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Inspector Rex

Inspector Rex (German: Kommissar Rex; Italian: Il commissario Rex) is an Austrian-Italian police crime drama television series created by Peter Hajek and Peter Moser. Originally an Austrian series aired from 1994 to 2004 on ORF 1, in 2008 it was revived under Austro-Italian production on Rai 1 and, from the next year, was made fully in Italy, with occasional episodes set in Austria. Rai 1 eventually cancelled the Austro-Italian production in June 2015, after eight Italian seasons.

The series follows the German Shepherd police dog Rex, his partners and the rest of the team at the Vienna Kriminalpolizei homicide unit, as they work together to solve crimes. From 2008, episodes are set in Rome.

A spin-off series, Stockinger, that focuses on Ernst Stockinger, one of the original members of the homicide division, was televised in 1996. International remakes include Polish Komisarz Alex (English title: Inspector Alex), set in Łódź (2012–present); Russian Muhtar's return (2004-2019, broadcast on Russia-1 and NTV); Portuguese Inspetor Max (2004–present); Lithuanian Inspektorius Mažylis (2014); Slovak Rex set in Bratislava (2017) and Canadian Hudson & Rex (2019–present).

Synopsis
The original series is set in Vienna and focuses on the three-man staff of an office of the Kriminalpolizei - the Austrian Criminal Police - specifically a Mordkommission (homicide unit). In addition to the three policemen, the office is staffed by a German Shepherd called Rex, the main star of the show, who functions variously as a cadaver dog, a sniffer dog (for both contraband and narcotics) and as another pair of eyes and ears for his team.

The original team at the office consisted of Richard Moser, Ernst Stockinger and Peter Höllerer. This team was also assisted by forensic expert Dr Leo Graf and retired policeman Max Koch. The show had many changes in characters, including Christian Böck replacing Stockinger, Alexander Brandtner replacing Moser and former statistics officer Fritz Kunz replacing Höllerer. The final Austrian incarnation of the series featured a male-female duo of the clumsy Marc Hoffmann and a female officer Nikki Herzog working alongside Kunz. Dr. Graf is the only character to remain for the entire Austrian production of the series.

In season eleven, the action moves to Rome, with Inspector Lorenzo Fabbri taking charge of the dog. Episodes were produced in both Italian and German. At the end of the season, Rex is apparently mortally wounded when he jumps on Fabbri's head to protect him from a bullet, but is shown in close-up still slightly breathing just before credits roll. The beginning of season 12 shows that Rex survived the bullet, when Fabbri takes Rex to the animal hospital.

Production
For the first ten seasons the show was scripted entirely in German, where most characters spoke with Austrian dialects. It was shot on location in Vienna and its surroundings, though the usage of areas in production was often geographically incorrect. While subtitles were used for most international markets, the series was dubbed in some countries, including France, Greece, Italy and Spain.

Following declining ratings during the eighth and ninth seasons, the series was cancelled mid-production in 2004, leaving the tenth and then final season with only four episodes and no finale that concluded the story. As the series was still highly popular abroad, particularly in Italy and Austria, the show remained in syndication for many years.

In 2007, following negotiations, Italian broadcaster RAI secured the rights to revive the series, with production moving to Rome. For the first season of the new series, numbered as season eleven, it was produced in both Austria and Italy, with production moving to Italy full-time for the twelfth season. A total of eighteen seasons were produced, the last airing in 2015, barring repeats. While occasional episodes were set in Austria, the series was scripted and filmed primarily in Italian from 2008 to the concluding 2015 season.

Australian season numbering
For Australian markets, season numbering was altered for airing on SBS, and this numbering was also used on the DVD sets, leaving some viewers confused as to how the European episode lists correspond with the Australian ones. For the DVD sets, seasons 1 to 8 have been re-arranged to seven longer seasons (the chronological episode order remaining unchanged), with the ninth and tenth season being labeled as "season eight". They have since followed the official lists, with season eleven labeled as season nine, season twelve as season ten and so on.

Rex
A trained police dog, Rex (revealed in the Pilot to be registered as "Reginald von Ravenhorst") is the legitimate star of the show. Establishing shots frequently show him demonstrating a new trick — unlatching doors, pushing trolleys, pointing to drugs or corpses — which then turn out to be useful in the course of the episode. He is often used to stalk suspects, often with a GPS-type object attached to him so that the officers can keep track.

Rex was stolen by criminals as a pup but managed to escape and befriend a boy, where he helped to solve his first case with the boy.

Initially, Rex and Moser share an apartment at Marokkanergasse 18, Wien-Landstraße; however the pair go house-hunting at the start of season 2. They quickly find a house (Waldstraße 8, Purkersdorf) owned by a man who does not want dogs there. However, Rex is able to alert him to a gas leak, and in gratitude, he allows Moser and Rex to stay.

Rex is frequently called upon to resolve difficult situations, including helping a young girl in shock, preventing a woman from committing suicide and helping to get Moser's mobile phone when a crime has been committed. One famous episode features Moser using Rex to resolve a hostage situation by telling him to creep up behind the criminal and "frighten him" (following Rex's earlier success at frightening Stockinger by jumping on him from behind).

There is also a considerable element of humour in Rex's activities. Rex has an uncanny penchant for ham rolls or "Wurschtsemmln" in the local dialect. He is introduced to them by Moser, who tells him, "I practically live on these." Rex constantly annoys Stockinger by pulling on his coat and stealing his ham rolls. Later, Höllerer keeps a running score of Böck's success against Rex – not a flattering result for the officer. While not chasing criminals, he often plays pranks on the officers or fails to obey orders to help with the housework. Rex is very fond of horses and once fastened a rope to Alex's car so he could take the horse home. Another time, Rex attacked a man who was beating a horse and, later in the same episode, he ran into a burning barn to rescue a horse.

With Moser, Rex reacts particularly badly to words like "frau" (woman) and, later, "tierarzt" (vet), as he disapproves of his master's attention to women. During a scene in which Koch claims that Moser "doesn't understand women at all now," Moser tells Koch, "Don't say that word. Every time you say 'woman', he [Rex] runs off with my laundry. " Koch asks him what Rex does with it, to which Moser replies, "He washes it." Rex was not jealous of Alex and stole a rose for Alex to give to a pretty blonde co-worker.

Once, when Moser is working undercover and needs to ensure Rex won't greet him, he tells Stockinger, "You only need to say 'vet' to him and he'll stop whatever he's doing", a statement which results in a memorable scene involving Stockinger walking after Rex at a crime scene calling out "Vet! Vet!"

Rex has to date been played by four dogs. Until 2000, he was played by Santo vom Haus Zieglmayer, also known as 'Beejay', and was then replaced by Rhett Butler. For the 2008 revival, Rex is played by a dog named Henry. Between 2012/13, Rex is played by Nicky.

Richard Moser (Tobias Moretti, 1994–1998)
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The first "team leader", Richard "Richie" Moser is a hard-bitten cop who, as the first season begins, is going through a bitter divorce from his wife Gina, who takes all their furniture. Moser is also attempting to quit smoking to improve his blood circulation. An ex-truck driver, Moser credits Max Koch with keeping him from a life of crime, at one point telling Koch that "I'd be on the wrong side of the law too, just like him", referring to a young pickpocket he has just chased through central Vienna.

Moser befriended Rex, whose former police trainer, Michael, was shot and killed by an escaping suspect. To save the dog from being put down, Moser "adopted" him without ever completing any of the official paperwork. He famously declares at one point, "My taxes pay for this dog, so why can't I give him a better home?" Moser, in contrast to his successors, is shown to be quite athletic, often performing acrobatic stunts while chasing suspects. Moretti's looks were also exploited by the producers of the show. He made several nude appearances, including an episode where Moser and a female colleague frolic naked in the woods to attract a serial killer targeting young couples.

As Moser's personal life improves, his sense of humour returns. This is noticeable in the general lightening in the tone of the show from the initial episodes ("Diagnosis Murder" being a prime example) to ones with more lighthearted banter among the officers. Being a bachelor, Moser flirts with many of the attractive women featured in the storylines. Moser begins a relationship with Sonja, his local vet, which Rex thoroughly disapproves of and constantly tries to sabotage. In time, Rex accepts Sonja and even pretends to have an injured paw when he wants her to stay with him. Sonja eventually leaves Moser and Rex when she is offered a job in America.

In the final scenes of the season 4 episode "Moser's Death", Moser is killed in the line of duty by an escaped 'borderline psychopath', played by famous German actor Ulrich Tukur (Das Leben der Anderen) while Moser is rescuing his lover, Patricia Neuhold (a psychologist who has been helping with the case). The escapee commits suicide just after he kills Moser, and there is a heartbreaking scene at the hospital after the doctor tells Moser's friends that he died. Rex takes a squeaky toy that Moser bought at the beginning of the episode to Moser's body and squeaks it until he accepts his master is gone, then he lays his head on Moser's chest and the scene fades to white.

Alexander Brandtner (Gedeon Burkhard, 1998–2001)
Alex Brandtner replaces Moser as team leader. Following Moser's death, Rex has become depressed and refuses to eat, wanting to stay near Moser's house all the time. However, Brandtner succeeds in helping Rex out of his depression. Brandtner had lost his former dog, Arko, in an explosion and does not want to work with dogs again until he meets Rex. The explosion has also robbed him of his hearing in his right ear, a fact he confides only to Rex. Brandtner moves into the house that Moser and Rex used to share, apparently because Rex does not want to leave.

Brandtner is portrayed as very attractive to women and performs various physical stunts throughout the series, such as diving over car bonnets, engaging in fast-paced chases on foot, and dives. On his first appearance in the show, he dives into the Danube to retrieve a vital piece of evidence, and later in his debut episode he parachutes from a light aircraft, along with Rex, in order to apprehend a suspect. His living room is filled with boxing and fitness gear.

He had once gone undercover in a prison and also as a drunken homeless man. He also seems to have an uncanny instinct for sensing if a suspect is guilty or innocent, even without evidence.

During the time Burkhard was on the show, the international ratings for the series increased. Unlike Moretti, Burkhard's looks were not exploited by the producers of the show, and he did not make nude appearances. The most skin that Burkhard showed was in an episode where a bank burglar forced Brandtner to strip to prove that he was unarmed before parading him through the street in only his underwear.

Marc Hoffmann (Alexander Pschill, 2002–2004)
Replacing Brandtner as team leader, Hoffmann is a very eager detective. Hoffmann is portrayed as being very witty, outsmarting murderers. He shares a close relationship with Nikki Herzog, although they sometimes have disagreements.

