emil Nolde (1867–1953)
 * Max Pietschmann (1865–1952)
 * Paul Schad-Rossa (1862–1916)
 * Sascha Schneider (1870–1927)
 * Clara Siewert (1862–1945)
 * Franz von Stuck (1863–1928)
 * Hans Unger (1872–1936)
 * Oskar Zwintscher (1870–1916)

Swiss
 * Arnold Böcklin (1827–1901)
 * Ferdinand Hodler (1853–1918)
 * Carlos Schwabe (1866–1926)

Austrian
 * Albin Egger-Lienz (1868–1926)
 * Rudolf Jettmar (1869–1939)
 * Gustav Klimt (1862–1918)
 * Alfred Kubin (1877–1959)
 * Karl Mediz (1868–1945)
 * Richard Müller (1874–1954)

Polish
 * Jacek Malczewski (1854–1929)
 * Kazimierz Stabrowski (1869–1929)
 * Witold Wojtkiewicz (1879–1909)
 * Stanisław Wyspiański (1869–1907)

Others
 * George Frederic Watts (1817–1904) English
 * James A. McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) American
 * Albert Pinkham Ryder (1847–1917) American
 * John William Waterhouse (1849–1917) English
 * Luis Ricardo Falero (1851–1896) Spanish
 * Ancell Stronach (1901–1981) Scottish
 * Jan Toorop (1858–1928) Dutch
 * Giovanni Segantini (1858–1899) Italian
 * Edvard Munch (1863–1944) Norwegian
 * Arthur Bowen Davies (1863–1928) American
 * Eliseu Visconti (1866–1944) Brazilian
 * John Duncan (1866–1945) Scottish
 * Early František Kupka (1871–1957) Czech
 * Hugo Simberg (1873–1917) Finnish
 * Frances MacDonald (1873–1921) Scottish
 * Fermín Arango (1874–1962) Spanish-Argentine
 * Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (1875–1911) Lithuanian
 * Stevan Aleksić (1876–1923) Serbian
 * Felice Casorati (1883–1963) Italian
 * Anselmo Bucci (1887–1955) Italian
 * Ze'ev Raban (1890–1970) Polish/Israeli
 * Beda Stjernschantz (1867—1910) Finnish

Symbolist playwrights

 * Gerhart Hauptmann (1862–1946) German
 * Hugo von Hoffmannsthal (1874 - 1929), Austrian
 * Federico García Lorca (1898–1936) Spanish
 * Fr. Allan MacDonald (1959 - 1904), Scottish Gaelic literature
 * Maurice Maeterlinck (1862–1949) Belgian
 * Máirtín Ó Direáin (1910 - 1988), Irish
 * Lugné-Poe (1869–1940) French
 * Reinhard Sorge (1892 - 1916) German

Composers affected by symbolist ideas

 * Richard Wagner (1813–1883) German
 * Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840–1893) Russian
 * Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) French
 * Charles Loeffler (1861–1935) American
 * Claude Debussy (1862–1918) French
 * Richard Strauss (1864–1949) German
 * Erik Satie (1866–1925) French
 * Béla Bartók (1881–1945) Hungarian

 * Alexander Scriabin (1872–1915) Russian
 * Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) French
 * Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (1875–1911) Lithuanian
 * Mieczysław Karłowicz (1876–1909) Polish
 * Cyril Scott (1879–1970) English
 * Karol Szymanowski (1882–1937) Polish
 * Lili Boulanger (1893–1918) French
 * Arnold Schoenberg (1874–1951) Austrian

title: Symbolism (arts)


text:
User:Jafosei

Jafosei is single and living in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.

Current interests include Skydiving, Weight training, and Rugby.

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Spiny lobster

Spiny lobsters, also known as langustas, langouste, or rock lobsters, are a family (Palinuridae) of about 60 species of achelate crustaceans, in the Decapoda Reptantia. Spiny lobsters are also, especially in Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, South Africa, and the Bahamas, called crayfish, sea crayfish, or crawfish ("kreef" in South Africa), terms which elsewhere are reserved for freshwater crayfish.

Classification
The furry lobsters (such as Palinurellus) were previously separated into a family of their own, the Synaxidae, but they are usually considered members of the Palinuridae. The slipper lobsters (Scyllaridae) are their next-closest relatives, and these two or three families make up the Achelata. Genera of spiny lobsters include Palinurus and a number of anagrams thereof: Panulirus, Linuparus, etc. The name derives from the small Italian port of Palinuro, which was known for harvesting the European spiny lobster (Palinurus elephas) in ancient Roman times. The town itself was named for the legendary figure of Palinurus, who was a helmsman in Virgil's Æneid.

