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Katarina Witt

Katarina Witt (, ; born 3 December 1965) is a German former figure skater. A two-time Olympic champion, Witt is regarded as one of the greatest ladies' singles figure skaters of all time. Her Laureus profile states that "she is remembered most for her overall athleticism, her charismatic appeal and her glamorous image on the ice."

Witt won the first of her two Olympic gold medals for East Germany at the 1984 Sarajevo Olympics, before winning a second at the 1988 Calgary Olympics. She is one of only two skaters to defend a ladies' singles Olympic title, the other being Norwegian Sonja Henie. Witt is a four-time World Champion (1984, 1985, 1987, 1988) and two-time World silver medalist (1982, 1986). She won six consecutive European Championships (1983–1988), a feat equalled only by Henie among female skaters. Between 1984 and 1988, Witt won ten gold medals from eleven major international events, making her one of the most successful figure skaters ever.

Retiring from competitive skating after defending her Olympic title in 1988, Witt reappeared at the 1994 Winter Olympics where she represented a reunified Germany while skating a Robin Hood-themed program, a comeback performance which saw her receive the Goldene Kamera award. Since her subsequent retirement, Witt has worked in film and television.

Early life
Witt was born in Staaken (at that time a district of Falkensee) in East Germany, just outside West Berlin, which is today part of Berlin. Her mother worked in a hospital as a physiotherapist and her father was a farmer. She went to school in Karl-Marx-Stadt (now reverted to its pre-war name Chemnitz). There, she attended the Kinder- und Jugendsportschule, a special school for athletically talented children.

Competitive career
Witt represented the SC Karl-Marx-Stadt club for East Germany (GDR). Jutta Müller began coaching her in 1977. Witt trained six days a week, sometimes for seven hours a day with three hours spent on compulsory figures. Witt made her first appearance in a major international competition at the 1979 European Championships, finishing 14th at the event. At the 1981 World Championships, she placed 1st in the short, 3rd in the long, and 2nd in the combined free skate, missing a medal due to low placement in figures. She placed on a major podium for the first time in 1982, winning silver at both the European and World Championships. She had a great shot at winning the 1982 World Championships, which she only required winning the long program to do. However, she stepped out of three jumps, including the legendary triple flip, the complex element she was the very first woman to accomplish, and a relatively easy double axel, which cost her the long program win and the overall gold medal. The eventual winner of the competition was Elaine Zayak, who landed six triples. The next season, she won her first European title but finished off the World podium in fourth place, because she was 8th in compulsory figures despite winning the combined free skating. Had she placed 1st in the long program instead of 2nd (on a 5–4 split) to Sumners, she would have jumped to the silver over both Leistner and Vodorezova. Her free skate with a triple flip and five triples was technically superior to Sumners', and many believed she should have taken the crucial 1st place in this phase.

In 1984, Witt was voted "GDR Female Athlete of the Year" by the readers of the East German newspaper Junge Welt. She won the 1984 Olympic title in Sarajevo, with reigning World champion Rosalynn Sumners of the United States in second. Witt and Sumners held the top two spots heading into the Olympic free skate, which was worth fifty percent of the total score. Witt landed three triple jumps in her free skate program, and the judges left room for Sumners to win the event. Sumners scaled back two of her jumps and Witt won the long program by one-tenth of a point on one judge's scorecard. Witt won the gold medal aged 18 years and 77 days, becoming one of the youngest Olympic figure skating champions. Witt then went on to win her first World title in dominant fashion (without Sumners) winning all three phases of the competition. She said then she planned to continue a while longer but did not see herself likely making it to the 1988 Calgary Olympics. Witt successfully defended her World title in 1985. Here, she was solid and clean in all three phases, placing 3rd to her two main competitors, Kira Ivanova and Tiffany Chin, in the compulsory figures, convincingly winning the short program even over the clean skates of Ivanova and Chin. In the long program, she was put under pressure by Ivanova who made a strong bid for the gold with a clean three-triple long program including a difficult triple loop, but Witt trumped her with a four-triple long program, highlighting her superior artistry to Ivanova's and overtaking her by six judges to three in the long program as well as overall. The judges left room for Chin to win the long program and event, but unfortunately she fell on a double axel and did not complete a triple salchow in her performance, settling for the bronze medal. Witt's longstanding gold-medal dominance of the sport was finally disrupted when in an upset she placed second to American Debi Thomas, the new United States Champion, the following year. At those Worlds, she did win the long program over Thomas's clean skate with identical content, scoring two 6.0s for artistic impression, but a combination miss which left her 4th in the short cost her the gold. This was also the first time since 1980 she would lose the short program phase at a World Championship. To win, she would have needed the final skater, Chin, to place between her and Thomas in the long program, but this did not occur. She had been considering making the 1986 World Championships her final event, but stung by the loss, Witt vowed to regain her title and skate on to Calgary.

In 1987, Witt won her third World title. Although Witt finished fifth in compulsory figures, which meant that Thomas could finish second in both the short and long programs and still retain the World title, Thomas' 7th place in the short program (due to a small hand down on her double axel) put the two skaters on a level playing field ahead of the free skate. In fact, five skaters entered the long program in strong contention for the gold: Kira Ivanova, Witt, Thomas, Elizabeth Manley, and Caryn Kadavy, all needing to only win the long program (or win the long program and beat Ivanova by two places in the long program in the case of Manley and Kadavy) to win. Skating last and under immense pressure with both Kadavy and Thomas having earlier turned in brilliant performances, Witt landed five triple jumps, including a clean triple loop jump which was most crucial of all to win. Earlier, Thomas had two footed her triple-loop attempt, and while Kadavy had done two successful triple loops, she had also popped several triple or double-axel attempts. Even on a night of brilliant skating by a majority of the notable competitors, Witt convincingly earned both the best technical and artistic marks of the night, was ranked first by seven of the nine judges, and reclaimed her World title to an appreciative crowd. In 1988, Witt won her sixth consecutive European Championship, equaling the achievement of Sonja Henie as the most-successful skater in ladies' singles at the European Championships. Both Witt's and Henie's number of European titles have since been surpassed by Irina Slutskaya, but Witt retains the record for most consecutive European titles, sharing it with Henie. Both Witt and Thomas were favoured contenders at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Their rivalry was known as the "Battle of the Carmens", as each woman had independently elected to skate her long program to music from Bizet's opera Carmen. They held the top two spots after the compulsory figures and the short program. Witt was third in the compulsories, behind Ivanova and Thomas, before winning the short program with Thomas second. In her long program, Witt landed four triple jumps and downgraded her planned triple-loop jump to a double loop. This left room for Thomas to win the long program, but Thomas missed three of her five planned triple jumps. Canadian skater Elizabeth Manley won the long program convincingly over Witt (seven judges to two), however Witt retained her Olympic title based on her overall scores (she had finished ahead of Manley in both the compulsory figures and the short program). Witt became only the second woman in figure skating history (after Sonja Henie) to defend her Olympic title successfully. Had Manley not narrowly lost second place to Thomas in the short program (by one judge), or Witt not narrowly held onto second place over Ito in the long program (on a 6–3 split), Manley would have defeated Witt for the overall gold medal. To honour Witt and her win in Calgary, North Korea issued miniature sheets with three large pictures of Witt on the ice. Time magazine called her "the most beautiful face of socialism."

Witt won a fourth and final World title to end her amateur career at the 1988 World Championships in Budapest, Hungary. She turned in a relatively lackluster long program, popping out of both a planned triple loop and triple salchow, and below the quality of her Olympic performance, but with other top contenders also being mostly subpar and fatigued after the high of the Calgary Games, she won gold with a victory in compulsory figures (just second win in figures in a World or Olympic event, only other instance was 1984 Worlds), 2nd place to Debi Thomas in the short program, and victory in the long program. One of her rivals, silver medalist Elizabeth Manley, later complained about some of what she perceived to be dubious foul play in the event, including Witt's win in the figures where she overcame Manley's lead in the first two figures in the final loop figure, which Manley believed to be her best, and Manley's music not being played properly to start her short program (where Manley had a combination miss and took only 4th place, ending her gold medal chances). On 1 November 1988, in honor of her victory at the Olympics, a block of stamps was released in the DPRK. In 1988, Witt started a professional career – rare for East German athletes. She spent three years on tour in the United States with Brian Boitano, also an Olympic champion. Their show, "Witt and Boitano Skating", was so successful that for the first time in ten years, New York's Madison Square Garden was sold out for an ice show. Later, she continued at Holiday on Ice in the United States and in western Europe. She also became an actress in the film Carmen on Ice (1989), which expanded upon her gold-medal free program in Calgary. In 1990, she received an Emmy Award for her role in this film. As a professional she was never as successful competitively as an amateur, often placing last of four or five women in her appearances at the two biggest professional championships (Challenge of Champions and World Professional Championships in Landover), but continued to receive great acclaim as an entertainer and show skater.

In 1994, Witt made a comeback to the competitive-skating scene, coached again by Jutta Müller. She was expected to be in a fierce three-person fight for only two spots on the German Olympic team with both young rising star Tanja Szewczenko and veteran Marina Kielmann, who was almost the same age as Witt. She finished second at the German Championships behind Szewczenko, but above Kielmann. Witt's first international competition for the reunified country of Germany, following eleven years competing for East Germany, was the 1994 European Championships, where she finished eighth, again behind Szewczenko who was fifth, but again ahead of Kielmann who was ninth. She and Szewczenko thus gained the two available spots ahead of Kielmann for the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, where she finished seventh. Particularly pleasing to Witt was her clean and very confident short program, where some of the contenders with more a difficult jump combination (Lu Chen, Josée Chouinard, Yuka Sato, Tonya Harding) faltered, left her 6th, and inclusion into the final flight of the long program which few gave her any chance of pre-Games. In a dramatic buildup, she would also draw last to skate, and get to close the show in her final Olympic skate, after the medalists had already been determined. Her free program to the music "Sag mir wo die Blumen sind" (an arrangement of the Pete Seeger folksong "Where Have All the Flowers Gone") included a peace message for the people of Sarajevo, the site of her first Olympic victory. While she had some technical problems, completing only three of her planned five triples, she delivered perhaps the most emotional and moving performance of the whole evening. She received the Golden Camera for her Olympic comeback.

