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Italian Somaliland

Italian Somaliland (Somalia Italiana; الصومال الإيطالي; Dhulka Soomaalida ee Talyaaniga) was a protectorate and later colony of the Kingdom of Italy in present-day Somalia, which was ruled in the 19th century by the Sultanate of Hobyo and Majeerteen in the north, and in the south by the political entities; Hiraab Imamate and the Geledi Sultanate.

Italy gradually secured much of the territory in the 1880s through a series of protection treaties. Starting in the 1890s, the Bimaal and Wa'dan revolts near Merca marked the beginning of Somali resistance to Italian expansion, coinciding with the rise of the anti-colonial Dervish movement in the north. By the end of 1927, following a two year military campaign against Somali rebels, Rome finally asserted authority over the entirety of Italian Somaliland.

In 1936, the region was integrated into Italian East Africa as the Somalia Governorate. This would last until Italy's loss of the region in 1941, during the East African campaign of World War II. Italian Somalia then came under British military administration until 1950, when it became a United Nations trusteeship, the Trust Territory of Somalia under Italian administration. On 1 July 1960, the Trust Territory of Somalia united with the former British Somaliland to form the Somali Republic.

History
The late 19th century had a huge impact in the Horn of Africa. The Somali Sultans that then controlled the region, such as Yusuf Ali Kenadid, Boqor Osman Mahamuud, Ahmed Yusuf, and Olol Dinle entered into treaties with one of the European colonial powers Great Britain and France, or Abyssinia.

First settlement
At the end of the 19th century, a growing social-political movement developed within Italy to start expanding its influence, since many other European countries had already been doing so, which was effectively leaving Italy behind. Italy also had serious economic problems. It is also argued by some historians that Italy had a minor interest in the mutton and livestock that were then plentiful in Somalia, though whatever designs Italy may have had on the resource-challenged Somali landscape were undoubtedly subordinate to its interest in the region's ports and the waters and lands to which they provided access.

Cesare Correnti organized an expedition under the Società Geografica Italiana in 1876. The next year, the travel journal L’Esploratore was established by Manfredo Camperio. The "Società di Esplorazioni Commerciali in Africa" was created in 1879, with the Italian industrial establishment involved as well. The "Club Africano", which three years later became the "Società Africana D’Italia", was also established in Somalia in 1880. The first recorded act of Somali resistance began in October 1893, when Vincenzo Filonardi disembarked at the city of Merca to create a colonial outpost. During the visit a captain of one of the Italian vessels, Lieutenant Maurizio Talmone, was assassinated.

Majeerteen-Italian treaties

In late 1888, Sultan Yusuf Ali Kenadid sent a treaty request to Italy to make his Sultanate of Hobyo an Italian protectorate. His rival Boqor Osman Mahamuud was to sign a similar agreement vis-a-vis his own Majeerteen Sultanate (Majeerteenia) the following year. Both rulers had entered into the protectorate treaties to advance their own expansionist goals, with Sultan Kenadid looking to use Italy's support in his ongoing power struggle with Boqor Osman over the Majeerteen Sultanate, as well as in a separate conflict with the Hiraab Sultanate over an area to the south of Hobyo. In signing the agreements, the rulers also hoped to exploit the rival objectives of the European imperial powers so as to more effectively assure the continued independence of their territories. The Italians, for their part, were interested in the largely arid territory mainly because of its ports, which could grant them access to the strategically important Suez Canal and the Gulf of Aden.

The terms of each treaty specified that Italy was to steer clear of any interference in the Sultanates' respective administrations. In return for Italian arms and an annual subsidy, the Sultans conceded to a minimum of oversight and economic concessions. The Italians also agreed to dispatch a few ambassadors to promote both the Sultanates' and their own interests. The new protectorates were thereafter managed by Vincenzo Filonardi through a chartered company. An Anglo-Italian border protocol was later signed on 5 May 1894, followed by an agreement in 1906 between Cavalier Pestalozza and General Swaine acknowledging that Baran fell under the Majeerteen Sultanate's administration.

The last piece of land acquired by Italy in Somalia in order to form Italian Somaliland was the Jubaland region. Britain ceded the territory in 1925 as a reward for the Italians having joined the Allies in World War I. The British retained control of the southern half of the partitioned Jubaland territory, which was later called the Northern Frontier District (NFD).

Italo-Abyssinian campaign
In January 1887 Italian troops from Somalia fought a battle against Ras Alula Engida's militia in Dogali, Eritrea, where they lost 500 troops. The Prime Minister, Agostino Depretis, died shortly after this defeat in July 1887. Francesco Crispi replaced him as Prime Minister. On 2 May 1889, the Ethiopian Emperor Menelik II and Italy signed the Treaty of Wuchale.

Coastal settlement
Italy gained control of the ports of the Benadir coastal area with the concession of a small strip of land on the coast from the Sultan of Zanzibar, and over the following decades, Italian settlement was encouraged. In 1905, Italy assumed the responsibility of creating a colony in southern Somalia, after several failed attempts. This followed revelations that the Benadir Company had tolerated or collaborated in the perpetuation of the slave trade. The administrative regulator was Governor Mercantelli, with the six subdivisions of Brava, Merca, Lugh, Itala, Bardera, and Jumbo. Following the assassination of an Italian Lieutenant by anti-colonial Somali rebels, Italian troops razed all villages east of the river Shabeelle in a nearly hundred-kilometre range in reprisal, while seizing livestock and killing Somali residents in the area. On 5 April 1908, the Italian Parliament enacted a basic law to unite all of the parts of southern Somalia into an area called "Somalia Italiana". The colonial power was then divided between the Parliament, the metropolitan government, and the colonial government. The power of the colonial government was the only power that was changed. The civil governor controlled export rights, regulated the rate of exchange, raised or lowered native taxes, and administered all civil services and matters relating to hunting, fishing, and conservation. The governor was in control of the police force, while nominating local residents and military arrangements.

From 5 April 1908 to 5 May 1936, the Royal Corps of Somali Colonial Troops (Regio corpo truppe coloniali della Somalia Italiana), originally called the "Guard Corps of Benadir", served as the territory's formal military corps. At the start of its establishment, the force had 2,600 Italian officers. Between 1911 and 1912, over 1,000 Somalis from Mogadishu served as combat units along with Eritrean and Italian soldiers in the Italo-Turkish War. Most of the troops stationed never returned home until they were transferred back to Italian Somaliland in preparation for the invasion of Ethiopia in 1935.

Effective Italian control remained largely limited to the coastal areas until the early 1920s. After the collapse of the Dervish movement, wherein Diiriye Guure was sultan and wherein Mohammed Abdullah Hassan' was emir, rebellion and revolt occurred, with disputes arising between different clans in the colony. The government of the time served as a mediator while maintaining close control over the military.

Colonial development and fascist era

In 1920, a member of the Italian royal family, The Duca degli Abruzzi, who was also a famous explorer, would establish the Società Agricola Italo-Somala (SAIS) in order to explore the agricultural potential of the territory. That same year, the Duca founded the Villaggio Duca degli Abruzzi ("Villabruzzi"; Jowhar) as an agricultural settlement in Italian Somaliland. The area produced sugar, bananas and cotton. On 5 December 1923, Cesare Maria De Vecchi di Val Cismon was named Governor in charge of the new colonial administration.

In November 1920, the Banca d'Italia, the first modern bank in Italian Somaliland, was established in Mogadishu.

After World War I in 1925, Trans-Juba, which was then a part of British East Africa, was ceded to Italy. This concession was purportedly a reward for the Italians having joined the Allies in World War I.

Following an examination of the layout of the land, the Italians began new local infrastructure projects, including the construction of hospitals, farms and schools.

The relationship between the Sultanate of Hobyo and Italy soured when Sultan Kenadid refused the Italians' proposal to allow a British contingent of troops to disembark in his Sultanate so that they might then pursue their battle against the Somali religious and nationalist leader Muhammad Abdullah Hassan's Dervish forces. Viewed as too much of a threat, Sultan Kenadid was eventually exiled to Aden in Yemen and then to Eritrea. His son Ali Yusuf Kenadid succeeded him on the throne. In 1924, Governor Cesare Maria De Vecchi adopted a policy of disarmentation of the northern Somali sultanates. Sultan Ali Yusuf Kenadid was thereafter in turn exiled. The Dubats colonial troops and the Zaptié gendarmerie were extensively used by De Vecchi during these military campaigns. However, unlike the southern territories, the northern sultanates were not subject to direct rule due to the earlier treaties they had signed with the Italians. In 1926, the agricultural colony of Villaggio Duca degli Abruzzi comprised 16 villages, with some 3,000 Somali and 200 Italian inhabitants, and was connected by a 114 km new railway to Mogadishu. Italian colonial policy followed two principles in Italian Somaliland: preservation of the dominant clan and ethnic configurations and respect for Islam as the territory's religion.

In 1928, the Italian authorities built the Mogadishu Cathedral (Cattedrale di Mogadiscio). It was constructed in a Norman Gothic style, based on the Cefalù Cathedral in Cefalù, Sicily. Following its establishment, Crown Prince Umberto II made his first publicized visit to Mogadishu. To commemorate the visit, the Arch of Umberto was constructed. The arch was built at the center of Mogadishu Garden. The Mogadishu International Airport was constructed that same year. The facility was regarded as one of the finest in the region.

Following a two year long Somali resistance, in late 1927 Italy finally extended authority across the entire territory. In the early 1930s, the new Italian Governors, Guido Corni and Maurizio Rava, started a policy of assimilation of the Somalis. Many Somalis were enrolled in the Italian colonial troops, and thousands of Italian colonists moved to live in Mogadishu. The city grew in size and some small manufacturing companies opened up. The Italians also settled in agricultural areas around the capital, such as Jowhar and Janale (Genale).

