tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-44775041245079466192024-03-13T07:18:10.760-07:00vikasUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-36541058784766604492007-03-05T04:58:00.000-08:002007-03-05T04:59:09.447-08:00egyptThis article is about the country of Egypt. For other uses, see Egypt (disambiguation).<br />جمهورية مصر العربية<br />Jumhūriyyat Miṣr al-ʿArabiyyah<br />Arab Republic of Egypt<br />Flag of Egypt Coat of arms of Egypt<br />Flag Coat of arms<br />Anthem: Bilady, Bilady, Bilady<br />Location of Egypt<br />Capital<br />(and largest city) Cairo<br />30°2′N 31°13′E<br />Official languages Arabic<br />Government Republic<br /> - President Hosni Mubarak<br /> - Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif<br />Establishment <br /> - First Dynasty c.3150 BC <br /> - Independence granted February 28, 1922 <br /> - Republic declared June 18, 1953 <br />Area<br /> - Total 1,001,449 km² (30th)<br />386,660 sq mi <br /> - Water (%) 0.6<br />Population<br /> - 2006 estimate 78,887,007 (15th)<br /> - 1996 census 59,312,914<br /> - Density 74/km² (120th)<br />192/sq mi<br />GDP (PPP) 2004 estimate<br /> - Total $305.253 billion (32nd)<br /> - Per capita $4,317 (112th)<br />HDI (2006) 0.702 (medium) (111th)<br />Currency Egyptian pound (LE) (EGP)<br />Time zone EET (UTC+2)<br /> - Summer (DST) EEST (UTC+3)<br />Internet TLD .eg<br />Calling code +20<br /><br />Egypt (Egyptian: km.t ; Coptic: Ⲭⲏⲙⲓ Kīmi ; Arabic: مصر Miṣr ; Egyptian Arabic: Máṣr), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country in North Africa that includes the Sinai Peninsula, a land bridge to Asia. Covering an area of about 1,001,450 square kilometers (386,560 square miles), Egypt borders Libya to the west, Sudan to the south, and Israel and the Gaza Strip to the northeast; on the north and the east are the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea, respectively.<br /><br />Egypt is the fifteenth most populous country in the world. The vast majority of its 78.8 million people (2006)[1] live near the banks of the Nile River (about 40,000 km² or 15,450 sq miles) where the only arable agricultural land is found. Large areas of land form part of the Sahara Desert and are sparsely inhabited. Around half of Egypt's residents live in urban areas, with the majority spread across the densely populated centres of greater Cairo (the largest city in Africa and the Middle East), Alexandria and other major towns in the Nile Delta.<br /><br />Egypt is famous for its ancient civilization and some of the world's most ancient and important monuments, including the Giza Pyramids and the Great Sphinx of Giza; the southern city of Luxor contains a particularly large number of ancient artifacts such as the Karnak Temple and the Valley of the Kings. Today, Egypt is widely regarded as a main political and cultural centre of the Middle East.[2][3][4][5]<br />Contents<br />[hide]<br /><br /> * 1 Etymology<br /> * 2 History<br /> * 3 Politics<br /> o 3.1 National<br /> o 3.2 Human rights<br /> o 3.3 Foreign relations<br /> * 4 Military<br /> * 5 Administrative divisions<br /> * 6 Economy<br /> * 7 Demographics<br /> * 8 Religion<br /> * 9 Geography<br /> o 9.1 Climate<br /> * 10 Culture<br /> o 10.1 Renaissance<br /> o 10.2 Arts<br /> o 10.3 Literature<br /> o 10.4 Music<br /> o 10.5 Festivals<br /> o 10.6 Sports<br /> * 11 See also<br /> o 11.1 Lists<br /> * 12 Notes and references<br /> * 13 External links<br /><br />[edit] Etymology<br />km.t (Egypt)<br />in hieroglyphs<br />km m t<br />niwt<br /><br /> * One of the ancient Egyptian names of the country, km.t, or "black land," is derived from the fertile black soils deposited by the Nile floods, distinct from the 'red land' (dSr.t) of the desert. The name is realized as kīmi and kīmə in the Coptic stage of the Egyptian language, and appeared in early Greek as Kymeía.<br /><br /> * Miṣr, the Arabic and official name for modern Egypt (Egyptian Arabic: Maṣr), is of Semitic origin directly cognate with the Hebrew מִצְרַיִם (Mitzráyim), meaning "the two straits" (a reference to the dynastic separation of upper and lower Egypt), and possibly means "a country" or "a state".[6] Miṣr in Arabic also means "a country" or "a state" or "frontier-land".<br /><br /> * The English name "Egypt" came via the Latin word Aegyptus derived from the ancient Greek word Αίγυπτος (Aigyptos). According to Strabo, Αίγυπτος (Aigyptos), in ancient Greek meant "below the Aegean" (Aἰγαίου ὑπτίως, "Aegaeou uptiōs"), and was formed by the combination of the two words. It has also been suggested that the word is a corruption of the ancient Egyptian phrase ḥwt-k3-ptḥ meaning "home of the Ka (Soul) of Ptah", the name of a temple of the god Ptah at Memphis.[7]<br /><br />[edit] History<br />The Nile River in Egypt.<br />The Nile River in Egypt.<br /><br /> Main articles: History of Egypt, Ancient Egypt, and Egyptians<br /><br />The Nile Valley has been a site of continuous human habitation since at least the Paleolithic era. Traces of these early peoples appear in the form of artifacts and rock carvings along the terraces of the Nile and in the desert oases. In the 10th millennium BC, a grain-grinding culture using the earliest type of sickle blades had been replaced by another culture of hunter-gatherers and fishers using stone tools. Climate changes and/or overgrazing around 8000 BC began to desiccate the pastoral lands of Egypt, eventually forming the Sahara. Early tribal peoples migrated to the Nile River where they developed a settled agricultural economy and more centralized society.[8]<br /><br />By about 6000 BC, organized agriculture and large building construction had appeared in the Nile Valley. During the Neolithic, several predynastic cultures developed independently in Upper and Lower Egypt. The Badarian culture and the successor Naqada series are generally regarded as precursors to Dynastic Egyptian civilization. The earliest known Lower Egyptian site, Merimda, predates the Badarian by about seven hundred years. Contemporaneous Lower Egyptian communities coexisted with their southern counterparts for more than two thousand years, remaining somewhat culturally separate, but maintaining frequent contact through trade. The earliest known evidence of Egyptian hieroglyphic inscriptions appear during the predynastic period on Naqada III pottery vessels, dated to about 3200 BC.[9]<br />tAwy ('Two Lands')<br />in hieroglyphs<br />N16<br />N16<br /><br />A unified kingdom was founded circa 3150 BC by King Menes, giving rise to a series of dynasties that ruled Egypt for the next three millennia. Egyptians subsequently referred to their unified country as tAwy, meaning 'Two Lands'; and later km.t (Coptic: Kīmi), the 'Black Land', a reference to the fertile black soil deposited by the Nile river. Egyptian culture flourished during this long period and remained distinctively Egyptian in its religion, arts, language and customs. The first two ruling dynasties of a unified Egypt set the stage for the Old Kingdom period, c.2700−2200 BC., famous for its many pyramids, most notably the Third Dynasty pyramid of Djoser and the Fourth Dynasty Giza Pyramids.<br />The Great Sphinx and the Pyramids of Giza, built during the Old Kingdom, are modern national icons that also lie at the heart of Egypt's thriving tourism industry.<br />The Great Sphinx and the Pyramids of Giza, built during the Old Kingdom, are modern national icons that also lie at the heart of Egypt's thriving tourism industry.<br /><br />The First Intermediate Period ushered in a time of political upheaval for about 150 years. Stronger Nile floods and stabilization of government, however, brought back renewed prosperity for the country in the Middle Kingdom c. 2040 BC, reaching a peak during the reign of Pharaoh Amenemhat III. A second period of disunity heralded the arrival of the first alien ruling dynasty in Egypt, that of the Semitic Hyksos. The Hyksos invaders took over much of Lower Egypt around 1650 BC, and founded a new capital at Avaris. They were eventually driven out by an Upper Egyptian force led by Ahmose I, who founded the Eighteenth Dynasty and relocated the capital from Memphis to Thebes.<br /><br />The New Kingdom (c.1550−1070 BC) began with the Eighteenth Dynasty, marking the rise of Egypt as an international power that expanded during its greatest extension to an empire as far south as Jebel Barkal in Nubia, and included parts of the Levant in the east. This period is known for some of the most well-known Pharaohs, including Hatshepsut, Thutmose III, Akhenaten and his wife Nefertiti, Tutankhamun and Ramesses II. The first known self-conscious expression of monotheism came during this period in the form of Atenism. Frequent contacts with other nations brought in new ideas in the New Kingdom. The country was later invaded by Libyans, Nubians and Assyrians, but native Egyptians drove them out and regained control of their country.<br />First built in the third or fourth century AD, the Hanging Church is Cairo's most famous Coptic church.