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Islam in Italy

Islam is a minority religion in Italy. Muslim presence in Italy dates back to the 9th century, when Sicily came under control of the Aghlabid Dynasty. There was a large Muslim presence in Italy from 827 (the first occupation of Mazara) until the 12th century. The Norman conquest of Sicily led to a gradual decline of Islam, due to the conversions and emigration of Muslims toward Northern Africa. A small Muslim community however survived at least until 1300 (the destruction of the Muslim settlement of Lucera).

During the 20th century, the first Somali immigrants from Italian Somaliland began to arrive. In more recent years, there has been migration from Pakistan, the Balkans, Bangladesh, India, Morocco, Egypt, and Tunisia. There are also some converts to Islam in Italy (most notably on the island of Sicily).

Legal status
Islam is not formally recognised by the Italian state. The official recognition of a religion different from Catholicism on behalf of the Italian Government is in fact to be approved by the President of the Republic under request of the Italian Minister of the Interior, following a signed agreement between the proposing religious community and the government. Such recognition does not merely depend on the number of followers of a given religion, and it requires congruence between the proposing religion principles and the Constitution. Official recognition gives an organised religion a chance to benefit from a national "religion tax", known as the Eight per thousand. Other religions, including Judaism and smaller groups, such as the Assemblies of God, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Seventh-day Adventists, already enjoy the official recognition in the form of signed agreements with the Italian government. In late 2004, Italian minister, Giuseppe Pisanu set out in an attempt to create a unified leadership amongst the Muslim community. In 2005, the Consulta per l'Islam Italiano was created. This council is composed of 16 members of the Muslim population that are elected by the Ministry of Interiors. The goal of this council was for the Muslim community to have frequent and harmonious dialogues with the Italian government. The Consulta does not have any real power to make binding decisions. It exists as a platform for the Muslim community. Strong disagreement between Council members slows its work.

Saracens
The Italian island of Pantelleria (which lies between the western tip of Sicily and North Africa) was conquered by the Umayyads in 700. The Arabs had earlier raided Roman Sicily in 652, 667 and 720 A.D.; Syracuse in the eastern end of the island was occupied for the first time temporarily in 708, but a planned invasion in 740 failed due to a rebellion of the Berbers of the Maghreb that lasted until 771 and civil wars in Ifriqiya lasting until 799.

Arab attacks on the island of Sardinia were less significant than those on Sicily and eventually failed to achieve the island's conquest, although they induced its separation from the Roman Empire, giving birth to a long period of Sardinian independence, the era of the Judicates.

Conquest of Sicily
According to some sources, the conquest was spurred by Euphemius, a Byzantine commander who feared punishment by Emperor Michael II for a sexual indiscretion. After a short-lived conquest of Syracuse, he was proclaimed emperor but was compelled by loyal forces to flee to the court of Ziyadat Allah in Ifriqiya. The latter agreed to conquer Sicily, with the promise to leave it to Euphemius in exchange for a yearly tribute. To end the constant mutinies of his army, the Aghlabid magistrate of Ifriqiya sent Arabian, Berber, and Andalusian rebels to conquer Sicily in 827, 830 and 875, led by, amongst others, Asad ibn al-Furat. Palermo fell to them in 831, followed by Messina in 843, Syracuse in 878. In 902, the Ifriqiyan magistrate himself led an army against the island, seizing Taormina in 902. Reggio Calabria on the mainland fell in 918, and in 964 Rometta, the last remaining Byzantine toehold on Sicily.

Under the Muslims, agriculture in Sicily prospered and became export oriented. Arts and crafts flourished in the cities. Palermo, the Muslim capital of the island, had 300,000 inhabitants at that time, more than all the cities of Germany combined. The local population conquered by the Muslims were Romanized Catholic Sicilians in Western Sicily and partially Greek speaking Christians, mainly in the eastern half of the island, but there were also a significant number of Jews. These conquered people were afforded freedom of religion under the Muslims as dhimmis. The dhimmi were also required to pay the jizya, or poll tax, and the kharaj or land tax, but were exempt from the tax that Muslims had to pay (Zakaat). The payment of the Jizya is payment for state services and protection against foreign and internal aggression as non Muslims did not pay the Zakaat tax. The conquered population could instead pay the Zakaat tax by converting to Islam. Large numbers of native Sicilians converted to Islam. However, even after 100 years of Islamic rule, numerous Greek-speaking Christian communities prospered, especially in north-eastern Sicily, as dhimmis. This was largely a result of the Jizya system which allowed co-existence. This co-existence with the conquered population fell apart after the reconquest of Sicily, particularly following the death of King William II of Sicily in 1189. By the mid-11th century, Muslims made up the majority of the population of Sicily.

Emirates in Apulia
From Sicily, the Muslims launched raids on the mainland and devastated Calabria. In 835 and again in 837, the Duke of Naples was fighting against the Duke of Benevento and appealed to the Sicilian Muslims for help. In 840 Taranto and Bari fell to the Muslims, and in 841 Brindisi. Muslim attacks on Rome failed in 843, 846 and 849. In 847 Taranto, Bari and Brindisi declared themselves emirates independent from the Aghlabids. For decades the Muslims ruled the Mediterranean and attacked the Italian coastal towns. Muslims occupied Ragusa in Sicily between 868 and 870.

Only after the fall of Malta in 870 did the occidental Christians succeed in setting up an army capable of fighting the Muslims. Over the next two decades, most of the territory held by Muslims on the mainland was liberated from Muslim rule. The Franco-Roman emperor Louis II reconquered Brindisi in 869, Bari in 871 and beat the Arabs at Salerno in 872. The Byzantines retook Taranto in 880. In 882 the Muslims had founded at the mouth of Garigliano between Naples and Rome a new base further in the north, which was in league with Gaeta, and had attacked Campania as well as Sabinia in Lazio. In 915, Pope John X organised a vast alliance of southern powers, including Gaeta and Naples, the Lombard princes and the Byzantines. The subsequent Battle of the Garigliano was successful, and all Saracens were captured and executed, ending any presence of Arabs in Lazio or Campania permanently. A hundred years later, the Byzantines called the Sicilian Muslims to ask for support against a campaign of German emperor Otto II. They beat Otto at the battle of Stilo in 982 and for the next 40 years largely succeeded in preventing his successors from entering southern Italy.

In 1002 a Venetian fleet defeated Muslims besieging Bari. After the Aghlabids were defeated in Ifriqiya as well, Sicily fell in the 10th century to their Fatimid successors, but claimed independence after fights between Sunni and Shia Muslims under the Kalbids.

Raids in Piedmont
After they had conquered the Visigoth Kingdom in Spain (729–765), the Arabs and Berbers from Septimania and Narbonne carried out raids into northern Italy, and in 793 again launched an offensive into northwestern Italy (Nicaea 813, 859 and 880). In 888, Andalusian Muslims set up a new base in Fraxinet near Fréjus in French Provence, from where they started raids along the coast and in inner France.

In 915, after the Battle of Garigliano, the Muslims lost their base in southern Lazio. In 926 King Hugh of Italy called the Muslims to fight against his northern Italian rivals. In 934 and 935 Genoa and La Spezia were attacked, followed by Nicaea in 942. In Piedmont the Muslims got as far as Asti and Novi, and also moved northwards along the Rhône valley and the western flank of the Alps. After defeating Burgundian troops, in 942–964 they conquered Savoy and occupied a part of Switzerland (952–960). To fight the Arabs, Emperor Berengar I, Hugh's rival, called the Hungarians, who in their turn devastated northern Italy. As a result of the Muslim defeat at the Battle of Tourtour, Fraxinet was lost and razed by the Christians in 972. Thirty years later, in 1002, Genoa was invaded, and in 1004 Pisa.

Pisa and Genoa joined forces to end Muslim rule over Corsica (Islamic 810/850-930/1020) and Sardinia. In Sardinia in 1015 the fleet of the Andalusian lord of Dénia come from  Spain, settled a temporary military camp as a logistic base to control the Tyrrhenian Sea and Italian peninsula, but in 1016 the fleet was forced to leave its base due to the military intervention of maritime republics of Genoa and Pisa.