In 1930, there were 22,000 Italians living in Italian Somaliland, representing 2% of the territory's population. The majority resided in the capital Mogadishu, with other Italian communities concentrated in Jowhar, Adale (Itala), Janale, Jamame and Kismayo.

In October 1934, Crown Prince Umberto II made his second publicized visit to Italian Somaliland. King Victor Emmanuel III would also travel to the territory, arriving on 3 November that same year, accompanied by Emilio de Bono, after a non-stop flight from Rome. They were welcomed by the Governor Maurizio Rava and other colonial administrators. The King then traveled to Villabruzzi on 5 November and then returned to Mogadishu, where he celebrated his 65th birthday on 11 November. Following his visit to Italian Somaliland, new maps and 14 stamps were published. To commemorate his visit, an Arch of Triumph was constructed in Mogadishu in 1934.

Italian East Africa (1936–1941)

By 1935, Mogadishu began to serve as a major naval base and port for the Italians. Then Prime Minister of Italy Benito Mussolini regarded Greater Somalia (La Grande Somalia) as the crown jewel in Italy's colonial empire on the continent. He viewed himself less as an invader than as a liberator of the occupied Somali territories, including the Ogaden region, to which the Ethiopian Empire laid claim. On this basis, he justified his plan to invade Ethiopia. In October 1935, the southern front of the Second Italo-Abyssinian War was launched into Ethiopia from Italian Somaliland. The Italian General Rodolfo Graziani commanded the invasion forces in the south. Over 40,000 Somali troops served in the war, mostly as combat units. They backed up the over 80,000 Italians serving alongside them at the start of the offensive. Many of the Somalis were veterans from serving in Italian Libya. During the invasion of Ethiopia, Mogadishu served as a chief supply base.

In June 1936, after the war ended, Italian Somaliland became part of Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale Italiana) forming the Somalia Governorate. The new colony of the Italian Empire also included Ethiopia and Eritrea. To commemorate the victory, an Arch of Triumph was constructed in Mogadishu.

From 1936 to 1940, new roads were constructed in the region, such as the "Imperial Road" from Mogadishu to Addis Ababa. New railways (114 km from Mogadishu to Jowhar) and many schools, hospitals, ports and bridges were also built.

Since the start of the colony, many Somali troops fought in the so-called Regio Corpo Truppe Coloniali. The soldiers were enrolled as Dubats, Zaptié and Bande irregolari. During World War II, these troops were regarded as a wing of the Italian Army's Infantry Division, as was the case in Libya and Eritrea. The Zaptié were considered the best: they provided a ceremonial escort for the Italian Viceroy (Governor) as well as the territorial police. There were already more than one thousand such soldiers in 1922. In 1941, in Italian Somaliland and Ethiopia, 2,186 Zaptìé plus an additional 500 recruits under training officially constituted a part of the Carabinieri. They were organised into a battalion commanded by Major Alfredo Serranti that defended Culqualber (Ethiopia) for three months until this military unit was destroyed by the Allies. After heavy fighting, all the Italian Carabinieri, including the Somali troops, received full military honors from the British.

In 1935, there were over 50,000 Italians settlers living in Italian Somaliland, constituting 5% of the territory's population. Of those, 20,000 resided in Mogadishu (called officially in Italian language:Mogadiscio), representing around 40% of the city's 50,000 residents. Mogadishu was an administrative capital of Italian East Africa, and new buildings were erected in the Italian architectural tradition. Other Italian settler communities were concentrated in Jowhar, Adale (Itala), Janale, Jamame, and Kismayo. These figures do not include the more than 220,000 Italian soldiers stationed throughout Italian Somaliland during the Second Italo-Ethiopian War.

The colony was also one of the most developed in Africa in terms of the standard of living of the colonists and of the local inhabitants, mainly in the urban areas. By 1940, the Villaggio Duca degli Abruzzi ("Villabruzzi"; Jowhar) had a population of 12,000 people, of whom nearly 3,000 were Italian Somalis, and enjoyed a notable level of development with a small manufacturing area with agricultural industries (sugar mills, etc.).

In the second half of 1940, Italian troops invaded British Somaliland, and ejected the British. The Italians also occupied Kenyan areas bordering Jubaland around the villages of Moyale and Buna. Although the Italian leadership believed were unsure where the British army would land first, Operation Canvas, to capture southern Somalia occurred first in January 1941, whereas the subsequent attempt to capture British Somaliland happened two months later in Operation Appearance.

In the spring of 1941, Britain regained control of British Somaliland and conquered Italian Somaliland with the Ogaden. However, until the summer of 1943, there was an Italian guerrilla war in all the areas of the former Italian East Africa.

British Military Administration (1941–1950)
British forces occupied Italian Somaliland and militarily administered the territory as well as British Somaliland. Faced with growing Italian political pressure inimical to continued British tenure and Somali aspirations for independence, the Somalis and the British came to see each other as allies. The first modern Somali political party, the Somali Youth Club (SYC), was subsequently established in Mogadishu in 1943; it was later renamed the Somali Youth League (SYL). The SYL evolved into the dominant party and had a moderate ideology. Hizbia Digil Mirifle Somali (HDMS) party served as the principal opposition to the right, although its platform was generally in agreement with that of the SYL.

In November 1949, the United Nations finally opted to grant Italy trusteeship of Italian Somaliland, but only under close supervision and on the condition — first proposed by the Somali Youth League (SYL) and other nascent Somali political organizations, such as Hizbia Digil Mirifle Somali (later Hizbia Dastur Mustaqbal Somali, or HDMS) and the Somali National League (SNL), that were then agitating for independence — that Somalia achieve independence within ten years.

Trust Territory of Somalia (1950–1960)
In 1949, when the British military administration ended, Italian Somaliland became a United Nations trusteeship known as the Trust Territory of Somaliland. Under Italian administration, this trust territory lasted ten years, from 1950 to 1960, with legislative elections held in 1956 and 1959.

On 1 April 1950, the Amministrazione fiduciaria italiana della Somalia (AFIS) began its rule. A deployment of 6,500 troops landed in Somalia to assist the establishment of AFIS under the leadership of Giovanni Fornari. Fornari's three year tenure would mark the most difficult years of the Trusteeship. The first half of AFIS's decade long rule would be marked by animosity and conflict between the Italian authorities and the Somali Youth League. Numerous SYL officials who had gained positions of prominence during the era of British Military Administration were either demoted, removed from their positions or imprisoned by Italians officials. These attempts to marginalize the league would lead to demonstrations across the country which were strongly repressed by the government, who had at the time come to decision not cooperate or concede to the SYL's plans for independence. In the 1956 parliamentary election, the Somali Youth League would win 54.29% of votes versus 26.01% for the nearest party, the Hizbia Digil Mirifle Somali. The growing power of the SYL would lead Italian officials to take a more conciliatory stance towards the organization. The SYL would also earn 416 of the 663 seats in the 1958 municipal election, with the HDMS securing 175 seats. By the 1959 parliamentary election, SYL would capture an even greater share of votes by winning 75.58% of the total ballot.

Italian was an official language in Italian Somaliland during the Fiduciary Mandate, as well as in the first years of independence. By 1952, the majority of Somalis had some understanding of the language.

Independence (1960)
On 1 July 1960, the Trust Territory of Somaliland (the former Italian Somaliland) and the former British Somaliland united to form the Somali Republic, with Mogadishu as the nation's capital. This day is celebrated as Somalia's Independence Day.

A government was formed by Abdullahi Issa and Muhammad Haji Ibrahim Egal and other members of the trusteeship and protectorate governments, with Abdulcadir Muhammed Aden as President of the Somali National Assembly, Aden Abdullah Osman Daar as President of the Somali Republic, and Abdirashid Ali Shermarke as Prime Minister. On 20 July 1961, through a popular referendum, the people of Somalia ratified a new constitution, which was first drafted in 1960.

Governors
• 1889–1893 Vincenzo Filonardi

• 1893–1896 Vacant

• 1896–1897 Vincenzo Filonardi

• 1897–1897 Ernesto Dulio

• 1897–1898 Giorgio Sorrentino

• 1898–1905 Emilio Dulio

• 1905–1906 Luigi Mercatelli

• 1906–1907 Giuseppe Salvago Raggi

• 1907–1908 Tommaso Carletti

• 1908–1910 Tommaso Carletti

• 1910–1916 Giacomo De Martino

• 1916–1919 Giovanni Cerrina Feroni

• 1920–1923 Carlo Ricci

• 1923–1928 Cesare Maria De Vecchi

• 1928–1931 Guido Corni

• 1931–1935 Maurizio Rava

• 1935–1936 Rodolfo Graziani

• 1936–1937 Angelo De Ruben

• 1937–1939 Francesco Saveno

• 1939–1940 Gustavo Pesenti

• 1940–1941 Carlo De Simone

title: Italian Somaliland


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Michael Vaughn (Alias)

Michael C. Vaughn is a fictional character on the television series Alias. Played by Michael Vartan, Vaughn is one of Sydney Bristow's co-workers and her ongoing love interest. He, like Sydney, is skilled in a variety of areas. His language abilities, shown in various episodes, include French, Spanish, Italian, and others.

Throughout the first three seasons, his code name was BoyScout; from season four on, it was Shotgun. In season five, Vaughn's birth name was revealed to be André Micheaux. His relationship with Sydney was included in TV Guide's list of the best TV couples of all time.

Character biography
Michael Vaughn was originally Sydney Bristow's handler while she was working as a double agent for the CIA within SD-6. But gradually, the two agents developed romantic feelings for each other as they worked closely together to bring down this corrupt espionage organization. This did little to endear him to Sydney's father Jack Bristow, another double agent within SD-6. Vaughn and Sydney's relationship became openly intimate after SD-6 was destroyed during the show's second season. When Sydney was apparently killed in a fire a few months later, a heartbroken Vaughn left the CIA and found work as a French teacher. He also became involved with NSC liaison Lauren Reed and married her some time during Sydney's two-year disappearance. Once he discovered that Sydney was still alive, Vaughn returned to the CIA and quickly saw his feelings for her reignite, a fact that caused a great deal of tension in his marriage to Lauren. Eventually, it was revealed that Lauren was a double agent for The Covenant and that Lauren seduced him in order to gain information on Sydney.