Witt's taste in figure-skating costumes sometimes caused debate. At the 1983 European Championships, she skated her Mozart short program in knee breeches instead of a skirt. Her blue, skirtless feather-trimmed 1988 costume for a showgirl-themed short program was considered too theatrical and sexy, and led to a change in the ISU regulations dubbed the "Katarina rule" which required female skaters to wear more modest clothing; skirts were required to cover the buttocks and crotch. In 1994, skating a Robin Hood-themed program, Witt stated, "I wore the Robin Hood – like a man's costume – because I didn't want to be accused of seducing the judges this time."

In 1994, Witt published her autobiography Meine Jahre zwischen Pflicht und Kür (My Years between Compulsories and Freestyle). In 1995, Witt was inducted into the World Figure Skating Hall of Fame. Her farewell from show skating tour took place in February and March 2008.

Post-skating career

In 1996, Witt received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.

In 1996, Witt had a cameo appearance in the movie Jerry Maguire and on the television show Everybody Loves Raymond.

She starred in a German-language film called Die Eisprinzessin - The Ice Princess, providing the vocals for the theme song, "Skate with Me".

She appeared as herself in two episodes of the comedy series Arli$ that aired in 1997 and 1998.

Witt posed nude for Playboy magazine, and the pictures were published months later in the December 1998 issue, which was the second ever sold-out issue of the magazine. (The first sold-out issue was the inaugural one including photos of Marilyn Monroe.) Witt said she did not care for the "cute, pretty, ice princess image" of figure skaters and wanted to "change people's perceptions".

In 1998, Witt appeared in the film Ronin in a small supporting role with several lines of dialogue. Around this time, she also played a villain in an episode of the tongue-in-cheek television series, V.I.P. In November 2005, Witt published a novel, Only with Passion, in which she offers advice to a fictional young skater based on her many years of skating. Since October 2006, she has had her own TV show, Stars auf Eis ("Stars on Ice"), on German channel ProSieben. She was invited to Istanbul as an honoured guest for the skating competition TV show called Buzda Dans ("Dance on Ice") on 25 February 2007. On 3 December 2011, Witt was confirmed as a judge on the UK TV show Dancing on Ice, where she made her first appearance on 8 January 2012.

On 7 July 2007, Witt was a competitor at the German segment of Live Earth. She headed Munich's unsuccessful bid to host the 2018 Winter Olympics.

In January 2013, Witt appeared on German TV in her first leading role, playing a figure skater who is pursued by a stalker. The made-for-television movie The Stalker (2013 film) thus has autobiographical elements, as Witt herself had been stalked in the United States 20 years earlier.

East German files
Following the dissolution of East Germany, Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (Stasi) files were found to show that the secret police had worked hard to keep Witt from defecting by giving her cars, accommodations, and permitted travel. Witt found 3,500 pages on her life from the age of seven.

title: Katarina Witt


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Tolpuddle Martyrs

The Tolpuddle Martyrs were six agricultural labourers from the village of Tolpuddle in Dorset, England, who, in 1834, were convicted of swearing a secret oath as members of the Friendly Society of Agricultural Labourers. They were arrested on charges under the Unlawful Oaths Act during a labour dispute over cut wages before being convicted in R v Loveless and Others and sentenced to penal transportation to Australia. They were pardoned in 1836 after mass protests by sympathisers and support from Lord John Russell and returned to England between 1837 and 1839.

The Tolpuddle Martyrs became a popular cause for the early union and workers' rights movements.

Background
In 1799 and 1800, the Combination Acts in the Kingdom of Great Britain had outlawed "combining" or organising to gain better working conditions, passed by Parliament because of a political scare following the French Revolution. In 1824, the Combination Acts were repealed due to their unpopularity and replaced with the Combinations of Workmen Act 1825, which legalised trade union organisations but severely restricted their activity.

By the start of the 19th century the county of Dorset had become synonymous with poorly paid agricultural labour. In 1815, after the end of the Napoleonic Wars, 13% of the county's population were receiving poor relief, and this worsened in the subsequent agricultural recession. By 1830 conditions were so bad that large numbers of labourers joined the Swing Riots that affected southern England that autumn; more than forty disturbances occurred in the county, involving two thirds of the labouring population in some parishes. A few landowners temporarily increased wages as a concession, but law enforcement was also increased and many labourers were arrested and imprisoned, and within a short time the gains in wages were reversed.

In 1833 six men from the village of Tolpuddle founded the Friendly Society of Agricultural Labourers as a friendly society to protest against the gradual lowering of agricultural wages. These Tolpuddle labourers refused to work for less than 10 shillings a week, although by this time wages had been reduced to seven shillings and were due to be further reduced to six. The Friendly Society's rules show it was clearly structured as a friendly society that operated as a trade-specific benefit society, led by George Loveless, a Methodist local preacher, and meeting in the house of Thomas Standfield. Groups such as the Friendly Society would often use a skeleton painting as part of their initiation process, where the newest member would be blindfolded and made to swear a secret oath of allegiance. The blindfold would then be removed and they would be presented with the skeleton painting to warn them of their own mortality but also to remind them of what happens to those who break their promises. An example of such a skeleton painting is on display at the People's History Museum in Manchester.

Prosecution and sentencing
In 1834, James Frampton, a magistrate and local landowner in Tolpuddle, wrote to Home Secretary Lord Melbourne to complain about the union, who recommended Frampton invoke the Unlawful Oaths Act 1797, an obscure law promulgated in response to the Spithead and Nore mutinies which prohibited the swearing of secret oaths. The Friendly Society's members: James Brine, James Hammett, George Loveless, George's brother James Loveless, George's brother in-law Thomas Standfield, and Thomas's son John Standfield, were arrested. They were tried together before the judge Sir John Williams in the case R v Lovelass and Others. All six were found guilty of swearing secret oaths and sentenced to transportation to Australia.

When sentenced to seven years' penal transportation, George Loveless wrote on a scrap of paper lines from the union hymn "The Gathering of the Unions":

Transportation, pardon, return
James Loveless, the two Standfields, Hammett and Brine sailed on the Surry to New South Wales, where they arrived in Sydney on 17 August 1834. George Loveless was delayed due to illness and left later on the William Metcalf to Van Diemen's Land, reaching Hobart on 4 September.

Of the five who landed in Sydney, Brine and the Standfields were assigned as farm labourers to free settlers in the Hunter Valley. Hammett was assigned to the Queanbeyan farm of Edward John Eyre, and James Loveless was assigned to a farm at Strathallan. In Hobart, George Loveless was assigned to the viceregal farm of Lieutenant Governor Sir George Arthur. In England they became popular heroes and 800,000 signatures were collected for their release. Their supporters organised a political march, one of the first successful marches in the United Kingdom, and all were eventually pardoned in March 1836 on the condition of good conduct, with the support of Lord John Russell, who had recently become Home Secretary. When the pardon reached George Loveless some delay was caused in his leaving due to no word from his wife as to whether she was to join him in Van Diemen's Land. On 23 December 1836, a letter was received to the effect that she was not coming and Loveless sailed from Van Diemen's Land on 30 January 1837, arriving in England on 13 June 1837.

In New South Wales, there were delays in obtaining an early sailing due to tardiness in the authorities confirming good conduct with the convicts' assignees and then getting them released from their assignments. James Loveless, Thomas and John Standfield, and James Brine departed Sydney on the John Barry on 11 September 1837, reaching Plymouth (one of the departure points for convict transport ships) on 17 March 1838. A plaque next to the Mayflower Steps in Plymouth's historical Barbican area commemorates the arrival. Although due to depart with the others, James Hammett was detained in Windsor, charged with an assault, while the others left the colony. It was not until March 1839 that he sailed, arriving in England in August 1839.

Later life
The Lovelesses, Standfields and Brine first settled on farms near Chipping Ongar, Essex, upon their return from transportation, with the Lovelesses and Brine living at Tudor Cottage in Greensted Green. The five later emigrated to the town of London, Upper Canada (in present-day Ontario), where there is now a monument in their honour and an affordable housing co-op and trade union complex named after them. George Loveless and Thomas Standfield are buried in Siloam Cemetery on Fanshawe Park Road East in London, Ontario. James Brine died in 1902, having lived in nearby Blanshard Township since 1868, and is buried in St. Marys Cemetery, St. Marys, Ontario.

Hammett returned to Tolpuddle and died in the Dorchester workhouse in 1891.

Museums
The Tolpuddle Martyrs Museum in Tolpuddle, Dorset, features displays and interactive exhibits about the martyrs and their effect on trade unionism. The Shire Hall in Dorchester, where the Tolpuddle Martyrs were tried, is now a museum, including material about them.

Cultural and historical significance
A monument was erected in their honour in Tolpuddle in 1934, and a sculpture of the martyrs, made in 2001, stands in the village in front of the Tolpuddle Martyrs Museum.

The annual Tolpuddle Martyrs' Festival is usually held in the third week of July, organised by the Trades Union Congress (TUC), and features a parade of banners from many trade unions, a memorial service, speeches, and music. Recent festivals have featured speakers such as Tony Benn, musicians such as Billy Bragg, and local folk singers including Graham Moore, as well as others from all around the world.

The courtroom where the martyrs were tried, which has been little altered in 200 years, in Dorchester's Shire Hall, is being preserved as part of a heritage scheme.

The story of Tolpuddle has enriched the history of trade unionism, but the significance of the Tolpuddle Martyrs continues to be debated since Sidney and Beatrice Webb wrote the History of Trade Unionism (1894) and continues with such works as Bob James's Craft Trade or Mystery (2001).

The following places are named in their honour:
 * Tolpuddle Street, Islington, London
 * Tolpuddle Way, Kirkdale, Liverpool
 * Tolpuddle Vineyard, Richmond, Tasmania

In 1984, a mural was created in Edward Square, off Copenhagen Street, Islington, to commemorate the gathering of people organised by the Central Committee of the Metropolitan Trade Unions to demonstrate against the penal transportation of the Tolpuddle Martyrs to Australia. The mural was painted by artist David Bangs.