In total, 12 extant genera are recognised, containing around 60 living species:

 * Jasus Parker, 1883
 * Justitia Holthuis, 1946
 * Linuparus White, 1847
 * Nupalirus Kubo, 1955
 * Palibythus Davie, 1990
 * Palinurellus De Man, 1881
 * Palinurus Weber, 1795
 * Palinustus A. Milne-Edwards, 1880
 * Panulirus White, 1847
 * Projasus George and Grindley, 1964
 * Puerulus Ortmann, 1897
 * Sagmariasus Holthuis, 1991

Description
Although they superficially resemble true lobsters in terms of overall shape and having a hard carapace and exoskeleton, the two groups are not closely related. Spiny lobsters can be easily distinguished from true lobsters by their very long, thick, spiny antennae, by the lack of chelae (claws) on the first four pairs of walking legs, although the females of most species have a small claw on the fifth pair, and by a particularly specialized larval phase called phyllosoma. True lobsters have much smaller antennae and claws on the first three pairs of legs, with the first being particularly enlarged.

Spiny lobsters typically have a slightly compressed carapace, lacking any lateral ridges. Their antennae lack a scaphocerite, the flattened exopod of the antenna. This is fused to the epistome (a plate between the labrum and the basis of the antenna). The flagellum, at the top of the antenna, is stout, tapering, and very long. The ambulatory legs (pereopods) end in claws (chelae).

Size
The size of the adults varies from a few centimetres to 30–40 cm. In general, it is said that rarely some individuals can reach 60 cm (Panulirus argus).

Nevertheless, some reports – the authenticity of which can be questioned – are of much larger lobsters. One such source is Bernard Gorsky's travel book La derniére ile. In this, the author lists the following statements:

 * According to a 1956 article from the New Caledonian daily newspaper La France Australe (published in Nyoma): "Since yesterday, a so-called porcelain spiny lobster, stuffed, can be seen in the window of Balande. Its length is 2 m, (including its antennae) and it weighed 11 kg.
 * Inhabitants of a small island in the Coral Sea caught a 2 m 10 cm, 17 kg porcelain spiny lobster, according to an Australian publication.
 * Gorsky himself caught 6–7 kg lobsters with local tribesmen on the Loyalty Islands group's Mouli island and mentioned them in the article in La France Australe. However, according to the locals, even bigger crabs can live there. According to the residents, a man from the Leikigne tribe (they live nearby on the other side of the Fayawa Strait) reported the following: he once went fishing with a friend and the friend drowned. He did not come to the surface, he followed him into the depths. Two legs protruded from a hollow, and in the hollow sat a huge crayfish, and it was eating the fisherman. The crawfish was said to be as thick as the trunk of a full-grown palm tree. (At the time, the locals (the people of Leikigne) gave credence to the report and believed that the victim could not have drowned because he swam "like a dolphin" – but a shark would not have killed him either, because there are usually no sharks in the lagoon there. According to them, only a lobster could be really responsible.) Since one of Gorsky's narrators ("Guy") was 20 years old at the time of the story (1965), and the incident occurred when he was 12, the story must have been around 1957 if true.
 * A study was conducted regarding the effect of growth and survival when you change the frequency of feeding the Spiny Lobster and it was determined that if there is increased feed frequency from one to sixteen feeds daily then that is where growth and feed attraction are at the peak of their performance. If the lobsters are fed too much though, more than 16 feeds a day causes decreased feed intake and reduction in overall growth. It was also determined that the rapid leaching of feed suggests that there is a beneficial effect of feeding multiple frequencies on growth and intake.

Fossil record
The fossil record of spiny lobsters has been extended by the discovery in 1995 of a 110-million-year-old fossil near El Espiñal in Chiapas, Mexico. Workers from the National Autonomous University of Mexico have named the fossil Palinurus palaecosi, and report that it is closest to members of the genus Palinurus currently living off the coasts of Africa.

Ecology
Spiny lobsters are found in almost all warm seas, including the Caribbean and the Mediterranean Sea, but are particularly common in Australasia, where they are referred to commonly as crayfish or sea crayfish (Jasus edwardsii), and in South Africa (Jasus lalandii).