Sicily under the Normans

The cultural and economical bloom in Sicily that had started under the Kalbids was interrupted by internecine fights, followed by invasions by the Tunisian Zirids (1027), Pisa (1030–1035), and the Romans (1027 onwards). Eastern Sicily (Messina, Syracuse and Taormina) was captured by the Byzantines in 1038–1042. In 1059 Normans from southern Italy, led by Roger I, invaded the island. The Normans conquered Reggio in 1060 (conquered by the Romanin 1027). Messina fell to the Normans in 1061; an invasion by the Algerian Hammadids to preserve Islamic rule was thwarted in 1063 by the fleets of Genoa and Pisa. The loss of Palermo in 1072 and of Syracuse in 1088 could not be prevented. Noto and the last Muslim strongholds on Sicily fell in 1091. In 1090–91, the Normans also conquered Malta; Pantelleria fell in 1123.

A small Muslim population remained on Sicily under the Normans. Roger II hosted at his court, among others, the famous geographer Muhammad al-Idrisi and the poet Muhammad ibn Zafar. At first, Muslims were tolerated by the Normans, but soon pressure from the Popes led to their increasing discrimination; most mosques were destroyed or made into churches. The first Sicilian Normans did not take part in the Crusades, but they undertook a number of invasions and raids in Ifriqiya, before they were defeated thereafter 1157 by the Almohads.

This peaceful coexistence in Sicily finally ended with the death of King William II in 1189. The Muslim elite emigrated at that time. Their medical knowledge was preserved in the Schola Medica Salernitana; an Arabian-Roman-Norman synthesis in art and architecture survived as Sicilian Romanesque. The remaining Muslims fled, for example to Caltagirone on Sicily, or hid out in the mountains and continued to resist against the Hohenstaufen dynasty, who ruled the island from 1194 on. In the heartland of the island, the Muslims declared Ibn Abbad the last Emir of Sicily.

To end this upheaval, emperor Frederick II, himself a Crusader, instigated a policy to rid Sicily of the few remaining Muslims. This cleansing was done in small part under Papal influence but mostly in order to create a loyal force of troops which could not be influenced by non-Christian infiltrators. In 1224–1239 he deported every single Muslim from Sicily to an autonomous colony under strict military control (so that they could not infiltrate non-Muslim areas) in Lucera in Apulia. Muslims were recruited however by Frederick in the army and constituted his faithful personal bodyguard, since they had no connection to his political rivals. In 1249, he ejected the Muslims from Malta as well. Lucera was returned to the Christians in 1300 at the instigation of the pope by King Charles II of Naples. Muslims were forcefully converted, killed or expelled from Europe. However a Muslim community was still recorded in Apulia in 1336 and very recently in 2009, a genetic study revealed a small genetic Northwest African contribution among today's inhabitants near the region of Lucera.

During Spanish rule of Sicily
During Spanish rule of Sicily, and to escape the Spanish inquisition of the Moriscos (Muslims who had converted to Christianity) in the Iberian peninsula, a few Moriscos migrated to Sicily. During this time there were several attempts to rid Sicily of its extensive formerly Muslim 'Moor' population. The attacks were also directed against crypto-Muslim slaves and Sicilian renegades who refused to deny Islam during the 16th and the 17th centuries. However, it is doubtful that the order was carried out in practice. The main reason that some former Muslims were able to remain in Sicily was that they were openly supported by The Duke of Osuna, now officially installed as viceroy in Palermo, advocated to the Spanish monarch in Madrid for allowing the Moriscos to stay in Sicily.

15th century: Ottomans in Otranto
During this century, the Ottoman Empire was expanding mightily in southeastern Europe. It completed the absorption of the Byzantine Empire in 1453 under Sultan Mehmet II by conquering Constantinople and Galata. It seized Genoa's last bastions in the Black Sea in 1475 and Venice's Greek colony of Euboea in 1479. Turkish troops invaded the Friuli region in northeastern Italy in 1479 and again in 1499–1503. The Apulian harbor town of Otranto, located about 100 kilometers southeast of Brindisi, was seized in 1480 (Ottoman invasion of Otranto), but the Turks were routed there in 1481 by an alliance of several Italian city-states, Hungary and France led by the prince Alphonso II of Naples, when Mehmet died and a war for his succession broke out. Cem Sultan, pretender to the Ottoman throne, was defeated despite being supported by the pope; he fled with his family to the Kingdom of Naples, where his male descendants were bestowed with the title of Principe de Sayd by the Pope in 1492. They lived in Naples until the 17th century and in Sicily until 1668 before relocating to Malta.

Attacks in the 16th century
It is a subject of debate whether Otranto was meant to be the base for further conquests. In any case, the Ottoman sultans had not given up their ambition to take over the Italian Peninsula and to finally install Islamic sovereignty after the conquest of Constantinople. After the conquests of Ragusa (Dubrovnik) and Hungary in 1526 and the defeat of the Turkish army at Vienna in 1529, Turkish fleets again attacked southern Italy. Reggio was sacked in 1512 by the famous Turkish corsair Khayr al-Din, better known by the nickname of Barbarossa; in 1526 the Turks attacked Reggio again, but this time suffered a setback and were forced to turn their sights elsewhere. In 1538 they defeated the Venetian fleet. In 1539 Nice was raided by the Barbary pirates (Siege of Nice), but an attempted Turkish landing on Sicily failed, as did the attempted conquest of Pantelleria in 1553 and the siege of Malta in 1565.

Next to Spain, the biggest contribution to the victory of the Christian "Holy League" in the battle of Lepanto in 1571 was made by the Republic of Venice, which between 1423 and 1718 fought eight costly wars against the Ottoman Empire. In 1594, the city of Reggio was again sacked by Cığalazade Yusuf Sinan Pasha, a renegade who converted to Islam.

Present day
According to a 2016 Pew Research Center projection and Brookings, there are 1,400,000 Muslims in Italy (2.3% of the Italian population), almost one third of Italy's foreign population (250.000 have acquired Italian citizenship). The majority of Muslims in Italy are Sunni, with a Shi'ite minority. There are also a few Ahmadi Muslims in the country. This diversity has induced a lack of organization throughout the Italian Muslim community. As a result, the community also lacks cohesive leadership.

Despite undocumented immigrants representing a minority of the Muslims in Italy, considering that undocumented migrants and refugees predominantly come from Muslim countries, the issue of Islam in contemporary Italy has been linked by some political parties (particularly the Lega Nord) with immigration, and more specifically illegal immigration. Immigration has become a prominent political issue, as reports of boatloads of illegal immigrants (or clandestini) dominate news programmes, especially in the summertime. Police forces have not had great success in intercepting many of the thousands of clandestini who land on Italian beaches, mainly because of a political unwillingness, partly fostered by the EU, to address the issue. However, the vast majority of the clandestini landing in Italy are only using the country as a gateway to other EU states, due to the fact that Italy offers fewer economic opportunities and social welfare services for them than Germany, France, or the United Kingdom.

While in medieval times, the Muslim population was almost totally concentrated in Insular Sicily and in the city of Lucera, in Apulia, it is today more evenly distributed, with almost 60% of Muslims living in the North of Italy, 25% in the centre, and only 15% in the South. Muslims form a lower proportion of immigrants than in previous years, as the latest statistical reports by the Italian Ministry of Interior and Caritas indicate that the share of Muslims among new immigrants has declined from over 50% at the beginning of the 1990s (mainly Albanians and Moroccans) to less than 25% in the following decade, due to the massive arrivals from eastern Europe.

Recent points of contention between ethnic Italians and the Muslim immigrant population include the strong presence of crucifixes in public buildings, including school classrooms, government offices, and hospital wards. Adel Smith has attracted considerable media attention by demanding that crucifixes in public facilities be removed. The Italian Council of State, in the Sentence No. 556, 13 February 2006, confirmed the display of the crucifix in government sponsored spaces. Smith was subsequently charged with defaming the Catholic religion in 2006.