<br />First built in the third or fourth century AD, the Hanging Church is Cairo's most famous Coptic church.<br /><br />The Thirtieth Dynasty was the last native ruling dynasty during the Pharaonic epoch. It fell to the Persians in 343 BC after the last native pharaoh, King Nectanebo II, was defeated in battle. Later, Egypt fell to the Greeks and Romans, beginning over two thousand years of foreign rule. Before Egypt became part of the Byzantine realm, Christianity had been brought by Saint Mark the Evangelist in the AD first century. Diocletian's reign marks the transition from the Roman to the Byzantine era in Egypt, when a great number of Egyptian Christians were persecuted. The New Testament was by then translated into Egyptian, and after the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451, a distinct Egyptian Coptic Church was firmly established.[10]<br /><br />The Byzantines were able to regain control of the country after a brief Persian invasion early in the seventh century, until in AD 639, Egypt was invaded by the Muslim Arabs. The form of Islam the Arabs brought to Egypt was Sunni, though early in this period Egyptians began to blend their new faith with indigenous beliefs and practices that had survived through Coptic Christianity, giving rise to various Sufi orders that have flourished to this day.[11] Muslim rulers nominated by the Islamic Caliphate remained in control of Egypt for the next six centuries, including a period for which it was the seat of the Caliphate under the Fatimids. With the end of the Ayyubid dynasty, a Turco-Circassian military caste, the Mamluks, took control about AD 1250 and continued to govern even after the conquest of Egypt by the Ottoman Turks in 1517.<br />Mosque of Mohamed Ali built in the early nineteenth century within the Cairo Citadel.<br />Mosque of Mohamed Ali built in the early nineteenth century within the Cairo Citadel.<br /><br />The brief French Invasion of Egypt led by Napolean Bonaparte in 1798 had a great social impact on the country and its culture. Native Egyptians became exposed to the principles of the French Revolution and had an apparent chance to exercise self-governance.[12] A series of civil wars took place between the Ottoman Turks, the Mamluks, and Albanian mercenaries following the evacuation of French troops, resulting in the Albanian Muhammad Ali (Kavalali Mehmed Ali Pasha) taking control of Egypt where he was appointed as the Ottoman viceroy in 1805. He led a modernization campaign of public works, including irrigation projects, agricultural reforms and increased industrialization, which were then taken up and further expanded by his grandson and successor Isma'il Pasha.<br /><br />Following the completion of the Suez Canal by Ismaiel in 1869, Egypt became an important world transportation hub. In 1866, the Assembly of Delegates was founded to serve as an advisory body for the government. Its members were elected from across Egypt and eventually they came to have an important influence on governmental affairs.[13] The country also fell heavily into debt to European powers. Ostensibly to protect its investments, the United Kingdom seized control of Egypt's government in 1882, but nominal allegiance to the Ottoman Empire continued until 1914 when as a result of the declaration of war with the Ottoman Empire, Britain declared a protectorate over Egypt and deposed the khedive, replacing him with his uncle who was appointed Sultan of Egypt.<br />Public riot during the 1919 Revolution sparked by the British exile of nationalist leader Saad Zaghlul.<br />Public riot during the 1919 Revolution sparked by the British exile of nationalist leader Saad Zaghlul.<br /><br />Between 1882 and 1906, a local nationalist movement for independence was taking shape. The Dinshaway Incident prompted Egyptian opposition to take a stronger stand against British occupation and the first political parties were founded. After the first World War, Saad Zaghlul and the Wafd Party led the Egyptian nationalist movement after gaining a majority at the local Legislative Assembly. When the British exiled Zaghlul and his associates to Malta on March 8, 1919, Egypt witnessed its first modern revolution. Constant revolting by the Egyptian people throughout the country led Great Britain to issue a unilateral declaration of Egypt's independence on February 22, 1922.[14]<br /><br />The new Egyptian government drafted and implemented a new constitution in 1923 based on a parliamentary representative system. Saad Zaghlul was popularly-elected as Prime Minister of Egypt in 1924, and in 1936 the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty was concluded. However, continued instability in the government due to remaining British control and increasing involvement by the King in politics led to the eventual toppling of the monarchy and the dissolution of the parliament through a coup d'état by a group of army officers in 1952. They forced King Farouk I to abdicate in support of his son King Ahmed Fouad II.<br />Evening view of Cairo, the largest city in Africa and the Middle East. The Cairo Opera House (center) is the main performing arts venue in the Egyptian capital.<br />Evening view of Cairo, the largest city in Africa and the Middle East. The Cairo Opera House (center) is the main performing arts venue in the Egyptian capital.<br /><br />The Egyptian Republic was declared on 18 June 1953 with General Muhammad Naguib as the first President of the Republic. Naguib was forced to resign in 1954 by Gamal Abdel Nasser – the real architect of the 1952 movement – and was later put under house arrest. Nasser assumed power as President and declared the full independence of Egypt from the United Kingdom on June 18, 1956. His nationalization of the Suez Canal on July 26, 1956 prompted the 1956 Suez Crisis. Three years after the 1967 Six Day War, in which Egypt lost the Sinai to Israel, Nasser died and was succeeded by Anwar Sadat. Sadat switched Egypt's Cold War allegiance from the Soviet Union to the United States, expelling Soviet advisors in 1972, and launched the Infitah economic reform policy, while violently clamping down on religious and secular opposition alike.<br /><br />In 1973, Egypt, along with Syria, launched a surprise attack on Israel in an attempt to regain the occupied Sinai Peninsula. Both the US and the USSR intervened and a cease-fire was reached between both sides. Despite not being a complete military success, most historians agree that the Yom Kippur war presented Sadat with a political victory that would later allow him to pursue peace with Israel. In 1977, Sadat made a historic visit to Israel which led to the 1978 peace treaty in exchange for the complete Israeli withdrawal from Sinai. Sadat's initiative sparked enormous controversy in the Arab world and led to Egypt's expulsion from the Arab League, but was supported by the vast majority of Egyptians.[15] Sadat was assassinated in Cairo by a fundamentalist military soldier in 1981 and was succeeded by the incumbent Hosni Mubarak. In 2003, the Egyptian Movement for Change, popularly known as Kifaya, was launched to seek a return to democracy and greater civil liberties.<br /><br />[edit] Politics<br /><br /> Main article: Politics of Egypt<br /><br />[edit] National<br />The Office of the President of Egypt at the Presidential Palace.<br />The Office of the President of Egypt at the Presidential Palace.<br /><br />Egypt has been a republic since 18 June 1953. President Mohamed Hosni Mubarak has been the President of the Republic since October 14, 1981, following the assassination of former-President Mohammed Anwar El-Sadat. Mubarak is currently serving his fifth term in office. He is the leader of the ruling National Democratic Party. Prime Minister Dr. Ahmed Nazif was sworn in as Prime Minister on 9 July 2004, following the resignation of Dr. Atef Ebeid from his office.<br /><br />Although power is ostensibly organized under a multi-party semi-presidential system, whereby the executive power is theoretically divided between the President and the Prime Minister, in practice it rests almost solely with the President who traditionally has been elected in single-candidate elections for more than fifty years. Egypt also holds regular multi-party parliamentary elections. The last presidential election, in which Mubarak won a fifth consecutive term, was held in September 2005.<br /><br />In late February 2005, President Mubarak announced in a surprise television broadcast that he had ordered the reform of the country's presidential election law, paving the way for multi-candidate polls in the upcoming presidential election. For the first time since the 1952 movement, the Egyptian people had an apparent chance to elect a leader from a list of various candidates. The President said his initiative came "out of my full conviction of the need to consolidate efforts for more freedom and democracy."