Apparently Hoffmann had studied forensic science under Graf, and the two men still seem to share a somewhat master-student relationship, with Hoffmann often deferring to Graf's judgment (where Brandtner and Moser had previously not always done so).

Lorenzo Fabbri (Kaspar Capparoni, 2008–2012)
In season 11, Rex moves to Rome, where he meets his new partner, Italian homicide detective Chief Inspector Lorenzo Fabbri. Rex seems to understand the Italian language quite easily. In the second episode of season 14 (entitled "Amidst the Wolves"), Fabbri dies in the explosion of a car during a trap prepared by a Mafia boss.

Davide Rivera (Ettore Bassi, 2012–2013)
Davide Rivera replaces Fabbri as team leader in season 14. Rivera becomes a friend with Rex after the loss of Inspector Lorenzo Fabbri. He follows his grandfather's advice, and eventually, Rex stops avoiding him.

Rivera appears for the last time on the last episode of season 15, titled "Legami di sangue." It is unknown why he does not appear in season 16.

Marco Terzani (Francesco Arca, 2013–2015)
Marco Terzani replaces Rivera as team leader in season 16.

Ernst Stockinger (Karl Markovics, 1994–1996)
The "straight man" to Rex — and, increasingly, Moser — Ernst Stockinger ("Stocki" for short) is a character who becomes much more likeable as his part in the series develops. Stockinger is thin and always has a very serious demeanour. In later episodes, this is revealed as a cover for his schemes to outsmart Rex, who loves to tease him. Although Stockinger pretends not to like dogs, he risks his career to help Moser save Rex when the dog is kidnapped to prevent Moser from testifying against an assassin. For all Stockinger's constant irritation with Rex, he genuinely has come to care for this particular dog. This is very obvious in the last two episodes Stocki appears in, when he is upset that Rex jumps from one roof to another to capture a killer. Stocki is also openly affectionate to Rex once his transfer is approved, and he realizes how much he is going to miss the team. He tells Richard and Höllerer they are his only friends and includes Rex as his friend as well.

Stockinger is married, and his wife, it seems, is not greatly pleased with her husband's choice of career at times, and Moser often reminds him of this. Stocki's knowledge of women does not save him and Rex from being thrown out by Stocki's wife when he watches Rex and the dog howls for Moser.

Another of Stockinger's idiosyncrasies is his constant references to surgery, which has been performed on him - most likely for stomach ulcers. He seems to delight in telling stories about this surgery at the most inappropriate moments, such as when the others are about to eat.

Eventually, Stockinger is transferred to Salzburg and leaves the series. In this final episode, Rex saves Stockinger by leaping across a classroom just as a disgruntled divorced man was about to stab Stockinger in the throat during an attempted kidnapping attempt on his child. Moser, in a farewell speech, jokingly tells Stocki, "You have been a bad cop, a bad man, and not at all a good friend." Stockinger later features in a spin-off two season television series, Stockinger, featuring him at his new police department. He is replaced by Christian Böck.

Peter Höllerer (Wolf Bachofner, 1994–1999)
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The obese Peter Höllerer is a constant source of comic relief in the series. Generally found ensconced behind his desk working the phones, his face visibly falls whenever Moser and Stockinger (or, later, Brandtner and Böck) require him to do fieldwork. That said, he is capable of surprising speed when running and can also demonstrate driving skills on a par with other officers. In one episode, Höllerer is taken hostage by a man with a bomb who forces him to drive away from a police blockade. Höllerer turns the tables by driving at high speed into an empty parking lot and diving out of the car. In another episode, Höllerer disarmed a bomb just before it would have exploded.

Höllerer tends to take a co-ordinating role when an operation is being planned, rather than actually going undercover or making the arrest himself. In these situations, he reveals himself to have a very clear head and to be capable of coping with even the most unusual situations that his partners get involved in.

Höllerer has a soft spot for Rex as the series progresses, after first voicing concern that Moser did not adopt him through the proper channels. This is shown by his keeping score between Böck and Rex in the early episodes featuring the former. Höllerer takes inordinate delight in seeing the dog outsmarting the man.

Höllerer's departure from the series is brought about by his retirement to care for his ailing mother, a woman about whom he often speaks. He is replaced by Fritz Kunz.

Of all the recurring characters in the series, Höllerer's accent is the thickest. Viewers familiar with standard German will often have difficulty understanding his Viennese dialect.

Christian Böck (Heinz Weixelbraun, 1996-2001)
Böck is first introduced as a somewhat suspicious-looking character, a member of a borderline-illegal car club who is not even trusted by his club mates. During the course of his investigation into this club, Moser begins to suspect Böck, but he turns out to be an undercover policeman making similar investigations. The two eventually combine to solve the relevant case, and Moser convinces Böck to transfer to his team. Böck's undercover skills are largely ignored after the transfer, but his personable manner proves an advantage when it comes to interrogations (particularly contrasting with the somewhat dour Moser). By the time of Brandtner's arrival, Böck's youth and athleticism have resulted in his frequently being involved in chasing criminals on foot. The dynamic between Böck and Kunz forms an almost constant source of comic relief. Most notable in this is their dialogue when trying to establish the angle from which a witness would have seen a certain event - each man speaks at cross-purposes to the other, and both end up totally confused. Böck and Rex share a rivalry, with Böck trying to outsmart Rex, but Rex wins nearly all the time. Böck is also one of the few who question Rex's abilities as an elite police dog, but Moser keeps telling him that he has always been this way.

Fritz Kunz (Martin Weinek, 1999-2004, 2008)
Replacing Höllerer after the latter's retirement to care for his mother, Kunz has been drawn from the statistics section of the force. Initially, he is very much out of place in the slightly freer atmosphere of Brandtner's office. A running gag in his early appearances deals with his obsessive-compulsiveness and fussy attention to the placement of his desk stationery (e.g., pencils arranged from tallest to shortest and paper clips aligned) only to have Rex or one of the others move everything around.

Kunz's background in statistics is also often the source of amusement, as he is seemingly able to deliver, from memory, obscure statistical information about the activities of criminals. He tends to be used to man the phones during investigations rather than on active duty. However, he is also occasionally required to go undercover (once as a kitchen hand, another time as a stable hand and another as an entertainer in a street market), much to his chagrin. Kunz is much tougher than he looks. He once smashed a door in with an axe just in time to save Alex's life after a murder suspect left Alex face down and unconscious in a filling bathtub.

Nikki Herzog (Elke Winkens)
The only female officer in the history of the show, Herzog (played by Elke Winkens) is paired with Hoffmann (Kunz is almost entirely desk-bound in this incarnation of the series), and sexual tension constantly results. The pair spend the night together before starting their new jobs, without realising that they are both police officers.

In contrast to Hoffmann, Herzog tends to be more level-headed and capable of performing physical acts. Her physical appearance also serves the team well in relating to suspects, as she is frequently underestimated and sometimes taunted by brash male criminals.

Giandomenico Morini (Fabio Ferri)
Morini is a colleague of Lorenzo Fabbri, and they work on every crime together. Rex does not obey Morini at all. However, in one episode, he takes care of Rex because Fabbri has broken his ankle. At the beginning of the 14th season, he is transferred to Milan and leaves the series.

Alberto Monterosso (Domenico Fortunato)
Alberto Monterosso replaces Morini.

Dr Leo Graf (Gerhard Zemann)
Dr Leo Graf is the forensic pathologist consulted by the detectives. On occasion, he is found at the crime scene itself. However, he is normally to be found in his pathology laboratory and occasionally comes into the police office. Gerhard Zemann is the only actor to appear as the same character throughout the long-running series.

Dr Graf is a sometimes prickly personality, but underneath this exterior, he has a very dry wit - frequently regaling the detectives against their will with the gruesome details of a murder.

Naturally, he is quite comfortable in his lab, surrounded by dead bodies, even if others are not. Many of the earlier episodes highlight the contrasting reactions of the policemen (especially Moser and Stockinger) and Graf to the death all around them.

At times, however, Dr Graf clearly resents the pressure put on him by the policemen. One memorable telephone exchange involves Moser agreeing to pay Dr Graf a number of Cuban cigars for working on the weekend. Another time, Graf's car is towed while he is investigating a murder scene. The resulting invective he uses towards the authorities responsible is caustic.

Where Graf is very amiable towards Moser's team, this relationship progressively changes as Brandtner arrives. Early episodes featuring Brandtner show Alex and Leo using formal language - generally involving the German "Sie" form of address (the polite form). Eventually, this exterior is broken down, and the new team is invited to call him Leo - a sign of considerable familiarity in German or Austrian society. Accordingly, Brandtner's greeting to Graf alters from the formal "Guten Morgen" to the more familiar "Servus."

With Hoffmann and Herzog, however, the relationship with Graf is more of a teacher-student one. It emerges early that Hoffmann had been taught forensic techniques by Graf, and it is clear that some of the awe felt by the considerably younger policeman for his mentor is still present. Graf also assumes a much more advisory role with this team, appearing only once during each investigation instead of being constantly on call.

By the time Rex moves to Rome with Lorenzo Fabbri of the Italian police, Dr Graf still serves as Vienna's main forensic officer as seen in a Rex special as Rex and Fabbri return to Vienna to investigate a case there.

Max Koch (Fritz Muliar)
Familiarly known to all as Max, Koch is a retired policeman who saved Moser from a life of crime and became something of a mentor to him. Many early episodes feature Moser asking Koch for advice - often in a café or a pool hall. It is, in fact, advice from Koch which is responsible for solving many of the more baffling cases, as his insights into human psychology - particularly female psychology (something he often claims Moser has had no knowledge of since his divorce) - prove correct. Occasionally, when a case hinges on the behaviour of a female witness or suspect, Koch good-humouredly teases Moser about women and gently tells him, "Richard, since your divorce, you've lost your touch with women"

As the series progresses, Koch's role alters to that of being a useful spy for Moser in certain situations where his team is too well-known. It is Koch's visit to a restaurant that provides the breakthrough in one case. In another, he stumbles upon the solution to a particularly brutal homicide while sitting in a park with Rex. Koch is increasingly reluctant to help Moser with his work, although he is always told that this will be the last time. As Stockinger points out, it always is the last time… until the next request. Moser also tries to appeal to Koch's sense of adventure which, as Max famously explains, is satisfied by eating goulash and not knowing if he will suffer from "Rinderwahnsinn" (mad cow disease).