In November 2016, Minister of the Interior Angelino Alfano reported that Italy had deported nine imams for inciting racial violence.

In January 2017, community groups representing around 70% of the Muslim community in Italy signed a pact with the government to "reject all forms of violence and terrorism" and to hold prayers in mosques in the Italian language or at least to have them translated.

Muslim prison population in Italy
As of 2013, of the total 64,760 detainees in Italy, approximately 13,500 (20.8%) came from countries with Islamic majorities, mostly Morocco and Tunisia.

Mosques
There are a total of eight mosques in Italy. While Italy is home to the fourth largest Muslim population in Europe, the number of mosques is minute in comparison to France (which is home to over 2,200 mosques) and the United Kingdom (which is home to over 1,500 mosques). The scarcity of mosques in Italy is caused predominantly by the fact that Italy does not officially recognize Islam as a religion. Official state recognition would guarantee and protect places of worship, recognize religious holidays and allow access to public funding.

There have been a number of cases of extraordinary rendition of Muslim activists, as well as attempts by a past government to close mosques. Many mosque constructions are blocked by opposition of local residents. In September 2008 the Lega Nord political party was reported to have introduced a new bill which would have blocked the construction of new mosques in much of the country, arguing that Muslims can pray anywhere, and do not need a mosque. The construction of mosques had already been blocked in Milan. The bill was not approved.

Extremism
In 2007, the Moroccan imam at the mosque in Ponte Felcino in Perugia was deported by the Italian government for extremist views.

Deportation (expulsion) of foreign suspects have been the cornerstone of Italy's preventive counter-terrorism fight against suspected radicals. Every deportee is prohibited from re-entering Italy and therefore the entire Schengen Area, for a period of five years. Italy is able to use this method as many radicalized Muslims are first-generation immigrants and therefore have not yet acquired Italian citizenship. In Italy as elsewhere in Europe, prison inmates show signs of radicalization while incarcerated and in 2018, 41 individuals were deported upon release from prison. Of the 147 deported by the Italian government in the 2015–2017 all were related to jihadism and 12 were imams. From January 2015 to April 2018, 300 individuals were expulsed from Italian soil. The vast majority of the deportees come from North Africa and a smaller group come from the Balkans.

In the mid to late 2010s, a "homegrown" Islamist movement started to emerge in Italy with Islamists writing online content in Italian. While radicalized individuals may get in contact with fellow extremists at mosques, indoctrination and planning of violence take place elsewhere.

From 1 August 2016 to 31 July 2017, a total of eight imams were deported. The following twelve-month period, two were deported.

In July 2016, the Moroccan imam at the Asonna center in Noventa Vicentina was deported for reportedly expressing extremist views and for posing a security threat. While most extremists are banned for 5 to 10 years, Muhammed Madad was banned from returning for 15 years.

In March 2018, police carried out an anti-terrorist operation in Foggia against the Al Dawa unauthorized prayer hall located near the railway station. Egyptian Abdel Rahman Mohy preached to children using Islamic State propaganda.

According to prison authorities in Italy, in October 2018 there were 66 Muslim detainees who either had been sentenced or were awaiting trial for terrorism offences.

Islamophobia
Although Muslim population in Italy is very small compared to its counterparts in France, Germany, Britain and Spain, anti-Islamic feeling in Italy runs high, which became clear following the September 11 attacks and 7 July 2005 London bombings. Survey published in 2019 by the Pew Research Center found that 55% of Italians had an unfavourable view of Muslims. Much of the local Italian media correlates Islam to terrorism as a whole. This contributes to these unfavorable opinions.

Acts of violence against Islamic places of worship
In recent years there have been some acts of violence against Islamic places of worship in Italy:

 * On April 24, 1994, a Molotov cocktail caused a fire at the small mosque in albenga's old
 * Anti-Islamic attacks following the September 2001 bombings in Sicily and Southern Italy
 * On January 24, 2004, a rock thrown from a car broke through the window of the entrance to the Mosque of Segrate,
 * In April 2004, the Mosque of Mercy in Savona was the subject of discriminatory spray writing on the door, including a swastika.
 * On the night of 3–4 August 2010, an arson attack was carried out in the offices of the Luce mosque in Bologna by unknown persons who entered it by cutting through the fences with a shear. The act has been condemned by the Jewish community in Bologna and by various political forces.

Organizations
A minority of Italian Muslims belong to religious associations, the best known of which are:

 * UCOII Unione delle Comunità Islamiche d'Italia (Union of the Islamic Communities and Organizations of Italy)
 * Since its founding, the union has been active in the political scene, recently attempting to become the primary Islamic liaison.
 * CICI, Centro Islamico Culturale d'Italia, which has its seat in the Mosque of Rome, which is reputed to be the largest mosque in Europe
 * COREIS, Comunità Religiosa Islamica Italiana, which has its seat in Milan, but also a branch in Rome.
 * USMI, Union of Muslim Students in Italy
 * Founded in the 1970s in Perugia and composed mostly of Jordanian, Syrian and Palestine students, the group's ideology is quite similar to the Muslim Brotherhood, the transnational Islamic movement in Egypt in the 1920s.

Notable Muslims

 * Edoardo Agnelli, businessman
 * Gabriele Torsello, freelance journalist
 * Ahmad Gianpiero Vincenzo, founder and president of the organization Intelletuali Musulmani Italiani (Italian Muslim Intellectuals)
 * Torquato Cardilli, diplomat
 * Vinnie Paz, lyricist and singer
 * Leda Rafanelli, poet and publisher
 * Adel Smith, activist
 * Stephan El Shaarawy, footballer
 * Abd al Wahid Pallavicini, Sufi figure and founder of the Italian Islamic religious community (COREIS) and the Interreligious Studies Academy (Accademia ISA)
 * Khaby Lame, TikToker
 * Ghali, rapper

title: Islam in Italy


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Frock coat

A frock coat is a formal men's coat characterised by a knee-length skirt cut all around the base just above the knee, popular during the Victorian and Edwardian periods (1830s–1910s). It is a fitted, long-sleeved coat with a centre vent at the back and some features unusual in post-Victorian dress. These include the reverse collar and lapels, where the outer edge of the lapel is often cut from a separate piece of cloth from the main body and also a high degree of waist suppression around the waistcoat, where the coat's diameter round the waist is less than round the chest. This is achieved by a high horizontal waist seam with side bodies, which are extra panels of fabric above the waist used to pull in the naturally cylindrical drape. As was usual with all coats in the 19th century, shoulder padding was rare or minimal.

In the Age of Revolution around the end of the 18th century, men abandoned the justaucorps with tricorne hats for the directoire style: dress coat with breeches or increasingly pantaloons, and top hats. However, by the 1820s, the frock coat was introduced along with full-length trousers, perhaps inspired by the then casual country leisure wear frock. Early frock coats inherited the higher collars and voluminous lapels of the dress coat style at the time, and were sometimes offered in different, albeit increasingly dark, colours. Within its first next few years, though, plain black soon became the only established practice, and with a moderate collar. The top hat followed suit.

Although black trousers did occur, especially at daytime, the black frock coat was commonly worn with charcoal grey, pin-striped or checked formal trousers. The single-breasted frock coat sporting the notched (step) lapel was more associated with day-to-day professional informal wear. Yet, from the end of the 19th century, with the gradual introduction of the lounge suit, the frock coat came to embody the most formal wear for daytime. Especially so when double-breasted with peaked lapels, a style sometimes called a Prince Albert after Prince Albert, consort to Queen Victoria. The formal frock coat only buttoned down to the waist seam, which was decorated at the back with a pair of buttons. The cassock, a coat that is buttoned up to the neck, forming a high, stand-up Roman collar for clergymen, was harmonised to the style of the contemporary frock coat.