In 1985 a memorial plaque for the Tolpuddle Martyrs was installed in Garema Place in the centre of Australia's capital city Canberra.

Comrades is a 1986 British historical drama film directed by Bill Douglas and starring an ensemble cast including James Fox, Robert Stephens and Vanessa Redgrave. Through the pictures of a travelling lanternist, it depicts the story of the Tolpuddle Martyrs.

A workshop production, based on the film Comrades, was performed at the Northcott Theatre, Exeter on 23 March 2023 and told the story of The Tolpuddle Martyrs up to the time of their arrest. It was written and directed by Tony Lidington and performed by drama students from the University of Exeter.

A musical drama by Alan Plater and Vince Hill, 'Tolpuddle', was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on 16 October 1982.

The Tolpuddle Martyrs also find reference in a poem by Daljit Nagra: "Vox Populi, Vox Dei".

The men who returned to Plymouth from Australia were commemorated with a plaque made by Clifford Harper at a ceremony in March 2020.

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

title: Tolpuddle Martyrs


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Jammu Siltavuori

Antti Veikko Ilmari Siltavuori (29 October 1926 – 9 March 2012), better known as Jammu Siltavuori or Jammu-setä ("Uncle Jammu"), was a Finnish murderer and sexual offender.

Early life
Veikko Siltavuori was born in Vaasa, Finland. There is little information about his early childhood. According to some sources, Siltavuori's childhood was difficult because of an alcoholic father who frequently physically abused him. He was bullied in school and called a weasel because of his dirty clothing.

Crimes
Siltavuori became well known in Finland when he murdered two eight-year-old girls, Päivi-Maria Hopiavuori and Tanja Johanna Pirinen in 1989. He burned the bodies shortly after. He picked up both girls on 3 March 1989 while driving through Myllypuro, a neighbourhood in Helsinki. Prior to this, he had been convicted of raping a five-year-old girl, sexual harassment, and attempted murder. He had previously been sentenced to life imprisonment in the 1960s, but was later paroled. He had also built a jail complete with cells, barred windows and small toilets in Paltamo, Kainuu.

Media publicity
The murders led to widespread media publicity, during which hundreds of letters to the editor were written about Siltavuori. An interview with Siltavuori was published in the April 1991 issue of Rikosposti, in which he said that he was the most hated person in Finland. There were demands for the death penalty or castration for him.

Antti Siltavuori, an industrial designer from Kirkkonummi, was the target of a telephone terror because of his name, and an old man was beaten in a restaurant in Helsinki because he resembled Jammu in appearance. The protesters' signs read, among other things: "A sex offender does not get better in prison. Experts in favor of involuntary treatment."

Sentences
For the two murders in 1989, Veikko Siltavuori was sentenced to 15 years in prison with the possibility of parole after 10 years, because a mental health examination legally found him to be partially insane. If that had not been the case, Siltavuori would have been again sentenced to life imprisonment.

After 10 years elapsed, his first and second parole hearings in a Prison Court were unsuccessful. After he served one more year in jail, the Prison Court released him on strictly supervised parole on 31 January 2000, on his third parole hearing. However, he was immediately involuntary committed to the Niuvanniemi mental hospital in Kuopio for criminal-psychiatric reasons. The involuntary commitment was reaffirmed in 2007 by the administrative court of Kuopio, on the basis that if he was released, he would be a serious security risk.

Death
While imprisoned, Siltavuori was attacked by another inmate, which caused Siltavuori to spend his final years in a wheelchair. He died in March 2012 at the age of 85 in Kuopio.

Literature

 * Markkula, Hannes: Kuusi suomalaista murhaa. 1996.

title: Jammu Siltavuori


text:
Ipos

In demonology, Ipos is an Earl and powerful Prince of Hell (a Duke to some authors) who has thirty-six legions of demons under his command. He knows and can reveal all things, past, present and future (only the future to some authors, and past and future to others). He can make men witty and valiant.

He is commonly depicted with the body of an angel with the head of a lion, the tail of a hare, and the feet of a goose, less frequently in the same shape but with the body of a lion, and rarely as a vulture.

Other spellings: Aiperos, Ayperos, Ayporos, Ipes.

title: Ipos


text:
Anyte

Anyte of Tegea (Ἀνύτη; ) was a Hellenistic poet from Tegea in Arcadia. Little is known of her life, but twenty-four epigrams attributed to her are preserved in the Greek Anthology, and one is quoted by Julius Pollux; nineteen of these are generally accepted as authentic. She introduced rural themes to the genre, which became a standard theme in Hellenistic epigrams. She is one of the nine outstanding ancient women poets listed by Antipater of Thessalonica in the Palatine Anthology. Her pastoral poetry may have influenced Theocritus, and her works were adapted by several later poets, including Ovid.

Life
No reliable information about Anyte's life survives, and she can only be approximately dated by the style of her work. Based on this, and on possible imitations of her works in the second half of the third century BC, she is generally thought to have been active around 300 BC. According to Julius Pollux, writing in the second century AD, she was from Tegea in Arcadia. An alternative tradition, recorded in the Greek Anthology, claimed that Anyte was from Mytilene on Lesbos. Anyte's use of a Doric dialect, and mentions in her poem of Tegea and the Arcadian god Pan, suggest that a Tegean origin is more likely, though Pollux may have simply assumed this on the basis of Anyte's mention of Tegea. The story of a Lesbian origin was likely a later invention to link Anyte to Sappho.

Only one story about Anyte's life is preserved. Pausanias claims that she was once visited by the god Asclepius while she was asleep, and told to go to Naupactus to visit a certain blind man there. On doing so, the man was cured, and he built a temple to Asclepius. Though little is known about Anyte's life, more of her poetry survives than any other ancient Greek woman, with the exception of Sappho.

Poetry
Twenty-five epigrams attributed to Anyte in antiquity survive, one quoted by Julius Pollux and the remainder in the Palatine or Planudean Anthology. Of these, nineteen are generally agreed to be by Anyte. Of the remaining six, four are attributed to both Anyte and another author in either the Palatine or Planudean Anthology, and two epigrams are attributed to Anyte by the Palatine Anthology, but are included without an author named in the Planudean. Of these six uncertain poems, two (AP 7.190 and 7.232) are considered possibly or probably by Anyte; the others are generally doubted. It is likely that Anyte compiled a book of her poetry from her epigrams – she may have been the first to do so. The Greek Anthology twice refers to her as "the lyric poet", and Pausanias mentions her epic poetry, but neither lyric nor epic poetry by Anyte survive.

Anyte's poetry is composed in a mixed dialect, with elements of Doric and epic language, as well as some Atticisms; it was common for Hellenistic poets to deliberately mix dialects in this way. It is often interested in women and children, and Kathryn Gutzwiller argues that it was deliberately composed in opposition to traditional epigrams, which were by anonymous authors and from a masculine and urban perspective. Accordingly, of five epitaphs written by Anyte which survive, only one marks the death of a young man, as was traditional in the genre; the remaining four all commemorate women who died young. She is most famous for her epitaphs for animals and pastoral epigrams describing idyllic landscapes. Two dedicatory epigrams by Anyte also survive.

Anyte's poetry was, like that of her contemporaries, highly allusive, particularly referencing Homer. She imitates the structure and syntax of Homer's poetry, making use of Homeric vocabulary to write about personal and domestic themes. For instance, Anyte's epigram 6, an epitaph dedicated to the unmarried Antibia, repeatedly echoes phrases from the Iliad and Odyssey. She also echoes Homer in her frequent use of compound adjectives, such as her description of the poikilodeiros ("with a neck of many colours") snake in epigram 10. Her work references Hesiod, archaic Greek lyric and Attic drama, and shows evidence that she was familiar with the epigrams of Simonides of Ceos and Anacreon. Several of her epigrams allude to the works of Erinna, a female poet of the early Hellenistic period.

Reception
Anyte's pastoral poems and epitaphs for pets were important innovations, with both genres becoming standards in Hellenistic poetry. Her pastoral works may have influenced Theocritus, and both Ovid and Marcus Argentarius wrote adaptations of her poems; the epigrammatist Mnasalces produced an epigram collection in imitation of Anyte. An epigram by Posidippus on the death of a young woman references one of Anyte's poems as well as Sappho and Erinna. Mary Maxwell suggests that the style of the Augustan poet Sulpicia was influenced by Anyte and her contemporary, Nossis. Antipater of Thessalonica lists her in his canon of nine women poets. According to Tatian, statues of Anyte were sculpted by Cephisodotus and Euthycrates.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, Anyte's poetry was highly thought of by the Imagist poets, with Richard Aldington describing her in his translation of Greek and Latin poetry as the "woman-Homer". Modern scholars have been more critical of Anyte's work, considering her subjects frivolous. However, Josephine Balmer describes her poetry as "stunning", and argues that it demonstrates both education and technical skill. H.D. adapted one of Anyte's epigrams in her poem "Hermes of the Ways"; she is one of the women included on Judy Chicago's Heritage Floor, is represented in Anselm Kiefer's series Women in Antiquity, and has a crater on Mercury named after her.

title: Anyte


text:
Caim

Caim (or Camio) is a Gaelic rendering of biblical 'Cain', who appears in a variation of the fantastical pedigree of Dardanus of Troy that is spun out in Lebor Bretnach, the Middle Irish language recension of the compilation called Historia Brittonum, known in the 9th century version by Nennius. The Lebor Bretnach, greatly modifies the genealogy given in Nennius, making emendations to earlier sources and tracing the line through Ham rather than Japheth with further spurious names:
 * Dardain m. Ioib m. Sadoirn m. Peil m. Palloir m. Zorastres m. Mesraim m. Caim.

In the predominantly Welsh-speaking regions of Wales (Gwynedd, Dyfed and Ynys Môn; latter now also known as Anglesey), Cain, Caio, Caim and Cail are commonplace first names for males. These names are derivatives of an ancient Welsh name "Ca" which is recorded in the book of Welsh folklore called the Mabinogion.