Vaughn became obsessed with her capture and was even encouraged by Jack Bristow to kill her. He eventually captures Lauren and she tells him that she fell in love with him, but then Sydney came back and he didn't need her anymore. She also claimed that the Covenant hadn't been in contact with her for two years by that point. Her 'confession' is ambiguous as she does appear to have developed feelings for Vaughn, as is evident by her reaction to Sark's earlier observation that it killed her when Michael dropped his gun, which was trained on her, to save Sydney. He plans to douse her in hydrochloric acid but is thwarted by Katya Derevko. Despite this, he ends up killing her at the end of the third season. This act continued to haunt him into the fourth season even though he shot Lauren to prevent her from killing Sydney.

Following Lauren's demise (and between the third and fourth seasons), Vaughn appeared to go into an emotional tailspin that culminated with him setting fire to his own house. He went through a month of psych evaluations before informing his best friend and fellow agent Eric Weiss of his resignation from the CIA. In reality, Vaughn had been recruited into a black ops division of the CIA called Authorized Personnel Only (APO), along with Sydney, Jack, and Marcus Dixon (Weiss and Marshall Flinkman would soon follow). One of his new duties was to keep an eye on Arvin Sloane, who had been appointed director of APO despite his long history of criminal activities as the head of SD-6. Vaughn successfully resumed his romantic relationship with Sydney during their first mission for APO.

The first season established that Michael Vaughn's father was one of several CIA agents killed in the line of duty by Irina Derevko, Sydney's mother. Bill Vaughn's death was questioned in season four after Vaughn found a journal apparently written by his father with entries dated three years after his death in 1979. Vaughn's subsequent investigation led him to conduct a secret mission in collaboration with Sydney; he turned rogue by the end of the episode "Nightingale". However, he returned to APO after discovering his father really was dead and that the journal entries had been part of a ruse devised by Elena Derevko. At the end of the fourth season Vaughn proposed to Sydney and the two took their long-delayed vacation to Santa Barbara. During this car ride he confessed that his real name was not Michael Vaughn and implied that his first allegiance was not to the CIA. The season, however, ended in a car crash that cut his explanation short. In the premiere of season 5, Vaughn is taken by an armed group from the crash site. He is thought to be a traitor when he is recovered, and reveals his real name as André Michaux; his father was actually a mathematician associated with a group known as Prophet Five. Seven years ago, he had been approached by a woman named Renée Rienne, whose father worked with Vaughn's at Prophet Five, and has since worked with her to uncover more information about the group. At the end of the episode, he is shot by a rogue agent disguised as a CIA executive. Shortly before this, he learned that Sydney was pregnant with his child.

At the end of episode "Maternal Instinct" (#5.11), it is revealed that Vaughn is still alive in Bhutan living with monks connected to the outside world. One monk informs him that Sydney gave birth to their daughter. Afterwards, in the episode "There's Only One Sydney Bristow" (#5.12), it is revealed that both Sydney and Jack Bristow know that Vaughn is still alive. In the episode "I See Dead People (#5.14) the information is revealed only to the other members of the APO team when they recover a chip from within Renée Rienne and Vaughn is forced out of hiding by Anna Espinosa, who is posing as Sydney. Vaughn and the disguised Espinosa find that Vaughn had a chip similar to the one inside Renée, his father claiming that the scar was from a bike accident. The chip leads them to an abandoned bunker beneath a German park. While Espinosa held hostage the clerk of the jewelry store that leads to the bunker, Vaughn breaks into it. Just as he finds the bunker, Espinosa attempts to shoot him, but finds that Vaughn knew of the deception and gave her an unloaded gun. In the ensuing scuffle, just as Espinosa attempts to shoot him with a new gun, the real Sydney sneaks up behind her and shoots her. Reunited with Sydney, Vaughn returns to Los Angeles and meets his daughter, Isabelle.

In the next episode, it is revealed that Jack told Vaughn while he was in the hospital that Prophet Five would stop at nothing to silence him, and that Vaughn was in no position to fight back. Jack gave Vaughn sodium morphate, a drug that slows the heart to mimic death, and Vaughn's body was picked up by one of Jack's contacts and he was shipped off to Nepal.

In the series finale, Vaughn participates in a wide variety of missions to bring about the fall of Prophet Five, Sloane and Irina. At the very end of the final episode a flash forward reveals that Sydney and Vaughn are married and semi-retired. They have a second child, Jack (named after Sydney's father).

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

title: Michael Vaughn (Alias)


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Talk:New Year

Uncategorized
For some reason the following important comment was removed. Many people do not realise that the new year only begins in London when Big Ben strikes 12 midnight on 31st December .It really begins at Greenwich which is about ten miles away but Big Bens time is synchronised with Greenwich. The new year does NOT begin at the international date line or in Australia or Berlin or New York (the new year is five house old by then.) It begins in London at midnight. Allthis was agreed at the Washington conference in 1880 The use of UTC..universal time makes no difference..the plus or minus signs used with UTC always direct one back to the place where time actually starts which is always Greenwich London Personally I think using UTC and not GMT is confusing for most people which is why GMT is still used so widely in the media. This is an important comment ..Please do not remove it! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.98.73.199 (talk) 09:19, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

 * In England the new year did not legally change from the twenty-fifth of March to the first of January until 1752,

I've NEVER understood this. Does it mean that before 1752, the year changed in March, ie the day after March 24 1700 was March 25 1701? Please someone explain! -- Tarquin 19:35, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

 * Your example is quite right. What's there to explain? Gdr 17:41, 2004 Oct 12 (UTC)

I think there's a lot to explain. You don't. Think.--Jack Upland (talk) 10:14, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

The new year begins locally at Dec 31 midnight (at the onset of January 1), local time (therefore local time zone). Locally speaking, it thus proceeds over the course of 25 hours until all time zones have completed it. However, if one wants to speak of the timing of the new year with respect to the entire planet, as one might do in astronomy, it would have to be Dec 31 midnight (at the onset of January 1) UTC. That is the standard against which all other time zones are measured, plus or minus. The date line will not do, as there is a time zone UTC-12 and another UTC+13, whereby different places on earth are actually 25 hours apart all the time, and where current dates may for a while be two days off from each other.

In answer to another question, yes, 24 Mar 1700 was followed by 25 Mar 1701 in Britain and its dominions, and similarly for other years and other places where a new-year date was not January 1. Even worse, since Scotland re-adopted January 1 as New Year in 1600, 31 Dec 1603 in both Scotland and England was followed by 1 Jan 1604 (Scotland)/1 Jan 1603(England). This continued through 28 Feb 1604(Scotland)/28 Feb 1603(England), which was followed by 29 Feb 1604(Scotland)/1 Mar 1603(England). Twenty three days later it was 23 Mar 1604(Scotland)/24 Mar 1603(England), followed by 24 Mar 1604(Scotland)/25 Mar 1604(England), and England and Scotland were off each other by one day until 30 Dec 1604(Scotland)/31 Dec 1604(England) was followed by 31 Dec 1604(Scotland)/1 Jan 1604(England) and then 1 Jan 1605(Scotland)/2 Jan 1604(England). Then 28 Feb 1605(Scotland)/29 Feb 1604(England) was followed by 1 Mar 1605(Scotland)/1 Mar 1604(England). They would rejoin dates entirely on 25 Mar 1605, which would last through 31 Dec 1607. This mess, lasting 449 days out of every 1461 days, would recur every four years as the two would observe their leap days at the opposite sides of the calendar year. The same thing happened between nations observing different new years, but was further complicated by the ten-day (later eleven-day) discrepancy between the Julian and Gregorian calendars. Yes, I am quite sure everyone must have found it abysmally annoying, especially merchants doing foreign trade. I'm only surprised they were willing to tolerate it for so long. Evensteven (talk) 02:51, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

1752, not 1753
According to the UK national archives and according to "The Oxford Companion to the Year" (ISBN 0-19-2142131-3), England moved new year to 1 January in 1752, not 1753.

I'm changing it back to 1752. -- Claus Tondering Oz1cz 15:11, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Also, if I understand the Wikipedia article on the United Kingdom correctly, the United Kingdom wasn't formed until the year 1800, so using the terms "the United Kingdom" and "the UK" is really an anachronism. -- Claus Tondering Oz1cz 16:15, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Isn't this just a result of the switch from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar? Surely they celebrated 1 January Julian before the shift. Saying January 1 wasn't the start of the year before this is extremely misleading. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 38.103.165.36 (talk) 02:27, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

The correct timing was indeed 1752, by Act of Parliament enacted in 1750. The United Kingdom was formed in 1707, not 1800, and therefore was in existence when this act was passed. The thrones of England and Scotland were joined in 1603 when King James VI of Scotland became James I of England, and subsequent kings were all kings of both England and Scotland also. However, the kingdoms themselves were not made one until the formation of the UK in 1707.