Following Stockinger's transfer to Salzburg, Koch assists the team to reorganise the office. His snide remarks about Stockinger's files result in Höllerer telling him to read through them all (to which Koch responds that he's doing more work since he retired than he did when he worked). He also spreads out his pipe collection on Stocki's old desk and declares that he will "open a pipe shop" while the team attempts to find a replacement for Stocki. Max is no longer seen or spoken of after Moser's death.

Katia Martelli (Pilar Abella)
Katia Martelli is the forensics officer in Rome. She is seen as a romantic interest for Fabbri, but Rex is opposed to this. She is always looking for an opportunity to ensnare him. At one point, when Fabbri is injured and is at home researching a murder related to role playing games on his computer, he asks for a gaming police officer to be sent to his house to brief him about computer game culture. Martelli takes this opportunity to enter his house and seduce him, and creates an RPG profile for him so he can befriend the suspects online—the figure she chooses for him is a model of Fabbri wearing only a towel.

Morini constantly goads Martelli and Fabbri into coupling. After one case is solved, Fabbri takes her home to wine and dine her, much to Rex's chagrin. At the start of the next episode, they drunkenly awake in Fabbri's bed.

Filippo Gori (Augusto Zucchi)
Filippo Gori is Fabbri's boss who hates Rex when they first meet and vows to eject him for being unauthorised. Eventually, he accepts that Rex can solve crimes and lets him stay; this came after Rex and Fabbri had brought down a prostitution and sex slave racket run by some illegal Chinese immigrants—Fabbri leaked the story to a journalist friend so that Rex was photographed on the front page of a newspaper. In the episode "A Man Alone," his partner is murdered. Although all limited evidence points to Gori, Fabbri proves that he is not the culprit.

Filippo (Morini's fish)
Filippo is Morini's fish. Morini got a fish because he was jealous of Lorenzo. Morini does not realize that he has named his fish after his boss, so when Gori comes in, he says his fish is called Filiberto.

Notable fans
German priest and choirmaster Georg Ratzinger, when asked if he ever watched television at the Vatican with his brother Pope Benedict XVI, stated that the brothers would watch Inspector Rex together, and were friends with the owner of the titular German Shepherd. "We always used to watch [Inspector Rex], because we like dogs, too. We are well acquainted with Herr Helmut Brossmann, the owner of the German shepherd Rex, who plays the title role. He lives in the vicinity of Regensburg."

Broadcasters
Kommissar Rex has been shown in the following countries:

Home releases
In Italy, the first 6 seasons were released on DVD, with only the Italian dub. The first two seasons were also released in Germany, again only with German audio.

In Australia, Region 4 English-subtitled DVDs of Inspector Rex are currently available for the first sixteen seasons (labeled as fourteen in Australia; see Australian numbering). The Italian seasons of the show were released under the special title "Rex in Rome".

On 10 October 2007, a special DVD, "Rex By Request" was released featuring the five favourite Kommissar Rex episodes as voted by fans. Also included is an interview with producer/writer Peter Hajek and an hour-long dog-training segment featuring Rex and his trainer Teresa Ann Miller.

Australian Releases:
 * Inspector Rex - Series 1 (4 Disc Box Set) - June 20, 2005
 * Inspector Rex - Series 2 (4 Disc Box Set) - September 22, 2005
 * Inspector Rex - Series 3 (4 Disc Box Set) - January 24, 2006
 * Inspector Rex - Series 4 (5 Disc Box Set) - March 31, 2006
 * Inspector Rex - Series 5 (4 Disc Box Set) - August 16, 2006
 * Inspector Rex - Series 6 (4 Disc Box Set) - November 10, 2006
 * Inspector Rex - Series 7 (4 Disc Box Set) - February 7, 2007
 * Inspector Rex - Series 8 (4 Disc Box Set) - June 7, 2007
 * Inspector Rex - Series 9 (2 Disc Set) - November 17, 2008
 * Inspector Rex - Series 10 (3 Disc Set) - November 27, 2009
 * Inspector Rex - Series 1 To 5 (21 Disc Box Set) - December 1, 2010
 * Inspector Rex - Series 6 To 10 (17 Disc Box Set) - October 5, 2011
 * Inspector Rex - Series 11 (3 Disc Set) - November 2, 2011
 * Inspector Rex - Series 12 (3 Disc Set) - November 20, 2013
 * lnspector Rex - Series 13 (3 Disc Set) - November 5, 2014
 * lnspector Rex - Series 14 (3 Disc Set) - November 4, 2015
 * Inspector Rex - Series 11 to 14 (12 Disc Set) - September 9, 2017
 * Rex Special Unit - Season 1 (3 Disc Set) - September 9, 2017
 * Rex Special Unit - Season 2 (3 Disc Set) - October 3, 2018

title: Inspector Rex


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L'Aquila

L'Aquila is a city and comune in central Italy. It is the capital city of both the Abruzzo region and of the Province of L'Aquila. , it has a population of 69,558 inhabitants. Laid out within medieval walls on a hill in the wide valley of the Aterno river, it is surrounded by the Apennine Mountains, with the Gran Sasso d'Italia to the north-east.

L'Aquila sits upon a hillside in the middle of a narrow valley; tall snow-capped mountains of the Gran Sasso massif flank the town. A maze of narrow streets, lined with Baroque and Renaissance buildings and churches, open onto elegant piazzas. Home to the University of L'Aquila, it is a lively college town and, as such, has many cultural institutions: a repertory theatre, a symphony orchestra, a fine-arts academy, a state conservatory, a film institute. There are several ski resorts in the surrounding province (Campo Imperatore, Ovindoli, Pescasseroli, Roccaraso, Scanno).

Geography
Close to the highest of the Apennine summits, L'Aquila is positioned at an elevation of 721 m in the Valley of the Aterno-Pescara, situated between four mountain peaks above 2000 m.

The mountains block the city off from warm humid air currents from the Mediterranean, and give rise to a climate that is cool in comparison to most of central Italy, and dry. It's common to say between locals that the city enjoys each year 11 cold months and one cool one ("Undici misi de friddu e unu de friscu").

L'Aquila is approximately 100 km east-northeast of Rome, with which it is connected by an autostrada through the mountains.

Middle Ages
The city's construction was begun by Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Sicily, out of several already existing villages (ninety-nine, according to local tradition; see Amiternum), as a bulwark against the power of the papacy. The name of Aquila means "Eagle" in Italian. Construction was completed in 1254 under Frederick's son, Conrad IV of Germany. The name was switched to Aquila degli Abruzzi in 1861, and L'Aquila in 1939. After the death of Conrad, the city was destroyed by his brother Manfred in 1259, but soon rebuilt by Charles I of Anjou, his successor as king of Sicily. The walls were completed in 1316.

It quickly became the second city of the Kingdom of Naples. It was an autonomous city, ruled by a diarchy composed of the City Council (which had varying names and composition over the centuries) and the King's Captain. It fell initially under the lordship of Niccolò dell'Isola, appointed by the people as the People's Knight, but he was then killed when he became a tyrant. Later, it fell under Pietro "Lalle" Camponeschi, Count of Montorio, who became the third side of a new triarchy, with the Council and the King's Captain. Camponeschi, who was also Great Chancellor of the kingdom of Naples, became too powerful, and was killed by order of Prince Louis of Taranto. His descendants fought with the Pretatti family for power for several generations, but never again attained the power of their ancestor. The last, and the one true "lord" of L'Aquila, was Ludovico Franchi, who challenged the power of the pope by giving refuge to Alfonso I d'Este, former duke of Ferrara, and the children of Giampaolo Baglioni, deposed lord of Perugia. In the end, however, the Aquilans had him deposed and imprisoned by the king of Naples.

The power of L'Aquila was based on the close connection between the city and its mother-villages, which had established the city as a federation, each of them building a borough and considering it as a part of the mother-village. The Fountain of the 99 Spouts (Fontana delle 99 Cannelle), was given its name to celebrate the ancient origin of the town. The City Council was originally composed of the Mayors of the villages, and the city had no legal existence until King Charles II of Naples appointed a "Camerlengo", responsible for city tributes (previously paid separately by each of its mother-villages). Later, the Camerlengo also took political power, as President of the City Council.

From its beginnings the city constituted an important market for the surrounding countryside, which provided it with a regular supply of food: from the fertile valleys came the precious saffron; the surrounding mountain pastures provided summer grazing for numerous transhumant flocks of sheep, which in turn supplied abundant raw materials for export and, to a lesser extent, small local industries, which in time brought craftsmen and merchants from outside the area.

Within a few decades L'Aquila became a crossroads in communications between cities within and beyond the Kingdom, thanks to the so-called "via degli Abruzzi", which ran from Florence to Naples by way of Perugia, Rieti, L'Aquila, Sulmona, Isernia, Venafro, Teano and Capua.

Negotiations for the succession of Edmund, son of Henry III of England, to the throne of the Kingdom of Sicily involved L'Aquila in the web of interests linking the Roman Curia to the English court. On 23 December 1256 Pope Alexander IV elevated the churches of Saints Massimo and Giorgio to the status of cathedrals as a reward to the citizens of L'Aquila for their opposition to King Manfred who, in July 1259, had the city razed to the ground in an attempt to destroy the negotiations. On 29 August 1294 the hermit Pietro del Morrone was consecrated as pope Celestine V in the church of Santa Maria di Collemaggio, in commemoration of which the new pope decreed the annual religious rite of the Pardon (nowadays known as Celestinian Forgiveness, Perdonanza Celestiniana), still observed today in the city on 28 and 29 August: it is the immediate ancestor of the Jubilee Year.

The pontificate of Celestine V gave a new impulse to building development, as can be seen from the city statutes. In 1311, moreover, King Robert of Anjou granted privileges which had a decisive influence on the development of trade. These privileges protected all activities related to sheep-farming, exempting them from customs duties on imports and exports. This was the period in which merchants from Tuscany (Scale, Bonaccorsi) and Rieti purchased houses in the city. Hence the conditions for radical political renewal: in 1355 the trade guilds of leather-workers, metal-workers, merchants and learned men were brought into the government of the city, and these together with the Camerario and the Cinque constituted the new Camera Aquilana. Eleven years earlier, in 1344, the King had granted the city its own mint.