[16] However, the new law placed draconian restrictions on the filing for presidential candidacies, designed to prevent well-known candidates such as Ayman Nour from standing against Mubarak, and paved the road for his easy re-election victory.[17]<br />The Egyptian Parliament.<br />The Egyptian Parliament.<br /><br />Concerns were once again expressed after the 2005 presidential elections about government interference in the election process through fraud and vote-rigging, in addition to police brutality and violence by pro-Mubarak supporters against opposition demonstrators.[18] This poses major questions about the government's purported commitment to democracy.<br /><br />As a result, most Egyptians are skeptical about the process of democratization and the role of the elections. Less than 25 percent of the country's 32 million registered voters (out of a population of more than 78 million) actually turned out for the 2005 elections.[19] Newspapers, however, have exhibited an increasing degree of freedom in criticizing the president, and the results of the 2005 parliamentary elections, which saw Islamist candidates such as the banned Muslim Brotherhood winning seats, indicate that a change of some sorts may be underway. A proposed change to the constitution would limit the president to two seven-year terms in office.[20]<br /><br />[edit] Human rights<br /><br /> Main article: Human rights in Egypt<br /><br />Members of the Kifaya democracy movement protesting a fifth term for President Hosni Mubarak.<br />Members of the Kifaya democracy movement protesting a fifth term for President Hosni Mubarak.<br /><br />Several local and international human rights organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have reported on Egypt's poor human rights record for many years. In 2005, the government of President Hosni Mubarak faced unprecedented public criticism when it clamped down on democracy activists challenging his rule. Some of the most serious human rights violations according to HRW's 2006 report on Egypt are routine torture, arbitrary detentions and trials before military and state security courts.[21]<br /><br />Discriminatory personal status laws governing marriage, divorce, custody and inheritance which put women at a disadvantage have also been cited. Laws concerning Christians which place restrictions on church building have been recently eased, but major constructions still require governmental approval.[22] In addition, intolerance of Baha'is and unorthodox Muslim sects remains a problem.[21]<br /><br />In 2005, the Freedom House rated political rights in Egypt as "6" (1 representing the most free and 7 the least free rating), civil liberties as "5" and gave it the freedom rating of "Not Free."[23] It however noted that "Egypt witnessed its most transparent and competitive presidential and legislative elections in more than half a century and an increasingly unbridled public debate on the country's political future in 2005."[24]<br /><br />The Egyptian Organization for Human Rights (EOHR) is one of the longest-standing bodies for the defense of human rights in Egypt.[25] In 2003, the government established the National Council for Human Rights, headquartered in Cairo and headed by former UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali who directly reports to the president.[26] The council has come under heavy criticism by local NGO activists, who contend it undermines human rights work in Egypt by serving as a propaganda tool for the government to excuse its violations[27] and to provide legitimacy to repressive laws such as the recently renewed Emergency Law.[28] Egypt has recently announced that it is in the process of abolishing the Emergency Law.[29]<br /><br />Denying a basic right of religious belief, the high court of Egypt has outlawed all religions and belief except Islam, Christianity and Judaism. (For more information see Egyptian Identification Card Controversy).<br /><br />Audio/Video Illustration of a "Kifaya or Kefaya" shout out for Human Rights in Egypt. This video is multimedia content related to the image illustrating this article. This addition contains °°°no explicit°°° visuals or foul language. Related links may be explicit and should be avoided by young and sensitive viewers.<br /><br />[edit] Foreign relations<br /><br /> Main article: Foreign relations of Egypt<br /><br />Egypt's foreign policy operates along a non-aligned level. Factors such as population size, historical events, military strength, diplomatic expertise and a strategic geographical position give Egypt extensive political influence in the Middle East and Africa, and within the Non-Aligned Movement as a whole. Cairo has been a crossroads of regional commerce and culture for centuries, and its intellectual and Islamic institutions are at the center of the region's social and cultural development.<br /><br />The permanent headquarters for the League of Arab States (The Arab League) is located in Cairo. The Secretary General of the League has traditionally been an Egyptian. Former Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa is the current Secretary General of the Arab League. The Arab League briefly moved out of Egypt to Tunis in 1978 as a protest at the peace treaty with Israel, but returned in 1989.<br /><br />Egypt was the first Arab state to establish diplomatic relations with the state of Israel, after the signing of the Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty at the Camp David Accords. Egypt has a major influence amongst other Arab states, and has historically played an important role as a mediator in resolving disputes between various Arab nations, and in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. Most Arab nations still give credence to Egypt playing that role, though its effects are often limited.<br /><br />Former Egyptian Deputy Prime Minister Boutros Boutros-Ghali served as Secretary General of the United Nations from 1991 to 1996.<br /><br />[edit] Military<br /><br /> Main article: Military of Egypt<br /><br />Egyptian F-16s flying in close formation<br />Egyptian F-16s flying in close formation<br /><br />The Egyptian military is the strongest military power on the African continent, and one of the strongest in the Middle East. The Egyptian Armed forces have also had more battle-field experience than most armies in the region and have a combined troop strength of around 450,000 active personnel.[30] The Egyptian military has recently undergone massive military modernization mostly in their Air Force. Egypt is currently the only Arab and African country with a spy satellite, EgyptSat 1. Egypt is the first Arab country to have a Spy Satellite.[31] Egypt is the third Middle East country to operate a spy satellite after Israel and Iran.<br /><br />The Egyptian government recently requested a batch of advanced F-15 fighters from the United States equipped with "smart" bombs to expand its Air Defense capability. Israel is trying to block the sale of the F-15 fighters because of concern that this would completely close the gap between the Egyptian and Israeli Air Forces.[32] According to the Israeli chair of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Yuval Steinitz, the Egyptian Air Force has roughly the same number of modern warplanes as the Israeli Air Force and far more Western tanks, artillery, anti-aircraft batteries and warships than the IDF.[33]<br /><br />Many Arab and African armies train in Egypt and in response to the poor performance the Lebanese armed forces showed during the recent Israeli-Hezbollah conflict, they have also signed deals with the Egyptian Armed Forces to train and equip the Lebanese Army.<br /><br />Egypt continues to contribute regularly to United Nations peacekeeping missions, most recently in East Timor, Sierra Leone, and Liberia. Conscription is compulsory for Egyptian men of 18 years of age who are not the only male child. Full-time students may defer their service until the age of 28. The length of the service depends on the level and kind of education achieved by the conscript and needs of the army at the time of conscription.<br /><br />[edit] Administrative divisions<br />Map of Egypt<br />Map of Egypt<br /><br /> Main article: Governorates of Egypt<br /><br />Egypt is divided into twenty-seven governorates (muhafazat, singular muhafazah).<br />Governorate English name Type<br />Ad Daqahliyah Dakahlia lower<br />Aswan Aswan upper<br />Asyut Assyout upper<br />Al-Bahr Al-Ahmar Red Sea frontier<br />Bani Suwayf Beni-Suef upper<br />El-Beheirah Behera lower<br />Bur Sa'id Port Said urban<br />Dumyat Damietta lower<br />Al-Fayyum Fayoum upper<br />Al-Gharbiyah Gharbia lower<br />Al Iskandariyah Alexandria urban<br />Al-Isma'iliyah Ismailia lower<br />Janub Sina' South Sinai frontier<br />El Gizah Giza upper<br /> <br />Governorate English name Type<br />Kafr ash Shaykh Kafr El-Sheikh lower<br />Matruh Matrouh frontier<br />Al-Monufiyah Menoufia lower<br />Al-Minya Menia upper<br />Al-Qahirah Cairo urban<br />Al-Qalyubiyah Kalyoubia lower<br />Qina Quena upper<br />Shamal Sina' North Sinai frontier<br />Al-Sharqiyah Sharkia lower<br />Suhaj Suhag upper<br />Al-Suways Suez urban<br />El Wadi El-Gedid New Valley frontier<br />Al-Uqsur Luxor upper<br /><br />[edit] Economy<br />Lions guard the Kasr-el-Nil Bridge which traverses the Nile at Tahrir Square. The construction of the bridge served as a catalyst for the development of the affluent commercial district Zamalek (Gezira Island).