Spiny lobsters tend to live in crevices of rocks and coral reefs, only occasionally venturing out at night to seek snails, clams, sea-hares, crabs, or sea urchins to eat. They sometimes migrate in very large groups in long files of lobsters across the sea floor. These lines may be more than 50 lobsters long. Spiny lobsters navigate using the smell and taste of natural substances in the water that change in different parts of the ocean. It was recently discovered that spiny lobsters can also navigate by detecting the Earth's magnetic field. They keep together by contact, using their long antennae. Potential predators may be deterred from eating spiny lobsters by a loud screech made by the antennae of the spiny lobsters rubbing against a smooth part of the exoskeleton. Spiny lobsters usually exhibit the social habit of being together. However recent studies indicate that healthy lobsters move away from infected ones, leaving the diseased lobsters to fend for themselves.

Like true lobsters, spiny lobsters are edible and are an economically significant food source; they are the biggest food export of the Bahamas, for instance.

Sound
Many spiny lobsters produce rasping sounds to repel predators by rubbing the "plectrum" at the base of the spiny lobster's antennae against a "file". The noise is produced by frictional vibrations – sticking and slipping, similar to rubber materials sliding against hard surfaces. While a number of insects use frictional vibration mechanisms to generate sound, this particular acoustic mechanism is unique in the animal kingdom. Significantly, the system does not rely on the hardness of the exoskeleton, as many other arthropod sounds do, meaning that the spiny lobsters can continue to produce the deterrent noises even in the period following a moult when they are most vulnerable. The stridulating organ is present in all but three genera in the family (Jasus, Projasus, and the furry lobster Palinurellus), and its form can distinguish different species.

title: Spiny lobster


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Izhevsk

Izhevsk (Иже́вск, ; Ижкар, or Иж) is the capital city of Udmurtia, Russia. It is situated along the Izh River, west of the Ural Mountains in Eastern Europe. It is the 21st-largest city in Russia, and the most populous in Udmurtia, with over 600,000 inhabitants.

From 1984 to 1987, the city was called Ustinov (Усти́нов), named after Soviet Minister of Defence Dmitry Ustinov. The city is a major hub of industry, commerce, politics, culture and education in the Volga Region. It is known for its defense, engineering and metallurgy industries. Izhevsk has the titles of the Armory Capital of Russia and the City of Labor Glory.

Pioneer settlements

The pioneer settlements on the territory where modern Izhevsk now stands were founded by Udmurts in the 5th century. There were two fortified settlements situated on the banks of the Karlutka River. Later this territory joined the Khanate of Kazan. In 1552, Russia conquered the Khanate and, in 1582, Ivan the Terrible conferred the lands by the Karlutka and Izh Rivers on Bagish Yaushev, a Tatar morza. The quit-rent had been imposed on the Udmurt population ever since. The Yaushevs owned the land until the reign of Peter the Great (1682–1721).

Ironworks construction
On September 15, 1757, Count Pyotr Shuvalov, owner of seven factories in the Urals, bought land in the Kama Region and got permission from Empress Elizabeth to build three ironworks there. In those days, ironworks were powered with steam, and wood was the only fuel. For that reason it was decided to build one of the plants on the forest-rich land near the Izh River and make iron bands and cast iron anchors. Another ironworks was built on the Votka River.

In April 10, 1760, serfs from neighboring villages and artisans from other Shuvalov's plants began dam construction under the direction of Alexey Moskvin, a mining engineer and a trustee of Shuvalov. This date is considered to be the date of Izhevsk's foundation. Construction proceeded at a slow pace. The serfs were unhappy with being taken from their villages, with arduous duties and regular physical punishment, leading to tumultuous rebellions.

In 1762 Shuvalov died. His son Andrey inherited the factories. In accordance with the ukase of Catherine the Great dated November 15, 1763, all Shuvalov's ironworks, including the one at Izhevsky Zavod, lapsed to the Crown for debts. Since that time, it has been under the authority of the Collegium of Mining, an institution in charge of the Russian mining industry. The ironworks on the Izh and Votka Rivers were called Kama Plants.

In 1763 construction of the dam and ironworks was completed and the first bloomery iron was smelted. As a result of the dam construction, the Izhevsk Reservoir, one of the biggest in Europe was formed. Near the ironworks, the settlement was built. This settlement was named Izhevsky Zavod, meaning "the factory on the Izh" in Russian.

Initially the ironworks made palm-wide iron bands from 3-6 m long. These bands were supplied to Moscow for the rebuilding of the Kremlin. The iron from Izhevsky Zavod was also used for construction in Saint Petersburg.

Pugachev's Rebellion
In October 1773, the news of the popular revolt against Catherine II on the Yaik and the manifestos of Yemelyan Pugachev reached Izhevsky Zavod. The Cossack passing himself off as Peter III proclaimed liberty for serfs and called for killing nobles and factory owners. This had the backing of the serfs and artisans. So Colonel Feodor Wenzel, the manager of the Goroblagodat and Kama plants, and Aleksey Alymov, the manager of Izhevsky Zavod ironworks, were forced to escape to Kazan.