In demonology

Of Cain, originator of murder, consigned to Hell by early Christian writers.

In demonology, Caim appears in Ars Goetia, the first part of Lesser Key of Solomon as a great president of Hell, ruling over thirty legions of demons. Much detail is offered: he is a good disputer, gives men the understanding of the voices of birds, bullocks, dogs, and other creatures, and of the noise of the waters too, and gives true answers concerning things to come.

He is depicted in 19th and 20th century occultist illustrations as appearing in the form of the black bird called a thrush, but soon he changes his shape into a man that has a sharp sword in his hand. When answering questions he seems to stand on burning ashes or coals.

The title 'president' of Hell would suggest a parallel with the presiding officer of a college or convocation, which are the only pre-modern uses of the term. Other authors consider Caim a 'prince' of Hell instead and depict him as a man wearing rich and elegant clothes, and the head and wings of a blackbird.

Demonological directories give an etymology from a supposed Latin word 'Chamos', 'Chamus', said to be a name given to Baal Peor, and possibly corrupted from Hebrew 'Chium', an epithet given to several Assyrian and Babylonian gods. Epigraphy does not confirm this etymology.

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Richard Swinburne

Richard Granville Swinburne (IPA ) (born 26 December 1934) is an English philosopher. He is an Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford. Over the last 50 years, Swinburne has been a proponent of philosophical arguments for the existence of God. His philosophical contributions are primarily in the philosophy of religion and philosophy of science. He aroused much discussion with his early work in the philosophy of religion, a trilogy of books consisting of The Coherence of Theism, The Existence of God, and Faith and Reason. He has been influential in reviving substance dualism as an option in philosophy of mind.

Early life
Swinburne was born in Smethwick, Staffordshire, England, on 26 December 1934. His father was a school music teacher, who was himself the son of an off-licence owner in Shoreditch. His mother was a secretary, the daughter of an optician. He is an only child. Swinburne attended a preparatory school and then Charterhouse School.

Academic career
Swinburne received an open scholarship to study classics at Exeter College, Oxford, but in fact graduated with a first-class Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy, politics, and economics. Swinburne has held various professorships throughout his career in academia. From 1972 to 1985, he taught at Keele University. During part of this time, he gave the Gifford lectures at Aberdeen from 1982 to 1984, resulting in the book The Evolution of the Soul. From 1985 until his retirement in 2002, he was Nolloth Professor of the Philosophy of the Christian Religion at the University of Oxford (his successor to this chair was Brian Leftow). He has continued to publish regularly since his retirement.

Swinburne has been an active author throughout his career, producing a major book every two to three years. He has played a role in the recent debate over the mind–body problem, defending a substance dualism that recalls the work of René Descartes in important respects (see The Evolution of the Soul, 1997).

His books are primarily very technical works of academic philosophy, but he has written at the popular level as well. Of the non-technical works, his Is There a God? (1996), summarising for a non-specialist audience many of his arguments for the existence of God and plausibility in the belief of that existence, is probably the most popular and is available in 22 languages.

In 1992 he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy. He is a recipient of James Joyce Award from the Literary and Historical Society of University College Dublin. Also, he was awarded honorary doctorates by the Catholic University of Lublin (2015), Dimitrie Cantemir Christian University in Bucharest (2016), the International Academy of Philosophy in Liechtenstein (2017), and New Georgian University in Poti (2023).

Christian apologetics
A member of the Orthodox Church, Swinburne is noted as one of the foremost Christian apologists, arguing in his many articles and books that faith in Christianity is rational and coherent in a rigorous philosophical sense. William Hasker writes that his "tetralogy on Christian doctrine, together with his earlier trilogy on the philosophy of theism, is one of the most important apologetic projects of recent times." While Swinburne presents many arguments to advance the belief that God exists, he argues that God is a being whose existence is not logically necessary (see modal logic) but metaphysically necessary in a way he defines in his The Christian God. Other subjects on which Swinburne writes include personal identity (in which he espouses a view based on the concept of a soul), and epistemic justification. He has written in defence of Cartesian dualism and libertarian free will.

Although he is best known for his vigorous defence of Christian intellectual commitments, he also has a theory of the nature of passionate faith which is developed in his book Faith and Reason.

According to an interview Swinburne did with Foma magazine, he converted from Anglicanism (Church of England) to Eastern Orthodoxy around 1996: "I don't think I changed my beliefs in any significant way. I always believed in the Apostolic succession: that the Church has to have its authority dating back to the Apostles, and the general teaching of the Orthodox Church on the saints and the prayers for the departed and so on, these things I have always believed."

Swinburne's philosophical method reflects the influence of Thomas Aquinas. He admits that he draws from Aquinas a systematic approach to philosophical theology. Swinburne, like Aquinas, moves from basic philosophical issues (for example, the question of the possibility that God may exist in Swinburne's The Coherence of Theism), to more specific Christian beliefs (for example, the claim in Swinburne's Revelation that God has communicated to human beings propositionally in Jesus Christ).

Swinburne moves in his writing program from the philosophical to the theological, building his case and relying on his previous arguments as he defends particular Christian beliefs. He has attempted to reassert classical Christian beliefs with an apologetic method that he believes is compatible with contemporary science. That method relies heavily on inductive logic, seeking to show that his Christian beliefs fit best with the evidence.

National Life Stories conducted an oral history interview (C1672/15) with Richard Swinburne in 2015–2016 for its Science and Religion collection held by the British Library.

Major books

 * Space and Time, 1968
 * The Concept of Miracle, 1970,
 * The Coherence of Theism, 1977 (new edition 2016) (part 1 of his trilogy on Theism)
 * The Existence of God, 1979 (new edition 2004, ISBN 0-19-927167-4) (part 2 of his trilogy on Theism)
 * Faith and Reason, 1981 (new edition 2005). (part 3 of his trilogy on Theism)
 * The Evolution of the Soul, 1986, ISBN 0-19-823698-0. (1997 edition online)
 * Miracles, 1989
 * Responsibility and Atonement, 1989 (part 1 of his tetralogy on Christian Doctrines)
 * Revelation, 1991 (part 2 of his tetralogy on Christian Doctrines)
 * The Christian God, 1994 (part 3 of his tetralogy on Christian Doctrines)
 * Is There a God?, 1996, ISBN 0-19-823545-3; revised edition, 2010, ISBN 978-0-19-958043-9
 * Simplicity as Evidence of Truth, The Aquinas Lecture, 1997
 * Providence and the Problem of Evil, 1998 (part 4 of his tetralogy on Christian Doctrines)
 * Epistemic Justification, 2001
 * The Resurrection of God Incarnate, 2003
 * Was Jesus God?, 2008
 * Free Will and Modern Science, Ed. 2011, ISBN 978-0197264898
 * Mind, Brain, and Free Will, 2013
 * Are We Bodies or Souls?, 2019, ISBN 978-0-19-883149-5

Spiritual autobiography

 * Richard Swinburne, "Natural Theology and Orthodoxy," in Turning East: Contemporary Philosophers and the Ancient Christian Faith, Rico Vitz, ed. (St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 2012), pp. 47–78.
 * Richard Swinburne, "The Vocation of a Natural Theologian," in Philosophers Who Believe, Kelly James Clark, ed. (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1993), pp. 179–202.

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Ŭ

Ŭ or ŭ is a letter in the Belarusian Latin alphabet used since 1840/1845, based on u. It is also used in the Esperanto alphabet, publicly presented in 1887, and formerly in the Romanian alphabet. The accent mark (diacritic) is known as a breve.

This letter should not be confused with Ǔ|u-caron, which is used to indicate u in the third tone of Chinese language pinyin; compare (caron) with  (breve).

It resembles an italic form of a Cyrillic Short I ().

Belarusian
The letter ŭ is called non-syllabic u (romanised: u nieskładovaje) in Belarusian because it resembles the vowel u but forms no syllables. It is an allophone of that forms the diphthongs aŭ, eŭ, oŭ and is equivalent to. Its Cyrillic counterpart is ў. Sometimes (as in National Geographic atlases), the Cyrillic letter ў is Romanized as w.

The letter ŭ was proposed by Alexander Rypinski in 1840. For lack of the corresponding type, his book ''Białoruś. Kilka słów o poezji prostego ludu tej naszej polskiej prowincji, o jego muzyce, śpiewie, tańcach was printed with û in Belarusian citations instead, but it was explained that the proper letter was u with Latin brevis''. The proper letter ŭ was first used in printing in 1845, in the novel Tajemnicze domino czyli Skutki niestałości by Gabriel Ossowski (in Polish with occasional Belarusian).

Esperanto
Ŭ represents a semivowel in the orthography of Esperanto, which is an international auxiliary language publicly presented in 1887. As in Belarusian, Esperanto Ŭ is pronounced as a non-syllabic, primarily in the diphthongs aŭ, eŭ and rarely oŭ.

It is thought that ŭ was created by analogy with the Belarusian letter ў (Cyrillic u with breve), which was proposed by P.A. Bessonov in 1870. It may also be considered that the placement of the breve above a vowel letter to turn it into an equivalent semivowel was inspired by the use thereof on the Cyrillic letter й, representing /j/ and formed by placing a breve over the letter и, used most commonly to represent /i/.

Ŭ may also be used for [w] in foreign names, such as Ŭaŝingtono for "Washington", although it usually is written with v (Vaŝingtono). It is also used for [w] in onomatopoeias, as in ŭa! "waa!", and uniquely in one native lexical word, ŭo, which is the Esperanto name of the letter ŭ itself.