The switch to the January 1 New Year was not automatic upon acceptance of the Gregorian calendar, but was made concurrent with that acceptance under the act of 1750. New Year's dates other than January 1 were themselves a deviation from the ancient and medieval use in the Julian calendar, so changes to the date of the New Year were not contingent upon the calendar itself. Besides, the numbering of years "AD" was not widespread until surprisingly recently, even given its first suggestions by Dionysius Exiguus in the 500s and the Venerable Bede in the 700s, so changing the date of the new year did not much affect calendar usage until the reversions to January 1 in the 17th and 18th centuries. While in other nations also, January 1 was re-established at the same time that the Gregorian calendar was adopted, witness the Scottish reversion to January 1 in 1600 even while the Julian calendar continued there for another 152 years. Evensteven (talk) 22:38, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

Wales village
I remember seeing a documentary this year on UK TV about a village in Wales that still celebrated New Year in March; does anyone know the name of the village?--Gyouseino 00:02, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

New Year vs. new year
I've noticed this article switches between New Year and new year in a number of places. Shouldn't all references to New Year be capitalised? Red minx 15:40, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Capitalization is the bane of American writers! Some pages look like they were written in German. If I remember the Wiki manual of style, the subject of the article is capitalized throughout. If it's an ordinary statement about the new year, no capitalization: I will begin dieting in the new year. New Year's Day is the proper name of the holiday and should be capitalized, just like Christmas, Hallowe'en, Labor Day, etc. Caeruleancentaur (talk) 14:41, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Historical dates of new year and the Julian Calendar
I think there's a lot of confusion about this, which I'm not totally able to clear up. The page about the Gregorian calendar, there is evidence (Samuel Pepys' diary) that English people believed Jan 1 to be the start of the year. I think there's too much bland acceptance that 25 March was New Year's Day (in England at least). This would make a rather strange calendar in practice. Can anyone produce a calendar that shows this??? Is this rather a minor tradition existing alongside the calendar year - like our current financial/fiscal year - that has been preserved by antiquarian, eccentric interest to the extent that in presentation of the issue it distorts the reality of the case? Doesn't it seem to be true that the Roman tradition of starting the year on Jan 1 has continued to the present day?--Jack Upland (talk) 10:24, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Since then I have read the Calendar (New Style) Act 1750article which shows that this was an official calendar but not in "common usage".--Jack Upland (talk) 21:00, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
 * As an official calendar, I'm sure it must have been in "common usage", but in a formal way. It is quite possible that informal usage preferred Jan 1. Europe was quite conversant with both changes of the New Year, and with differing new years in different locations. Since they had to deal with those complexities regularly, they may well have felt comfortable with treating them casually according to preference, when they were able. Evensteven (talk) 02:08, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Bede
I understand that Bede began the New Year sometime in September, but I will try to find the reference. This means that some of his dates for events happen in a different year with a different to that which we would call it.Streona (talk) 10:44, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

 * For the indiction in Septemeber see R. L. Poole, "The chronology of Bede's Historia ecclesiastica and the councils of 679-680", Journal of Theological Studies, 20 (1919) 24–40; reprinted in Reginald Lane Poole, Studies in chronology and history (1934). For Christmas in December see Wilhelm Levinson, "The beginning of the year of the Incarnation in Bede's Historia ecclesiastica", Appendix VI in England and the continent in the eighth century (1946) 265-279. — Joe Kress (talk) 01:21, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
 * The ancient Christian liturgical year always and everywhere began on September 1, the date of the new year of the Indiction. This was still the case in Bede's time, and none of the subsequent changes to the liturgical year had yet happened in his time. In Bede's time, it was generally the educated monks of the church who served as keepers of the calendar for their locales, as was indeed the case with Bede himself, so the liturgical calendar was de facto the civil calendar also. Even modern researchers place Bede's death on Thursday, May 26, 735, though while we know he was live in the afternoon of Wednesday the 25th and past sunset, we do not know whether he died before or after midnight. However, the liturgical day always began with Vespers, the service conducted around the time of sunset, and he was living then. That made the day (liturgically speaking) already Thursday the 26th, and therefore likewise civilly. Midnight was not a consideration at the time. Similarly, Bede was among the first to count years as AD, a practice that did not really catch on for many centuries. As such, the indiction was the primary tool for him to use to ascertain the year, as indeed it still is for historians of those times. The September 1 date for the change of the year of the indiction was not the same as the January 1 New Year date of the Julian calendar, but there was no commonly-used year number at the time, so the January 1 new year was irrelevant to counting long times. Historians have long been required to convert years by means of the indiction, and then to adjust for the January 1 "new year" depending on the time of year. Evensteven (talk) 00:31, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Lao New Year
It is Feb 7th 2008 and today we are celebrating the Lao New Year. It is not in April. You may want to research that more since there may be a discrepency. —Preceding unsigned comment added by DeFKnoL (talk • contribs) 19:20, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Lao New Year is in April. Feb 7, 08 was the Chinese New Year based on the Lunar New Year. Petersam (talk) 19:58, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

March 1 or March 15?
This article says, The ancient Roman calendar started the year on 1 March. But it also says, The year... began on the day when consuls first entered office — fixed by law at 15 March in 222 BC (until it changed to January 1 in 153 BC). Which is right? Were both right at different points in time? If so, when did it change? - Shaheenjim (talk) 14:11, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

 * The old Roman calendar underwent revisions and development of its own while it was in use, over some 700 years or so. In its earlier stages, it didn't even count time during most of the winter. There were only ten months, the first being March, then through to December, although the names for July (for Julius Caesar) and August (for Augustus Caesar) were later changes. This left September through December as the seventh through tenth months, their names deriving from the Latin words septum (7), octum (8), novum (9), and decum (10). The annual times, lengths, and seasonal placements of these months were pretty close to what we know today, but agricultural activity slowed between the winter solstice and spring equinox enough so that many of those days were left untallied. So, March 1 began the calendar year.

 * Later on, January and February were created as new months to backfill the empty winter, but March 1 stayed on as the new year, and the new months were the 11th and 12th of the year. It seems that by 222 BC, the new year had been legally changed to March 15th, and then again to January 1st in 153 BC. The New Year was definitely defined by Roman law, and that law could be changed, so New Year was not consistently defined throughout the lifetime of use of the Roman calendar. That new year definition was of importance, though, because it not only marked the date on which consuls and other officials took office (whose terms were generally one year), but it was also the date on which the Roman Senate convened for the new year, marking the senators' term of office also. It is said that in 46 BC, when Julius Caesar was working to get the new (Julian) calendar adopted, that he put forth the idea of March 25th as the new "New Year", preferring the time of the spring equinox, which fell at that date that year. His idea was rejected by the Senate however, and January 1 remained the legal civil New Year for many centuries to come, beyond the end of the empire.

 * The definition of the Julian calendar contained no method for counting years, however. Year counts were independent of the calendar, and marked the time of the emperors' reigns, restarting at a count of 1 with each new ruler. For taxation, the Indiction defined a period of fifteen years to govern various applications of law, counting years as 1 to 15, then back to 1. Indictions were at first not counted themselves, but gradually came to be identified also. This is the most useful way historians have of pinpointing a year, as it is the most consistently followed and regular pattern lasting over many centuries. Thus, the civil New Year was of small concern with regard to the numbering of years, while the Indiction was primary for that purpose. Evensteven (talk) 02:00, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Consistency
1 January or January 1. Take your pick but be consistent. Caeruleancentaur (talk) 14:36, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Update
Dates of the various new years should be updated to reflect the year 2009. Caeruleancentaur (talk) 14:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

... most-watched event on television worldwide last year. Is someone going to be around to change statements like this every year? Instead of "last year", the year should be specified. SlowJog (talk) 00:00, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Byzantine New Year
Apparently this is still celebrated in Amalfi, Italy, and was set on 1 September. Any sources or explanation for the changes? (from the Julian 1 January system to this one, and from it to the current Greek one?) -114.91.65.233 (talk) 02:26, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
 * From the year of the Indiction: a new year began on September 1. This ran concurrently with the January 1 civil new year in the ancient empires, as the Indiction was a basis of taxation rather than civil operation. The ancient Christian church adopted September 1 as the start of its annual liturgical cycle, which became the source for a later change of the civil new year, and civil (not religious) new year observations. Evensteven (talk) 00:36, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Syntax, etc.
The article has some major problems in simple syntax and legibility. For instance, the entry "According to the Christian tradition, on January 1 coincides with the circumcision of Christ (eight days after birth), when the name of Jesus (Luke (II: 21))," which just seems to end in mid-thought and, immediately preceding, "January still remains a symbol of New Year's celebration," which just doesn't make sense. And, as already mentioned, several "this year" mentions that might already be out of date. PurpleChez (talk) 13:45, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

As it is English syntax you are talking about please say "grammar" as it is not about computer programmingMod mmg (talk) 01:23, 12 December 2009 (UTC)
 * FYI, the term syntax pertains to natural languages as well, and predates the invention of computers. ~ Ningauble (talk) 23:09, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

removal
I would like to seek out you opinions on removing the following line "...the date that is considered the most festive." I believe there is no reason for it to be there Mod mmg (talk) 09:25, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Update: Removing it now.Mod mmg (talk)

I told you a million times not to exagerate
"Millions converge on Times Square each year" Millions is a LOT of people! Everywhere else I read that the crowd has been estimated at "up to a million". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.224.95.82 (talk) 17:13, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

In fact its not difficult to estimate the size of possible crowds using google earth. Times sq is essentially an x shaped crossroads.If people filled the legs of the x to a total distance of ten blocks ..highly unlikely but not impossible the available space would be 2500 (ten blocks) times 2(roads) times 180 (total width of two roads each 85 feet wide ..total space equals 900,000sq feet minus emergency police lanes etc 200000 leaves 700000divided by four sq feet for one persons space allows 175000 people maximum.I doubt if this figure has ever been reached probably the largest crowds have been about 70000.The actual areas of the real times sq open places could not hold more than about 20000 maximum The way the NY authorities and US media continuously exaggerate the size of these crowds is really most embarrassing .Its time NYPD made a serious correct estimate of the size of these crowds One new years it was clear on CNN there were only a few thousand in Times SQ itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.98.73.199 (talk) 08:58, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

 * average space occupied by an individual in a crowd is two square feet, not four. Not familiar with the American block system, but Times Square is not square - it's between 42nd and 48th street one way and between 7th and 8th avenue the other. Lastly, there's a masssive amount of space that is not on either of the roads which cross, and thus not accounted for in your calculation - most authorities give the area as close to 1.4 million square feet.129.67.49.203 (talk) 03:19, 25 March 2014 (UTC)

Sinhalese New Year
"Sinhalese New Year" section says that astrologer select the time of New Year bigging but this giving wrong impression. Actually Sinhalese New year time is the exact time of Sidereal astrology Sun moves from Pisces to Aries. D dasun (talk) 13:44, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Malayali new year
In the article, it is written that "Malayali New Year (Vishu) is celebrated in the South Indian state of Kerala" during mid April. This is factually incorrect. As per the definition, "New Year is the time at which a new calendar year begins and the calendar's year count is incremented". The malayalam calendar's year count DOES NOT get incremented on Vishu. The year gets incremented in the malayalam month of "Chingam", which normally falls during August or September in the Gregorian calendar. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rk662003 (talk • contribs) 09:53, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Links
Links in the "Adoption of 1 January" section don't have spaces after them, this results in the words: Veniceuntil, Russiafrom, erain, equinoxday. Fixed but it got reverted. Ikmxx (talk) 21:32, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

Venice
The table reports Venice adopted 1 january new year on 1522, immediately below the table it's written that "1 March was the first day of the numbered year in the Republic of Venice until its destruction in 1797". Either of the two piece of information is incorrect or further explanation is needed.