On January 1, 1774, a detachment of Yemelyan Pugachev's rebel army reached the town. The rebels destroyed the ironworks, burned its office buildings, and wrecked the houses of the managers. They demolished the food depot and distributed the food to the people. The ironworks money was sent to the staff of the rebel army, near Ufa. The serfs were freed. Some of them joined the detachment. Iron production stopped for a while. Around this time, Catherine realized the seriousness of the rebellion and sent an army led by General Aleksandr Bibikov to crush the insurrection. In April 1774, Pugachev's army fought losing battles everywhere and was forced to leave Izhevsky Zavod. The managers returned and cowed serfs and artisans into submission, forcing them to pledge allegiance to Catherine the Great. A list of workers who had joined the rebel army was compiled for future reprisal.

In spite of opposition from the forces of Wenzel and Alymov Brothers, Pugachev's army occupied the town again on June 27, 1774. The crowds hailed Yemelyan Pugachev. He dealt with the complaints of serfs and workers for two days. Forty-two persons, including Wenzel and the Alymovs, were executed. On June 29, Pugachev left Izhevsky Zavod and set out for Kazan. Many workmen of Izhevsky Zavod joined his detachments and fought selflessly in the last battles of the Rebellion, which was mostly crushed by early September 1775. In spite of the defeat of the rebel army and the execution of its leader, bands of rebels continued to fight. New managers of the ironworks suppressed serfs and brought back artisans by force, cracking down on the bands of rebels.

The ironworks was restored and began to function by the end of 1775. The former order was reinstated. The forced laborers weren't interested in boosting productivity and the practice fell into decay by the 19th century.

Arms factory foundation
In 1800, Emperor Paul I ordered an arms factory built in the Urals in view of a mounting threat from Napoleonic France. Andrew Deryabin, a mining engineer, chief of Goroblagodat, Perm, Kama and Bogoslov plants, chose the site for the new plant. He saw several places in the Perm and Vyatka governorates and concluded that the most suitable place for plant foundation was Izh Zavod. It occurred to him to turn the ironworks into the armory.

Alexander I approved of Deryabin's project and construction began on the arms factory building on June 10, 1807, considered the year of Izhevsk's second birth.

Dudin's plan
The new factory had a shortage of manpower. Staff vacancies were filled by serfs, workmen from Urals mining plants and recruits. Armorers were transferred from other arms factories and hired from Europe, mainly from Denmark and Sweden.

The population of the settlement grew quickly so that by the end of 1808 there were more than 6,000 inhabitants. Because of housing requirements, people had to build their houses after work, at night. Houses were made from wood found in forests near the factory. At the same time, workers built new barracks for the soldiers and housing for factory employees, officers and officials, the hospital, schools and other social facilities.

The settlement was built according to the master plan. Architect Feodor Dudin was an author of this plan and a director of all construction works. The principle of an urban grid was the basis of the new master plan. Wide and straight streets crossed side streets running perpendicular to them. Their accurate network formed small rectangular blocks.

On May 18, 1810, a major fire burned in Izhevsky Zavod. 174 houses, the warehouse, and two wooden churches were destroyed.

After the fire, implementation of Dudin's plan began. The houses were made of pinewood logs. As a rule, a house consisted of two izbas, joined with an inner porch. Houses of the poor consisted of one izba. Armorers and officials erected two-storied and five-wall log houses. There were 15 streets in Izh by the 1820s. In 1812, Izhevsky Zavod was divided into three administrative parts because of growth in population and territory. In 1816, there were 1,710 houses, 8 factory stone buildings, a prison, a cemetery, a stone church and a school in the settlement. The population was 8,324.

In the 1820s, 1830s, and 1840s, a number of large stone building was erected. St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral was built between 1818 and 1823, and visited by Tsar Alexander (who considered Alexander Nevsky his patron saint) shortly after its completion. Other noteworthy large stone buildings which still remain from that era include the Arsenal (1823–25), Public Offices (1843–45) and house of contractor Egor Novikov. All improved Izhevsk's appearance.

By 1850, the settlement had more than doubled, to population of 19,163. Its territory was about 6200 square miles. 3499 buildings were wooden, and 27 others, including three churches, were made of stone. The settlement had 1066 wells.

Izhevsky Zavod after the Emancipation Reform of 1861
On February 19, 1861, Emperor of Russia Alexander II carried out the Emancipation Reform. On October 9, 1865, Berg-kollegia, apprehending a prospective cost increase, leased the arms factory to a partnership of industrialists.