By the late 19th century, the knee-length dress coat, morning coat and shorter cut lounge suit were all standardized. While the dress coat and the morning coat are knee-length coats like the frock coat and traditionally share the waist seam of the precursor, they are distinguished by the cutaway of the skirt which gives dress coats and morning coats tails at the back. From the 1920s, the frock coat was increasingly replaced as day formal wear by the cut-away morning coat. In 1936, it was suspended from the protocol of audiences at the British royal court. While effectively relegated to a rarity in formal wear ever since, it does occur in certain formal marriages and traditional processions.

Name
The name frock coat appeared out from the earlier frock.

Earlier terminology also used redingote (or redingotte, redingot), derived from a French alteration of the English "riding coat", an example of reborrowing.

History
Frock coats emerged during the Napoleonic Wars, where they were worn by officers in the Austrian and various German armies during campaign. They efficiently kept the wearer warm as well as protecting his uniform. Privates and non-commissioned officers would wear greatcoats on campaign.

The earlier frock

During the mid seventeenth century the older doublets, ruffs, paned hose and jerkins were replaced by the precursor to the three piece suit comprising waistcoat, tight breeches and a long coat called a justacorps, topped by a powdered wig and tricorne hat. This coat, popularised by Louis XIII of France and Charles II of England, was knee length and looser fitting than the later frock coat, with turn-back cuffs and two rows of buttons. English and French noblemen often wore expensive brocade coats decorated with velvet, gold braid, embroidery and gold buttons to demonstrate their wealth.

Before the frock coat existed, there was another garment called the frock in the 18th century, which was probably unrelated to the frock coat, sharing only a similarity in name. The earlier frock was originally country clothing that increasingly became common around 1730. Formal dress was then so elaborate that it was impractical for everyday wear, so the frock became fashionable as half dress, a less formal alternative. By the 1780s the frock was worn widely as town wear and, towards the end of the 18th century, started to be made with a single-breasted cut away front and tails. It was thus the precursor to the modern dress coat worn with white tie dress code.

These relations can be seen in similar foreign terms. The modern word for a dress coat in Italian, French, Romanian and Spanish is frac; in German and Scandinavian languages Frack; and Portuguese fraque, used in the late 18th century to describe a garment very similar to the frock, being a single or double-breasted garment with a diagonally cutaway front in the manner of a modern morning coat. Even coats with horizontally cut away skirts like a dress coat were referred to as a frock in the late eighteenth and very early 19th century, before being renamed to dress coat.

This suggests that the earlier frock from the 18th century is more the direct ancestor of the modern dress coat, whereas the frock coat in the 19th century, the subject under discussion here, is a different garment altogether with separate military origins in the 19th century. However a remote historical connection to the frock cannot entirely be excluded, as is the case with similar looks variably referred to as redingote or riding coat.

Other meanings of the term frock include clerical garb and a type of woman's dress combining a skirt with a shirt–blouse top.

Military uniforms
The first military frock coats were issued late in the Napoleonic Wars to French line infantry and Prussian Landwehr troops. Unwilling to soil the expensive tail coats on campaign, the French adopted a loose fitting single-breasted coat with contrasting collar and cuffs. The Germans, having been devastated by years of war, were unable to afford elaborate uniforms like the British line infantry and chose a peaked cap and double-breasted blue coat, again with contrasting collar and cuffs, as these were cheaper to produce for the large numbers of recruits, smart enough for full dress and more practical for campaigns.

By the 1840s, frock coats were regulation for the American, Prussian, Russian and French armies. By 1834 officers of the British Army had adopted a dark blue/black frock coat for ordinary duties, derived from an earlier greatcoat worn during the Napoleonic period. US army officers were first issued navy blue frocks during the Mexican War, with gold epaulettes and peaked caps of the German pattern. Enlisted USMC personnel received a double breasted version with red piping worn with a leather stock and shako to reflect their status as an elite unit. Infantry soldiers continued to be issued the 1833 pattern shell jacket until the M1858 uniform complete with French style kepi entered service shortly before the US Civil War.

The earlier redingote
The men's redingote was an eighteenth-century or early-nineteenth-century long coat or greatcoat, derived from the country garment (i.e. derived from "riding coat") with a wide, flat collar called a frock. In French and several other languages, redingote is the usual term for a fitted frock coat. The form a men's redingote took could be of the tightly fitting frock coat style or the more voluminous, loose "great coat" style, replete with overlapping capes or collars, such as a "garrick" redingote, depending on fashion throughout its popularity.

During the 19th century the term redingote also applied to a military riding coat worn mainly by French cavalrymen. This took the form of a greatcoat with long skirts, extending over the sides of the horse being ridden.

The origins and rise of the frock coat

When the frock coat was first worn, correct daytime full dress was a dress coat. The frock coat began as a form of undress, the clothing worn instead of the dress coat in more informal situations. The coat itself was possibly of military origin. Towards the end of the 1820s, it started to be cut with a waist seam to make it more fitted, with an often marked waist suppression and exaggerated flair of the skirt. This hour-glass figure persisted into the 1840s. As the frock coat became more widely established around the 1850s, it started to become accepted as formal day time full dress, thus relegating the dress coat exclusively to evening full dress, where it remains today as a component of white tie. At this period, the frock coat became the most standard form of coat for formal day time dress. Through most of the Victorian era it continued to be worn in similar situations those in which the lounge suit is worn today such as in weddings, funerals and by professionals. It was the standard business attire of the Victorian era.

Prince Albert, consort to Queen Victoria, is usually credited with popularising the frock coat and even gave a synonym for its double-breasted version, a "Prince Albert". During the Victorian era, the frock coat rapidly became worn universally in Britain, Europe and America as standard formal business dress or for formal daytime events. It was considered the most correct form of morning dress for the time.

Notably, however, this time was before contemporary established dress code terminology and so definitions of formal attire, as well as morning and evening attire, were not altogether according to later standards.

The decline of the frock coat
Around the 1880s and increasingly through into the Edwardian era, an adaptation of the riding coat called a Newmarket coat, that rapidly and ever since became known as a morning coat, began to supplant the frock coat as daytime full dress. Once considered a casual equestrian sports coat, the morning coat slowly started to become both acceptable and increasingly popular, as a standard day-time town full dress alternative to the frock coat, a position which the morning coat enjoys to this day.

The morning coat was particularly popular amongst fashionable younger men and the frock coat increasingly came to be worn mostly by older conservative gentlemen. The morning coat gradually relegated the frock coat only to more formal situations, to the point that the frock coat eventually came to be worn only as court and diplomatic dress.

The lounge suit was once only worn as smart leisure wear in the country or at the seaside but in the middle of the 19th century started to rise rapidly in popularity. It took on the role of a more casual alternative to the morning coat for town wear, moving the latter up in the scale of formality. The more the morning coat became fashionable as correct daytime full dress, the more the lounge suit became acceptable as an informal alternative. Finally the frock coat became relegated to the status of ultra-formal day wear, worn only by older men. At the most formal events during the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, heads of government wore the frock coat but at more informal meetings they wore morning coats or even a lounge suit. In 1926, George V hastened the demise of the frock coat when he shocked the public by appearing at the opening of the Chelsea Flower Show wearing a morning coat. The frock coat barely survived the 1930s only as an ultra-formal form of court dress, until being finally officially abolished in 1936 as official court dress by Edward VIII (who later abdicated to become the Duke of Windsor). It was replaced by the morning coat, thus consigning the frock coat protocol-wise to the status of historic dress at the British royal court.

Since that time it has been worn sparingly, albeit arguably not altogether vanished (see section on contemporary use further below).

Formal wear
Frock coats worn with waistcoat and formal striped trousers are still very occasionally worn as daytime formal wear, especially to weddings, as an alternative to morning coats, in order to give the wedding attire a Victorian flavour. They are today usually only worn by the wedding party, where elements of historical costume are more acceptable and even this practice is unusual, as its role as a formal ceremonial coat in daytime formal wear has been long supplanted in modern dress code by the morning coat. Like morning coats, frock coats are only worn for daytime formal events before 5pm. and no later than until around 7pm.

Prior to the establishment of morning dress around the turn of the century in 1900, the expression "morning dress" tended to refer to frock coat, while gradually extending to mean both the frock coat and morning dress in the contemporary sense.