<br />Lions guard the Kasr-el-Nil Bridge which traverses the Nile at Tahrir Square. The construction of the bridge served as a catalyst for the development of the affluent commercial district Zamalek (Gezira Island).<br /><br /> Main article: Economy of Egypt<br /><br />Egypt's economy depends mainly on agriculture, media, petroleum exports, and tourism; there are also more than three million Egyptians working abroad, mainly in Saudi Arabia, the Persian Gulf and Europe. The United States as well has a large population of Egyptian immigrants. The completion of the Aswan High Dam in 1971 and the resultant Lake Nasser have altered the time-honored place of the Nile River in the agriculture and ecology of Egypt. A rapidly-growing population, limited arable land, and dependence on the Nile all continue to overtax resources and stress the economy.<br /><br />The government has struggled to prepare the economy for the new millennium through economic reform and massive investments in communications and physical infrastructure. Egypt has been receiving U.S. foreign aid (since 1979, an average of $2.2 billion per year) and is the third-largest recipient of such funds from the United States following the Iraq war. Its main revenues however come from tourism as well as traffic that goes through the Suez Canal.<br /><br />Economic conditions have started to improve considerably after a period of stagnation from the adoption of more liberal economic policies by the government, as well as increased revenues from tourism and a booming stock market. In its annual report, the IMF has rated Egypt as one of the top countries in the world undertaking economic reforms. Some of the major steps concerning economic reforms taken by the new government since 2003 include a dramatic slashing of customs and tariffs, a new taxation law implemented in 2005 that decreases corporate taxes from 40% to the current 20%, resulted to the stated 100% increase in tax revenue by the year 2006.<br /><br />FDI (Foreign Direct Investment) into Egypt has increased considerably in the past few years due to the recent economic liberalization measures taken by minister of investment Mahmoud Mohieddin, exceeding $6 billion in 2006. Egypt is slated to overcome South Africa as the highest earner of FDI on the African continent in 2007.<br /><br />Although one of the main obstacles still facing the Egyptian economy is the trickle down of the wealth to the average population, many Egyptians criticize their government for higher prices of basic goods while their standards of living or purchasing power remains relatively stagnant. Often corruption is blamed by Egyptians as the major impediment of not feeling the benefits of the newly attained wealth. Although major reconstruction of the infrastructure in the country is promised by the government, with a large portion of the sum payed for the newly acquired 3rd mobile license ($3billion) by Etisalat, slated to be pumped into the country's railroad system after public outrage against the government for recent disasters that took place in 2006 claimed more than 100 lives.<br /><br />The most well known examples of Egyptian companies that have expanded regionally and globally are the Orascom Group and Raya. The IT sector has been expanding rapidly in the past few years, with many new start-ups conducting outsourcing business to North America and Europe, operating with companies such as Microsoft, Oracle and other major corporations, as well as numerous SME's. Some of these companies are the Xceed Contact Center, Raya Contact Center, E-Group Connections and C3 along with other start ups in that country. The sector has been stimulated by new Egyptian entrepreneurs trying to capitalize on their country's huge potential in the sector, as well as constant government encouragement.<br /><br />[edit] Demographics<br />Egyptian farm.<br />Egyptian farm.<br /><br /> Main articles: Demographics of Egypt and Egyptians<br /><br />Egypt is the most populous country in the Middle East and the second-most populous on the African continent, with nearly 79 million people. Almost all the population is concentrated along the banks of the Nile (notably Alexandria and Cairo), in the Delta and near the Suez Canal. Approximately 90% of the population adheres to Islam and most of the remainder to Christianity (primarily the Coptic Orthodox denomination).[1] Apart from religious affiliation, Egyptians can be divided demographically into those who live in the major urban centers and the fellahin or farmers of rural villages.<br /><br />Egyptians are by far the largest ethnic group in Egypt at 97-98% (about 76.4 million) of the total population.[1] Ethnic minorities include the Bedouin Arab tribes living in the eastern deserts and the Sinai Peninsula, the Berber-speaking (Amazigh) Siwis of the Siwa Oasis, the ancient Nubian communities clustered along the Nile in the southernmost part of Egypt with interspersed communities of Beja who become more consolidated and concentrated in the south-eastern-most corner of the country, and a number of Roma clans mostly in the Nile Delta and Fayyum who are progressively losing their identity as urbanization increases.<br /><br />Egypt also hosts some 90,000 refugees and asylum seekers, made up mostly of 70,000 Palestinian refugees and 20,000 Sudanese refugees. The once-vibrant Jewish community in Egypt has virtually disappeared, with only a small number remaining in Egypt and those who visit on religious occasions. Several important Jewish archaeological and historical sites remain.<br /><br />[edit] Religion<br />Cairo's unique city scape with its ancient mosques<br />Cairo's unique city scape with its ancient mosques<br /><br /> Main article: Religion in Egypt<br /><br />Religion plays a central role in most Egyptians' lives, as visitors to the country quickly discover. The rolling calls to prayer that are heard five times a day have the informal effect of regulating the pace of everything from business to entertainment. Cairo is famous for its numerous mosque minarets and church towers. Unfortunately, this religious landscape has been marred by a long-standing record of religious extremism,[34] most recently typified in a 16 December 2006 judgment of the Supreme Administative Council of Egypt which has insisted on a clear demarcation between "recognized religions"—Islam, Christianity and Judaism—and all other religious beliefs—thus effectively delegitimatizing and forbidding practice of all but these aforementioned religions.[35] This judgment has lead to the requirement for communities to either commit perjury or be subjected to denial of identification cards which is tantamount to the denial of their right to citizenship.<br /><br />Egypt is predominantly Muslim, at approximately 90% of the population, with the majority being adherents of the Sunni branch of Islam[1] A significant number of Muslim Egyptians also follow native Sufi orders,[36] and a minority of Shi'a.<br /><br />Christians represent about 10% of the population, 90% of whom belong to the native Coptic denominations (primarily Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria, but also Coptic Catholic Church; a very small Protestant Coptic community exists too), while the remainder includes the Latin Rite Roman Catholic Church, Greek Orthodox Church of Alexandria, Syriac Orthodox of Antioch, and Armenian Apostolic Church and some (Uniate) Eastern Catholic Churches such as the Maronite, Chaldean, Syriac Catholic and Armenian Catholic Churches, largely found in the urban regions of Alexandria and Cairo. However, the number and percentage of Egyptian Christians (primarily Copts) is largely understated according to many Coptic Christians and it is believed the actual number of Christians in Egypt is closer to 20% of the population. Over the last decades the proportion of Egyptian Christians has decreased due to Muslim families tending to have more children, and Egyptian Christians leaving Egypt due to discrimination and persecution. The Coptic Christian community usually has the highest standard of living in urban Egypt and usually have attained a higher average standard of education than the larger Muslim population.[1]<br /><br />According to the present Egyptian constitution, any new legislation must at least implicitly agree with Islamic laws. The mainstream Hanafi school of Sunni Islam is largely organised by the state, through Wizaret Al-Awkaf (Ministry of Religious Affairs). Al-Awkaf controls all mosques and overviews Muslim clerics. Imams are trained in Imam vocational schools and at Al-Azhar University. The department supports Sunni Islam and has commissions authorised to give Fatwa judgements on Islamic issues.