Romanian
Ŭ was previously part of the Romanian alphabet. U with breve was used only in the ending of a word. It was essentially a Latin equivalent of the Slavonic back yer found in languages like Russian. Unpronounced in most cases, it served to indicate that the previous consonant was not palatalized, or that the preceding i was the vowel [i] and not a mere marker of palatalization. When ŭ was pronounced, it would follow a stressed vowel and stand in for semivowel u, as in words eŭ, aŭ, and meŭ, all spelled today without the breve. Once frequent, it survives today in author Mateiu Caragiale's name – originally spelled Mateiŭ (it is not specified whether the pronunciation should adopt a version that he himself probably never used, while in many editions he is still credited as Matei). In other names, only the breve was dropped, while preserving the pronunciation of a semivowel u, as is the case of B.P. Hasdeŭ.

Romanization of Indic scripts
When transcribing Malayalam texts into ISO 15919, usually the final glottal-stop is transcribed as 'ŭ', an epenthetic vowel (a rule called as saṁvr̥tōkāram). In Tamil, any wordfinal-'u' is always a short-vowel, hence transcribing it as 'ŭ' (a rule called as kuṟṟiyal ukaram). The Kashmiri vowel /ॖ is also sometimes transcribed as 'ŭ'.

Other uses
In some philological transcriptions of Latin, "ŭ" denotes a short U — for example, "fŭgō" (, to chase away), vs "fūmō" (, to smoke).

The letter is also commonly used among Slavists to denote the short back closed vowel of Proto-Slavic.

The McCune–Reischauer Romanization of Korean uses "ŭ" to signify the close back unrounded vowel in 으.

Several schemes for pronunciation of English words have used "ŭ". For example, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language has used "ŭ" for, the vowel in the English word "cut".

In Kurrentschrift, an outdated script used in German handwriting, the lower-case letter "u" is adorned with a breve to distinguish it from the otherwise identical letter "n". The script was used for teaching writing in schools; the last variant, known as Sütterlinschrift, as late as 1941. The ingrained habit of writing "ŭ" for "u" persisted for a long time even as people switched to cursive scripts with easily distinguishable shapes for "u" and "n", occasionally leading to confusion between "ŭ" (meaning "u") and "ü" among later generations not brought up with this tick.

title: Ŭ


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Forsyth–Edwards Notation

Forsyth–Edwards Notation (FEN) is a standard notation for describing a particular board position of a chess game. The purpose of FEN is to provide all the necessary information to restart a game from a particular position.

FEN is based on a system developed by Scottish newspaper journalist David Forsyth. His system became popular in the 19th century, then Steven J. Edwards extended it to support its use by computers. FEN is defined in the "Portable Game Notation Specification and Implementation Guide". In the Portable Game Notation for chess games, FEN is used to define initial positions other than the standard one. FEN does not provide sufficient information to decide whether a draw by threefold repetition may be legally claimed or a draw offer may be accepted; for that, a different format such as Extended Position Description is needed.

Definition
A FEN record defines a particular game position, all in one text line and using only the ASCII character set. A text file with only FEN data records should use the filename extension.

A FEN record contains six fields, each separated by a space. The fields are as follows:
 * 1) Piece placement data: Each  is described, starting with rank 8 and ending with rank 1, with a "/" between each one; within each rank, the contents of the squares are described in order from the a- to the h-file. Each piece is identified by a single letter taken from the standard English names in algebraic notation (pawn = "P", knight = "N", bishop = "B", rook = "R", queen = "Q" and king = "K"). White pieces are designated using uppercase letters ("PNBRQK"), while black pieces use lowercase letters ("pnbrqk"). A set of one or more consecutive empty squares within a rank is denoted by a digit from "1" to "8", corresponding to the number of squares.
 * 2) Active color: "w" means that White is to move; "b" means that Black is to move.
 * 3) Castling availability: If neither side has the ability to castle, this field uses the character "-". Otherwise, this field contains one or more letters: "K" if White can castle kingside, "Q" if White can castle queenside, "k" if Black can castle kingside, and "q" if Black can castle queenside. A situation that temporarily prevents castling does not prevent the use of this notation.
 * 4) En passant target square: This is a square over which a pawn has just passed while moving two squares; it is given in algebraic notation. If there is no en passant target square, this field uses the character "-". This is recorded regardless of whether there is a pawn in position to capture en passant. An updated version of the spec has since made it so the target square is recorded only if a legal en passant capture is possible, but the old version of the standard is the one most commonly used.
 * 5) Halfmove clock: The number of halfmoves since the last capture or pawn advance, used for the fifty-move rule.
 * 6) Fullmove number: The number of the full moves. It starts at 1 and is incremented after Black's move.

Examples
The following example is from the FEN specification:

Here is the FEN for the starting position: rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1

And after the move 1.e4: rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKBNR b KQkq e3 0 1

And then after 1...c5: rnbqkbnr/pp1ppppp/8/2p5/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq c6 0 2

And then after 2.Nf3: rnbqkbnr/pp1ppppp/8/2p5/4P3/5N2/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKB1R b KQkq - 1 2

FEN adjustment for chess variants like Chess960
FEN is crucial for recording games in chess variants such as Chess960 (also known as Fischer Random Chess), where the initial position is not necessarily the traditional initial position. However, the FEN castling availability encoding (KQkq) is inadequate for variants in which there are two rooks on the same side of the king on the back rank, as if only one rook were available for castling it would be ambiguous which rook it was without knowing their initial positions. The solution implemented by chess engines like Shredder and Fritz_9 is to use the letters of the columns on which the rooks began the game. This scheme is sometimes called Shredder-FEN. For the traditional setup, Shredder-FEN would use AHah instead of KQkq.

Another solution is offered by X-FEN, which offers more backward compatibility than Shredder-FEN does, but at the cost of more complexity.

title: Forsyth–Edwards Notation


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Vassago

Vassago (also Vasago, Usagoo) is a demon described in demonological grimoires such as the Lesser Key of Solomon and the Book of the Office of Spirits.

Lesser Key of Solomon
He is the third demon in the Lesser Key (including Thomas Rudd's variant) and is referred to as a prince "of a good nature" and of the "same nature as Agares". He rules twenty-six legions of spirits, and is summoned to tell magicians of past and future events, and locate lost objects. He is one of the few spirits found in the Lesser Key of Solomon but not in Johann Weyer's Pseudomonarchia Daemonum.

According to Rudd, Vassago is opposed by the Shemhamphorasch angel Sitael.

Other works
Vassago is mentioned in the Book of the Office of Spirits as Usagoo, appearing as an angel, "just and true in all his doings," with the powers of inciting the love of women and revealing hidden treasures, in addition to ruling twenty spirits. Sloane MS 3824 mentions Vassago in invocations to summon spirits that guard treasure, and in the "Experiment of Vassago" and the "Experiment of Agares," both intended to capture the named spirits in crystals.

Vassago is mentioned in the novel Hideaway by Dean Koontz, and in its film adaptation.

Murderer and vampire-themed cult leader Rod Ferrell used "Vassago" as a "vampire name" and burned a V representing this alias onto his victims; Ferrell did not know how to spell or pronounce Vassago's name correctly, and typically called himself "Vesago".

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Pet adoption

Pet adoption is the process of transferring responsibility for a pet that was previously owned by another party. Common sources for adoptable pets are animal shelters, rescue groups, or other pet owners. Some organizations give adopters ownership of the pet, while others use a guardianship model wherein the organization retains some control over the animal's future use or care.

Online pet adoption sites have databases, searchable by the public, of pets being housed by thousands of animal shelters and rescue groups.

Before adoption
Animals are placed up for adoption for numerous reasons like being abandoned, lost, or rehomed from their current family. The need for rehoming sometimes results from allergies, death of a pet-owner, divorce, the birth of a baby, or relocation. Additionally, adoption mayweather, and traffic and enter adoption shelters in need of medical attention before entering the adoption process. After medical examinations, treatments, and behavioral tests, adoption centers (at their discretion) determine if the pet is healthy enough for adoption.

Euthanasia (also known as putting down or putting to sleep) is another method that has been used when dealing with animals who may suffer from terminal illnesses, injuries, or over-population in shelters, although many veterinarians do not consider this to be an ethical use of their resources for young and healthy animals, while others argue that euthanasia is a more humane option than leaving a pet in a cage for very long periods of time.

Homes cannot always be found, however, and euthanasia is often used for the excess animals to make room for newer pets unless the organization has a no-kill policy. The Humane Society of the United States estimates that 2.4 million healthy, adoptable cats and dogs are euthanized each year in the US because of a lack of homes. Animal protection advocates campaign for adoption instead of buying animals in order to reduce the number of animals who have to be euthanized. Many shelters and animal rescues encourage the education of spaying or neutering a pet in order to reduce the number of animals euthanized in shelters and to help control the pet population.

To help lower the number of animals euthanized each year, some shelters have developed a no-kill policy. Best Friends Animal Society is the largest no-kill shelter in the United States who adopts policies such as "Save Them All". This shelter and many others strive to keep their animals as long as it takes to find them new homes. City shelters and government-funded shelters rarely have this policy because of the large number of animals they receive.

No-kill shelters are usually run by groups that have volunteers or individuals with enough space to foster pets until a permanent home can be found. However, many of these groups and individuals have a finite number of spaces available. This means they will not take in new animals unless a space opens up, although they will often take back pets that they have adopted out previously. Sometimes they try to find foster homes where the animal can be placed temporarily until someone adopts it.

Physical appearance, behavior, and health of the dog play crucial roles in the pet adoption decision-making process, with many adopters prioritizing appearance over health. Social influences, such as breed popularity trends, and demographic factors, including household size and the presence of children, significantly affect the likelihood of dog ownership. Additionally, prior experience with dogs is a strong predictor of future dog adoption. Understanding these factors can help develop strategies to encourage responsible adoption practices and reduce the rates of dog relinquishment to shelters.

Adoption process
The central issue in adoption is whether the new adopter can provide a safe, secure, and permanent home for the adopted pet. Shelters, pounds, and rescue organizations can refuse to supply pets to people whom they deem unable to provide a suitable home. A new owner may face training or behavioral challenges with a pet who has been neglected, abused, or left untrained. Adoption centers recommend patience, training, persistence, and consistency of care to help the pet overcome its past and get comfortable with the adopter.