Dubiousness of the start of Roman Catholic liturgical year
My recent edits have removed a "dubious tag" (dated Nov 2011) from the "Christian liturgical year" section of the article, which was questioning the Latin Rite's definition of the beginning of Advent as "4:00 pm on the Saturday preceding the fourth Sunday prior to 25 December (between November 26 and December 2)". I doubt there is any question of the date of Advent Sunday, and I cannot speak to exactly 4 PM. However, the practice of beginning the Christian liturgical day at sunset is extremely ancient, borrowed from Judaism in fact. The evening Vespers service was created to be the first service of the new liturgical day. And so it is still practiced, as it always has been, in the Eastern Orthodox Church. So it was also practiced in the Roman church, for 1000 years before the East-West Schism, and for well after. I believe the Roman Catholic Church still views Vespers in this way also. The common practices of modern church liturgical life probably do not highlight or call attention to this fact in the Roman Catholic Church as much as in the Orthodox Church, but as far as I know, there is no discontinuity between them. Therefore, the evening of the (civil) Saturday before Advent Sunday is technically to be counted as Sunday when one speaks of liturgical matters and calendars. Assuming the Latin Rite is explicit about 4PM, then that is how the Roman Catholic Church defines it. The Orthodox today usually use something like 6 PM instead, but it's not an absolute thing there. In either case, though, the "evening before"-ness is very far from dubious. For verification, perhaps the Latin Rite itself could be consulted? I don't have one myself. Evensteven (talk) 00:52, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Historical English new years
The second paragraph of the "Historical European new year dates" section and its subsequent Christmas style description are in conflict (and were before I made recent changes). The latter implies the use of Christmas style beginning before the 13th century (but evidently after 1066 and probably William I). The former neglects mention of that, and speaks only of March 25th, which certainly was around later. I don't happen to know the actual historical details at present, but some sourced info appears to be needed. Evensteven (talk) 22:52, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Currently we have the declaration "In England, the Angle, Saxon, and Viking invasions of the fifth through tenth centuries plunged the region back into pre-history for a time." . Seems to me there were quite a few publications in this period, is pre history the right word? BTW, Bede is referenced in this talk page, but not in the main article. We do know that Roman standards and traditions appear to have continued in use until replaced so why do we assume Christianity re-introduced Jan.1st? Did it ever go away? Anglo Saxon Pagan traditions also started a new year after the Winter Solstice whose festivities are believed to have followed the Solstice and hence the New Year would have started about the same time as the Julian calendar the church followed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.94.115.69 (talk) 11:27, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

UK v. KGB
Although the following comments are interesting they do not make clear the entire picture The proper title of the United Kingdom today is The United Kingdom of Great Britain (Great simply means the bigger of two islands) and Northern Ireland, with Power Devolved (devolved simply means transferred) from the Crown (Crown means the Monarch/King or Queen)to Parliament (Parliament means ALL the present 640 Members of Parliament elected by the people...it does not include the Members of the House of Lords ...Parliament is the same as the American House of Representatives without the Senate) Since Parliament contains the MPs of all parties and from all parts of the United Kingdom,Scotland Wales England etc it represents the sense of the United Kingdom being a united country In 1688 there was the English Revolution when Parliament threw out the new Catholic King...he went to Europe and Parliament brought in a new King Dutch nobleman William to rule them with his wife Mary. Since then the UK has essentially been a Republic as if the Queen or any other Monarch did not sign the Laws that Parliament had passed they would be thrown out within a week and Parliament would appoint someone else as King etc That person could be anyone Americans distort history by thinking that they created a revolution but that is wrong. It was the English revolution of 1688 that inspired the American war of Independence and the French revolution \\\\

Although the documents that created the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707 did use the phrase 'United Kingdom' in one instance, that was an adjectival usage - like "the united States of America" in the American Declaration of Independence. It was not meant to be taken as the name of the country.

Rather, prior to 1707, Scotland and England (which formally annexed Wales during the reign of Henry VIII), were separate nations with the same monarch. In 1707, they merged into the semi-federal Kingdom of Great Britain. On 1 January 1801, Ireland was added to the union and the name of the country changed again, to United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

Prior to the change of calendar in 1752, Scotland observed New Year's Day on 1 January while England observed it on 25 March. This difference did not change when the Kingdom of Great Britain was created in 1707 as Scotland's legal system remained (and remains) separate from the rest of the country, as does its system of education, and a few other things. That is why the Kingdom of Great Britain was, and the United Kingdom *is*, "semi-federal". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:9:6500:3060:1813:67F6:4766:10A7 (talk) 03:35, 14 January 2015 (UTC)
 * As the Parliament of the United Kingdom article will tell you, Parliament does include the Lords. Other than that I agree with what you wrote about the constitutional status of the constituent countries (your take on Glorious Revolution and the Act of Settlement are rather fanciful). But I am struggling to discover which part of the article you think should be changed? I think it already says that Scotland changed to 1 Jan in 1600, whereas England, Wales and Ireland did not do so until they adopted the Gregorian calendar. Would you identify, please? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 11:48, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20090621043226/http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk:80/Egypt/ptolemies/chron/roman/chron_rom_cal.htm to http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/Egypt/ptolemies/chron/roman/chron_rom_cal.htm#eponymous

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New Years Day should be March if we look at Roman Numbering..
Septem, Octo, Novem, Decem are seven to ten in Latin, yet nine to twelve on the calender. How did this discrepancy arise? March 1st should be New Year's Day by that reckoning surely. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.13.175.27 (talk) 09:20, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

External links modified (February 2018)
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111011111840/http://homepages.tesco.net/~jk.calisto/calisto/calendars/change_dates_ny.htm to http://homepages.tesco.net/~jk.calisto/calisto/calendars/change_dates_ny.htm

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Gregorian reform
I deleted the line:

 * In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII while reforming the Julian calendar established January 1 as the beginning of a New Year of the Gregorian calendar.

as it's simply not true. The papal bull Inter Gravissimas, defining the Gregorian calendar, does not mention the date of New Year, and is itself dated in the Annunciation Style.

In the Wikipedia article, the next section Current readoptions of January 1 states when the different parts of Europe (re)adopted January 1 as New Year; these years are often different from the year they adopted the Gregorian calender. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Adhemar (talk • contribs) 16:40, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 27 December 2018
Rijanmagar (talk) 16:14, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Dolotta (talk) 18:09, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 January 2021
Please change

a Happy New Year sign in northeastern China

to

A Happy New Year sign in northeastern China 78.149.76.158 (talk) 10:09, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done --Paul ❬talk❭ 10:45, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Short description
Shorten per WP:SDSHORT. Editor2020 (talk) 05:42, 12 November 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 January 2022
In section "Adoptions of January 1" change "Start year" of Russia from 1725 to 1700 like it done in Russian version of this article. Source: Decree of Peter I No. 1736 from 19 (29) December 1699 "On the celebration of the New Year": http://nlr.ru/e-res/law_r/search.php Lexa070301 (talk) 17:23, 8 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment: the source we have (for 1725) is supported by [and probably originates from) this citation: So which is correct?  the citation you have given is only a search box: would you give us the text (in Cyrillic is fine) that we need to put in the box (so as to get that decree), please? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 19:50, 8 January 2022 (UTC)
 * I notice the Russian Wikipedia article does use the date of 1700 in a table, however, there were few if any applicable references to support this. The closest applicable reference I could find was a table from Calista perpetual calendar program by John Kent. That said, I believe Lexa070301 is referring to this document perpetrated by Peter the Great. You may notice that his English Wikipedia article refers to the new year and calendar change proclaimed in 1699 and uses page 197 of Atkinson's translation of Oudard's work published in 1929 as a reference. I imagine we could use the same here and you can peruse a copy of such here at the Internet Archive. —Uzume (talk) 03:41, 9 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's good enough for me. I will change the article accordingly. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 11:05, 9 January 2022 (UTC)
 * ✅ --11:29, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 January 2023
I would like to either change or fix the statement, for example:

"Many cultures celebrate the event in some manner."

To:

"About numerous cultures around the world came here to celebrate this event in some approximate way of form."