"The morning dress for gentlemen is a black frock coat or a black cut-away, white or black vest, according to the season, gray or colored pants, plaid or stripes according to the fashion, a high silk stove pipe hat and a black scarf or necktie. A black frock coat with black pants is not considered a good combination.. The morning dress is suitable for garden parties, Sundays, social teas, informal calls, morning calls and receptions."

"At afternoon funerals, wear a frock coat and top hat. Should the funeral be your own, the hat may be dispensed with."

Cloth
Standard fibres used for the frock coat included wool and vicuña. The most common weaves were known as broadcloth and duffel, both so called "heavy wools" manufactured along a process originating from Flanders in the 11th century (Flemish cloth). The standard colour of a civilian frock coat was solid black but later, in the Victorian era, charcoal grey became an acceptable but less common alternative and Midnight Blue was an even rarer alternative colour. For business and festive occasions the revers was lined with black silk facings (either satin or grosgrain). For funerals black frock coats without self-faced revers were worn with a matching black waistcoat. In military uniforms a wider variety of colours was and is common, prompting such colour names as "navy blue" and "cadet grey".

On more formal outings the coat was worn with a pair of cashmere striped morning trousers (cashmere stripes refers to the muted design in black, silver and charcoal grey, not the fibres of the cloth). However, trousers of muted checks were also worn in slightly more informal situations. In keeping with the rules set for morning dress, trousers matching the coat were considered a somewhat less formal alternative.

A matching black waistcoat was worn for more formal business or more solemn ceremonies. During the earlier Victorian period, colourful fancy waistcoats of silk were noted as being worn by gentlemen such as Charles Dickens. In summer a white or buff coloured linen waistcoat could be worn. For festive occasions a lighter coloured waistcoat such as light grey was permissible.

Cut
The length of the skirt of the frock coat varied during the Victorian era and Edwardian era according to fashion. The most conservative length became established as being to the knees but fashion conscious men would follow the latest trends to wear them either longer or shorter. Similarly, the height of the waist – the point of maximal waist suppression – changed according to fashion. During its heyday, the frock coat was cut following the 19th century ideal of flattering the natural elegance of the naked figure, based on the ideals of Neoclassicism that admired the depiction of the idealised nude in Classical Greco-Roman sculpture. The elegance of the form of the frock coat derived from its hourglass shape with a closely cut waist which at times around the 1830s-40's was reinforced further with padding to round out the chest. A cut with an ideal hourglass silhouette was achievable because coats during this era were all made bespoke, individually cut to the exact measurements of the customer. The 19th century aesthetics of tailoring contrasted markedly to the modern style of cutting suits which involves a greater degree of drape (fullness), as established by the great early 20th century Savile Row tailor Frederick Scholte. Caution needs to be exercised by modern tailors trained to create the drape cut style of modern lounge suits to minimise drape – particularly around the waist – when cutting a historically accurate frock coat. Sometimes, modern lounge suit coats with an unusually long skirt are referred to by ready-to-wear makers as a 'frock coat' but these lack the waist seam, resulting in the fuller drape more typical of a modern overcoat or a lounge suit jacket. The silhouette of the historically accurate frock coat has the waist seam precisely tailored to permit the classical and elongating hourglass figure with the strong waist suppression.

Details

Another characteristic of frock coats was their lack of any outer pockets. Only late in the Victorian and Edwardian era were they ever made with a chest pocket to sport a pocket square, a feature more typical of the modern lounge suit. Oscar Wilde, a famous dandy of his time, was often seen in portraits wearing just such a model but this was rather rare on frock coats; while in keeping with the flamboyant nature of Wilde's dress, it was frowned upon by traditionalists. Side pockets were always absent from frock coats but pockets were provided on the inside of the chest or inside the top part of the tail.

The buttons on a frock coat were always covered in cloth, often to match the silk on the revers, showing in the triangle of lining wrapped over the inside of the lapels. Another common feature was the use of fancy buttons with a snow-flake or check pattern woven over it.

Through most of the Victorian era until towards the end, the lapels were cut separately and sewn on later, apparently because it made the lapel roll more elegantly from bottom up. The lapel revers from the inside of the coat wrapped over to the front, creating a small triangle of silk, while the outer half was cut from two strips of the body fabric. This was a feature of double-breasted frock coats used on all such coats but morning and dress coats, which had previously followed this practice, began to be made with attached lapels (wholecut) around the end of the Edwardian era. Through the Victorian era, a row of decorative button holes was created down the lapel edge but by Edwardian period these were reduced down to just the one lapel boutonnière button hole.

Turn back cuffs on the sleeves, similar to the turn ups (cuffs in American English) on modern trouser hems, were standard, with two buttons on the cuff.

Another rare feature was the use of decorative braiding around the sleeve cuffs and lapel edges.

Accessories

Proper accessories to wear with the frock coat included a non-collapsible top hat and a boutonnière in the lapel. A Homburg hat was considered too informal to wear with proper formal morning dress. During the Victorian and Edwardian era, button boots with a single row of punching across the cap toe were worn along with a cane. On cold days, it was common to wear a frock overcoat, a type of overcoat cut exactly the same as the frock coat, with the waist seam construction only a little longer and fuller to permit it to be worn over the top of the frock coat. Patent leather dress boots were worn up until the Edwardian era with morning dress. The practice of wearing patent leather shoes is today reserved strictly for evening formalwear. Trousers are uncuffed and worn with braces to avoid the top of the trousers from showing underneath the waistcoat. Only white shirts were worn with frock coats. The shirt was worn with a standing detachable collar with either wingtips or "imperial" style (plain standing). The most standard neckwear was a formal cravat. The cravat was tied in the Ascot knot characterised by way the ends cross over in front or alternatively in a Ruche knot, tied like a four-in-hand knot of a modern necktie. A decorative cravat pin often adorned with a precious stone or pearl was used to keep the cravat tidy. The cravat was usual with a frock coat when worn in more formal occasions through the Victorian and Edwardian eras, although the long necktie came to be worn increasingly after the turn of the century in the same manner as it is today with morning dress. The practice of wearing bow ties as an acceptable alternative with formalwear fell away after the late Victorian to early Edwardian era and became relegated to eveningwear, as remains the case in the 21st century. As with a formal shirt for white tie, cuffs were single (rather than double) cuffed and made to close with cufflinks. The waistcoat was usually double-breasted with peaked lapels. Formal gloves in light grey suede, chamois or kid leather were also required.

Informal frock coat suits
The solid black garment described above was widely used but before the lounge suit became popular, there was a need for a more informal garment for smart casual wear. A version of the frock coat was used here too, with matching trousers and a more informal cloth, featuring stripes or the check shown in the plate opposite. The waistcoat, instead of being black as usual in the formal version, was matching or odd. Until the modern cut away morning coat was worn, the single breasted frock coat was called a morning coat and was used in such a less formal context and double breasted coats made this way would often not fasten, being held loosely together in much the same way the modern morning coat is, with a single link.

The accessories for the two styles depended on the intended use of the coat: for more formal settings, the outfit might still have striped trousers and demand a top hat and white gloves; for business, by the turn of the century, the morning coat was used (again, this referred to a single breasted frock coat then, not the modern morning coat). This last was accompanied by a business collar (such as winged collar, not a standing Imperial collar); a four in hand tie (as opposed to the formal cravat and puff) and a soft Derby or Homburg.

General
Although ceasing to be required by protocol as formal attire at the British royal court in 1936, at the order of the short-reigning King Edward VIII, the frock coat has not altogether vanished as modern civilian formal wear.

The state funeral of Winston Churchill in 1965 included wearers of frock coats.

Savile Row tailor and reinnovator Tommy Nutter (1943– 1992) was a frequent wearer.

Frock coats, albeit often in other colours than black, survive until this day in the livery of hotel staff.

King Tupou VI of Tonga (born 1959) is a frequent wearer of frock coats.