In Canada, reputable animal shelters or humane societies go through an extensive process to ensure that potential pets and their respective families are well-suited and prepared for their lives ahead. Adoption fees include spaying/neutering, veterinary care including all updated vaccinations, microchipping, and pet insurance. Phone interviews, written questionnaires, and in-person visits gather information on the potential family's history with pets, their lifestyle, habits, and their ability to take on the conditions of the adopted pet. Adult pets can be more difficult to place because of existing habits or behaviors that are difficult to manage or unwanted. A rescue pet's unknown history may also complicate its ability to be adopted. Shelters and humane societies remain connected with information packages on why pets are unwanted, what to expect in the first weeks of pet adoption, guides, recommendations, specific behavior training requests, and follow-up calls to ensure that everyone is satisfied with the adoption.

A "forever home" is the home of an adopter who agrees to be responsible for the animal for the remainder of the pet's life. There are two basic understandings of the concept. A broad interpretation simply says that the adopter of the pet agrees that the animal's well-being is now their personal responsibility for the rest of the animal's life. If the adopter can no longer keep the animal for any reason, they would need to be responsible for finding a healthy and happy home for the animal. Many animal shelters require adopters to return the animal to the shelter if they can no longer care for the animal.

The adopter should have a plan in place for the care of the animal in the event of the adopter dying before the pet. A more restrictive view that some shelters attempt to integrate as part of the adoption agreement puts conditions on when and why the adopter could arrange to move the animal to a new family. Some agreements might specify allergies or violent behavior on the part of the animal as reasons allowable for an adopter to relinquish the animal. It is common for families to celebrate Gotcha Day on the anniversary of the animal's arrival at their forever home.

Education about and promotion of pet adoption is also done by animal welfare organizations and by local government animal control agencies. In 2016, the U.S. state of Georgia made the "adoptable dog" its state dog, similar to Colorado's adopted dog.

After filling out an application to adopt an animal, there is also an adoption fee that must be paid to adopt an animal. Adoption fees serve several purposes. If someone is willing to pay for an animal, chances are they will take care of him or her and not abuse or neglect their new pet. Most animals of age are spayed or neutered and up to date on all of their shots. Depending on the shelter or organization, some pets may be microchipped, which helps locate them if they are lost. The adoption fees help cover these costs and also help provide food for the animals left in the shelter.

Big Black Dog syndrome and related concerns
Big black dogs (BBDs) are consistently the hardest dogs to place—even if they're friendly, well-trained, and in perfect health. This is due to a number of factors, including fear stigma against certain breed types, attraction to ads and the fact that black dogs often do not photograph as well as lighter-coated ones, and the typecasting of black dogs as aggressive in film and on television. Organizations have started campaigns to educate the public about BBD syndrome.

Similarly, shelters often have difficulty placing black cats due to common superstitions regarding black cats as bringers or harbingers of bad luck. Some shelters also have policies halting or limiting the adoption of black cats immediately prior to Halloween for fear that the animals will be tortured, or used as "living decorations" for the holiday and then abandoned.

Pet ownership
According to the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) (2018), being responsible for a pet requires commitment and should be considered a privilege. Similar to having children, the pet depends on the owner for their needs such as food and shelter, exercise and mental stimulation, and veterinary care. When choosing to adopt a pet, the lifestyle of the owner and the pet are recommended to be compatible. Once a pet is chosen, the owner is recommended to identify it the pet needs and medical attention like being spayed or neutered. If a situation arises that the owner can no longer provide a suitable household for the animal, rehoming is recommended. The AVMA presents guidelines for being a responsible pet owner. This guideline is a resource of things to consider before becoming a pet owner.

Rescue dog
A rescue dog is a dog that has been placed in a new home after being abused, neglected, or abandoned by its previous owner. The term can also apply to dogs that are found as strays, surrendered by owners for a variety of reasons, including relationship breakdowns, moving home where the owner is unable or unwilling to take their pets, or elderly people who are not permitted to take their dog(s) into a nursing home.

Many animal rescue organisations exist to rescue, care for and re-home dogs and protect them from unnecessary euthanasia. Common examples include the RSPCA in the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth countries, the ISPCA in Ireland, or the ASPCA in the United States. Many rescue dogs are rehomed quickly, but some wait longer for a home. This may be relevant when the dog is older. Some agencies provide ongoing health care and support for older dogs after they have been placed in a home. There are several charities dedicated to rescuing and rehoming older dogs.

The ASPCA estimates that approximately 3.3 million dogs in the United States enter shelters each year. Of these, 1.6 million are adopted, 670,000 are euthanized, and 620,000 are returned to their previous owners. A study conducted by the United States National Council on Pet Population Study and Policy (NCPPSP) in 1998 found that the main reasons for pets being relinquished are: family moving, landlord will not allow pets, too many animals in household, cost of keeping the pet, owner is having personal problems, inadequate facilities, and no homes available for puppies. The study found that 47.7% of dogs turned in to shelters were not altered (spayed or neutered), 33% had not been to a veterinarian, and 96% of dogs had no obedience training. The conclusion of the researchers was that the owners who were relinquishing their pets did not have the knowledge to be responsible dog owners, and that educational programs aimed at present and prospective owners would reduce the number of dogs relinquished to animal shelters.

title: Pet adoption


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Srirangapatna

Srirangapatna is a town and headquarters of one of the seven Taluks of Mandya district, in the Indian State of Karnataka. It gets its name from the Ranganthaswamy temple consecrated around 984 CE. Later, under the British rule, the city was renamed to Seringapatnam. Located near the city of Mandya, it is of religious, cultural and historic importance.

The monuments on the island town of Srirangapatna have been nominated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the application is pending on the tentative list of UNESCO.

History
Srirangapatna has since time immemorial been an urban center and place of pilgrimage. During the Vijayanagar empire, it became the seat of a major viceroyalty, from where several nearby vassal states of the empire, such as Mysore and Talakad, were overseen. When perceiving the decline of the Vijayanagar empire, the rulers of Mysore ventured to assert independence, Srirangapatna was their first target. Raja Wodeyar I vanquished Rangaraya, the then viceroy of Srirangapatna, in 1610 and celebrated the Navaratri festival in the town that year. It came to be accepted in time that two things demonstrated control and signified sovereignty over the Kingdom of Mysore by any claimant to the throne, including the successful holding of the 10-day-long Navaratri festival, dedicated to Chamundeshwari, patron goddess of Mysore and control of the fort of Srirangapatna, the fortification nearest to the capital city of Mysore.

Srirangapatna remained part of the Kingdom of Mysore from 1610 to after India's independence in 1947; as the fortress closest to the capital city of Mysore, it was the last bastion and defence of the kingdom in case of invasion.

Hyder and Tipu
Srirangapatna became the capital of Mysore under Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan. When Tipu finally dispensed with the charade of deference to the Wodeyar Maharaja who was actually his captive, and proclaimed the "Khudadad State" under his own kingship, though the then incumbent Wodeyar scion Chamaraja Wodeyar IX was still officially the king of Mysore.

During Tipu Sultan's wars against the British, Kodavas, and Malabar rajas; he rounded up entire communities of Nairs, Kodavas, and Mangalorean Catholics in the conquered regions and deported them to Srirangapatna, where they were held in bondage until they received freedom from captivity as a result of Tipu's defeat by the British in 1799.

Treaty of Seringapatam, 1792
The Treaty of Seringapatam (also called Srirangapatna), signed 18 March 1792, ended the Third Anglo-Mysore War. Its signatories included Lord Cornwallis on behalf of the British East India Company, representatives of the Nizam of Hyderabad and the Maratha Empire, and Tipu Sultan, the ruler of Mysore.

Battle of Seringapatam, 1799
Srirangapatna was the scene of the last and decisive battle of the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War, fought in 1799 between Tipu Sultan, ruler of Mysore, and a combined force of 50,000 men provided equally by the Nizam of Hyderabad and the East India Company, under the overall command of General George Harris.

At the battle's climax, Tipu Sultan was killed within the fort of Seringapatam, betrayed by one of his own confidants. The spot where he fell is today marked by a memorial. Although the joint forces of the victorious army plundered Seringapatam and ransacked Tipu's palace, much of the site of the battle is still intact, including the ramparts, the Water Gate, the area where British prisoners were held, and the site of the destroyed palace.

Apart from the usual gold and cash, innumerable other valuables were shipped to England, including objets d'art and personal possessions of Tipu Sultan such as his rich clothing, shoes, sword, and firearms. Most of these remain in the British Royal Collection and in the Victoria and Albert Museum, the latter of which holds Tipu's Tiger, an automaton of a tiger on top of a British soldier. The sword of Tipu Sultan was purchased at a Sotheby's auction by Vijay Mallya, a liquor baron from Karnataka.

British composer Harriet Wainwright composed a work for chorus ("Seringapatam") about the battle.

Location
Although situated only 15 km from Mysore city, Srirangapatna lies in the neighbouring district of Mandya. The entire town is enclosed by the river Kaveri to form a river island, the northern half of which is shown in the adjacent image. While the main river flows on the eastern side of the island, the Paschima Vaahini segment of the same river flows to its west. The town is easily accessible by train from Bengaluru and Mysore and is also well-connected by road, lying as it does just off the Bangalore-Mysore National Highway 275. The highway passes through this town and special care was taken to minimize any impact on the monuments.

Religious significance
The town takes its name from the celebrated Ranganathaswamy temple which dominates the town, making Srirangapatna one of the most important Vaishnavite centers of pilgrimage in South India. The temple was built by the Ganga dynasty rulers of the area in the 9th century; the structure was strengthened and improved upon architecturally some three centuries later. Thus, the temple is a medley of the Hoysala and Vijayanagar styles of temple architecture.