This is the change I requested for. 204.129.232.191 (talk) 17:01, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: This does not seem to be an improvement. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 17:08, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
 * @ScottishFinnishRadish Are there any reasons? How? 204.129.232.191 (talk) 17:13, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Because your suggested prose is difficult to parse and poorly written. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 17:16, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Yeah, it doesn't make any sense in English and has several grammatical errors.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:43, 26 January 2023 (UTC)

Do we really need 4 fireworks pics back to back?
One seems like it should be sufficient. This is not the fireworks article. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:42, 26 January 2023 (UTC)

Improper use of Great Britain in change to Gregorian table.
Great Britain would be better replaced with England and Wales as this is more accurate and renders the 'except Scotland' clause unnecessary. 31.185.154.241 (talk) 15:03, 18 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Yes agreed. I suspect that the prolix version arose from the fact that Scotland changed its civil year to 1 January wef from "the day after 31 December 1699" but it did not adopt the Gregorian calendar at the same time. It took England 150 years to catch up, changing both at the same time. I have changed it as per your suggestion. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 16:06, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

Fireworks animation in lead section
Since the animated GIF at the top of the page was alongside other content and auto-played, looped infinitely, and did not provide a way to pause it, I replaced it with a still image from this article's gallery (which had previously been in the lead section).

AKiwiDeerPin (talk) 15:52, 1 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia's Accessibility Guidelines about animations.
 * Web Content Accessibility Guidelines on "Play, Stop, Hide".

Highly dubious historical England information removed
The paragraph on historical New Year dates in England was highly dubious in multiple ways:

 * 1) The idea that Anglo-Saxon England was "plunged into prehistory" is unreferenced, irrelevant, and frankly rather absurd.
 * 2) The 19th-Century "Curiosities of Popular Customs" reference claims that William the Conqueror was crowned on January 1st, but the article Coronations of William the Conqueror and Matilda gives December 25th, completely undermining the claimed logic.
 * 3) The Catholic Encyclopedia reference gives a confusing timeline with dates used "before 1066" and "from 1087 to 1155", but no actual mention of what was used during William the Conqueror's reign.

Perhaps the first source has the story half right, and William standardised on December rather than March to match his coronation? Or perhaps his successor is who actually enacted the reform, in 1087? A better source is definitely needed.

A lot of this was noted 6 years ago in above, but no change made, so I've just deleted most of that passage. - IMSoP (talk) 22:02, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

 * I have replaced it with this:
 * Better? --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 21:27, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

 * That's a much clearer source, thanks, and could well be where the Catholic Encyclopedia got their information - 1087 appears to just be a misreading or mistyping of 1067.
 * I've added the switch back in 1155 to the article, because that's essential to making sense of what came next. And I've replaced the other use of the Catholic Encyclopedia ref with the new Handy-Book ref, because it covers the same ground much more clearly.
 * I've also made some other edits (including fixing one actual error), and would appreciate your peer review. - IMSoP (talk) 21:42, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:New Year


text:
A Walk in the Woods (book)

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail is a 1998 travel book by the writer Bill Bryson, chronicling his attempt to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail during the spring and summer of 1996. For much of his journey, Bryson was accompanied by his friend Matt Angerer (pseudonymously called "Stephen Katz" in the book), who had previously appeared in Bryson's 1991 book Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe.

Written in a comic style, the book mixes accounts of Bryson's walk with broader discussions about the Trail's history, and the sociology, ecology, conservation status and people of the places Bryson walked through.

Plot
The book starts with Bryson explaining his curiosity about the Appalachian Trail near his house. He and his old friend Stephen Katz start hiking the trail from Georgia in the South, and stumble in the beginning with the difficulties of getting used to their equipment; Bryson also soon realizes how difficult it is to travel with his friend, who is a crude, overweight recovering alcoholic, and even less prepared for the ordeal than he is. Overburdened, they soon discard much extra food and equipment to lighten their loads.

After hiking for what seemed to him a large distance, they realize they have still barely begun while in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and that the whole endeavor is simply too much for them. They skip a huge section of the trail, beginning again in Roanoke, Virginia. The book recounts Bryson's desire to seek easier terrain as well as "a powerful urge not to be this far south any longer". This section of the hike finally ends (after nearly 800 miles (1,300 km) of hiking) with Bryson going on a book tour and Katz returning to Des Moines, Iowa, to work.

In the following months Bryson continues to hike several smaller parts of the trail, including a visit to Centralia, Pennsylvania, the site of a coal seam fire, and eventually reunites with Katz to hike the Hundred-Mile Wilderness in Maine, which again proves too daunting. Ultimately Bryson hiked about 40% of the trail. In the 21st century, about 25% of thru-hike attempts are successful. Bryson quotes the older figure of 10%.

At the time of his attempt to hike the Appalachian Trail, Bryson was aged in his forties.

Writing process
Bryson admitted that he found the book hard to write, remarking in an interview that "the thing about walking is that it's not eventful. It doesn't generate material. A long walk, a really long walk, is an exceedingly repetitious experience…when I finally got a book out of it, I was kind of astounded." He described himself as "wretchedly homesick" during his hike and that he had had to fictionalize some of Angerer's behavior, as "he was quite depressed at this time...he just felt like life had kicked him in the balls and he wasn’t doing very well. And I portrayed all of that. And it was just depressing...my revelation with that was, instead of making him just depressed, I just made him angry, which he also was. I made it much more that he was angry with the trail rather than angry with life...so it really became the two of us against the trail. And then it started to work much better, I think, as a narrative."

Whilst pleased with his accomplishments on the Trail, Bryson expressed regret that he and Angerer had not completed the 100-Mile Wilderness section. He also identified the Berkshires as the part of the Trail that he would most like to re-hike.

Film adaptation
In 2005, Robert Redford announced, and later confirmed, that he would star in and produce an adaptation of Bryson's book into a film, and that he would play Bryson. He also hoped that his erstwhile co-star and friend, Paul Newman, would team up with him to play the role of Katz, although he jokingly expressed doubt as to whether the health-conscious Newman would consider putting on enough weight to accurately portray the rotund Katz. However, Newman retired from acting in May 2007 and died in 2008.

In February 2007, Chris Columbus, director of Home Alone and the first two Harry Potter films, was reported to have agreed to direct the adaptation. However, in January 2008, the Hollywood Reporter, while noting that the script was delayed due to the Hollywood writers' strike, reported that Barry Levinson, the Academy Award–winning director of Rain Man, was in talks to direct.

Redford has said of the project "It'll be fun. I don't know when I've read a book that I laughed so loud. Also, it's a chance to take a look at the country ... The backdrop is pretty terrific, if you stop to think of all the visuals that are possible as they go along that trail."

In February 2012, it was reported that novelist Richard Russo, during a speech at Union College, confirmed that he was working on the screenplay.

By November 2013, Nick Nolte had been cast to costar as Katz. Larry Charles (of Borat and Brüno) was briefly attached as director, but eventually the job went to Ken Kwapis, whose most recent film was Big Miracle and who was a key figure on the U.S. television series The Office. The screenplay was by Michael Arndt, credited as Rick Kerb, and Bill Holderman, who is a producer at Redford's Wildwood Enterprises. Shooting began in spring 2014. The movie was largely filmed at Amicalola Falls State Park, in Dawsonville, Georgia, including scenes at The Lodge at Amicalola Falls.

The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on January 23, 2015, and was released in theaters on September 2, 2015, by Broad Green Pictures.

Reception
A Walk In the Woods was named by CNN as the funniest travel book ever written. A review in The New York Times stated that readers, "may find themselves turning the pages with increasing amusement and anticipation as they discover that they're in the hands of a satirist of the first rank". The New Yorker described the book as a "wry, well-researched account".

The book was met with anger amongst some members of the Appalachian Trail community, with letters to the Appalachian Trailway News, a newsletter of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, excoriating Bryson for his perceived cynicism, ill-informed complaints and demeaning portrayal of Southerners. Despite this, it has been credited with a 50% increase in long-distance hiker numbers during the two years after publication.

Angerer claimed in a 2015 interview with the Des Moines Register that the book was "true for the most part", but disagreed with Bryson's portrayal of his initial physical fitness and thought that his purported womanizing had been exaggerated. He died in June 2023 at the age of 71.

Editions

 * ISBN 0-7679-0251-3. Hardback. Published by Broadway Books, on May 4, 1998.
 * ISBN 0-7679-0252-1. Paperback. Published by Broadway Books, on May 4, 1999.

title: A Walk in the Woods (book)


text: User talk:216.152.145.24

title: User talk:216.152.145.24


text:
Language demographics of Quebec

This article presents the current language demographics of the Canadian province of Quebec.

Demographic terms
The complex nature of Quebec's linguistic situation, with individuals who are often bilingual or multilingual, requires the use of multiple terms in order to describe the languages which people speak.
 * Francophone: Speaking French as a first language.
 * Anglophone: Speaking English as a first language.
 * Allophone: Having a mother tongue other than English or French.
 * Mother tongue : The first language learned by a person, which may or may not still be used by that individual in adulthood, is a basic measure of a population's language. However, with the high number of mixed francophone-anglophone marriages and the reality of multilingualism in Montreal, this description does not give a true linguistic portrait of Quebec. It is, however, still essential, for example in order to calculate the assimilation rate. Statistics Canada defines mother tongue as the first language learned in childhood and still spoken; it does not presuppose literacy in that or any language.
 * Home language : This is the language most often spoken at home and is currently preferred to identify francophones, anglophones, and allophones. This descriptor has the advantage of pointing out the current usage of languages. However, it fails to describe the language that is most used at work, which may be different.
 * Knowledge of official languages : This measure describes which of the two official languages of Canada a person can speak informally. This relies on the person's own evaluation of his/her linguistic competence and can prove misleading.
 * First official language learned: Measures whether English or French are the first of the two official languages learned; it places allophones into English or French linguistic communities.
 * Official language minority: Based on first official language learned, but placing half of the people equally proficient since childhood in both English and French into each linguistic community; it is used by the Canadian government to determine the demand for minority language services in a region

Knowledge of languages
The question on knowledge of languages allows for multiple responses. The following figures are from the 2021 Canadian census and the 2016 Canadian census, and lists languages that were selected by at least one per cent of respondents.