In the middle of the 14th century the city was struck by plague epidemics (1348, 1363) and earthquakes (1349). Reconstruction began soon, however. In the 14th–15th century Jewish families came to live in the city, while the generals of the Franciscan Order chose the city as the seat of the Order's general chapters (1376, 1408, 1411, 1450, 1452, 1495). Bernardino of Siena, of the Franciscan order of the Observance, visited L'Aquila twice, the first time to preach in the presence of King René of Naples, and in 1444, on his second visit, he died in the city. In 1481 Adam of Rottweil, a pupil and collaborator of Johann Gutenberg, obtained permission to establish a printing press in L'Aquila.

The Osservanti branch of the Franciscan order had a decisive influence on L'Aquila. As a result of initiatives by Friar Giovanni da Capistrano and Friar Giacomo della Marca, Lombard masters undertook, in the relatively underdeveloped north-east of the city, an imposing series of buildings centring on the hospital of Saint Salvatore (1446) and the convent and the Basilica of San Bernardino. The construction work was long and difficult, mainly because of the earthquake of 1461, which caused the buildings to collapse, and the translation of the body of San Bernardino did not take place until 14 May 1472. The whole city suffered serious damage on the occasion of the earthquake, and two years went by before repairs on the churches and convents began.

In a strategy finalised to increasing their political and economic autonomy, the Aquilani took a series of political gambles, siding sometimes with the Roman Papacy, sometimes with the Kingdom of Naples. When the Pope excommunicated Joanna II, Queen of Naples, appointing Louis III of Anjou as heir to the crown in her stead, L'Aquila sided with the Angevines. Joanna hired the condottiero Braccio da Montone. In exchange for his services, Braccio obtained the lordship of Teramo, as well as the fiefdoms of Capua and Foggia: he started a 13-month-long siege of L'Aquila, that resisted bravely. Facing Braccio, at the head of the Angevine army was Muzio Attendolo Sforza and his son Francesco. The final clash between the two contenders was just below the walls of Aquila, near the hamlet today called Bazzano. In the battle fought on 2 June 1424, Braccio, mortally wounded in the neck, was made prisoner and transported to Aquila, where he died three days later, on 5 June 1424. The Pope had him buried in deconsecrated earth. The citizens of L'Aquila honoured the bravery of their enemy Braccio by dedicating one of the main streets of the city to his name.

Modern era
This period of freedom and prosperity ended in the 16th century, when Spanish viceroy Philibert van Oranje partially destroyed L'Aquila and established Spanish feudalism in its countryside. The city, separated from its roots, never developed again. Ancient privileges were revoked. L'Aquila was again destroyed by an earthquake in 1703. Successive earthquakes have repeatedly damaged the city's large cathedral, and destroyed the original dome of the Basilica of San Bernardino, designed along the lines of the dome of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence. The city was also sacked two times by French troops in 1799.

L'Aquila, like so much of Italy, is a city of political contrasts. In the 1970s a novel by Alberto Moravia was seized because it was considered obscene, a local Catholic Archbishop protested the nudity of a centuries-old statue of a young man, and a group of local reactionaries even asked for the seizure of the £50 coin because it showed a naked man. In October 2003, however, a liberal judge in l'Aquila ordered the small town of Ofena to remove a crucifix from its elementary school so as to not to offend the religious sensibilities of two young Muslim students. After a national outcry, the judge's decision was overturned. In May 2007 Massimo Cialente, a physician and medical researcher, was elected mayor of L'Aquila with a centre-left coalition.

Earthquakes

Earthquakes mark the history of L'Aquila, as the city is partly built on an ancient lake-bed which amplifies seismic activity.

On 3 December 1315 the city was struck by an earthquake which seriously damaged the San Francesco Church. Another earthquake struck on 9 September 1349, killing about 800 people. Other earthquakes struck in 1452, then on 26 November 1461, and again in 1501 and 1646. On 3 February 1703 a major earthquake struck the town. More than 3,000 people died and almost all the churches collapsed; Rocca Calascio, the highest fortress in Europe was also ruined by this event, yet the town survived. L'Aquila was then repopulated by decision of Pope Clement XI. The town was rocked by earthquake again in 1706. On 26 June 1958 an earthquake of 5.0 magnitude struck the town.

On 6 April 2009, at 01:32 GMT (03:32 CEST) an earthquake of 6.3 magnitude struck central Italy with its epicentre near L'Aquila, at 42.4228°N, 13.3945°W. Initial reports said the earthquake caused damage to between 3,000 and 10,000 buildings in L'Aquila. Several buildings also collapsed. 308 people were killed by the earthquake, and approximately 1,500 people were injured. Twenty of the victims were children. Around 65,000 people were made homeless. There were many students trapped in a partially collapsed dormitory. The 6 April earthquake was felt throughout Abruzzo; as far away as Rome, other parts of Lazio, Marche, Molise, Umbria, and Campania.

G8 summit
Because of the 2009 earthquake, the Berlusconi government decided to move that year's G8 summit from its scheduled Sardinian host of La Maddalena to L'Aquila, so that disaster funds would be distributed to the affected region and to show solidarity with the city's inhabitants. World leaders converged on L'Aquila on 8 July and many of them were given tours of the devastated city by the host Prime Minister.

Climate
L'Aquila has an oceanic climate (Köppen climate classification: Cfb), influenced by its high altitude.

Main sights

Although less than an hour-and-a-half drive from Rome, and popular with Romans for summer hiking and winter skiing in surrounding mountains, the city is sparsely visited by tourists. Among the sights are:

Religious buildings

 * L'Aquila Cathedral: main church dedicated to Saint Maximus of Aveia (San Massimo), was built in the 13th century, but razed after the 1703 earthquake. The most recent façade dated from the 19th century, but the earthquake of 2009 and subsequent aftershocks collapsed parts of the transept and possibly more of the cathedral.
 * Basilica of San Bernardino (1472): church has a fine Renaissance façade by Nicola Filotesio (commonly called Cola dell'Amatrice), and contains the monumental tomb of the saint (1480), decorated with sculptures, and executed by Silvestro Ariscola.
 * Santa Maria di Collemaggio: church just outside the town, has a very fine, but simple, Romanesque façade (1270–1280) in red and white marble, with three decorated portals and a rose-window above each. The two side doors are also fine. The interior contains the mausoleum of Pope Celestine V erected in 1517.
 * Santa Giusta: Romanesque façade with Gothic rose window
 * San Silvestro: 14th-century Romanesque façade with Gothic rose window
 * Chiesa dei Santi Marciano e Nicandro: a 13th century church

Secular buildings

 * Spanish fort (Forte Spagnolo): massive castle in the highest part of the town, erected in 1534 by the Spanish viceroy Don Pedro de Toledo. In 2016, home to the National Museum of Abruzzo.
 * Fontana Luminosa ("Luminous Fountain"): a 1930s sculpture of two women bearing large jars.
 * Fontana delle novantanove cannelle (1272): a fountain with ninety-nine jets distributed along three walls. The source of the fountain is still unknown.
 * L'Aquila cemetery: includes grave of Karl Heinrich Ulrichs, 19th‑century German gay rights pioneer who lived in L'Aquila; every year, gay people from all over the world meet at the cemetery to honour his memory.
 * Palace of Nobles
 * Roman ruins of Amiternum: ruins of an Ancient Roman city

Also nearby are several ski resorts like Gran Sasso d'Italia, the highest of the Apennines where in its valley the movie The Name of the Rose was filmed in the end of the 1980s. The town also contains some fine palaces: the municipality has a museum, with a collection of Roman inscriptions and some illuminated service books. The Palazzi Dragonetti and Persichetti contain private collections of pictures.

Cinematographic activities
The first step of L'Aquila in the cinematographic activities was the Cineforum Primo Piano founded by Gabriele Lucci in the middle of the 1970s. As a work of Lucci, in 1981 saw the establishment of l'Istituto Cinematografico dell'Aquila, an institute for the production and diffusion of the cinematographic culture in Italia and abroad.

The Teatro Stabile d'Abruzzo is based in the city and was formed in 2000.

Sport
The city is the home of five-time Italian champions L'Aquila Rugby. The football squad, L'Aquila Calcio, played 3 times in serie B.

Frazioni
The following is a list of the frazioni in the comune of L'Aquila: Aquilio, Aragno, Arischia, Assergi, Bagno, Bazzano, Camarda, Cansatessa, Casaline, Cermone, Cese di Preturo, Civita di Bagno, Colle di Preturo, Colle di Sassa, Colle Roio – Poggio di Roio, Collebrincioni, Collefracido di Sassa, Collemare di Sassa, Coppito, Filetto, Foce di Sassa, Forcelle, Genzano di Sassa, Gignano, Monticchio, Onna, Paganica, Pagliare di Sassa, Pescomaggiore, Pettino, Pianola, Pile, Pizzutillo, Poggio di Roio, Poggio Santa Maria, Pozza di Preturo, Pratelle, Preturo, Ripa, Roio Piano, San Giacomo Alto, San Giuliano, San Gregorio, San Leonardo, San Marco Di Preturo, San Martino di Sassa, Santa Rufina di Roio, Sant'Angelo, Sant'Elia, Santi, San Vittorino, Sassa, Tempera, Torretta, Vallesindola, Vasche.

International relations
L'Aquila is twinned with:

 * 🇱🇧 Baalbek, Lebanon
 * 🇮🇹 Bernalda, Italy
 * 🇷🇴 Bistrița, Romania
 * 🇪🇸 Cuenca, Spain
 * 🇮🇹 Foggia, Italy
 * 🇨🇳 Haining, China
 * 🇦🇺 Hobart, Australia
 * 🇩🇪 Rottweil, Germany
 * 🇦🇷 San Carlos de Bariloche, Argentina
 * 🇮🇹 Sant'Angelo d'Alife, Italy
 * 🇮🇹 Siena, Italy
 * 🇺🇸 Washington, United States
 * 🇨🇦 York, Toronto, Canada
 * 🇵🇱 Zielona Góra, Poland

Transport
L'Aquila railway station, on the Terni–Sulmona railway, is the main train station of the city, with trains to Terni, Rieti and Sulmona.