Tradition holds that all the islands formed in the Kaveri River are consecrated to Sri Ranganathaswamy (PrabhaVishnu mentioned in Vishnu Sahasranama) and large temples have been built in very ancient times dedicated to that deity on the three largest islands. The Srirangapatna temple is one of the three temples of the God Ranganatha (Adi Ranga) that are situated in the natural islands formed in the Kaveri river. They are:

 * Adi Ranga: the Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple at Srirangapatna, Srirangapatna taluk, Mandya district, Karnataka, India
 * Madhya Ranga: the Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple at Shivanasamudra, Kollegala taluk, Chamarajanagara district, Karnataka, India
 * Antya Ranga: the Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple at Srirangam, Srirangam taluk, Tiruchirappalli district, Tamil Nadu, India

The presence of the Kaveri River is in itself considered auspicious and sanctifying. The Paschima Vaahini section of the Kaveri at Srirangapatna is considered especially sacred; the pious come from far and wide to immerse the ashes of the departed and perform obsequies to their ancestors in these waters.

Demographics
According to the 2011 India Census Data, Srirangapatna had a population of 155,130 persons. Males constitute 50.06% and females constitute 49.93% of the total population. 9.80% of the population are under 6 years of age.

Geography
Srirangapatna is at 12.41°N, 76.7°W. It has an average elevation of 679 m above mean sea-level.

Places of interest
The town is famous for a very ancient temple dedicated to Sri Ranganathaswamy, a form of Lord Vishnu. There is also Kalyani Siddhi Vinayaka Temple in front of the Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple. Other temples in Srirangapatna include the Lakshminarasimha Swamy Temple, Jyothi Mahaswara Temple, Bidhcotta Ganesha Temple, Panduranga Swamy Temple, the Sathyanarayana Swamy Temple, the Anjunaya Swamy Temple, the Ayyapa Temple, the Gangadhareswara Swamy Temple, and RaganathaNagara Ganesha Temple, Lakshmi Temple, Sri Raghavendra Swamy Mutt on Old Post Office Road, surrounding Srirangapatna in fort 8 Ganesh & Anjunaya temples. The Karighatta (Black Hill) and its temple of Lord Srinivasa is a few kilometres from the town. The deity is Kari-giri-vasa (one who resides on the black hill). The renowned Nimishambha Temple is about 2 km from the town. Srirangapatna also hosts the summer palace of Tipu Sultan and his mausoleum.

Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple
The Ranganthaswamy Temple – usually referred to as "Sri Ranganathaswamy" – is dedicated to Ranganatha, a manifestation of Vishnu. It is one of the five important pilgrimage sites along the river Kaveri for devotees of Ranganatha. These five sacred sites are together known as Pancharanga Kshetrams in Southern India. Since Srirangapatna is the first temple starting from upstream, the deity is known as Adi Ranga (lit; "first Ranga"), and the town of Srirangapatna, which derives its name from the temple, is on an island in the river Kaveri.

Daria Daulat Bagh
The Dariya Daulat Palace (Summer Palace) is set amidst beautiful gardens called Daria Daulat Bagh. Tippu Sultan built this palace in 1784. The palace is built in the Indo-Saracenic style is mostly made of teakwood. The palace has a rectangular plan and is built on a raised platform.

Other attractions in Srirangapatna include the Jama Masjid (a Mosque) and the Dariya Daulat Gardens. The mosque has stone Arabic inscriptions which mention the 99 titles given to the almighty Allah, and the Farsi inscription which mentions that the Masjid was built in AD 1782 by Tipu Sultan.

Tipu Sultan Gumbaz
The Gumbaz is an impeccably detailed mausoleum and houses the remains of Tipu Sultan, his father Hyder Ali and his mother Fatima Begum among beautifully manicured gardens. Various tombs of other relatives surround the gumbaz, some with small signs offering guidance on which specific individuals are buried here. The outer gumbaz columns are made of amphibolite, a very dark rock that exudes a somber richness. Handcrafted door frames covered in a deep lacquer finish lead into an inner tomb illuminated only by natural light. All visitors are welcome inside, and even encouraged to enter by the friendly doormen.

Wellesley Bridge
Wellesley Bridge was erected by Kingdom of Mysore's Dewan, Purnaiah on the Kaveri river in 1804. It was named after the then Governor General Marquis of Wellesley. The bridge is built of stone pillars and stone corbels and surrounded by stone girders. The bridge is very strong and has survived the heavy traffic of many years.

Karighatta viewpoint
The Karighatta viewpoint gives good panorama of Mysore and Srirangapatna cities from a height of 3,000 feet. Karighatta is a hill a few kilometres outside the 'island' town of Srirangapatna. The name Karighatta translates to "Black Hill" in Kannada. The hill supports the dry scrub jungle and many tamarind and gooseberry trees are found around the temple. A small river, Lokapavani, a tributary of Kaveri flows by the hill. The main entrance to the temple, with huge wooden doors opens into a large quadrangle, which is the main shrine for Vaikunta Srinivasa in black stone, flanked by Yoga Srinivasa (without his consort) and Bhoga Srinivasa idols. The hill may be climbed by stone steps (450 in number). A winding paved road is used for vehicular transport. The stone steps lead to a flat hilltop where the temple stands. The hillock has a superb panoramic view of Srirangapatna and Mysore. The beautiful landscape around the hill and the confluence of the Kaveri and Lokapavani rivers can be seen from atop the hill.

Nimishamba Temple
The famous Nimishamba (the incarnation of Parvathi, the goddess wife of Lord Shiva) temple is on the bank of the Lokapavani river. This temple too can be clearly seen from the top of the Karighatta hill. It is a belief that Parvathi will clear all the problems and troubles of her devotees within a minute (nimisha in Sanskrit), and hence the name.

Garrison Cemetery, Srirangapatna
The Garrison Cemetery is located in Srirangapatna, on the banks of the river Cauvery, about 300m from the Bangalore Mysore Highway. It has about 307 graves of the European officers killed in the final assault on Tippu Sultan in 1799, and their family members. Among the graves, there are 80 graves of the officers of the Swiss Regiment de Meuron, and the rest of the graves are their family members.

Scott’s Bungalow, Seringapatam
The Scott’s Bungalow is located in Seringapatam on the banks of the river Cauvery, at about half a mile from the Mysore Gate of the Seringapatam gate. The bungalow was the residence of Col. Scott, an officer of the Madras Army who took part in the siege of Seringapatam in 1799. The bungalow is associated with the legend and tragedy of Col. Scott. The story of Scott’s Bungalow is lamented in a poem by Walter Yeldham called The Deserted Bungalow, published in 1875.

Lord Harris's House
Between the Garrison Cemetery and Scott’s Bungalow a path leads to Lord Harris's House on the river banks. This house is known as Lord Harris's House or The Doctor's Bungalow or Puraniah's Bungalow. This house was the residence of General Harris, for a short time after the siege of Seringapatam in 1799, and went on to become headquarters of the commanding officer of Seringapatam. In 1809, the house was the scene of a mutiny by officers of the Madras Army, led by Col. Bell, against Sir. George Barlow, the Governor of Madras. Purnaiah, lived in this house after his retirement from service in 1811, and died there on 28 March 1812. A tablet on the wall records the connection of Lord Harris and Puraniah to the house.

Srirangapatna Fort
The fortress is in the west of the island, and is surrounded by double walls. The point at which the British broke through the walls, and thus Tipu Sultan's troops surprised, is marked by an obelisk. Also highlighted is the place where Tipu Sultan was killed by the British forces. In addition, the dungeon in which the Mysore rulers had imprisoned British soldiers.

Colonel Bailey's Dungeon
Colonel Bailey's Dungeon was the place where Tipu Sultan used to imprison all the British officers. It is near the death place memorial of Tipu Sultan and is surrounded by gardens on all four sides. Bailey was the only British officer who died in that place and could not make it through the tough conditions and so it was later named after him.

Another version says that the commanding officer of the British at the Battle of Pollilur (1780), Col. Baillie, was imprisoned here after the defeat of his troops in the First Mysore War.

Obelisk Monument
Obelisk in Srirangapatna is a memorial erected by the then government of Mysore in memory of the English soldiers died during the siege of Srirangapatna. The Memorial was built during the reign of Krishnaraja Wadiyar IV in 1907, to celebrate the defeat of Tipu in 1799. The inscription on the plaque reads "This monument is erected by the government of Mysore in 1907 in order to commemorate the siege of Seringapatam by the British forces under lieutenant general G. Harris (George Harris, 1st Baron Harris) and its final capture by assault on 4 May 1799. As also the names of those gallant officers who fell during the operations."

Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary
Near the town is the Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary, where several bird species breed, including the painted stork, open-billed stork, black-headed ibis, river tern, great stone plover and Indian shag.

In literature

 * Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe's Tiger is a fictionalised account of the Battle of Seringapatam. It concentrates on the exploits of the fictional character of Richard Sharpe, and the historic Arthur Wellesley, later the Duke of Wellington.
 * Wilkie Collins' The Moonstone includes a prologue that takes place during the Battle of Srirangapatna, entitled "The Storming of Seringapatam (1799)", during which a British officer steals a sacred Hindu diamond that becomes the mystery at the centre of the novel.
 * John Forster mentions in The Life of Charles Dickens that in a childhood playground of C.D., "he had been... delivered from the dungeons of Seringapatam, an immense pile ('of haycock'), by the victorious British ('boy next door and his two cousins')...". See p. 10 of the Everyman edition published in 1969. First published: London; Chapman and Hall, 1872–1874, in 3 volumes.

title: Srirangapatna


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Balan

Balan may refer to:

Places

 * Bălan, a town in Harghita County, Romania
 * Bălan, Sălaj, a commune in Sălaj County, Romania
 * Bălan (river), a tributary of the Râmnicul Sărat in Vrancea County, Romania
 * Balan, Ain, a French commune
 * Balan, Ardennes, a French commune
 * Balan, Iran (disambiguation), places in Iran

People

 * Balan (surname)
 * Balan K. Nair (1933–2000), Indian actor
 * Sir Balan, the brother of Sir Balin in Arthurian legend
 * King Balan of al-Andalus (Moorish Spain), father of Fierabras in the chansons de geste
 * Dan Balan, singer and songwriter

Other uses

 * Balam (demon), sometimes spelled "Balan"
 * Balan: Book of Angels Volume 5, a 2006 album by the Cracow Klezmer Band composed by John Zorn
 * Balan (film), the first Indian talkie film in Malayalam cinema
 * Balan Wonderworld, a 2021 video game

title: Balan


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User talk:Owenville

Hello, Owenville. Welcome to Wikipedia.