In 1866, serfs of the factory obtained their liberty with the 1861 Emancipation Manifesto and gained self-government. Izhevsky Zavod was divided into two volosts: Nagornaya Volost and Zarechnaya Volost, or Zareka. Each volost had its board of administration and consisted of rural groups. Rural circles were headed by a starosta, selected in the gathering. There were seven rural societies in Nagornaya Volost; Zarechnaya Volost consisted of four.

Administrations of volosts reported to the Board of Sarapul Zemstvo. They were led by volost starshinas, elected for three years. Volost administrations were in charge of doing duty and paying taxes. They issued passports, managed improvement of territory and other local affairs.

Administrative and police oversight was carried out by the factory administration. Besides the administration delivered documents of title to land and house. The ponds, pastures and hayfields were turned over to the armorers and artisans.

The abolition of serfdom aggravated wealth inequalities between the inhabitants of Izhevsky Zavod. Well-to-do sections of population included the factory management, skilled armorers and artisans, administrative professionals, officials, clergy and merchants. Such stratification had an influence on view of the settlement. Working people were driven out of Nagornaya Part and settled in boggy Zareka. At that time, Koltoma, another working-class locality, grew. In the early 1870s, there were about twenty private stone buildings in Izhevsky Zavod. In Zarechnaya Part all houses were made of wood.

Civic life depended on government contract work. In the years of war or army re-equipment, the orders grew, and so did the workforce and labour earnings. After the government orders were filled and wages were cut, most workmen left the arms factory and the settlement fell into decay until the next government contract.

Enterprises in Izhevsky Zavod
In 1872, the steel works was founded in Izhevsky Zavod. In 1884, the arms factory and the steel works passed to the state.

Private armories appeared in Izhevsky Zavod.

 * In 1860, an armorer named Ivan Fyodorovich Petrov began making hunting rifles at a small armory in Zaręka. Later, he set up shop in Yekaterinburg, Omsk, Nizhny Novgorod and the Caucasus. He and his sons also sold gunpowder in Izhevsky Zavod. One of his sons, Vasily, later opened his own armory.
 * Andrian Nikandrovich Evdokimov was a competitor of the Petrovs. He had the armory on Bazarnaya Street.
 * Nikolay Ilyich Berezin built his enterprise on Bazarnaya Street, too. He produced guns. He also owned a small iron foundry in the northeast suburbs.
 * Merchants Porsev and Kilin were the owners of two brick factories.

There were twelve private industrial enterprises in Izhevsky Zavod by 1914.

Izhevsky Zavod merchants
In the 1870s, trade blossomed in Izhevsky Zavod. The Bodalev Brothers, Mokletsov, Ogloblin, Sveshnikov and Sozykin were the most successful merchants. It was profitable to deal in spirits. There were three vodka distilleries, four wine warehouses, three wine cellars, and about fifty taverns in 1872. This year Ivan Bodalev opened his brewery on the bank of the reservoir.

Religious buildings
At the turn of the 19th century, there were four temples in Izhevsky Zavod. St. Michael's Cathedral was built between 1897 and 1915.

Izhevsky Zavod was one of the residence centers of the Udmurt Jews, who spoke Udmurtish Yiddish. In the workmen's settlement since 1849 under the Jewish religious needs the house of worship was allocated. A second prayer house was opened in 1917. Both synagogues were closed in 1930 by the Soviet authorities.

The Russian Revolution and the Russian Civil War
On March 5, 1917, workers at the plant formed a worker's soviet, which included representatives of the workers, the army and of other citizens. Two days later the factory administration resigned and was replaced with elected officials. By mid-September of the same year, Bolsheviks took control of both the council and its influential newspaper.

On October 27, 1917, Soviet government was officially announced, with the council officially dissolved soon thereafter. The former leaders of the council were arrested in June 1918, contributing to an uprising against Bolshevik rule. The struggle for control of the city continued until the arrival of the Red Army, which took Izhevsk on November 7. On April 13, 1919, the city was occupied by units of Admiral Kolchak's White Army, only to fall again, this time decisively, to another assault by the Red Army in June 8 of the same year.

The Soviet period

The Soviet period saw significant growth in the size and importance of Izhevsk. In 1921, the city became the administrative center of Votsk Autonomous Oblast, a precursor to the Udmurt Republic. On December 28, 1934, Izhevsk received status of capital of the Udmurt Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. The first tramline was opened in 1935. It was 5 km long.

On March 14, 1937, the Republic's constitution was adopted. It consolidated the capital status of Izhevsk. In the autumn of 1941 several defense-related plants evacuated to Izhevsk. In June, 1943, Izhevsk Mechanical Plant was founded. During World War II, Izhevsk plants produced 12 and a half million small arms.