Examples of frock coats in fashion in the 21st century include Alexander McQueen in 2012, Prada's autumn edition in 2012, and Paul Smith in 2018.

Frock coats still appear in certain traditional Catholic processions, such as the Blutritt in Germany.

Some wedding grooms apply more or less creative civil or military variants of frock coats. In the civilian wear cases it is sometimes accompanied by the same creativity in terms of ascot ties. As a prominent example, when Prince Harry married Meghan Markle in 2018, he and his brother and best man Prince William opted for military full dress uniform variants of frock coats.

Military uniforms
The cut of a frock coat with a waist seam flatters a man's figure, as opposed to a sack coat, and such frock coats remained part of some 21st-century military uniforms. They can either be single-breasted, as in some army uniforms, or double-breasted as in both army and navy uniforms. An example of the latter is seen in the modern gala dress of officers in the Spanish Navy. The British Army currently retains the frock coat for ceremonial wear by senior officers of Lieutenant-General rank and above, by officers of the Household Division, by some bandmasters and by holders of certain Royal appointments.

The 19th century Polish frock coat with hood and toggle-and-tow fastenings stood model for the overcoat used by the Royal Navy and British Army from 1890 on, known as Duffel coat or Monty coat.

Orthodox Jewish wear
In the Lithuanian yeshiva world, many prominent figures wear a black frock coat also known as a kapotteh (accompanied by either a Homburg or fedora hat) as formal wear. In recent years many Sefardi rabbis also wear a similar frock coat. The frock coat amongst non-Hassidic Jews is usually reserved for a rosh yeshiva, (maybe also the mashgiach and other senior rabbis of the yeshiva) and other rabbis such as important communal rabbis and some chief rabbis.

Most married male Lubavitcher Hasidim also don frock coats on Shabbat. All Hasidim also wear a gartel (belt) over their outer coats during prayer services.

Most Hasidim wear long coats called rekelekh during the week, which are often mistaken for frock coats but are really very long suit jackets. On Shabbat, Hasidim wear bekishes, which are usually silk or polyester as opposed to the woollen frock coat. The bekishe and the rekel both lack the waist seam construction of the frock coat. Additionally, bekishes can be distinguished from frock coats by the additional two buttons on front and a lack of a slit in the back.

Part of the slit hem in the back of the frock coat is rounded so as to not require tzitzit. The buttons are usually made to go right over left on most Jewish frock coats, particularly those worn by Hasidic Jews.

In Yiddish, a frock coat is known as a frak, a sirtuk or a kapotteh.

Teddy Boys
The Teddy Boys, a 1950s UK youth movement, named for their use of Edwardian-inspired clothing, briefly revived the frock coat, which they often referred to as a "drape".

Popular culture

 * Doctor Who features frock coats worn by the Doctor during the second, fourth, fifth, sixth, eighth, eleventh, and twelfth incarnations. It also features black frock coats worn by some incarnations of the Master, usually with a Nehru collar.

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

title: Frock coat


text:
Talk:Freedom of information in the United States

Stubs
I've merged a few redundant stubs into this one: Open meetings law, open records law, government in the sunshine. If someone was inspired to merge again, combining this article with Freedom of Information Act (disambiguation), that'd be great - I didn't, because my understanding of sunshine law is that it's a little broader than just government records, but that may not be a useful distinction, and the FOIA (disambig) page has a great international scope that is lacking from this article. Cdc 01:44, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

 * This article overwhelmingly deals with the USA; I've mentioned sunshine laws in the main FOI article, so what I'm going to do is move this to Freedom of information in the United States, redirect sunshine law to Freedom of information legislation, and then we have scope to write about the various national FOI/openness laws in the US as well as the individual states. Sunshine laws aren't FOI per se, but they're "spiritually" very similar, and it's probably worth discussing them alongside related legislation. Shimgray | talk | 14:33, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

Freedom of Information / open records
I'm trying to track down the origin of the statement: "The first open records law was passed in Wisconsin shortly after it became a state in 1848." Mberigan 19:58, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Creating more pages on Wikipedia to cover open records
It might be time to go back to a collection of articles on this instead of putting all of it in one place. Each of the 50 states has its own unique open records law with attendant controversies, and these are all different from the federal FOIA.

There are also emerging controversies that (I think) deserve their own page.

I'll check back in a bit to see if anyone else has a different opinion but for right now I'd propose writing a separate article called "Open Records" that primarily deals with the state-level laws and state-level controversies, and leaving this article to primarily cover the federal law and its controversies.Leslie Graves 14:12, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

 * A few of the articles on individual state laws do make it clear how they differ from federal law. Most are a paragraph long and basically say the same thing.  These are redundant and can be redirected to this article.--RadioFan (talk) 01:30, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

Merge proposal
I am proposing that Barbara Schwarz be merged into this article. It is generally agreed that her notability stems exclusively from her extreme filings of FOIA requests. There are three good secondary sources in her bio (2 Salt Lake Trib, 1 Oregonian) that can support a short summary here as an example of abuses of FOIA. - Crockspot 03:10, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Oppose if the same amount of information that is currently in the Barbara Schwarz article were part of this one, we'd be discussing a spin off per WP:SS. Anynobody 03:27, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
 * It would not be the same amount. It would be a summary, using only the secondary sources I mentioned. - Crockspot 04:47, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

 * Moving this discussion to Talk:Freedom of Information Act (United States) - Crockspot 04:51, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Redundant article to Freedom of Information Act (United States)?
Not to change the topic but has anyone else noticed Freedom of Information Act (United States)? I'm wondering if before the Barbara Schwarz question is addressed if we should merge these two articles first? Anynobody 03:37, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Crap. I didn't realize there were two. The other is where the Schwarz article should be merged. - Crockspot 04:46, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

state specific articles
There have been a number of articles created recently that are specific to states. There is little information in there beyond the legislation numbering, nothing that would explain how that state's freedom of information laws are any different from any other. Any objections to merging these to this article? California seems to be the one exception that has more more material in it and may warrant a dedicated article.--RadioFan (talk) 17:43, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Uncited information
I've again pulled down a large chunk of uncited material from this article. As with any WP article, it needs to be cited if it's going to be included.

I don't normally mind waiting to let someone add sources, but after more than a decade of FOI experience, I know that this information includes several inaccuracies. Don't repost without citations. — Bdb484 (talk) 22:19, 26 November 2013 (UTC)
 * It sounds like you'd be the perfect editor to remove the inaccuracies and find reliable sources for the remaining statements. In lieu of that, remove the inaccuracies and tag the rest, and I'll search for sources. Deal? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 23:01, 26 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I may get around to that. In the meantime, feel free to source anything you'd like to restore on your own. — Bdb484 (talk) 03:03, 27 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I've got a better plan. I'll restore the material, with cn tags, and you give the community some time to add the citations. There is WP:NORUSH to do so. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 06:06, 27 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Better still: Don't start an edit war trying to restore bad information. The deadline is WP:NOW. — Bdb484 (talk) 06:31, 27 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm calling your bluff. Please identify the so-called "false," "bad" information, or I will consider your challenge of this material to have been made in bad faith. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 06:51, 27 November 2013 (UTC)
 * And I yours. If you want to justify an edit war by violating WP:AGF, I'm not sure that defense will be well received.
 * There's no sense giving a line-by-line accounting of the problems. Beyond the clearly false material, there is other material that is misleading, and then there is additional material that is the result of original research. The pervasiveness of these problems in individual sentences casts doubt on the verifiability of the entire section, hence its removal. This was noted in the original edit summary.
 * If you want the material restored, the WP:BURDEN is on you to cite it. Alternatively, you could see whether there's consensus for a repeal of WP:V. — Bdb484 (talk) 07:57, 27 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Throw me a bone. One example of a false statement, please. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 17:33, 27 November 2013 (UTC)
 * The Freedom of Information Act does not fall under the Ohio Open Meetings Law. — Bdb484 (talk) 03:34, 28 November 2013 (UTC)
 * It seems that you are mistaken, see here, here, though the sentence could be tweaked for clarity. I agree that this was a rather shoddily written section but it was certainly better than nothing. In particular I don't see anything controversial or challengeable about the first two sentences. How about we restore those and jettison the rest? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 06:29, 28 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Never mind, found sources. Hopefully we never cross paths again. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 07:55, 29 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm definitely not mistaken. I think you -- as well as the original author -- have failed to recognize the distinction between the Freedom of Information Act and the concept of freedom of information more broadly. In Ohio, FOIA has nearly no relevance to your ability to access records from state and local governments, though you could say the the Public Records Act is its state-level analogue. The Open Meetings Act advances the cause of freedom of information, but it is not similar in any meaningful way to FOIA. If we were looking for a federal equivalent, that would probably be the Government in the Sunshine Act. — Bdb484 (talk) 20:51, 29 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Whatever floats your boat. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 22:40, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Copyvio/plagiarism/close paraphrasing in "State legislation" section
I recently edited the "State legislation" section read, minus tags and refs:

All fifty states also have public records laws that allow members of the public to obtain documents and other public records from state and local governments.