A few tips for you to start going. (I'll send more if I see that I can help you :-)

 * Check out Welcome, newcomers + the links in there.
 * Sign your stuff on talk pages with ~ It will convert to your username + the time.
 * If puzzled, put a question on Village pump, or feel free to ask me on my talk page if it's a very general question.
 * Have fun.

-- Cimon Avaro on a pogo-stick 05:19 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

title: User talk:Owenville


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Animal shelter

An animal shelter or pound is a place where stray, lost, abandoned or surrendered animals – mostly dogs and cats – are housed. The word "pound" has its origins in the animal pounds of agricultural communities, where stray livestock would be penned or impounded until they were claimed by their owners.

While no-kill shelters exist, it is sometimes policy to euthanize animals that are not claimed quickly enough by a previous or new owner. In Europe, of the 30 countries included in a survey, all but six (Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Italy and Poland ) permitted euthanizing non-adopted animals.

Terminology
The shelter industry has terminology for their unique field of work, and though there are no exact standards for consistent definitions, many words have meanings based on their usage.

Animal control has the municipal function of picking up stray dogs and cats, and investigating reports of animal abuse, dog bites or animal attacks. It may also be called animal care and control, and earlier was called the dog catcher or rabies control. Stray, lost or abandoned pets picked up off the streets are usually transported to the local animal shelter, or pound. Uncomplicated stray cases are usually kept for a period of time, called stray hold. After the holding period, an animal is considered forfeited by its owner, and may become available for adoption. Animals involved in attacks or bites are placed in quarantine and are not available for adoption until investigations or legal cases are resolved. Animal control's interest is mainly public safety and rabies control.

Many shelter policies allow individuals to bring in animals to the shelter, often called owner surrender, or relinquishing an animal. An open admission shelter will accept any animal regardless of reason, and is usually a municipal-run shelter or a private shelter with a contract to operate for a municipality. Municipal shelters may limit incoming animals to those from the area in which they serve. A managed admission shelter requires an appointment and will restrict admission of animals to fit their available resources. Limited admission shelters are usually private or non-profit shelters without municipal contracts, and they may limit their intake to only highly-adoptable and healthy animals.

An animal in a shelter has four outcomes: return to owner, adoption, transfer to another shelter or rescue facility, or euthanasia. Return to owner is when a stray animal, that was found and housed at the shelter, is picked up by its owner. Most animal shelters practice adoption, where an animal in their care is given or sold to an individual who will keep it and care for it. Some shelters work with rescue organizations, giving an animal to the rescue rather than adopting it to an individual. Some jurisdictions mandate that shelters cooperate with rescues; some shelters utilize rescues to offload animals with health or behavior problems that they are not equipped to deal with. Many shelters practice some level of euthanasia.

Euthanasia is the act of putting an animal to death. A high kill shelter euthanizes many of the animals they take in; a low kill shelter euthanizes few animals and usually operates programs to increase the number of animals that are released alive. A shelter's live release rate is the measure of how many animals leave a shelter alive compared to the number of animals they have taken in. A no kill shelter practices a very strict high live release rate, such as 90%, 95%, or even 100%. Since there is no standard of measurement, some shelters compare live releases to the number of healthy, adoptable animals, while others compare live releases to every animal they took in – as such, the terms high kill, low kill, and no kill are therefore subjective.

Shelter partners include rescue groups, fosters and sanctuaries. Rescue groups will often pull dogs from shelters, helping to reduce the number of animals at a shelter. A rescue group often specializes in a specific dog breed, or they pull hard-to-adopt animals such as those with health or behavioral issues with the intention of rehabilitating the animal for a future adoption. Many rescues don't have brick and mortar locations but operate out of a home or with foster partners. A foster will temporarily take animals from the shelter to their home to give them special attention or care, such as a newly whelped litter of puppies, or an animal recovering from an illness. An animal sanctuary is an alternative to euthanasia for difficult-to-adopt animals; it is a permanent placement which may include secure kenneling and care by staff experienced in the handling of animals with serious aggression or permanent behavioral problems, or a home for aged animals that will be cared for until their natural death. Adoption and sending to rescue or sanctuary are permanent placements; fostering is a temporary placement.

A retail rescue takes advantage of right-of-first-choice of the free or cheap inventory of animals from shelters to flip shelter-pulled animals under the banner of 'adoption', with little or no retraining or veterinary care in between pulling a dog and selling it. They may also obtain animals cheaply from auctions or puppy mills and command high dollar for their adoptions under the ruse of having 'rescued' the animal. A retail shelter operates like an ordinary animal shelter but with more of the flavor of a pet store than a traditional shelter by selling pet supplies. They may even obtain animals from out of the area to increase their inventory of animals, rather than serving only their geographic service area.

Many shelters routinely spay or neuter all their adoptable animals and vaccinate them for rabies and other routine pet diseases. Shelters often offer rabies clinics or spay-neuter clinics to their local public at discount rates. Some shelters participate in trap–neuter–return programs where stray animals are captured, neutered and vaccinated, then returned to the location they were picked up.

Canada
In Quebec, there are two types of animal shelters:
 * SPCA (in French, 'Société pour la prévention de la cruauté envers les animaux')
 * SPA (in French, 'Société protectrice des animaux')

Germany
Larger cities in Germany have a city shelter (Tierheim) for animals or contract with one of the many non-profit animal organizations in the country, which run their own shelters. Most shelters are populated by dogs, cats, and a variety of small animals like mice, rats, and rabbits. Additionally, there are so-called Gnadenhöfe ("mercy-farms") for larger animals that take cattle or horses from private owners who want to put them down for financial reasons.

The Animal Protection Act prohibits killing of vertebrates without a proper reason. Generally, proper reasons are slaughtering or hunting for food production (cats and dogs are excepted from that), control of infectious diseases, painless killing "if continued life would imply uncurable pain or suffering" or if an animal poses a danger to the general public. The latter will be a reason for euthanasia only if an authority concerned with public safety orders it based on an investigation. Because of the ruling, all German animal shelters are practically no-kill shelters. Facilities must be led by a person who is certified in the handling of animals. Most shelters contract veterinarians to provide medical care.

India
Goshalas are a type of shelter for homeless, unwanted or elderly cattle in India. Cows are venerated by many Hindus and slaughter of cattle is illegal in most places in the country.

New Zealand
In New Zealand, dog pounds are run by each territorial local authority, which provide animal control services under the Dog Control Act 1996.

Poland
In Poland, it is allowed to euthanize animals in shelters only because of illness. However, it is permitted to kill blind litters as they are considered dependent.

United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom, animal shelters are more commonly known as rescue or rehoming centres and are run by charitable organizations. The most prominent rescue and rehoming organizations are the RSPCA, Cats Protection and the Dogs Trust.

United States
In the United States there is no government-run organization that provides oversight or regulation of the various shelters on a national basis. However, many individual states regulate shelters within their jurisdiction. One of the earliest comprehensive measures was the Georgia Animal Protection Act of 1986, a law enacted in response to the inhumane treatment of companion animals by a pet store chain in Atlanta. It provided for the licensing and regulation of pet shops, stables, kennels, and animal shelters, and it established, for the first time, minimum standards of care. The Georgia Department of Agriculture was tasked with licensing animal shelters and enforcing the new law through the Department's newly created Animal Protection Division. An additional provision, added in 1990, was the Humane Euthanasia Act, the first state law to mandate intravenous injection of sodium pentothal in place of gas chambers and other less humane methods. The law was further expanded and strengthened with the Animal Protection Act of 2000.

Currently, it is estimated that there are approximately 5,000 independently-run animal shelters operating nationwide. Shelters have redefined their role since the 1990s. No longer serving as a lifelong repository for strays and drop-offs, modern shelters have taken the lead in controlling the pet population, promoting pet adoption and studying shelter animals' health and behavior. To prevent animal euthanization, some shelters offer behavioral assessments of animals and training classes to make them more adoptable to the public. Most shelters also provide medical care that includes spaying and neutering to prevent overpopulation.

Shelters and shelter-like volunteer organizations responded to cat overpopulation with trap-neuter-return (TNR) programs, which reduced feral cat populations and reduced the burden on shelters.

In the United States, many government-run animal shelters operate in conditions that are far from ideal. In the wake of the financial crisis of 2007–2008, many government shelters ran out of adequate space and financial resources. Shelters unable to raise additional funds to provide for the increased number of incoming animals have no choice but to euthanize them, sometimes within days. In 2012, approximately four million cats and dogs died in U.S. shelters. However, recent years have seen a dramatic drop in the number of animals euthanized in shelters, due mainly to a successful push to promote spaying and neutering of pets.

title: Animal shelter


text:
Ipes

IPES may refer to:

 * Instituto de Pesquisas e Estudos Sociais, a Brazilian think tank of the 1960s
 * Inverse photoemission spectroscopy
 * Ipos, an Earl and powerful Prince of Hell in demonology
 * Tabebuia, Ipê trees
 * Lapacho, a medical tea
 * Improved Proposed Encryption Standard

title: Ipes


text:
Newark Airport (disambiguation)

Newark Liberty International Airport (FAA/IATA: EWR), is an airport in Newark, New Jersey, United States, serving the New York metropolitan area.

Newark Airport may also refer to:

 * Newark Liberty International Airport (NJT station), a New Jersey Transit train station serving the airport
 * Newark Airport Interchange, a highway interchange outside of Newark Liberty International Airport
 * Newark Metropolitan Airport Buildings, the original buildings at the New Jersey airport, listed on the National Register of Historic Places
 * Newark-Heath Airport (FAA: VTA), in Newark, Ohio, United States

title: Newark Airport (disambiguation)


text:
Separ

Separ may refer to:
 * Separ, New Mexico, an unincorporated community and ghost town in the United States
 * Separ, Iran, a village
 * Vepar, a demon
 * Separ, Rapper, rapper from Slovakia (mid-Europe)

title: Separ