Notable people

 * Mariangelo Accorso, (Aquila, 1489 – Aquila, 1546), Humanist
 * Amico Agnifili, (Rocca di Mezzo, 1398 – Aquila, 1476), Cardinal
 * Antonia of Florence (1402–1472), saint
 * Corrado Bafile (1903–2005), Cardinal
 * Bernardino da Siena, (Massa Marittima, 1380 – Aquila, 1444), saint.
 * Braccio da Montone, (Perugia, 1368 – Aquila, 1424), condottiero
 * Giovanbattista Branconio dell'Aquila, (Aquila, 1473 – 1522), papal protonotary, friend of Raphael
 * Buccio di Ranallo, (Aquila 1294 – Aquila 1363), epic poet, historian, Count of Pettino
 * Raffaele Cappelli (1848–1921)
 * John of Capistrano, (Capestrano, 1386 – Ilok, 1456), saint
 * Celestine V, (?, 1215 – Fumone, 1296), saint
 * Pompeo Cesura, (Aquila, ? – Rome, 1571), painter
 * Appius Claudius Caecus, (Amiternum, 350 a.C. – ?, 271 a.C.), Roman Politician
 * Marco Dall'Aquila (c.1480-after 1538), lutenist and composer
 * Nazzareno De Angelis (1881–1962), opera singer
 * Nicola Di Francia (born 1985), footballer
 * Carlo Franchi (1938–2021), racing driver
 * Nestore Leoni (1862–1947), painter
 * Mario Magnotta (1942–2009), janitor and internet phenomena
 * Lorenzo Natali, (Florence, 1922 – Rome, 1989), vice-president of the European Commission.
 * Paul Piccone (1940–2004), founder and editor of TELOS.
 * Roberto Ruscitti (b. 1941), composer
 * Sallustius (4th century), historian
 * Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (1825–1895), writer
 * Trebisonda Valla, (Bologna 1916 – L'Aquila 2006), Olympic gold medal
 * Amleto Vespa (1888–1940), spy for Japan
 * Bruno Vespa (b. 1944), journalist
 * Claudia Romani (b. 1982), modelù
 * Ferdinando Bologna (1925–2019), Art historian

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

title: L'Aquila


text:
Big in Japan (band)

Big in Japan were a punk band that emerged from Liverpool, United Kingdom in the late 1970s. They are better known for the later successes of their band members than for their own music.

History
Big in Japan began from the same Merseyside scene which would produce Echo & the Bunnymen, the Teardrop Explodes, OMD and Dalek I Love You.

Big In Japan started off playing gigs around Liverpool, such as Ruffwood School in Kirkby along with Wah! Heat, but most notably at Eric's Club. Their stage show was unique: lead singer Jayne Casey would perform with a lampshade over her shaved head, guitarist Bill Drummond played in a kilt and bassist Holly Johnson performed in a flamboyant manner which he would later take further in Frankie Goes to Hollywood.

As an initial idea of Deaf School's Clive Langer, his friend Bill Drummond (guitar, vocals), Kevin Ward (bass, vocals) and Phil Allen (drums), formed the band in May 1977, playing only three gigs, the first of them at Bretton Hall College, in Yorkshire. In August, the line-up grew, joining Jayne Casey (vocals), Ian Broudie (guitar) and Clive Langer (guitar), who quit in September, but not before the band recorded their first song released, "Big in Japan", which appeared on the split single "Brutality, Religion and a Dance Beat", released the same year. In October, Ambrose Reynolds joined to replace Ward who then left that December, but Reynolds himself quit shortly afterwards and was replaced by Holly Johnson. In January 1978, Budgie (previously in The Spitfire Boys and later member of The Slits and Siouxsie and the Banshees) replaced Allen on drums, and in early June, Johnson was sacked and replaced with ex-Deaf School Steve Lindsey, who was replaced in July by Dave Balfe (previously in Dalek I Love You), the last member to join.

Hatred of the band reached such a level that a petition calling on them to split up was launched by a jealous young Julian Cope resulting from a rivalry with the Crucial Three. Displayed in local shop Probe Records the petition gathered numerous signatures, including those of the band themselves. According to Cope's autobiography, "Of course, Bill Drummond was into the whole thing and told us we needed 14,000 signatures, then they'd split up. We got about nine". In the 1980s, Drummond became manager of Cope's band, The Teardrop Explodes.

The band broke up after a last gig at Eric's on 26 August 1978. During their time, Big in Japan recorded four songs which were included in From Y to Z and Never Again EP, released afterwards to pay off debts. The unintentional consequence of the EP was the formation of the Zoo label, which went on to release early material by Echo & the Bunnymen and The Teardrop Explodes, amongst others. They also recorded a Peel Session on 12 February 1979, with a line-up of Casey, Broudie, Johnson and Budgie; the session was broadcast on 6 March 1979. Balfe and Drummond then formed the short-lived Lori and the Chameleons.

Big in Japan left a recorded legacy of seven songs: one on a single, four on their EP From Y to Z and Never Again, and two released on compilation albums. As of 2005, five out of these recorded songs are commercially available, on the compilation album, The Zoo: Uncaged 1978–1982.

According to the Liverpool Echo, Big in Japan were "a supergroup with a difference—its members only became super after they left"; former members of Big in Japan would later find fame in the KLF, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, the Lightning Seeds, the Teardrop Explodes and Siouxsie and the Banshees.

The German group Alphaville's first single was called "Big in Japan", named directly after the band. Coincidentally, Frankie Goes to Hollywood's single "Relax" was displaced from the top of the German charts by Alphaville's "Big in Japan". Singer/songwriter Gold later said that "we never got to speak with him [Holly Johnson] but he must have wondered 'who is this German group with a song named after my band?'!"

Members' remembrances
Jayne Casey later states:"We were all a bit too eccentric at a time when punk was quite macho and clear cut...a bit too much for people to handle. We always wanted to be like the Monkees or something. We wanted to be a cartoon, and that's how we tried to sell ourselves to the record companies".

Ian Broudie said:"It was more performance art than rock and roll. But it gave me a healthy disregard for musicianship. It's ideas that are important, not proficiency".

Bill Drummond recalled:[The] group only lasted 12 months but that's about as long as any punk band should last. We never got anywhere, but all went on to success later on with bands like Siouxsie and the Banshees and the Teardrop Explodes.

Singles and EPs

 * "Brutality, Religion and a Dance Beat" (Eric's, September 1977) – split with Chuddie Nuddies
 * From Y to Z and Never Again (Zoo, 1978)

Compilations

 * Street to Street: A Liverpool Album (1978) – "Match of the Day"
 * To the Shores of Lake Placid (1982) – "Suicide a Go Go" / "Society for Cutting Up Men"
 * The Zoo: Uncaged 1978–1982 (1990) – "Nothing Special" / "Cindy & the Valley of the Barbie Dolls" / "Suicide a Go Go" / "Taxi" / "Society for Cutting Up Men"

Other work
Three unreleased songs were recorded for the band's only John Peel session of 6 March 1979; "Suicide High Life", "Goodbye" and "Don't Bomb China".

A bootleg CD is in circulation which contains all of the material listed above as well as demo versions of "Society for Cutting Up Men" (named after the manifesto Society for Cutting Up Men), "Boys Cry", "Big in Japan", "Space Walk", "Match of the Day" and "Taxi". It also contains the audio from the band's performance of "Suicide a Go Go" on their Granada TV appearance of 23 March 1978 (on Tony Wilson's, So It Goes).

Black-and-white, amateur home movie footage of the band performing live at Eric's still exists—excerpts of the band performing both "Big in Japan" and "Cindy and the Barbi Dolls" were used in the BBC Television's Rock Family Trees: The New Merseybeat, originally broadcast in August 1995 and repeated in 1997.

Band members

 * Bill Drummond – guitar, vocals (1977–1978)
 * Kev Ward – bass, vocals (1977)
 * Phil Allen – drums (1977)
 * Jayne Casey – vocals (1977–1978, 1979)
 * Ian Broudie – guitar (1977–1978, 1979)
 * Clive Langer – guitar (1977)
 * Ambrose Reynolds – bass (1977)
 * Holly Johnson – bass, vocals (1977–1978, 1979)
 * Budgie – drums (1978, 1979)
 * Steve Lindsey – bass (1978)
 * David Balfe – bass (1978)

title: Big in Japan (band)


text:
Talk:Friedrich von Schelling

Schelling, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von (1775-1854), German idealistic philosopher, born at Leonberg, in Wurttemberg. Studied at Tubingen and Leipzig and joined Immanuel Hermann von Fichte as lecturer at Jena (1798-1803). From 1803 to 1806 he lectured at Wurzburg. In 1806, after moving to Munich, he became secretary of the academy of art, and later of the academy of science while lecturing at Erlangen from 1820-1827. In 1841 he was appointed a member of the academy of Berlin, where he lectured for four years at the university. His early writings (1794-1796),influenced by Fichte, were followed by the more significant 'Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature' (1797); 'System of Transcendental Idealism' (1800); and 'The Nature of Human Freedom' (1809). His system, objective idealism, considered nature-phlosophy and spirit-philosophy as co-ordinated and equal factors in the complete system of philosophy, instead of subordinating the objective (real, material) to the subjective (transcendental, ideal) as Fichte had done. Schopenhauer said von Schelling was the conciliator of idealism and realism; therefore artistic genius, which combines the expressions of objective and subjective, appeared to him to be the highest type of human consciousness. Von Schelling was greatly influenced by Spinoza and no doubt the Rosicrucians in his philosophy of the fundamental source from which both real and ideal are derived, i.e., the Infinite, which contains both real and transcendental ideals in harmony with an evolving and eternal universe. This Infinite, or God, is something akin to the will-to-live of Schopenhauer. Original complete works (14 vols., 1856-1861; new edition 1927) issued by his sons. See C. Frantz, 'Schelling's Positive Philosophy', 1879-80; J. Watson, 'Schelling's Transcendental Idealism', 1883; H. Knittermeyer, 'Schelling und die romantische Schule', 1928; and H. Fuhrmans, 'Schellings letzte Philosophie', 1940.

title: Talk:Friedrich von Schelling


text:
Dave Bartholomew

David Louis Bartholomew (December 24, 1918 – June 23, 2019) was an American musician, bandleader, composer, arranger, and record producer. He was prominent in the music of New Orleans throughout the second half of the 20th century. Originally a trumpeter, he was active in many musical genres, including rhythm and blues, big band, swing music, rock and roll, New Orleans jazz, and Dixieland. In his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, he was cited as a key figure in the transition from jump blues and swing to R&B and as "one of the Crescent City's greatest musicians and a true pioneer in the rock and roll revolution".