The provisions of these state laws vary considerably. States with traditionally strong access laws include Vermont, which provides virtually unfettered access on many levels; Florida, which was one of the first states to enact a sunshine law; and Ohio, whose courts have issued several access-friendly rulings. Other jurisdictions, such as Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia, were known for being relatively non-transparent but have recently made significant changes to their open government laws to foster greater public access to information.

The section was blanked by with the comment: "WP:COPYVIO; all material was plagiarized from the provided sources."

I believe a more appropriate guideline to cite would have been WP:PARAPHRASE, as the language wasn't copied verbatim. But no matter, the message is the same. In line with WP:PARAPHRASE, I would appreciate Bdb484's assistance by identifying his or her specific concerns. Put another way, how far must we further deviate from the sources' language in order to alleviate his or her concerns of copyright violation? Or does he or she feel that in-text attribution would be better in this situation? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 23:41, 29 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Whichever standard you prefer, you screwed up. WP:PARAPHRASE isn't a defense of close paraphrasing; it's an admonishment against it, saying that you should "summarize source material in [your] own words." You lifted sentences from the source material without making meaningful changes to them. That's a pretty classic case of plagiarizing, though I'm sure that you didn't mean to, as that's what everyone says when they are found doing the same thing.
 * In the first instance, you changed "50" to "fifty," "which" to "that" and "government bodies" to governments." In the second, you WP:COPYPASTED a complete sentence without doing anything to change it.
 * What you did is just as much a copyright violation as rearranging the tracks on The Black Album and calling it your own work, or cutting a few scenes out of Bio-Dome and then calling yourself the director. In the case of the third sentence, it would actually be more like just crossing out the author's name on a book cover and scrawling in your own.
 * I think the best way forward would be to adhere to WP copyright policies. "Superficial change of copyright-protected text is not enough. Wikipedia articles must be written in the author's own words." — Bdb484 (talk) 05:17, 30 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I have no desire to get into a discussion about whether this was or was not a copyright violation, I just want to know what will satisfy you. If I re-write the first two sentences will that be sufficient? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 05:23, 30 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I can understand your desire to avoid that conversation, but if you don't understand how to avoid copyright violations, it may be hard for you to write this in a way that is satisfactory. — Bdb484 (talk) 23:31, 30 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Please answer the question. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 23:47, 30 November 2013 (UTC)
 * It depends on whether your rewrite inadvertently plagiarizes the sources again. I'd say you should go for it and we'll see what happens. — Bdb484 (talk) 03:43, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I want to understand the scope of your concerns. I.e., if I re-write the two sentences you referenced above, will you then complain about other sentences? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 04:08, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
 * If by "complain about other sentences" you mean using edit summaries when I make edits, then yes. And if by "complain" you just mean answering your questions about my edits, then yes, I'll probably do that, too. — Bdb484 (talk) 05:11, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
 * No, I mean will you delete the section based on COPYVIO concerns about sentences we haven't discussed? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 05:25, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I intend to delete all copyright violations I find. At the moment, I don't know of any others in the current version of the page. — Bdb484 (talk) 05:32, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Freedom of information in the United States. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20070415102640/http://www.ire.org:80/foi/bga/ to http://www.ire.org/foi/bga/

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text:
Norway Scholarship

The Norway Scholarship is a scholarship to the University of Oxford that is awarded in Norway. Norway Scholars receive funding for one or two years of study and research at Oxford University, and the scholar always becomes a member of Wadham College.

The first Norway Scholarship was awarded in 1920. Since then, one Norway Scholar has been selected annually, except for a few periods, such as during the Second World War. The scholarship is highly competitive, and is awarded to a current student, or recent graduate of Oslo University. Past Norway Scholars have included Nordahl Grieg, Peter A. Munch and Harald Sverdrup.

History
The idea for a scholarship fund enabling students from Royal Frederik University, (now University of Oslo) to study for one year at Wadham College in Oxford was conceived in 1919 by a young alumnus of the college, who during the war years 1914–18 had held the post of British vice-consul at Kristiansund in Møre og Romsdal, Norway. Arthur Ivor Garland Jayne (1882-1958) was a son of Francis Jayne (1845–1921) Lord Bishop of Chester. Arthur Jayne had married Fredrikke Marie Cathrine von Munthe af Morgenstierne, daughter of Professor Bredo Henrik von Munthe af Morgenstierne (1851–1930), Rector of the University of Oslo (1912–1918). As with famous Polar explorer Fridtjof Nansen, he gave NOK 5000.- towards the establishment of a Norwegian Oxford Scholarship Fund. Altogether Jayne succeeded in raising NOK. 60 000.- or approximately GBP 2780. Jayne spent his later life as a lecturer in English at the University of Oslo.

Arthur Jayne retrospectively explained his initiative in a letter dated 14. October 1945 to Professor Didrik Arup Seip (1884–1963), then Rector of Oslo University, in the following words:

''At the time of the first world war – - – a considerable amount of ‘Allied’ propaganda material, sent to Norway and intended to inform Norwegian opinion about the war, proved ill-adapted to enlist the understanding sympathy of those who had previously had cultural or business contacts with the nations in conflict with the Allies. The experience seemed to indicate the great importance of any educational facilities which would bring the youth of Norway and Britain into really close association with each other. It struck me that one useful step in that direction could be some permanent arrangement which would enable Norwegian students to participate in the typically English form of university life that exists in the college system of Oxford and Cambridge. Without actual residence in a college this is impossible. But whereas foreign students have been able to attend courses at English universities, it has always been very difficult for them to obtain permission to reside at a college, sharing to the full all that the college environment can offer.''

From 1920, with the exception of the years 1926–27 and the war years 1940–44, Norwegian students were awarded the Norway Scholarship for studies of the most varied description. However, as the basic funding of the scholarship proved inadequate, the scholars soon became dependent on supplementary grants from other university funds, but from the late 1970s even this arrangement proved inadequate to meet rising costs. For some years no scholars were appointed at all. The basic foundation capital had by then shrunk to only NOK. 130 000.- (about GBP 6500.- at the current rate of exchange).

In the late 1970s Alf Bøe (Wadham. 1952) as head of the Committee, called on Andor Birkeland (Wadham. 1946) of the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation,  accountant Sven Guldberg (Wadham. 1937) and former Minister for Culture Helge Sivertsen (Wadham. 1938). With the help of the College and of William Bentley, British Ambassador to Norway, they were able to raise NOK 1 170 000 (around GBP 117 000). In the 1990s Bøe formed a new committee consisting of Michael Benskin (St. Peter's. 1965), Haakon Melander (Balliol. 1966) and Erik Rudeng (Norway scholar. 1969). Iver B. Neumann (Norway Scholar. 1988) was recruited in 1993. When Bøe retired in 2003, Neumann took over as chair. Bjørn Blindheim (Norway Scholar. 1992) and Neumann formed a Norwegian chapter of the Oxford Society, with Blindheim as chair. Since 1981 the Committee has organised an annual dinner with a guest of honour from Oxford University, who has also given one or more lectures locally in Oslo. King Harald V of Norway (Balliol College.1960) often participates at the grand dinner of Norway Scholars that is held each year in Oslo by the Oxford University Society Norway.

title: Norway Scholarship


text: User talk:69.195.180.213

title: User talk:69.195.180.213


text:
Karekare, New Zealand

Karekare is a small coastal settlement in West Auckland, New Zealand, sandwiched between the Waitākere Ranges and a large black sand surf beach.