World War II had a profound effect on the city; much of the industrial infrastructure evacuated from the western regions of the Soviet Union was relocated to the city. Elements of the evacuated enterprises were used to create the Izhevsk Mechanical Plant, which remains an important manufacturer of military components.

Military industry remained the core of the local economy after the war, so Izhvesk was designated a closed city, inaccessible to foreigners. The city's Izhmash factory began manufacturing the AK-47 automatic rifle in 1948, and continues to produce modern variants of the design to this day. The rifle's designer, Mikhail Kalashnikov lived in Izhevsk until his death in 2013. In 1966, Izhmash began manufacturing the Izh brand of automobiles.

In 1984, the city was renamed Ustinov; in honor of former minister of defense Dmitry Ustinov. Three years later, despite vocal protests by a significant number of citizens, Izhevsk regained its historical name.

Izhevsk weathered the post-Soviet years reasonably well, carried through by the continued demand for its military products. The city remains an important industrial and military center of the country, referred to as the "Armory of Russia", a title it shares with the city of Tula.

2022 school shooting
On 26 September 2022, Artem Kazantsev, a former pupil, committed a mass shooting at School No. 88 in the city. Eighteen people, including eleven children, were killed, and 24 others were injured. The school has about 1,000 pupils. Kazantsev later killed himself at the scene.

Administrative and municipal status
Izhevsk is the capital of the republic. Within the framework of administrative divisions, it is incorporated as the city of republic significance of Izhevsk—an administrative unit with the status equal to that of the districts. As a municipal division, the city of republic significance of Izhevsk is incorporated as Izhevsk Urban Okrug.

Demographics
Population:

According to the 2010 census, the capital of Udmurtia is home to more than 100 ethnicities. More than two-thirds of residents are Russians (68.8%). Other groups include Udmurts (14.8%), Tatars (8.9%), Ukrainians, Belarusians, Mari, Bashkirs, Chuvash, Armenians, Jews and Germans.

Izhevsk was one of the homes of the Udmurt Jews. Jews have lived in Izhevsk since the 1830s.

Economy
Izhevsk is the most important economic center of the Udmurt Republic, with the majority of financial and industrial activity concentrated in the city. Military industry remains the backbone of the local economy, with a number of enterprises operating in the city. By far the most important of these is Izhmash, which produces small arms and assault rifles popular both in Russia and abroad. The plant also produces motorcycles and automobiles under IZH brandname.

In 2006, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez visited Izhevsk to tour the Izhmash manufacturing center where he announced his government's intention to purchase a large number of Izhevsk-produced rifles.

Transport
City public transport included buses, trolleybuses and trams. The main railway station is located in the southern part of the city, and the Izhevsk Airport is located east of the city.

Climate
Izhevsk has a humid continental climate (Köppen climate classification Dfb) with long, cold winters and short, warm summers. Summers are quite a bit warmer than at corresponding latitudes in Western Europe, courtesy of the city's far inland location. Winters are a lot colder than said areas, also due to the distance from the North Atlantic, which results in limited temperature moderation. Even so, winters are a lot less severe than those in Russian cities east of the Ural Mountains.

An extreme July temperature of +37.0 C was recorded during the 2010 Northern Hemisphere summer heat waves, although the highest temperature recorded is +38.1 C in August 2021.

Education
Izhevsk is the scientific and cultural center of the Udmurt Republic. Early on, the state took a leading role in childcare and education. 320 Public kindergartens/ preschools provide affordable childcare for 32,000 children. 100 public schools provide free general education to over 100,000 Izhevsk students. A wide variety of technical colleges and two-year professional schools award associate degrees, most notably in medical assistance, performing arts and teaching.

The Ural department of the Russian Scientific Academy is represented in Izhevsk by several institutions, specializing in physics, applied mechanics and technical sciences, and economics, and the Institute of History, Language and Literature of Udmurtia does the same.

Four out of five higher education institutes in the Udmurt Republic are located in Izhevsk: Udmurt State University, Izhevsk State Technical University, Agricultural Academy, and Izhevsk State Medical Academy. Each of these educational institutions admits foreign students.

Udmurt State University celebrated its 75th anniversary in 2006. It is the oldest educational institution in the Udmurt Republic. Some 28,000 students are currently studying at the university, which offers 86 different majors. The university has thirteen departments and seven institutes. Out of 1,000 faculty members 130 hold Doctor of Science (Dr.Sc.) degrees, and 460 are Candidates of Sciences (Cand.Sc., equivalent to first year of Ph.D.). UdSU graduate school offers 11 attestation committees qualified to award Cand.Sc. and Dr.Sc. degrees in ecology, economics, law, psychology, pedagogics, ethnology, history, culture, linguistics of the Ural region, and Udmurt linguistics.