Many musicians have recorded Bartholomew's songs, but his partnership with Fats Domino produced some of his greatest successes. In the mid-1950s they wrote more than forty hits for Imperial Records, including the Billboard number one pop chart hit "Ain't That a Shame". Bartholomew's other hit songs as a composer include "I Hear You Knocking", "Blue Monday", "I'm Walkin'", "My Ding-a-Ling", and "One Night". He was a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame.

Early life
He was born Davis Bartholomew on December 24, 1918, in Edgard, Louisiana, to Mary and Louis Bartholomew. He learned to play his father's preferred instrument, the tuba, then took up the trumpet, taught to him by Peter Davis, who had also tutored Louis Armstrong. Around 1933, Bartholomew moved with his parents to New Orleans, where he played in local jazz and brass bands, including Papa Celestin's, as well as Fats Pichon's band on a Mississippi riverboat. He took charge of Pichon's band in 1941, and after a stay in Jimmie Lunceford's band joined the US Army during World War II. He developed writing and arranging skills as a member of the 196th Army Ground Forces Band.

Early music career
At the end of the war Bartholomew returned to New Orleans and, by November 1945, had started leading his own dance band, Dave Bartholomew and the Dew Droppers, named after a local hotel and nightclub, the Dew Drop Inn. The band became locally popular, described as "the bedrock of R&B in the city", and, according to the music historian Robert Palmer, was a "model for early rock 'n' roll bands the world over". A local journalist wrote of the band, in June 1946: "Putting it mildly, they make the house 'rock'." In 1947, they were invited by club owner Don Robey to perform in Houston, Texas, where Bartholomew met Lew Chudd, the founder of Imperial Records.

Bartholomew and his band made their first recordings, including "She's Got Great Big Eyes", at Cosimo Matassa's New Orleans studio for De Luxe Records in September 1947. Their first hit was "Country Boy", credited to Dave Bartholomew and His Orchestra, which reached No. 14 in the national Billboard R&B chart in early 1950. Prominent members of the band, besides Bartholomew on trumpet and occasional vocals, were the saxophonists Alvin Tyler, Herb Hardesty, and Clarence Hall, the bass player Frank Fields, the guitarist Ernest McLean, the pianist Salvador Doucette, and the drummer Earl Palmer. They were later joined by the saxophonist Lee Allen.

Imperial Records and Fats Domino
Two years after they had first met in Houston, Lew Chudd asked Bartholomew to become Imperial's A&R man in New Orleans. Bartholomew produced Imperial's first national hits, "3 x 7 = 21", written by him and recorded by the female singer Jewel King, and "The Fat Man", recorded in December 1949 by a young pianist, Fats Domino. "The Fat Man" — based on the drug-themed "Junker's Blues", with lyrics rewritten by Bartholomew and Domino to attract a wider audience — reached No. 2 on the R&B chart and eventually sold over one million copies, kicking off Domino's career.

Both records featured Bartholomew's band, as did a succession of further hits through the 1950s. Bartholomew's "genial, steady-rolling arrangements" contributed to the music's success. Cosimo Matassa said, 'Many times I think Fats' very salvation was Dave being able to be stern enough and rigid enough to insist on things getting done... He was adamant as he could be about the discipline of the players.'

Bartholomew left Imperial after a disagreement with Chudd at the end of 1950, and for two years he recorded for other labels, including Decca, King and Specialty. Among his recordings at King was "My Ding-a-Ling", which Bartholomew wrote and first recorded in January 1952; the song was later recorded by Chuck Berry, who had an international hit with it in 1972, although Berry substantially changed the song's arrangement and verses and claimed credit for writing it. While at Specialty, Bartholomew produced Lloyd Price's recording of "Lawdy Miss Clawdy", which featured Domino (uncredited) on piano. The single reached No. 1 on the R&B chart in mid-1952.

After that success, Bartholomew returned to Imperial to work again on Domino's recordings, co-writing and producing a series of R&B hits for him. Domino's crossover to the pop chart came in 1955 with "Ain't That a Shame" (initially titled "Ain't It A Shame"), on which Bartholomew deliberately sought to make Domino's style more appealing to white record buyers. Further, hits followed through the late 1950s and early 1960s: "I'm in Love Again" and "Blue Monday" (both in 1956), "I'm Walkin'" (1957), "I'm Gonna Be a Wheel Someday" (1959), "Let the Four Winds Blow" (1961) — all co-written and produced by Bartholomew — and "Blueberry Hill" (1956) and "Walking to New Orleans" (1960), also produced by Bartholomew.

Over the same period, Bartholomew wrote, arranged, and produced recordings by many other Imperial artists, including Smiley Lewis (for whom Bartholomew wrote "I Hear You Knocking" and "One Night", both of which were hits and were later recorded by other musicians), the Spiders, Chris Kenner, Earl King, Tommy Ridgley, Robert Parker, T-Bone Walker, Roy Brown, Frankie Ford, and Shirley and Lee (who recorded for Aladdin Records and for whom Bartholomew produced "Let the Good Times Roll"). Several of Bartholomew's songs were later covered by other musicians. "Ain't That A Shame" was recorded successfully by Pat Boone; "I Hear You Knocking" was a hit for Gale Storm in the 1950s and Dave Edmunds in the 1970s; "One Night" and "Witchcraft" were hits for Elvis Presley; and "I'm Walkin'" was a hit for Ricky Nelson. On various of his songs, a co-writing credit was given to his wife, Pearl King (sometimes confused with the musician Earl King).

Later life and death
After Imperial was sold to Liberty Records in Los Angeles in 1963, Bartholomew remained in New Orleans, working for Trumpet Records and Mercury Records and then establishing his own label, Broadmoor Records, in 1967. The label folded the following year, when its distributor, Dover Records, collapsed.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Bartholomew led a traditional Dixieland jazz band in New Orleans, releasing an album, Dave Bartholomew's New Orleans Jazz Band, in 1981. He also took part in Fats Domino's international tours during that period. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a non-performer in 1991, and released two further albums in that decade, Dave Bartholomew and the Maryland Jazz Band (1995) and New Orleans Big Beat (1998), while continuing to make occasional appearances with his band at festivals.

Bartholomew married Pearl King in 1942. After her death in 1967 he married Rhea (née Douse), with whom he had four sons and one daughter. He remained a resident of New Orleans, and celebrated his 100th birthday on Christmas Eve 2018, but plans for a celebration concert were suspended after he was hospitalized.

Bartholomew died of heart failure at East Jefferson General Hospital in Metairie, Louisiana on June 23, 2019, and was buried at St Gabriel the Archangel Catholic Church in Gentilly.

title: Dave Bartholomew


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File:Negativland-EscapeFromNoise.jpg

Licensing
This claim is under peer review at Fair use. —LarryGilbert 15:58, 2004 Mar 12 (UTC)

title: File:Negativland-EscapeFromNoise.jpg


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Comic timing

Comic timing or comedic timing emerges from a performer's joke delivery: they interact with an audience—intonation, rhythm, cadence, tempo, and pausing—to guide the audience's laughter, which then guides the comedic narrative. The pacing of the delivery of a joke can have a strong impact on its comedic effect, even altering its meaning; the same can also be true of more physical comedy such as slapstick. Comic timing is also crucial for comedic video editing to maximize the impact of a joke, for example, through a smash cut.

History
The use of comic timing can be first observed in the comic plays of the ancient Greeks. Specifically, Aristophanes indicated brief pauses in his works, such as The Clouds, in order to elicit laughter from the unfolding events. William Shakespeare, along with comic playwrights before him, also utilized comic timing in much of his plays. For example, Cleopatra's strategic interjections during Mark Antony's speech in Act 1 Scene 2 of Antony and Cleopatra, shift an otherwise serious scene to a comic one. George Bernard Shaw notably continued the usage of comic timing into the late 19th century. In his 1894 play Arms and the Man for instance, Shaw triggers laughter near the end of Act 2 through Nicola's calculated eruptions of composure.

While the use of comic timing continued to flourish on stage, by the mid-20th century, comic timing became integral to comedy film, television and stand-up comedy. In movies, comedians such as Charlie Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy and Buster Keaton perfected their comedic performances through precise timing in films like One A.M., The Lucky Dog, and The Playhouse respectively. In television, Lucille Ball notably utilized comic timing in her show I Love Lucy. For example, in the episode "Lucy Does a TV Commercial" Ball acts out an advertisement within a fake television set, but ruins the illusion by a comically timed break of the TV's fourth wall. In stand-up, George Carlin's routine "Seven Words You Can't Say on Television" gets a laugh from the timing difference between the delivery of the first 6 words and the seventh. Additionally, Rowan Atkinson's routine "No One Called Jones" utilized a slow comic timing in his list of students' names to reveal multiple double entendres.

While the above history highlights specific writers and performers, all workers in comedy, from Victor Borge to Sacha Baron Cohen and beyond, have utilized comic timing to deliver their humour most effectively.

Beat
A beat is a pause taken for the purposes of comic timing, often to allow the audience time to recognize the joke and react, or to heighten the suspense before delivery of the expected punch line. Pauses—sometimes called "dramatic pauses" —in this context, can be used to distinguish subtext or even unconscious content—that is, what the speaker is really thinking about. A pause can also be used to heighten a switch in direction. As a speaker talks, the audience naturally "fills in the blanks", finishing the expected end of the thought. The pause allows this to happen before the comedian delivers a different outcome, thus surprising the listener and (hopefully) evoking laughter.

Pregnant pause
A pregnant pause (as in the classical definition, "many possibilities") is a technique of comic timing used to accentuate a comedy element, which uses comic pauses at the end of a phrase to build up suspense. It is often used at the end of a comically awkward statement or in the silence after a seemingly non-comic phrase to build up a comeback. Refined by Jack Benny, who introduced specific body language and a phrase in his pregnant pauses, the pregnant pause has become a staple of stand-up comedy.

title: Comic timing


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Keola Beamer

Keola Beamer (born Keolamaikalani Breckenridge Beamer February 18, 1951) is a Hawaiian slack-key guitar player, best known as the composer of "Honolulu City Lights" and an innovative musician who fused Hawaiian roots and contemporary music. Keola Beamer descends from one of Hawaii's most respected musical families.

Family
Keola was born in Hawaii on February 18, 1951. His mother, Winona Beamer ("Auntie Nona") was one of the most important figures in the revival of Hawaiian culture. She was a composer, dancer and educator. His ancestors were musicians for the previous five generations. He can trace his roots to the House of Kamehameha and Ahiakumai, 15th century rulers of Hawaii. His great-grandmother was Helen Desha Beamer, an influential songwriter and hula dancer. His father is Odell Steppe. Beamer is also a cancer survivor.