Geography
It is located 35 km west of Auckland city centre, south of the larger beach of Piha. It is north of Whatipu, south of Piha and west of the Centennial Memorial Park and Water Catchment area, which cover most of the native bushland Waitākere Ranges. Karekare Beach is the confluence of the Company Stream, which was traditionally known by the name Waiteahoaho, and the Karekare Stream. The Karekare Falls are located inland from the beach.

The beach at Karekare is split into two sections separated by the, Karekare Stream, Karekare Beach to the south and Tāhoro / Union Bay, to the north. Two major geographical sites within Karekare are The Watchman, traditionally known by the names Te Matua and Te Tokamatua, a significant knoll on the beach's ridge, and Paratahi Island, located to the south of Karekare.

Karekare is the remains of an ancient volcanic crater of the Waitākere Volcano, which was uplifted due to tectonic forces between 3 and 5 million years ago. Te Matua (the Watchman) is the hardest remaining portion of dacite of the crater, and Paratahi Island is a lava dome.

History
Karekare, along with the greater Waitākere Ranges area, was traditionally settled by the Te Kawerau ā Maki iwi. Karekare is one of the few locations where textiles created prior to European contact have been preserved. The ocean between Piha and the Pararaha Valley was traditionally known as Waikarekare, referring to the turbulent waters of the Tasman Sea. Over time, the name was shortened to Kakare and Karekare, and began to be used for the beach and the general area.

A traditional Te Kawerau ā Maki legend of the area involves three rocks found on the beach. According to the legend, Te Matua (the Watchman), the large headland of the beach, had two children during Te Ao Kohatu, the age where inanimate things of the world could walk. Te Matua's children would play at the beach, however one disobeyed their parent, and strayed too far away. When the age of Te Ao Kohatu ended, her two children were frozen in place: Te Tokapiri, the obedient child who remained close to their mother, and Te Tokapaoke, who stands at the southern end of Karekare, alone in the ocean. Te Tokapaoke became known as Paratahi Island.

Karekare was a major settlement for Te Kawerau ā Maki in the Waitākere Ranges, known for its extensive kūmara (sweet potato) cultivations inland. Te Kawerau ā Maki rangatira Kowhatu-ki-te-uru, known for his abilities to create stone pā, settled at Karekare in the mid-18th century. Directly north-east of the beach, Kowhatu-ki-te-uru built a pā known as Te Kaka Whakaara ("The Kākā Parrot Standing Watch") on The Watchman (Te Matua), while the kāinga (village) near the pā was known as Te Marae o Mana, referring to Kowhatu-ki-te-uru's son Manaairangi. The cultivations were known as Māraroa ("The Great Gardens"). Other significant pā in the area included one on Te Ahua Point, and one at Te Aoaho (above Karekare Falls).

In 1826 during the Musket Wars, Te Kaka Whakaara pā was attacked by two Ngāpuhi taua (war parties) led by Hōne Heke and Te Kahakaha. Te Kawerau ā Maki killed many of the Ngāpuhi taua by pelting them with rocks, however could not match the musket fire from the war parties. Te Kawerau ā Maki suffered many losses, especially at Wharengarahi, a cave on the beach where many of the tribe's women, children and elderly were taking shelter. Due to the battle, Karekare was not occupied when Te Kawerau ā Maki returned after the war, due to the tapu caused by the deaths.

During the early colonial era, Karekare was the site of two Kauri mills: Karekau Sawmill, which operated between 1881 and 1886, and a smaller mill which opened in 1906. In the early 20th century, the lower Karekare valley was farmland, tended to by the Farley family. In 1935, the Karekare Surf Club was formed.

Demographics
Karekare is described by Statistics New Zealand as a rural settlement, and covers 11.92 km2 and had an estimated population of as of  with a population density of  people per km2. It is part of the Waitākere Ranges South SA2 statistical area.

Before the 2023 census, the settlement had a smaller boundary, covering 6.03 km2. Using that boundary, Karekare had a population of 255 at the 2018 New Zealand census, an increase of 39 people (18.1%) since the 2013 census, and an increase of 63 people (32.8%) since the 2006 census. There were 90 households, comprising 132 males and 123 females, giving a sex ratio of 1.07 males per female, with 60 people (23.5%) aged under 15 years, 27 (10.6%) aged 15 to 29, 123 (48.2%) aged 30 to 64, and 39 (15.3%) aged 65 or older.

Ethnicities were 92.9% European/Pākehā, 8.2% Māori, 2.4% Pacific peoples, 3.5% Asian, and 2.4% other ethnicities. People may identify with more than one ethnicity.

Although some people chose not to answer the census's question about religious affiliation, 77.6% had no religion, 10.6% were Christian, 1.2% were Hindu, 1.2% were Buddhist and 4.7% had other religions.

Of those at least 15 years old, 75 (38.5%) people had a bachelor's or higher degree, and 12 (6.2%) people had no formal qualifications. 39 people (20.0%) earned over $70,000 compared to 17.2% nationally. The employment status of those at least 15 was that 87 (44.6%) people were employed full-time, 42 (21.5%) were part-time, and 6 (3.1%) were unemployed.

Tourism
At the turn of the century, holidaymakers would travel by coach from Glen Eden to stay at the Karekare guest house. Karekare continues to be a popular destination for Aucklanders in summer, but receives fewer visitors than nearby Piha, partly because the road is narrow and only recently sealed. There are surf patrols in summer.

The track to the base of the Waitakere waterfall—Karekare falls—is a short walk from the road. The track to the top of the falls is now closed to help stop the spread of the incurable Kauri dieback disease.

The settlement was immortalised in song by Crowded House on their Together Alone album in 1993, much of which was recorded at Karekare; the well known Dub/Reggae group, Salmonella Dub, used the name as well on their album Feel the Seasons Change - Live with the NZSO. The location will also be familiar to viewers of the film The Piano, which included beach scenes shot at Karekare and Piha.

Safety information
The rips along this section of coast are very unpredictable and can shift with little warning, and have caused a number of drownings. Lifeguards advise swimming between the red and yellow flags, during patrol hours.

Education
There is a small community primary school (Lone Kauri School) with approximately 30 students located at Karekare. It is an independently operating branch of Oratia School, under the supervision of a senior teacher.

title: Karekare, New Zealand


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BL 2.75-inch mountain gun

The Ordnance BL 2.75-inch mountain gun was a screw gun designed for and used by the Indian Mountain Artillery into World War I.

Description
The gun was an improved version of the 1901 BL 10-pounder mountain gun.

The new 1911 version improved on the 1901 gun with a new pole trail, recoil buffer, recuperator and gun shield, and increased shell weight from 10 to 12.5 lb. It was a screw gun design, where the barrel could be separated into two parts via a screw joint. This allowed for the gun to have a heavier barrel, but still be broken into smaller portions for transport by mule teams. This was important for a weapon designed to be used in mountainous and rough terrain, or where adequate vehicle and horse transport was not readily available. The weapon could be carried by six mules or towed.

Service history
The gun was adopted in 1911 and began entering service in 1914.

The weapon served primarily with the Indian Mountain Artillery in the northwest portion of British Indian territory (on what is now the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan) and participated in British-led military action in that theatre.

It also served in Mesopotamia and the Salonika front during World War I.

Due to its specialised nature the gun was produced in only limited numbers, with just 183 manufactured during the war.

It was superseded at the end of World War I by the QF 3.7-inch mountain howitzer.

Surviving examples

A 2.75-inch mountain gun is on display at the Heugh Battery Museum, Hartlepool

title: BL 2.75-inch mountain gun


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