Izhevsk is a pilot city of the Council of Europe and European Commission Intercultural cities programme.

Museums and galleries
There are about fifty museums and galleries in Izhevsk. The most popular of them are:
 * The Kalashnikov Museum and Exhibition Complex of Small Arms;
 * The Gerd National Museum — the Arsenal;
 * The Udmurt Republican Museum of Fine Arts;
 * The Izhmash Museum;
 * The Museum of Medicine and Pharmacy;
 * The Museum of Electrification and Electroenergetics;
 * The Gennadiy Krasilnikov Memorial Flat;
 * The National Center of Decorative and Applied Arts and Handicraft;
 * The Galerea Exhibition Center.

The Kalashnikov Museum and Exhibition Complex of Small Arms, or the Kalashnikov Museum, opened in 2004. Its expositions tell about Izhevsk as one of the most important centers of Russian arms production. The main person of the museum narration is Mikhail Kalashnikov. The museum and exhibition complex holds the permanent exposition devoted to this legendary Russian armourer. There are temporary expositions in addition to the permanent exposition launched in 2004. The Museum has a demonstration hall, including the shooting gallery where different models of historical and contemporary arms are presented, and the pneumatic shooting gallery.

17 kilometers from Izhevsk is the Ludorvay Architectural and Ethnographic Open-air Museum. It was founded in 1990 on the premises of the former Russian settlement Ilyinka. Total area of the culture preserve is about 40 hectares. It divided into five exhibition parts: the Sector of Central Udmurts, the Sector of Southern Udmurts, Russian sector, the Windmill, and the Mushtor Apiary Complex.

Theaters and philharmonics
Izhevsk has a number of theaters, among the most prominent of which are:
 * State Russian Drama Theatre;
 * State National Theatre of the Udmurt Republic;
 * State Opera and Ballet Theatre of the Udmurt Republic;
 * State Puppet Theatre of the Udmurt Republic;
 * Modern Dramaturgy and Direction Centre;
 * "Young Man" Municipal Theatre;
 * "Ptitsa" Theatre-Studio;
 * State Philharmonic of the Udmurt Republic.

Circus
One of the integral parts of Izhevsk cultural life is the State Circus of the Udmurt Republic. Residents of Izhevsk have liked circus throughout the history of the city. In olden days the settlement was visited by vagrant performers — skomorokhs with mountain bears, strongmen and fakirs. Since the turn of the 19th century, shows took places in booths — temporary structures with benches for the rich and standing room for the poor.

The first Izhevsk circus was built by Aleksandr Koromyslov in 1895. It had existed until the Civil War began. On 21 September 1926, the Kolart Circus was opened. It was made of wood and seated 1,500 spectators.

In 1943, at the height of The Great Patriotic War, the stone circus building was erected in the Kolart's place. It was designed by P.M. Popov after the pattern of Ciniselli Circus in Saint Petersburg. On 29 November 1943, wounded soldiers saw the first show there. The Circus seated 1,800 spectators and was considered one of the best in the Soviet Union.

On January 14, 1990, the Circus was closed because of dilapidation. On 29 December 1999, the building was razed.

On January 17, 2000, a cornerstone of new circus was laid. The project was designed by Moscow architect Mikhail Vesnin. In the judgment of specialists, the contemporary building of the Circus is one of the best in Russia. It seats 1,800 spectators like the predecessor and has current technologies and high-performance audio and light equipment.

The International Circus Art Festival has been held at the State Circus of the Udmurt Republic yearly in March since 2008. Circus stars come to Izhevsk from every corner of the globe. Some of the world's leading circus art festivals and circus managers and producers join the festival jury.

Sports
The Izhevsk ice hockey team HC Izhstal plays in the Supreme Hockey League. In the season 2013-14 the team finished the regular season 19th and failed to qualify for the playoffs.

The football club Zenit-Izhevsk plays in the Russian Professional Football League. In the season 2013-14 the team finished fifth in the zone Ural-Povolzhye.

The women's handball team Universitet plays in Russian Superleague.

The sledge hockey team Udmurtia was twice champion of Russia (2010, 2014).

Entertainment
In the post-Soviet period, Izhevsk became known as home to a vibrant art and music scene. Izhevsk is sometimes referred to as "the capital of Russian electronic music". The most well-known Izhevsk electronic act was Стук Бамбука в XI Часов (Stuk Bambuka v XI Chasov), whose only album Лёгкое дело холод (1991) is now considered classic.