Overview as of the 2016 census

 * Population: 8,164,361
 * Official language: French
 * Majority group: Francophone (77.1%)
 * Minority groups: Allophone (13.15%), Anglophone (7.45%), Aboriginals (0.6%), native speakers of two languages or more (2.3%)

Among the ten provinces of Canada, Quebec is the only one whose majority is francophone. Quebec's population accounts for 23.9% of the Canadian population, and Quebec's francophones account for about 90% of Canada's French-speaking population.

English-speaking Quebecers are a large population in the Greater Montreal Area, where they have built a well-established network of educational, social, economic, and cultural institutions. There are also historical English-speaking communities in the Eastern Townships, the Ottawa Valley, the Laurentians (such as Ste. Agathe des Monts, Ste. Adolphe de Howard, Arundel, Lachute, Mont Tremblant) and the Gaspé Peninsula. By contrast, the population of Quebec City, the second-largest city in the province, is almost exclusively francophone. Overall in the province the proportion of native English speakers dropped significantly between 1951 and 2001, from 13.8% to 8% in 2001, while it has since stabilized.

The remaining 13% of the population, known as allophones, are native speakers of more than 30 different languages. With the exception of Aboriginal peoples in Quebec (the Inuit, Huron, Mohawks, Iroquois, Abenaki, Montagnais, Cree, Innu, Ojibway etc.), the majority are products of recent immigration and often come to adopt either English or French as home languages.

Numbers of native speakers
Of the population of 7,903,001 counted by the 2011 census, 7,815,955 completed the section about language. Of these, 7,663,120 gave singular responses to the question regarding their first language. The languages most commonly reported were the following:

Numerous other languages were also counted, but only languages with more than 2,000 native speakers are shown. (Percentages shown are the ratio between the number of singular responses and the number of total responses.)

Cities
All figures are rounded to 0.01%.

Montreal

There are today three distinct territories in the Greater Montreal Area: the metropolitan region, Montreal Island, and Montreal, the city. (The island and the city were coterminous for a time between the municipal merger of 2002 and the "demerger" which occurred in January 2006.)

Quebec allophones account for 9% of the population of Quebec. The vast majority of them (88%) reside in Greater Montreal. Anglophones are also concentrated in the region of Montreal (80% of their numbers).

Francophones account for 65% of the total population of Greater Montreal, anglophones 12.6% and allophones 20.4%. On the island of Montreal, the francophone majority dropped to 46.96% by 2011, a net decline since the 1970s owing to francophone outmigration to more affluent suburbs in Laval and the South Shore (fr. Rive-Sud) and an influx of allophone immigrants. The anglophones account for 16.64% of the population and the allophones 35.24%.

Bilingualism
According to the 2016 census, the rate of bilingualism in English and French is at 44.5 percent, a figure which continues to grow at a much faster rate in Quebec than in the rest of Canada. Bilingual speakers represented 42.6 percent in 2011, and 40.6 percent in 2006 (in 2016, it was 17.9 percent in Canada overall, up from just at 17.5 percent in 2011).

While 44.5 percent of the total population of Quebec reported being bilingual in 2016, this figure rose to 70 percent for those aged 14 to 17.

Almost 90 cities, towns or boroughs in Quebec are considered officially bilingual, a designation allowing them to offer services, post signage and mail communications in the country's two official languages.

Birth rate
At 1.74 children per woman, Quebec's 2008 fertility rate was above the Canada-wide rate of 1.59, and had increased for five consecutive years. However, it remained below the replacement fertility rate of 2.1. This contrasts with its fertility rates before 1960, which were among the highest of any industrialized society. Although Quebec is home to only 23.9% of the population of Canada, the number of international adoptions in Quebec is the highest of all provinces of Canada. In 2001, 42% of international adoptions in Canada were carried out in Quebec.

Immigration
In 2003, Quebec accepted some 37,619 immigrants. A large proportion of these immigrants originated from francophone countries and countries that are former French colonies. Countries from which significant numbers of people immigrate include Haiti, Congo, Lebanon, Morocco, Rwanda, Syria, Algeria, France and Belgium. Under the Canada-Quebec Accord, Quebec has sole responsibility for selecting most immigrants destined to the province (see related article, Immigration to Canada).

Interprovincial migration
Interprovincial migration, especially to Ontario, results in a net loss of population in Quebec. The numbers of French-speaking Quebecers leaving the province tend to be similar to the number entering, while immigrants to Quebec are more likely to leave. Outmigration has most affected the English-speaking minority in Quebec, accounting for its population being significantly reduced since the 1970s.

Legislation

 * 1988 – Official Languages Act (federal)
 * 1982 – Articles 14, 16–23, 55 and 57 of the Constitution Act, 1982 (federal)
 * 1977 – Charter of the French Language (provincial)
 * 1974 – Official Language Act (provincial)
 * 1969 – An Act to promote the French language in Quebec (provincial)
 * 1969 – Official Languages Act (federal)

There are two sets of language laws in Quebec, which overlap and in various areas conflict or compete with each other: the laws passed by the Parliament of Canada and the laws passed by the National Assembly of Quebec.

Since 1982, both parliaments have had to comply with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which constitutionalized a number of fundamental human rights and educational rights of minorities in all provinces (education is a provincial jurisdiction in Canada). Prior to this, Quebec was effectively the sole province required constitutionally to finance the educational needs of its linguistic minority. Ontario and Quebec are both required to finance schools for their principal religious minorities (Roman Catholic in Ontario, Protestant in Quebec), but only in Quebec is the minority almost completely composed of speakers of the minority language. (Quebec also provided English schools for anglophone Roman Catholics.) In 1997, an amendment to the constitution allowed for Quebec to replace its system of denominational school boards with a system of linguistic school boards.

The federal language law and regulations seek to make it possible for all Canadian anglophone and francophone citizens to obtain services in the language of their choice from the federal government. Ottawa promotes the adoption of bilingualism by the population and especially among the employees in the public service.

In contrast, the Quebec language law and regulations promote French exclusively as the common public language of all Quebecers. Although Quebec currently respects most of the constitutional rights of its anglophone minority, it took a series of court challenges to enforce. The government of Quebec promotes the adoption and the use of French and limits the presence of English. This is to counteract the trend towards the anglicization of the population of Quebec.

In May 2022, The CAQ Quebec government of François Legault passed Bill 96, with 78 MNAs in favour (from the CAQ and Québec solidaire) and 29 against (from the Liberal Party and Parti Québécois). The bill strengthens the 1970s Charter of the French Language. In that same year, François Legault caused controversy when he said that Quebec risked being a Louisiana (which used to be French speaking but is no longer) if Quebec doesn't have more control over immigration policy.

Anglicization and Francization
(see: Language contact, Stratum (linguistics), Linguistic description, Sociolinguistics)

The following table shows summary data on the language shifts which have occurred in Quebec between 1971, year of the first Canadian census asking questions about home language, and 2001 :

The second column starting on the left shows the number of native speakers of each language, the third shows the number of speakers using it at home.

The fourth column shows the difference between the number of speakers according to home language and those who speak it as mother tongue.

The fifth column shows the quotient of the division between the number of home language speakers and the native speakers.

Until the 1960s, the francophone majority of Quebec had only very weak assimilation power and, indeed, did not seek to assimilate non-francophones. Although the quantity of non-francophones adopted French throughout history, the pressure and, indeed, consensus from French-language and English-language institutions was historically towards the anglicization, not francization, of allophones in Quebec. Only a high fertility rate allowed the francophone population to keep increasing in absolute numbers in spite of assimilation and emigration. In the early 1960s, with the rise of irreligion, the fertility rate of the Quebecois began declining in a manner consistent with most developed societies, and some in Quebec's francophone majority feared the beginning of a demographic collapse: unlike the anglophone sphere, the francophone sphere was not assimilating allophones, and lower fertility rates were therefore much more determinative. Quebec's language legislation has tried to address this since the 1960s when, as part of the Quiet Revolution, French Canadians chose to move away from Church domination and towards a stronger identification with state institutions as development instruments for their community. Instead of repelling non-Catholic immigrants from the French-language public school system and towards the Protestant-run English system, for instance, immigrants would now be encouraged to attend French-language schools. The ultimate quantifiable goal of Quebec's language policy is to establish French as Quebec's common public language.

Recent census data show that goal has not been reached as successfully as hoped. After almost 30 years of enforcement of the Charter of the French Language, approximately 49% of allophone immigrants – including those who arrived before the Charter's adoption in 1977 – had assimilated to English, down from 71% in 1971, but still considerably more than anglophones' overall share of the province's population. This leads some Quebecers, particularly those who support the continued role of French as the province's common public language, to question whether the policy is being implemented successfully. The phenomenon is linked to the linguistic environments which cohabit Montreal – Quebec's largest city, Canada's second-largest metropolitan area, and home to a number of communities, neighbourhoods, and even municipalities in which English is the de facto common language. The anglophone minority's capacity to assimilate allophones and even francophones has therefore compensated to a large extent for the outmigration of anglophones to other provinces and even to the United States.

A number of socio-economic factors are thought to be responsible for this reality. They include: the historic role of the English language in Canada and the U.S.; its growing influence in the business and scientific world; the perceived advantages of learning English that result from this prominence and which are particularly appealing to allophones who have yet to make a linguistic commitment; the historic association of English with immigrant Quebecers and French with ethnic French-Canadian Québécois, which plays into linguistic and identity politics; and the post-industrial clustering of anglophones into Montreal and away from regional communities. These factors go not only to allophone immigrants' direct linguistic assimilation, but also their indirect assimilation through contact with the private sector. Although the Charter of the French language makes French the official language of the workplace, the socio-economic factors cited here also often make English a requirement for employment, especially in Montreal, and to a lesser extent outside of it, notably in Canada's National Capital Region, bordering Ontario, and in the Eastern Townships, particularly Sherbrooke.