<br /><br />Egypt hosts two major religious institutions. Al-Azhar University (Arabic: جامعة الأزهر) is the oldest Islamic institution of higher studies (founded around 970 A.D) and considered by many to be the oldest extant university. Egypt also has a strong Christian heritage as evidenced by the existence of the Coptic Orthodox Church headed by the Patriarch of Alexandria, which has a following of approximately 50 million Christians worldwide; affiliated sister churches are located in Ethiopia, Syria and Eritrea.<br />Over seven million Egyptians follow the Christian faith as members of the Coptic Church.<br />Over seven million Egyptians follow the Christian faith as members of the Coptic Church.<br /><br />Religious freedom in Egypt is hampered to varying degrees by extremist Islamist groups and by discriminatory and restrictive government policies. Being the largest religious minority in Egypt (and the Arab World), Coptic Christian are the most negatively affected community. Until recently, Christians were required to obtain presidential approval for even minor repairs in churches. Although the law was recently eased by handing down the authority of approval to the governors, Copts continue to face many obstacles in building new or repairing existing churches.[37] Copts have faced increased marginalization after the 1952 coup d'état. That however changed to some degree when President Sadat appointed Boutros Boutros-Ghali, as the Egyptian Foreign Minister. Prominent Copts on the cabinet now include Finance Minister Youssef Boutros Ghali and Environment Minister Maged George. In addition, Naguib Sawiris, an extremely successful businessman and one of the wealthiest people internationally is a Copt. Under the Mubarak government, Coptic Christmas (January 7) was recognized as an official holiday in 2002.[38] The Coptic community however has occasionally been the target of hate crimes and physical assault, most recently in El Kosheh massacre that left 21 Copts dead, and during the 2006 attacks on three churches in Alexandria that left one dead.[39] In addition, many Copts continue to complain of being minimally represented in law enforcement, state security and public office, and of being discriminated against in the workforce on the basis of their religion.[40]<br /><br />Egypt was once home to one of the oldest Jewish communities in the world. Egyptian Jews who were mostly Karaites partook of all aspects of Egypt's social, economic and political life; one of the most ardent Egyptian nationalists, Yaqub Sanu' (Abu Naddara), was a Jew, as are traditional musician elSheikh Dawoud Husni, and the popular singer Leila Mourad, and filmmaker Togo Mizrahi.<br /><br />For a long time, Arab Jews from around the Ottoman Empire and Arab world, were attracted to Egypt in settled in it. After the 1956 Suez Crisis, some 25,000 Jews were expelled by Gamal Abdel Nasser, many of these held official Egyptian citizenship. Their Egyptian citizenship was revoked and their property was confiscated. A steady stream of migration of Egyptian Jews followed, reaching a peak after the Six-Day War with Israel in 1967. Today, Jews in Egypt number less than 200.[41]<br /><br />Bahá'ís in Egypt, whose population is estimated to be a couple of thousands, have long been persecuted, having their institutions and community activities banned. Since their faith is not officially recognized by the state, they are also not allowed to use it on their national identity cards (conversely, Islam, Christianity, & Judaism are officially recognized); hence most of them do not hold national identity cards. In April 2006 a court case recognized the Bahá'í Faith, but the government appealed the court decision and succeeded in having it suspended on 15 May.[42] On December 16, 2006, only after one hearing, the Supreme Administrative Council of Egypt ruled against the Bahá'ís and stating that the government may not recognize the Bahá'í Faith in official identification numbers.[35]<br /><br />There are Egyptians who identify as atheist and agnostic, but their numbers are largely unknown as openly advocating such positions risks legal sanction on basis of apostasy (if a citizen takes the step of suing the 'apostating' person, not automatically by the general prosecutor). In 2000, an openly atheist Egyptian writer, who called for the establishment of a local association for atheists, was tried on charges of insulting Islam in four of his books.[43]<br /><br />Although freedom of religion is guaranteed by the constitution, Egyptians converting from Islam to Christianity or vice-versa have faced great troubles due to the practices of administratives. Public officials, being conservative themselves dismay and increase the complexity of the legal procedures required to instate the religion change as required by law. Security agencies fear that such conversions, especially those from Islam to Coptic Christianity, may stir social unrest, and takes forceful steps to prevent it from happening in many cases, sometimes by detaining the subjects.<br /><br />[edit] Geography<br />White Desert, Farafra.<br />White Desert, Farafra.<br /><br /> Main article: Geography of Egypt<br /><br />At 386,636 mi² (1,001,450 km²[44]), Egypt is the world's thirtieth-largest country (after Mauritania). It is comparable in size to Tanzania, twice the size of France, four times the size of the UK, and is more than half the size of the US state of Alaska.<br /><br />Nevertheless, due to the aridity of Egypt's climate, population centres are concentrated along the narrow Nile Valley and Delta, meaning that approximately 99% of the population uses only about 5.5% of the total land area.[45]<br /><br />Egypt is bordered by Libya on the west, Sudan on the south, and by Israel and the Palestinian Gaza Strip on the northeast. Egypt's important role in geopolitics stems from its strategic position: a transcontinental nation, it possesses a land bridge (the Isthmus of Suez) between Africa and Asia, which in turn is traversed by a navigable waterway (the Suez Canal) that connects the Mediterranean Sea with the Indian Ocean via the Red Sea.<br /><br />Apart from the Nile Valley, the majority of Egypt's landscape is a big, sandy desert. The winds blowing can create sand dunes over one hundred feet high. Egypt includes parts of the Sahara Desert and of the Libyan Desert. These deserts were referred to as the "red land" in ancient Egypt, and they protected the Kingdom of the Pharaohs from western threats.<br /><br />Towns and cities include Alexandria, one of the greatest ancient cities, Aswan, Asyut, Cairo, the modern Egyptian capital, El-Mahalla El-Kubra, Giza, the site of the Pyramid of Khufu, Hurghada, Luxor, Kom Ombo, Port Safaga, Port Said, Sharm el Sheikh, Suez, where the Suez Canal is located, Zagazig, and Al-Minya. Oases include Bahariya, el Dakhla, Farafra, el Kharga and Siwa.<br />Satellite image of Egypt, generated from raster graphics data supplied by The Map Library<br />Satellite image of Egypt, generated from raster graphics data supplied by The Map Library<br /><br />Protectorates include Ras Mohamed National Park, Zaranik Protectorate and Siwa. See Egyptian Protectorates for more information.<br /><br />[edit] Climate<br /><br />In terms of average rainfall, Egypt is almost certainly the driest country in the world. South of Cairo, rainfall averages only around 2 to 5 mm (0.1 to 0.2 in) per year, and years typically pass by between falls. On a very thin strip of the northern coast the rainfall can be as high as 170 mm (7 in), all between November and March. Snow has been known to fall on Mount Sinai.<br /><br />It is hot in the summer, with temperatures averaging between 80 and 90°F (27 - 32°C), and up to 109°F (42°C) on the Red Sea coast. Winters are warm, with temperatures averaging between 55 and 70°F (13 to 21°C). A steady wind from the northwest helps hold down the temperature near the Mediterranean coast. The Khamaseen is a wind that blows from the south in Egypt, usually in spring or summer, bringing sand and dust, and sometimes raises the temperature in the desert to more than 100°F (38°C).<br /><br />[edit] Culture<br />Bibliotheca Alexandrina is a commemoration of the ancient Library of Alexandria in Egypt's second largest city.<br />Bibliotheca Alexandrina is a commemoration of the ancient Library of Alexandria in Egypt's second largest city.<br /><br /> Main article: Culture of Egypt<br /><br />Egyptian culture has five thousand years of recorded history. Ancient Egypt was among the earliest civilizations and for millennia, Egypt maintained a strikingly complex and stable culture that influenced later cultures of Europe, the Middle East and Africa. After the Pharaonic era, Egypt itself came under the influence of Hellenism, Christianity, and Islamic culture. Today, many aspects of Egypt's ancient culture exist in interaction with newer elements, including the influence of modern Western culture, itself with roots in ancient Egypt.