Career
Beamer's career began in the early 1970s. His debut recording in 1972 was headlined "Jack de Mello presents Keola Beamer" and titled "Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar in the Real Old Style", followed in the same year by an album with his brother Kapono in 1972. This second album was headlined "Jack de Mello presents Keola and Kapono Beamer" and titled "This Is Our Island Home - We Are Her Sons," and subtitled "Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar in the Real Old Style". The album featured traditional songs as well as songs composed by Keola, Kapono, and Winona. Keola and Kapono performed as a duo, mixing traditional materials and styles with mainland pop influences. In their seven albums over the next decade, they played an important part in establishing the style that came to be called "Hawaiian contemporary," rooted in Hawaiian language and tradition but open to influences from elsewhere, incorporating rock, pop, Latin, folk-revival singer-songwriter, Hollywood soundtrack, and more. Their ' 1978 LP Honolulu City Lights title song was a popular single in Hawaii, and in 2004 Honolulu Magazine placed the album first on a list of the fifty most important Hawaiian albums. In the 1980s, the brothers separated professionally, each producing award-winning records. After several pop-oriented albums, Keola connected with George Winston's Dancing Cat recording project for five releases between 1994 and 2002, emphasizing slack key guitar and Hawaiian lyrics, but without abandoning "contemporary" influences. Beamer is influential as a teacher. He started offering lessons in the early 1970s, at a time when most players would only play for family members. About 1972, Keola and Kapono provided slack key guitar lessons at the Guitar and Lute Workshop, a custom guitar manufacturer and recording studio located near Ala Moana Shopping Center on Piikoi Street. "In my early twenties, I was making guitars with George Gilmore and Donald Marienthal. We had the wild idea we could make nice guitars out of koa and mango wood so we took out a loan from the Small Business Administration and started the Guitar and Lute Workshop on Waimanu Street in Honolulu. People started coming in to ask about slack key. There were very few teachers back then, so I agreed to try it." Keola published an instruction manual entitled "Hawaiian Slack Key". Teaching became his occupation for several years until he turned to full-time performing and composing.

In 1973 he published First Method for the Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar (the first instruction book for the form), and in the 1990s he produced several more instruction books and videos and started offering lessons on-line via his website. Since 2001, he has run a series of "cultural immersion" workshops dedicated not only to slack key but other aspects of Hawaiiana. Meanwhile, he has continued to tour and to release CDs on his own 'Ohe Records label. In 2014, he was honored with a NACF Artist Fellowship for Music. He lives in Lahaina, Hawaii.

Beamer was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2012 under the Best Regional Roots Music Album category, which includes Hawaiian music. The same year the musical soundtrack for the motion picture movie Descendants was nominated for the Grammy Awards. Beamer played on and contributed to the work.

Beamer has influenced many guitar players.

Discography

 * Keola Beamer & Raiatea (2013)
 * Malama Ko Aloha (Keep Your Love) (2012)
 * Kahikina O Ka Hau (The Coming of the Snow) (2011)
 * Keola Beamer & Raiatea (2010)
 * Our Beloved Land (with R. Carlos Nakai) (2005)
 * Ki Ho'alu (Loosen the Key) DVD (2003)
 * Mohala Hou - Music of the Hawaiian Renaissance (2003)
 * Ka Leo O Loko - Soliloquy (2002)
 * Island Born (2001)
 * Kolohane - From the Gentle Wind (1999)
 * Mauna Kea - White Mountain Journal (1997)
 * The Golden Lehua Tree (narrated by Nona Beamer) (1996)
 * Moe'uhane Kika - Tales from the Dream Guitar (1995)
 * Wooden Boat (1994)
 * Sweet Maui Moon (1989)
 * Honolulu City Lights (1978)
 * Keola and Kapono Beamer (1976)
 * Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar in the Real Old Style (1972)

title: Keola Beamer


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Talk:Flexagon

A little pedantry to start
It is highly unlikely that Brit transplant Stone was using A4 paper in 1939. Much more plausible is that he was using foolscap which was one of the standard paper sizes in use in the UK until well into the 70s. According to the paper size entry herein A4 was adopted by the UK in 1959 but I have no recollection of seeing or indeed being aware of A4 until the late 70s. It's possible that despite its recognition it was regarded as another dirty European trick designed to drag the unwilling heirs of King Arthur into the 20th century.Cross Reference 23:17, 14 October 2007 (UTC)Cross Reference 23:12, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

This has apparently been updated in the page but the paragraph now disagrees with itself. It says he cut off foolscap (English size) to make letter (American) size but then that he cut off the American paper to fit his English binder. Ralimisoot (talk) 17:27, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. One of these must be incorrect. I'll try to track down a citation for this--looking for the Gardner column which might be the source. Tomajohnson (talk) 23:15, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

The Scientific American article reads: "Arthur H. Stone... found that he had to trim an inch off American notebook sheets to fit them into his English binder." Tomajohnson (talk) 20:35, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Early comments
this really needs a diagram. Kingturtle 08:12, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)
 * Provided a diagram of the tritetraflexagon. I'd like to do ones for the larger tetraflexagons too, but it'd just be duplication of the MathWorld page. --AlexChurchill 11:18, Sep 7, 2004 (UTC)

I would just like to point out that the so-called Tuckerman Traverse was also independently worked out by me, myself, when I was 11 years old, without any help from anyone. Bloody poncy mathematicians with their "look at us, we're so clever" attitude. A child could work that stuff out, and did. So there. Bonalaw
 * In reply to the last comment:
 * No one says that one needs to study maths for some 10 years and get those cert. to be good in maths. Even the most difficult unsolved maths problem didn't relate to anything advanced, it's just persistance and the faith that matter.
 * I remember from somewhere a physican said something like 'I was thinking a physics problem hard and have no idea, so I go out to have a walk and relax and I saw some children on the street, I asked them about that question, and, to my surprise, they answered it correctly straight away.'

 * I think the point of mentioning Tuckerman is to say that he was the first recorded person to disover it. It's a very common thing in mathematics of all branches for someone to discover something for themself and then discover someone else has done it earlier. Now, if anyone has a claim they discovered the Tuckerman traverse earlier than 1940, and published information on it somewhere, that might be worth mentioning here. --AlexChurchill 11:18, Sep 7, 2004 (UTC)

 * Yeah, sorry, just my deadpan sense of humour. Doesn't come across very well in type, I'm afraid. (Though I really did work it out independently, that bit is true.) I was rather surprised to find the concept being named for its discoverer though, given its obviousness. Has anyone discovered that water is wet yet? I'll have that one. Bonalaw 12:47, 13 Sep 2004 (UTC)
 * I guess a lot of enthusiastic young readers of Martin Gardner's column also worked out the theory for hexaflexagons, part of which became known as the Tuckerman traverse. I can recall doing likewise in my teenage years. DFH 19:56, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Tukey & Feynman "not published"?
The statement that the complete theory of flexagons developed by Tukey & Feynman was "not published" requires a citation. There are lots of theoretical works on flexagons that have been published since they worked on them, and it seems incredible that none of their early work has since surfaced. DFH 08:36, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Tuckerman traverse
I think a new page is needed for the Tuckerman traverse and related theory, so that this article doesn't become too unwieldy as an introduction to the subject. DFH 19:52, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Flexagons Inside Out
I found this description of the book by Les Pook, (DFH 14:28, 26 July 2006 (UTC))
 * Description: (182 pages) Photocopy and make flexagon nets plus explanation of maths at recreational level.Flexagons are paper models that can be flexed in different ways to change their shape. They are easy to make, and work in surprising ways. This book explains the maths behind flexagons and includes instructions to make them. Flexagons will appeal to anyone interested in puzzles or recreational maths.Flexagons are paper models that can be flexed in different ways to display different faces. They are easy to make, and work in surprising ways. This book contains numerous diagrams that the reader can photocopy and use to construct a variety of fascinating flexagons. Alongside this, the author also explains the mathematics behind these amazing creations. The technical details would require a mathematical background but the models can be made and used by anyone. Flexagons bring maths to life and will appeal to anyone interested in puzzles or recreational maths.Flexagons are hinged polygons that have the intriguing property of displaying different pairs of faces when they are flexed. Workable paper models of flexagons are easy to make and entertaining to manipulate. Flexagons have a surprisingly complex mathematical structure and just how a flexagon works is not obvious on casual examination of a paper model. Flexagons may be appreciated at three different levels. Firstly as toys or puzzles, secondly as a recreational mathematics topic and finally as the subject of serious mathematical study. This book is written for anyone interested in puzzles or recreational maths. No previous knowledge of flexagons is assumed, and the only pre-requisite is some knowledge of elementary geometry. An attractive feature of the book is a collection of nets, with assembly instructions, for a wide range of paper models of flexagons. These are printed full size and laid out so they can be photocopied.1. Making and flexing flexagons; 2. Early history of flexagons; 3. Geometry of flexagons; 4. Hexaflexagons; 5. Hexaflexagon variations; 6. Square flexagons; 7. Introduction to convex polygon flexagons; 8. Typical convex polygon flexagons; 9. Ring flexagons; 10. Distorted polygon flexagons; 11. Flexahedra.
 * An excellent resource for anyone with little previous knowledge to understand the basics, but with enough detail to satisfy the interest of all but the most ardent mathmos. Eureka
 * Pook's book summarizes a great deal of what is known about flexagons of all shapes and types, and contains much new material. An excellent purchase for someone who already knows something about flexagons and wants to know more. Ethan Berkove, Lafayette College.
 * This interesting book contains a wide collection of nets for making paper models of flexagons. Zentralblatt.

Images of irregular strips required to make flexagons
You can get images from The Colossal Book of Mathematics by Martin Gardner, which I possess. I unfortuantely doesn't have a scanner. If nyone would be kind enough to provide such images, it would be greatly appreciated.--24.149.204.116 14:51, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Procedure for Creation of Hexaflexagon Strips
Flexagons of every order may be created using the following procedure.