Currently the music scene continues to evolve creating new talents such as Anna Krab calling herself the Electronic Queen of Udmurtia and Distract-a-bee with a dick-logo tending to release an album every week.

Italmas (Италмас) is an Udmurt folk theater and dance company.

Notable buildings and structures

 * Alexander Nevsky Cathedral is a Neoclassical building from 1823 patterned after St. Andrew's Cathedral in Kronstadt (whose architect was Andreyan Zakharov)
 * St. Michael's Cathedral was built by the Izhevsk arms works in the early 20th century, destroyed by the Bolsheviks and rebuilt to the original design in 2007
 * Pesochnaya TV Mast (195-m tall guyed tubular steel mast built in 1962, which is equipped with six crossbars running in two levels from the mast structure to the guys )

Pond
Izhvesk City Pond's area is over 22 km2, yet it was artificially constructed (in parts dug by hand) in the 1760s for industrial needs. Empress Elizabeth of Russia granted Count Peter Shuvalov official permission to create three factories in the Kama River region September 15, 1757.

Construction of the three-step industrial dam at the critical point where the two rivers (Izh and Yagul/Podborenka) join started both the pond and the city in April 1760.

The dam was reconstructed in 1809–1815 when Andrey Fedorovich Deryabin converted the original metalworking factory into the new arms producing facility. It was subsequently modernized again in 1983–1984 in order to extend the dam. Today a number of major Izhevsk industrial plants are still located along the pond.

In 1972, the Izhevsk Pond Embankment, a three-mile-long walkway and a system of boulevards and squares, was extended along the pond. The "Friendship of Nations" Square, with its central monument celebrating 400 years of Udmurtia's union with Russia, is a focal point of the esplanade and a hip place for youth recreation. During the summer months excursion boats operate from Izhevsk to the village of Volozhka.

International relations
Izhevsk is a pilot city of the Council of Europe.

Twin towns – sister cities
Izhevsk is twinned with:

 * 🇧🇾 Brest, Belarus
 * 🇦🇷 Córdoba, Argentina
 * 🇻🇪 Maracay, Venezuela
 * 🇺🇸 Salt Lake City, United States
 * 🇭🇺 Tatabánya, Hungary
 * 🇨🇳 Wuhan, China
 * 🇨🇳 Xining, China
 * 🇧🇬 Yambol, Bulgaria

It was twinned with Będzin, Poland, until the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, for which Będzin cut ties.

Science and technology

 * Yevgeny Dragunov (1920–1991), firearm designer
 * Victor Kalashnikov (1942–2018), weapons scientist and engineer, son of Mikhail Kalashnikov
 * Vladimir Napolskikh (born 1963), ethnographer and linguist
 * Gennadiy Nikonov (1950–2003), firearm designer
 * Taisiya Osintseva (1923–2008), neurologist and physician

Sport

 * Alina Zagitova (born 2002), figure skater, European, World and Olympic champion
 * Dmitri Bykov (born 1977), ice hockey defenceman
 * Andrei Kirilenko (born 1981), basketball player, European champion
 * Galina Kulakova (born 1942), cross-country skier, four-time Olympic champion
 * Maxim Maksimov (born 1979), biathlete
 * Valeriy Medvedtsev (born 1964), biathlete
 * Vladimir Semakov (born 1985), Russian and Ukrainian biathlete, European champion
 * Vladimir Shkurikhin (born 1958), volleyball player, world and European champion
 * Ivan Tcherezov (born 1980), biathlete, world champion
 * Tamara Tikhonova (born 1964), cross-country skier, two-time World and a two-time Olympic champion
 * Pavel Tonkov (born 1969), racing cyclist
 * Fedor Tyutin (born 1983), ice hockey defenceman, world champion
 * Anna Zhigalova (born 1981), sumo wrestler
 * Andrei Vedernikov (born 1959), cyclist, world champion

Others

 * Alexander Saburov (1908–1974), partisan in World War II, Soviet general and politician
 * Volodymyr Selivanov (born 1945), Ukrainian statesman
 * Artem Chigvintsev (born 12 June 1982), professional dancer
 * Elena Evseeva (born 13 December 1982), ballerina
 * Timofey Kulyabin (born 1984), theater and opera director
 * Rauf & Faik (born 7 July 1999), pop duet musicians
 * Yulia Chirkova (born 1 September, 1996), glamour model and pornographic actress, better known by her professional name Jia Lissa.

title: Izhevsk