<br /><br />Egypt's capital city, Cairo, is Africa's largest city and has been renowned for centuries as a center of learning, culture and commerce. Egypt has the highest number of Nobel Laureates in Africa and the Arab World. Some Egyptian born politicians were or are currently at the helm of major international organizations like Boutros Boutros-Ghali of the United Nations and Mohamed ElBaradei of the IAEA.<br /><br />[edit] Renaissance<br /><br />The work of early nineteenth-century scholar Rifa'a et-Tahtawi gave rise to the Egyptian Renaissance, marking the transition from Medieval to Early Modern Egypt. His work renewed interest in Egyptian antiquity and exposed Egyptian society to Enlightenment principles. Tahtawi co-founded with education reformer Ali Mubarak a native Egyptology school that looked for inspiration to medieval Egyptian scholars, such as Suyuti and Maqrizi, who themselves studied the history, language and antiquities of Egypt.[46] Egypt's renaissance peaked in the late 19th and early 20th centuries through the work of people like Muhammad Abduh, Ahmed Lutfi el-Sayed, Qasim Amin, Salama Moussa, Taha Hussein and Mahmoud Mokhtar. They forged a liberal path for Egypt expressed as a commitment to individual freedom, secularism and faith in science to bring progress.[47]<br /><br />[edit] Arts<br />Eighteenth dynasty painting from the tomb of Theban governor Ramose in Deir el-Madinah<br />Eighteenth dynasty painting from the tomb of Theban governor Ramose in Deir el-Madinah<br /><br />The Egyptians were one of the first major civilizations to codify design elements in art. The wall paintings done in the service of the Pharaohs followed a rigid code of visual rules and meanings. Modern and contemporary Egyptian art can be as diverse as any works in the world art scene. The Cairo Opera House serves as the main performing arts venue in the Egyptian capital. Egypt's media and arts industry has flourished since the late nineteenth century, today with more than thirty satellite channels and over one hundred motion pictures produced each year. Cairo has long been known as the "Hollywood of the Middle East;" its annual film festival, the Cairo International Film Festival, has been rated as one of 11 festivals with a top class rating worldwide by the International Federation of Film Producers' Associations.[48] To bolster its media industry further, especially with the keen competition from the Persian Gulf Arab States and Lebanon, a large media city was built. Some Egyptian actors, like Omar Sharif, have achieved worldwide fame.<br />[edit] Literature<br /><br />Literature constitutes an important cultural element in the life of Egypt. Egyptian novelists and poets were among the first to experiment with modern styles of Arabic literature, and the forms they developed have been widely imitated throughout the Middle East. The first modern Egyptian novel Zaynab by Muhammad Husayn Haykal was published in 1913 in the Egyptian vernacular.[49] Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz was the first Arabic-language writer to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Egyptian women writers include Nawal El Saadawi, well known for her feminist activism, and Alifa Rifaat who also writes about women and tradition. Vernacular poetry is perhaps the most popular literary genre amongst Egyptians, represented by such luminaries as Ahmed Fuad Nigm (Fagumi), Salah Jaheen and Abdel Rahman el-Abnudi.<br /><br />[edit] Music<br /><br /> Main article: Music of Egypt<br /><br />Upper Egyptian folk musicians from Kom Ombo.<br />Upper Egyptian folk musicians from Kom Ombo.<br /><br />Egyptian music is a rich mixture of indigenous, Mediterranean, African and Western elements. In antiquity, Egyptians were playing harps and flutes, including two indigenous instruments: the ney and the oud. Percussion and vocal music also became an important part of the local music tradition ever since. Contemporary Egyptian music traces its beginnings to the creative work of people such as Abdu-l Hamuli, Almaz and Mahmud Osman, who influenced the later work of Egyptian music giants such as Sayed Darwish, Umm Kulthum, Mohammed Abdel Wahab and Abdel Halim Hafez. These prominent artists were followed later by Amr Diab. He is seen by many as the new age "Musical Legend", whose fan base stretches all over the Middle East and Europe. From the 1970s onwards, Egyptian pop music has become increasingly important in Egyptian culture, while Egyptian folk music continues to be played during weddings and other festivities.<br />[edit] Festivals<br /><br />Egypt is famous for its many festivals and religious carnivals, also known as mulids. They are usually associated with a particular Coptic or Sufi saint, but are often celebrated by all Egyptians irrespective of creed or religion. Ramadan has a special flavor in Egypt, celebrated with sounds, lights (local lanterns known as fawanees) and much flare that many Muslim tourists from the region flock to Egypt during Ramadan to witness the spectacle. The ancient spring festival of Sham en Nisim (Copto-Egyptian: Ϭⲱⲙ‘ⲛⲛⲓⲥⲓⲙ shom en nisim) has been celebrated by Egyptians for thousands of years, typically between the Egyptian months of Baramouda (April) and Bashans (May) following Easter Sunday.[50]<br /><br />[edit] Sports<br /><br />Football (soccer) is the de facto national sport of Egypt. Egyptian Soccer clubs El Ahly and El Zamalek are the two most popular teams and enjoy the reputation of long-time champions of the sport regionally. Squash and tennis are other close favorites among Egyptians. The Egyptian Squash team has been known for its fierce competition in world-wide championships since the 1930s.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-46614177346946523322007-03-05T04:57:00.001-08:002007-03-05T04:57:30.626-08:00persiaHistory<br /><br />[edit] Achaemenid Empire (550 BC–330 BC)<br /><br /> Main article: Achaemenid Empire<br /><br />Cyrus the Great, founder of Persian Empire and first charter of human rights.<br />Cyrus the Great, founder of Persian Empire and first charter of human rights.<br />Apadana Hall, Persepolis: Angra Mainyu kills the primeval bull, whose seed is rescued by Mah, the moon, as the source for all other animals.<br />Apadana Hall, Persepolis: Angra Mainyu kills the primeval bull, whose seed is rescued by Mah, the moon, as the source for all other animals.<br /><br />The earliest known record of the Persians comes from an Assyrian inscription from c. 844 BC that calls them the Parsu (Parsuash, Parsumash) and mentions them in the region of Lake Urmia alongside another group, the Madai (Medes). For the next two centuries, the Persians and Medes were at times tributary to the Assyrians. The region of Parsuash was annexed by Sargon of Assyria around 719 BC. Eventually the Medes came to rule an independent Median Empire, and the Persians were subject to them.<br /><br />The Achaemenids were the first to create a centralized state in Persia, founded by Achaemenes (Hakhamanish), chieftain of the Persians around 700 BC.<br /><br />Around 653 BC, the Medes came under the domination of the Scythians, and Teispes, the son of Achaemenes, seems to have led the nomadic Persians to settle in southern Iran around this time — eventually establishing the first organized Persian state in the important region of Anshan as the Elamite kingdom was permanently destroyed by the Assyrian ruler Ashurbanipal (640 BC). The kingdom of Anshan and its successors continued to use Elamite as an official language for quite some time after this, although the new dynasts spoke Persian, an Indo-Iranian tongue.<br /><br />Teispes' descendants may have branched off into two lines, one line ruling in Anshan, while the other ruled the rest of Persia. Cyrus II the Great united the separate kingdoms around 559 BC. At this time, the Persians were still tributary to the Median Empire ruled by Astyages. Cyrus rallied the Persians together, and in 550 BC defeated the forces of Astyages, who was then captured by his own nobles and turned over to the triumphant Cyrus, now Shah of a unified Persian kingdom. As Persia assumed control over the rest of Media and their large empire, Cyrus led the united Medes and Persians to still more conquest. He took Lydia in Asia Minor, and carried his arms eastward into central Asia. Finally in 539 BC, Cyrus marched triumphantly into the ancient city of Babylon. After this victory, he set the standard of the benevolent conqueror by issuing the Cyrus Cylinder. Cyrus was killed in 530 during a battle against the Massagetae or Sakas.<br />Darius I of Persia.<br />Darius I of Persia.<br />Achaemenid empire at its greatest extent.<br />Achaemenid empire at its greatest extent.<br /><br />Cyrus' son, Cambyses II, annexed Egypt to the Achaemenid Empire. The empire then reached its greatest extent under Darius I. He led conquering armies into the Indus River valley and into Thrace in Europe. A punitive raid against Greece was halted at the Battle of Marathon. His son Xerxes I tried to subdue the Greeks, but his army was defeated at the Battle of Plataea 479 BC.