The result is a largely bilingual workforce. Francophones are often compelled to learn English to find employment (particularly in the Montreal area), while anglophones in the province are pressured to do the same with French, and allophones are asked to learn both. Census data adjusted for education and professional experience show that bilingual francophones had a greater income than bilingual anglophones by the year 2000.

In 2001, 29% of Quebec workers declared using English, either solely (193,320), mostly (293,320), equally with French (212,545) or regularly (857,420). The proportion rose to 37% in the Montreal metropolitan area, where bilingualism is common. Outside Montreal, on the other hand, the proportion of anglophones has shrunk to 3% of the population and, except on the Ontario and U.S. borders, struggles to maintain a critical mass to support educational and health institutions – a reality that only immigrants and francophones usually experience in the other provinces. Unilingual anglophones are however still on the decline because of the higher English-French bilingualism of the community's younger generations.

Not all analysts are entirely comfortable with this picture of the status of the English language in Quebec. For example, a more refined analysis of the Census data shows that a great deal of anglicization continues to occur in the communities traditionally associated with the English-language group, e.g., the Chinese, Italian, Greek and Indo-Pakistani groups. Nevertheless, a majority of new immigrants in every census since 1971 have chosen French more often than English as their adopted language. Statistics Canada's 2011 National Household Survey of Canada reported that for the first time in modern history, the first official language of more than half of Quebec immigrants was French. Those who spoke French as their first official language formed 51.1% of all immigrants to the province, while an additional 16.3% spoke both French and English; among those who immigrated to the province between 2006 and 2011, the proportion who spoke French as their first official language was 58.8%.

General studies

 * Marmen, Louise and Corbeil, Jean-Pierre (2004). Languages in Canada 2001 Census, New Canadian Perspectives Series, Canadian Heritage, ISBN 0-662-68526-1

Language shifts

 * Lisée, Jean-François (2004). Conference: The French fact in Québec and Canada: The Hidden Storm, American University Summer Institute, Washington D.C.
 * O'Keefe, Michael (2001). Francophone Minorities: Assimilation and Community Vitality, 2nd Edition, New Canadian Perspectives Series, Canadian Heritage, ISBN 0-662-64786-6
 * O'Keefe, Michael (1999). Francophone Minorities: Assimilation and Community Vitality, 1st Edition, New Canadian Perspectives Series, Canadian Heritage
 * Castonguay, Charles (1999). "French is on the ropes. Why won't Ottawa admit it ?", in Policy Options / Options politiques, 20, 8 : 39-50
 * Castonguay, Charles (1999). "Getting the facts straight on French : Reflections following the 1996 Census", in Inroads Journal, volume 8, pages 57 to 77
 * Castonguay, Charles. (1998). Transcript of a Standing Joint Committee on Official Languages hearing, recorded on April 28

General studies

 * Bouchard, Pierre, Castonguay, Charles, Langlois, Simon, Pagé, Michel and Vincent, Nadine (2005). Les caractéristiques linguistiques de la population du Québec; profil et tendances 1991–2001 (Fascicule 1), Office québécois de la langue française ISBN 2-550-44200-8

Language at work

 * Moffet, Virginie (2006). Langue du travail : indicateurs relatifs à l’évolution de la population active et à l’utilisation des langues au travail en 2001, Office québécois de la langue française ISBN 2-550-46345-5
 * Chénard, Claire and Van Shendel, Nicolas (2002). Travailler en français au Québec : les perceptions de travailleurs et de gestionnaires, Office québécois de la langue française

Language shifts

 * Castonguay, Charles. "La force réelle du français au Québec", Le Devoir, 20 December 2005
 * Castonguay, Charles (2005). Les indicateurs généraux de vitalité des langues au Québec : comparabilité et tendances 1971–2001 (Étude 1), Office québécois de la langue française 48 pages
 * Castonguay, Charles. "Quelle est la force d'attraction réelle du français au Québec? Analyse critique de l'amélioration de la situation du français observée en 2001", Le Devoir, 10 December 2003
 * Castonguay, Charles. Assimilation linguistique et remplacement des générations francophones et anglophones au Québec et au Canada dans Recherches sociographiques, 2002
 * Castonguay, Charles (1999). Population history des minorités de langue officielle, Le Programme de contestation judiciaire du Canada, Conférence linguistique
 * Castonguay, Charles (Fall 1992). "L'orientation linguistique des allophones à Montréal", in Cahiers québécois de démographie, volume 21, issue 2

Demolinguistic forecast

 * Termote, Marc (2003). "La dynamique démolinguistique du Québec et de ses régions", in Piché, Victor and Le Bourdais, Céline (eds.), La démographie québécoise. Enjeux du XXIe siècle. Montréal, Les Presses de l'Université de Montréal, collection "Paramètres", pages 264–299
 * Termote, Marc (2002). "L'évolution démolinguistique du Québec et du Canada", in La mise à jour des études originalement préparées pour la Commission sur l'avenir politique et constitutionnel du Québec. Rapport soumis au ministre délégué aux affaires intergouvernementales canadiennes. Volume 2, livre 2. Québec, Conseil exécutif, Bureau de coordination des études, pages 161–244
 * Termote, Marc (1999). Perspectives démolinguistiques du Québec et de la région de Montréal à l'aube du XXIe siècle : implications pour le français langue d'usage public, Conseil de la langue française, Montréal, 15 September 1999

Aboriginal languages

 * Maurais, Jacques, (ed.) (1992). Les langues autochtones du Québec, Collection : Dossiers, 35, Pages : xviii, 455. Conseil de la langue française

title: Language demographics of Quebec


text:
Utility fog

Utility fog (also referred to as foglets) is a hypothetical collection of tiny nanobots that can replicate a physical structure. As such, it is a form of self-reconfiguring modular robotics.

Conception
The term was coined by John Storrs Hall in 1989. Hall thought of it as a nanotechnological replacement for car seatbelts. The robots would be microscopic, with extending arms reaching in several different directions, and could perform three-dimensional lattice reconfiguration. Grabbers at the ends of the arms would allow the robots (or foglets) to mechanically link to one another and share both information and energy, enabling them to act as a continuous substance with mechanical and optical properties that could be varied over a wide range. Each foglet would have substantial computing power, and would be able to communicate with its neighbors.

In the original application as a replacement for seatbelts, the swarm of robots would be widely spread out, and the arms loose, allowing air flow between them. In the event of a collision the arms would lock into their current position, as if the air around the passengers had abruptly frozen solid. The result would be to spread any impact over the entire surface of the passenger's body.

While the foglets would be micro-scale, construction of the foglets would require full molecular nanotechnology. Hall suggests that each bot may be in the shape of a dodecahedron with twelve arms extending outwards. Each arm would have four degrees of freedom. The foglets' bodies would be made of aluminum oxide rather than combustible diamond to avoid creating a fuel air explosive.

Hall and his correspondents soon realized that utility fog could be manufactured en masse to occupy the entire atmosphere of a planet and replace any physical instrumentality necessary to human life. By foglets exerting concerted force, an object or human could be carried from location to location. Virtual buildings could be constructed and dismantled within moments, enabling the replacement of existing cities and roads with farms and gardens. While molecular nanotech might also replace the need for biological bodies, utility fog would remain a useful peripheral with which to perform physical engineering and maintenance tasks. Thus, utility fog also came to be known as "the machine of the future".

title: Utility fog


text:
Ed Sciaky

Edward Leon Sciaky (April 2, 1948–January 29, 2004) was an American rock radio disc jockey who spent his broadcasting career in the Philadelphia area.

Early life and education
He was born in New York City and raised in Philadelphia, where he graduated from Central High School, and then from Temple University where he majored in mathematics.

Career
Sciaky became known for promoting new talent, helping establish the careers of scores of artists, most notably Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, David Bowie, Janis Ian, and Yes. Sciaky can also be heard introducing AC/DC on the Live from the Atlantic Studios CD off their 1997 boxset, Bonfire.

He was one of the first FM disc jockeys who thrived when given the chance to choose their own music, venturing beyond playing pop hits. Frequently, he would play lesser known songs that had personal meaning for himself or listeners. He was a good friend to many musicians who enjoyed his intelligent interviews and his knowledge of rock-n-roll. One of his best recording artist friends was Billy Joel, who at 23, had just released his Cold Spring Harbor album and was trying to promote it. Sciaky subsequently featured it on one his Sigma Sound Studios broadcasts.

Sciaky provided the master tape of Yes's live version of The Beatles' "I'm Down" for the band's 1992 Yesyears box set.

Sciaky's broadcasting career, all in the Philadelphia area, included WRTI, WHAT, WXUR, WDAS, WMMR, WIOQ, WYSP, WMMR (again), and WMGK.

In 2003, Sciaky's Sunday With Springsteen specialty show won a "Best Of Philly" award from Philadelphia magazine.

The Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia posthumously inducted Sciaky into their Hall of Fame in 2005.

Personal life
Sciaky lived on the Main Line, near Philadelphia. His house was home to a substantial, well-organized music collection, as well as a rather large iguana, perhaps five feet long. The resting iguana would sometimes startle first time guests when it moved slightly and caught their attention.

He was married to Judy (Feldshur) Sciaky from 1969 until his death. They had one child in 1985, Monica, an opera singer with a doctorate in vocal arts, who married Eiki Isomura, who has his doctorate in conducting and is the son of world renowned violist Kazuhide Isomura.

Death
Sciaky died of complications from diabetes on January 29, 2004, in New York City, at the age of 55. E Street drummer Max Weinberg and singer-songwriter Steve Forbert served as pallbearers at his funeral, which was attended by 1500 people.

title: Ed Sciaky