It is known that all flexagons are eventually folded into a hexagon. In order to generate the development, all we do is reverse the process. When folded, the hexagon has free edges indicated by thick lines in the figure (right). Unfolding at a triangle adjacent to either of these free edges generates a new triangle. The next free edge is found from this partial development by counting three triangles from the fold. This is similarly unfolded and the final free edge is again three triangles away from the previous fold. The three folds increases the number of triangles from six to nine. A tenth is added on the end to provide an overlap to stick the flexagon together, but the resulting straight strip is recognisable as the development of the trihexaflexagon. Taking this a stage further, the free edge is initially taken at an arbitrary point along the strip. The strip is unfolded. Again, counting three triangles along the strip a 'free edge' of the higher order development is found, this is unfolded. Note: the direction of the unfolding is always the same; in this case the first unfolding moves the right hand section of the strip up, the second moves the left end down. Looking along the strip from the right hand end, the development is unwound in a clockwise direction. Anti-clockwise is also correct, but the direction of 'unwinding' cannot change half way through the process. The process is repeated three times yielding the complete development of the next highest order flexagon (in this case the tetrahexaflexagon).

By repeating this process, developments of all possible hexaflexagons can be produced. Different variants arise from different choices of start position, and the ancestry of the development.

I have not included this in the article because I cannot find a reference for it. Gordon Vigurs 12:09, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Some help and feedback
In my online book thedreamingofvictoria.com I have used a trihexaflexagon in the narrative, and have added pages to demonstrate the making of a trihexaflexagon, and how a maze can be added to a trihexaflexagon's surface. There are photos and a video page. I would really appreciate any comments, especially if I can make things clearer, or have made a mistake. TIA. David Horsley 222.144.134.247 08:57, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

"Added, for the first time publicly, ....." ?
Describing the new section about the "Elusive 3 Extra Combinations" as being "Added, for the first time publicly,", comes perilously close to breaching Wikipedia guidelines on "No original research" WP:NOR, which is barely saved only by the untraced reference to the 1995 unpublished knowledge of the "Impossible Paper Company Inc". I am somewhat uneasy about letting this claim stand unsupported by a more precise reference. The added section is notable and fascinating, so I am not going to be so churlish as to delete it for the above reasons. Please try to fix it, and do so quickly. DFH 19:57, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Although I have no doubt to its veracity, it seems that that section is original research. So unless someone can find a reliable third-party source for it, it will have to be removed.  J kasd  06:43, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

minor editing help needed
I added a short section "Trihexaflexagon", and changed the name of the section listing the various types to "Inventory of flexagons" (question: is the Duahexa REALLY a flexagon, given the definition that flexing must reveal different faces???). My problem is that I would like to make my reference to this in "Trihexaflexagon" be a clickable link to the "inventory" but I don't know how to code it! -- Martha (talk) 19:30, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

questioning edits by 69.37.122.92
I noted that the text I had added in January (see above) about Trihexaflexagons was deleted yesterday by 69.37.122.92. This disturbs me - not because it was my contribution, but because the way it stands now, the whole article seems very insular and lopsided. It devotes a medium amount of attention to the Tritetraflexagon, most of the page including copious colorful pictures to the Hexahexaflexagon, and barely a few words to any of the other types. As it stands, I believe the page is a very poor example of a Wikipedia article and even incorrectly titled. While I could of course reinstate my contribution, I am not doing that at present because I believe the whole article needs re-working to make it "encyclopedia quality". Is anyone interested in working on this? —Martha (talk) 18:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Copied?
It looks like the section Inventory of flexagons was just copied from Mathematical Games. I don't think that this is a good idea. Can someone verify my suspicion? CHL (talk) 16:05, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yeah, it was. You're right that it is a bad idea as it probably was a copyright violation, so I removed it. I think I will also try to rewrite the whole article as it is not very encyclopedic as it stands.  J kasd  11:20, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Rewrite
Seeing as this article has some serious issues. I am currently trying to rewrite it at User:Jkasd/Misc_draft. Feel free to edit that page directly. My main goals are to remove the original research and how-to content, and to introduce formal definitions and such to the article.  J kasd  02:53, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Plagiarism
The very first version of the article, in 2002, was taken pretty much verbatim from this book. Some of the text in the lead was recently replaced, but we might want to check and see if there's more still there. Oops, no. This 2004 book contains text from the original 2002 version of the wikipedia article, and claims copyright on it. Who plagiarized whom here? Dicklyon (talk) 03:02, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure, probably best just to rewrite that part. I have previously removed an other section of this article that was taken almost word for word from Martin Gardner's book: Hexaflexagons and Other Mathematical Diversions.  J kasd  03:06, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

They're easy to make
I did this in our AP calc clase to show everyone. They minds were blown away, even the teach himself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.165.117.4 (talk) 18:41, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

Need for expansion
After cleaning up a ton of how-to content, the core of the article is now pretty sparse. There's a need for expansion and cleanup in the tetraflexagon and hexaflexagon sections, especially. The article could probably benefit from some generalized discussion of the properties of fexagons.Tomajohnson (talk) 19:50, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Trihexaflexagon
The article presently says "This is the simplest of the hexaflexagons to make and to manage, and is made from a single strip of paper, divided into ten equilateral triangles." but flexagon.net suggests that 18 equilateral triangles in two rows of one strip of paper provides this. Any disagreement with "18"? Boud (talk) 21:06, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

The diagram says "This trihexaflexagon template shows 3 colors of 9 triangles, ..." but instead it shows 2 colours each of 3 parallelgrams and 1 colour of 2 parallelograms and 2 triangles. This could possibly be described as 3 colours each of 3 pairs of equilateral triangles. Any objections to correcting this? Boud (talk) 21:06, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

Vi Hart video for popular culture section?
This video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIVIegSt81k) by vihart has 7.8M views. Would it be appropriate for consideration in the `In popular culture` section? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ryanguill (talk • contribs) 04:20, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Remove Flextangle?
I think the bit about one particular flextangle (under "In Popular Culture") should be removed, since flextangles are not flexagons. (Plus there are many, many other flextangles out there besides this Wrinkle in Time one. There's no reason to start with this one. If it should be kept, then the flextangle "variety" should be added to the list of varieties.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sjohnson.sc (talk • contribs) 18:49, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I split a new article kaleidocycle/flextangles. Tom Ruen (talk) 19:40, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

Chrysler logo
As someone unfamiliar with the Chrysler logo (not a common brand in my country) this description is confusing. The linked Chrysler Wikipedia page shows the Stellantis logo, which is a series of dots in a circle, and further down the page is the Chrysler logo which is the word “Chrysler” with wings attached. A pentagon logo that matches the description on this page can be found on the “History of Chrysler” page, in the Logos/pentestar section. Is there a way to directly link there? 118.149.78.44 (talk) 23:38, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Vi Hart video
Pinging are there any sources at all for the Vi Hart video? Otherwise, I will have to remove it. Dialmayo 16:57, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Flexagon


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Coprolite

A coprolite (also known as a coprolith) is fossilized feces. Coprolites are classified as trace fossils as opposed to body fossils, as they give evidence for the animal's behaviour (in this case, diet) rather than morphology. The name is derived from the Greek words κόπρος (kopros, meaning "dung") and λίθος (lithos, meaning "stone"). They were first described by William Buckland in 1829. Before this, they were known as "fossil fir cones" and "bezoar stones". They serve a valuable purpose in paleontology because they provide direct evidence of the predation and diet of extinct organisms. Coprolites may range in size from a few millimetres to over 60 centimetres.

Coprolites, distinct from paleofeces, are fossilized animal dung. Like other fossils, coprolites have had much of their original composition replaced by mineral deposits such as silicates and calcium carbonates. Paleofeces, on the other hand, retain much of their original organic composition and can be reconstituted to determine their original chemical properties, though in practice the term coprolite is also used for ancient human fecal material in archaeological contexts.

Initial discovery
British fossil hunter Mary Anning noticed as early as 1824 that "bezoar stones" were often found in the abdominal region of ichthyosaur skeletons found in the Lias formation at Lyme Regis. She also noted that if such stones were broken open they often contained fossilized fish bones and scales as well as sometimes bones from smaller ichthyosaurs. These observations by Anning led the geologist William Buckland to propose in 1829 that the stones were fossilized feces and name them coprolites. Buckland also suspected that the spiral markings on the fossils indicated that ichthyosaurs had spiral ridges in their intestines similar to those of modern sharks and that some of these coprolites were black with ink from swallowed belemnites.

Research value
By examining coprolites, paleontologists are able to find information about the diet of the animal (if bones or other food remains are present), such as whether it was a herbivore or a carnivore, and the taphonomy of the coprolites, although the producer is rarely identified unambiguously, especially with more ancient examples. In some instances, knowledge about the anatomy of animals' digestive tracts can be helpful in assigning a coprolite to the animal that produced it, one example being the finding that the Triassic dinosauriform Silesaurus may have been an insectivore, a suggestion which was based on the beak-like jaws of the animal and the high density of beetle remains found in associated coprolites. Further, coprolites can be analyzed for certain minerals that are known to exist in trace amounts in certain species of plant that can still be detected millions of years later. In rare cases, coprolites have even been found to contain well-preserved insect remains.

Recognizing coprolites

The recognition of coprolites is aided by their structural patterns, such as spiral or annular markings, content, undigested food fragments, and associated fossil remains. The smallest coprolites are often difficult to distinguish from inorganic pellets or from eggs. Most coprolites are composed chiefly of calcium phosphate, along with minor quantities of organic matter. By analyzing coprolites, it is possible to infer the diet of the animal which produced them.

Coprolites have been recorded in deposits ranging in age from the Cambrian period to recent times and are found worldwide. Some of them are useful as index fossils, such as Favreina from the Jurassic period of Haute-Savoie in France.

Some marine deposits contain a high proportion of fecal remains. However, animal excrement is easily fragmented and destroyed, so usually has little chance of becoming fossilized.

Coprolite mining
In 1842 the Rev John Stevens Henslow, a professor of botany at St John's College, Cambridge, discovered coprolites just outside Felixstowe in Suffolk in the villages of Trimley St Martin, Falkenham and Kirton and investigated their composition. Realising their potential as a source of available phosphate once they had been treated with sulphuric acid, he patented an extraction process and set about finding new sources.

Very soon, coprolites were being mined on an industrial scale for use as fertiliser due to their high phosphate content. The major area of extraction occurred over the east of England, centred on Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely with its refining being carried out in Ipswich by the Fison Company. There is a Coprolite Street near Ipswich docks where the Fisons works once stood.

The industry declined in the 1880s but was revived briefly during the First World War to provide phosphates for munitions. A renewed interest in coprolite mining in the First World War extended the area of interest into parts of Buckinghamshire as far west as Woburn Sands.

title: Coprolite