<br /><br />The Achaemenid Empire was the largest and most powerful empire the world had yet seen. More importantly, it was well managed and organized. Darius divided his realm into about twenty satrapies (provinces) supervised by satraps, or governors, many of whom had personal ties to the Shah. He instituted a systematic tribute to tax each province. He took the advanced postal system of the Assyrians and expanded it. Also taken from the Assyrians was the usage of secret agents of the king, known as the King's Eyes and Ears, keeping him informed.<br /><br />Darius improved the famous Royal Road and other ancient trade routes, thereby connecting far reaches of the empire. He may have moved the administration center from Fars itself to Susa, near Babylon and closer to the center of the realm. The Persians allowed local cultures to survive, following the precedent set by Cyrus the Great. This was not only good for the empire's subjects, but ultimately benefited the Achaemenids, since the conquered peoples felt no need to revolt.<br />Persian and Median soldiers with Farvahar in center.<br />Persian and Median soldiers with Farvahar in center.<br /><br />It may have been during the Achaemenid period that Zoroastrianism reached South-Western Iran, where it came to be accepted by the rulers and through them became a defining element of Persian culture. The religion was not only accompanied by a formalization of the concepts and divinities of the traditional (Indo-)Iranian pantheon but also introduced several novel ideas, including that of free will, which is arguably Zoroaster's greatest contribution to religious philosophy. Under the patronage of the Achaemenid kings, and later as the de-facto religion of the state, Zoroastrianism would reach all corners of the empire. In turn, Zoroastrianism would be subject to the first sycretic influences, in particular from the Semitic lands to the west, from which the divinities of the religion would gain astral and planetary aspects and from where the temple cult originates. It was also during the Achaemenid era that the sacerdotal Magi would exert their influence on the religion, introducing many of the practices that are today identified as typically Zoroastrian, but also introducing doctrinal modifications that are today considered to be revocations of the original teachings of the prophet.<br /><br />The Achaemenid Empire united people and kingdoms from every major civilization in south west Asia. For the first time in history, people from very different cultures were in contact with one another under one ruler.<br /><br />[edit] Hellenistic Persia (330 BC–150 BC)<br /><br /> Main article: Seleucid Empire<br /><br />The later years of the Achaemenid dynasty were marked by decay and decadence. The greatest empire of the time collapsed in only eight years, when it fell under the attack of a young Macedonian king, Alexander the Great.<br /><br />The Achaemenid Empire's weakness was exposed to the Greeks in 401 BC, when a rebel prince, Cyrus the Younger, hired 14,000 Greek mercenaries to help secure his claim to the imperial throne (see Xenophon, Anabasis). This exposed the political instability weakness of Achaemenid State during a crisis of succession.<br /><br />Philip II of Macedon, leader of most of Greece, decided to take advantage of this weakness when, after the death of Artaxerxes III Ochus in 338, the Persian Empire had no strong leader. After Philip's death in 336, his son and successor Alexander landed in Asia Minor in 334 BC. His armies quickly swept through Lydia, Phoenicia, and Egypt, before defeating all the troops of Darius III at Gaugamela (331) and capturing the capital at Susa. The last Achaemenid resistance was at the "Persian Gates" between Susa and near the royal palace at Persepolis. The Achaemenid Empire was now in Alexander's hands.<br /><br /><br />Map of Alexander's empire.<br />Map of Alexander's empire.<br /><br />Along his route of conquest, Alexander founded many colony cities, often named "Alexandria". For the next several centuries, these cities served to greatly extend Greek, or Hellenistic, culture in Persia.<br /><br />Alexander's empire broke up shortly after his death, and Alexander's general, Seleucus I Nicator, tried to take control of Persia, Mesopotamia, and later Syria and Asia Minor. His ruling family is known as the Seleucid Dynasty. However he was killed in 281 BC by Ptolemy Keraunos before he could conquer Greece and Macedonia.<br /><br />Greek colonization continued until around 250 BC; Greek language, philosophy, and art came with the colonists. Throughout Alexander's former empire, Greek became the common tongue of diplomacy and literature. Trade with China had begun in Achaemenid times along the so-called Silk Road; but during the Hellenistic period it began in earnest. The overland trade brought about some fascinating cultural exchanges. Buddhism came in from India, while Zoroastrianism traveled west to influence Judaism. Incredible statues of the Buddha in classical Greek styles have been found in Persia and Afghanistan, illustrating the mix of cultures that occurred around this time (See Greco-Buddhism), although it is possible that Greco-Buddhist art dates from Achaemenid times when Greek artists worked for the Persians.<br /><br />Although recently discovered cuneiform evidence (e.g., the Babylonian Chronicles from the Hellenistic Period) show how much continuity there was in the Eastern civilization, it can not be denied that the Seleucid kingdom began to decline after about a century. The eastern provinces of Bactria and Parthia broke off in 238 BC. King Antiochus III's military leadership kept Parthia from overrunning Persia itself, but when he tried to intervene in Greece, his successes alarmed the burgeoning Roman Republic. Roman legions began to attack the kingdom. At the same time, the Seleucids had to contend with the revolt of the Maccabees in Judea and the expansion of the Kushan Empire to the east. The empire fell apart and was conquered by Parthia and Rome.<br /><br />[edit] Parthian Empire (250 BC–AD 226)<br /><br /> Main article: Parthia<br /><br />The Parthian Empire.<br />The Parthian Empire.<br />Metallic statue of a Parthian prince (thought to be Surena), AD 100, kept at The National Museum of Iran, Tehran.<br />Metallic statue of a Parthian prince (thought to be Surena), AD 100, kept at The National Museum of Iran, Tehran.<br /><br />Its rulers, the Arsacid dynasty, belonged to an Iranian tribe that had settled there during the time of Alexander. They declared their independence from the Seleucids in 238 BC, but their attempts to unify Iran were thwarted until after Mithridates I advent to the Parthian throne in about 170 BC.<br /><br />The Parthian Confederacy shared a border with Rome along the upper Euphrates River. The two polities became major rivals, especially over control of Armenia. Heavily-armoured Parthian cavalry (cataphracts) supported by mounted archers proved a match for Roman legions, as in the Battle of Carrhae in which the Parthian General Surena defeated Marcus Licinius Crassus of Rome. Wars were very frequent, with Mesopotamia serving as the battleground.<br /><br />During the Parthian period, Hellenistic customs partially gave way to a resurgence of Persian culture. However, the empire lacked political unity. The administration was shared between Seven Parthian clans who constituted the Dahae Confederation, each of these clans governed a province of the empire. Suren-Pahlav Clan, Karen-Pahlav Clan and Mihran Clan were the most influential ones. By the 1st century BC, Parthia was decentralized, ruled by feudal nobles. Wars with Rome to the west and the Kushan Empire to the northeast drained the country's resources.<br /><br />Parthia, now impoverished and without any hope to recover the lost territories, was demoralized. The kings had to give more concessions to the nobility, and the vassal kings sometimes refused to obey. Parthia's last ruler Artabanus IV had an initial success in putting together the crumbling state. However, the fate of the Arsacid Dynasty was doomed when in AD 224, the Persian vassal king Ardashir revolted. Two years later, he took Ctesiphon, and this time, it meant the end of Parthia. It also meant the beginning of the third Persian Empire, ruled by the Sassanid kings. Sassanids were from the province of Persis, native to the first Persian Empire, the Achaemenids.<br /><br />[edit] Sassanid Empire (226–651)<br /><br /> Main article: Sassanid Empire<br /><br />The Sassanid Empire in 610.<br />The Sassanid Empire in 610.<br />One of the rock reliefs at Naqsh-e Rustam depicting the triumph of Shapur I over the Roman Emperor Valerian, and Philip the Arabian<br />One of the rock reliefs at Naqsh-e Rustam depicting the triumph of Shapur I over the Roman Emperor Valerian, and Philip the Arabian<br /><br />Ardashir I, led a rebellion against the Parthian Confederacy in an attempt to revive the glory of the previous empire and to legitimize the hellenized form of Zoroastrianism practised in south western Iran. In two years he was the Shah of a new Persian Empire.<br /><br />The Sassanid dynasty (also Sassanian) (named for Ardashir's grandfather) was the first dynasty native to the Pars province since the Achaemenids; thus they saw themselves as the successors of Darius and Cyrus. They pursued an aggressive expansionist policy. They recovered much of the eastern lands that the Kushans had taken in the Parthian period. The Sassanids continued to make war against Rome; a Persian army even captured the Roman Emperor Valerian in 260.<br /><br />The Sassanid Empire, unlike Parthia, was a highly centralized state. The people were rigidly organized into a caste system: Priests, Soldiers, Scribes, and Commoners. Zoroastrianism was finally made the official state religion, and spread outside Persia proper and out into the provinces. There was sporadic persecution of other religions. The Eastern Orthodox Church was particularly persecuted, but this was in part due to its ties to the Roman Empire. The Nestorian Christian church was tolerated and sometimes even favored by the Sassanids.<br /><br />The wars and religious control that had fueled The Sassanid empire's early successes eventually contributed to its decline. The eastern regions were conquered by the White Huns in the late 5th century. Adherents of a radical religious sect, the Mazdakites, revolted around the same time. Khosrau I was able to recover his empire and expand into the Christian countries of Antioch and Yemen. Between 605 and 629, Sassanids successfully annexed Levant and Roman Egypt and pushed into Anatolia.<br /><br />However, a subsequent war with the Romans utterly destroyed the empire. In the course of the protracted conflict, Sassinid armies reached Constantinople, but could not defeat the Byzantines there. Meanwhile, the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius had successfully outflanked the Persian armies in Asia Minor and attacked the empire from the rear while the main Iranian army along with its top Eran Spahbods were far from battlefields. This resulted in a crushing defeat for Sassanids in Northern Mesopotamia. The Sassanids had to give up all their conquered lands and retreat. This defeat was mentioned in Qur'an as a "victory for believers," referring to the Romans, who were monotheists, in contrast to the pagan Sassinids. (Note: The official religion of the Sassanid empire was Zoroastrianism. It is not an Abrahamic/Semitic religion like Christianity or Islam, so it would be classified as "Pagan" by the followers of those religions even though it was monotheistic).<br /><br />Following the advent of Islam and collapse of Sassanid Empire, Persians came under the subjection of Arab rulers for almost two centuries before native Persian dynasties could gradually drive them out. In this period a number of small and numerically inferior Arab tribes migrated to inland Iran. [1]<br /><br />Also some Turkic tribes settled in Persia between the 9th and 12th centuries.[2]<br /><br />In time these peoples were integrated into numerous Persian populations and adopted Persian culture and language while Persians retained their culture with minimal influence from outside.[3]<br /><br />[edit] Islam and Persia (650–1037)<br /><br /> Main article: Islamic conquest of Persia<br /><br />The explosive growth of the Arab Caliphate coincided with the chaos caused by the defeat of Sassanids in wars with the Byzantine Empire. Most of the country was conquered between 643 to 650. Persia's conquest by Islamic Arab armies marks the transition into "medieval" Persia.<br /><br />Yazdgerd III, the last Sasanian emperor, died ten years after he lost his empire to the newly-formed Muslim Caliphate. He tried to recover some of what he lost with the help of the Turks, but they were easily defeated by Muslim armies. Then he sought the aid of the Chinese Tang dynasty. However, the Chinese help did not avail and Arab muslims ultimately defeated the Chinese forces in the battle of Talas, a century after Yazdgerd's death. He is believed to have lived on the borders of Islamic Persia. Some historians say that he lived inside Islamic Iran.<br /><br />The Arab empire, ruled by the Umayyad Dynasty, was the largest state in history up to that point. It stretched from the Iberian Peninsula to the Indus River, from the Aral Sea to the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. The Umayyads borrowed heavily from Persian and Byzantine administrative systems and moved their capital to Damascus, in the center of their empire. The Umayyads would rule Persia for a hundred years.<br /><br />The Arab conquest dramatically changed life in Persia. Arabic became the new lingua franca, Islam eventually replaced Zoroastrianism, and mosques were built. A new language, religion, and culture were added to the Iranian cultural milieu.<br /><br />In 750 the Umayyads were ousted from power by the Abbasid dynasty. By that time, Persians had come to play an important role in the bureaucracy of the empire [4]. The caliph Al-Ma'mun, whose mother was Persian, moved his capital away from Arab lands into Merv in eastern Iran. It was he who later founded the House of Wisdom in Baghdad, based on the Iranian Jondishapour.<br /><br />But political unrest continued. In 819, Samanids carved out an independent state in eastern Persia to become the first native rulers after the Arabic conquest. They made Samarqand, Bukhara and Herat their capitals and revived the Persian language and culture. Zoroastrian clerics complied and authored major religious texts, such as the Denkard, in Pahlavi. It was approximately during this age, when the poet Firdawsi finished the Shahnameh, an epic poem retelling the history of the Iranian kings. This epic was completed by 1008 AD.<br /><br />In 913, western Persia was conquered by the Buwayhid, a Deylamite tribal confederation from the shores of the Caspian Sea. They made the city of Shiraz their capital. The Buwayhids destroyed Islam's former territorial unity. Rather than a province of a united Muslim empire, Iran became one nation in an increasingly diverse and cultured Islamic world.<br /><br />[edit] Turkic rule (1037–1219)<br /><br /> Main article: Seljuq dynasty<br /><br />Persian Army- Watercolor by Haydar Hatemi-2002<br />Persian Army- Watercolor by Haydar Hatemi-2002<br /><br />The Muslim world was shaken again in 1037 with the invasion of the Seljuk Turks from the northeast. The Seljuks created a very large Middle Eastern empire. The Seljuks built the fabulous Friday Mosque in the city of Isfahan. The famous Persian mathematician and poet, Omar Khayyám, wrote his Rubaiyat during Seljuk times.<br /><br />In the early 13th century the Seljuks lost control of Persia to another group of Turks from Khwarezmia, near the Aral Sea. The Shahs of the Khwarezmid Empire later ruled.<br /><br />[edit] Mongols and their successors (1219–1500)<br /><br /> Main articles: Ilkhanate and Timurid dynasty<br /><br />Mosques with Persian names and designs in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and India illustrate just how far east Persian culture extended due to their conquests. The actual architectural domed design of Mosques were borrowed from the Sassanid era, which then spilled into the Muslim world.<br />Mosques with Persian names and designs in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and India illustrate just how far east Persian culture extended due to their conquests. The actual architectural domed design of Mosques were borrowed from the Sassanid era, which then spilled into the Muslim world.<br /><br />In 1218, Genghis Khan sent ambassadors and merchants to the city of Otrar, on the northeastern confines of the Khwarizm shahdom. The governor of Otrar had these envoys executed. Genghis attacked Otrar in 1219, Samarkand and other cities of the northeast.<br /><br />Genghis' grandson, Hulagu Khan, finished the invasions that Genghis had begun when he defeated Khwarzim Empire, Baghdad, and much of the rest of the Middle East from 1255 to 1258. Persia temporarily became the Ilkhanate, a division of the vast Mongol Empire.<br /><br />In 1295, after Ilkhan Mahmud Ghazan converted to Islam, he renounced all allegiance to the Emperor Chengzong of Yuan China who had recently succeeded his grandfather Kublai Khan as Great Khan. The Ilkhans patronized the arts and learning in the fine tradition of Iranian Islam; indeed, they helped to repair much of the damage of the Mongol conquests.<br /><br />In 1335, the death of Abu Sa'id, the last well-recognized Ilkhan, spelled the end of the Ilkhanate. Though Arpa Ke'un was declared Ilkhan his authority was disputed and the Ilkhanate was splintered into a number of small states. This left Persia vurnerable to conquest at the hands of Timur the Lame or Tamerlane, a Central Asian conqueror seeking to revive the Mongol Empire. He ordered the attack of Persia beginning around 1370 and robbed the region until his death in 1405. Timur was an even greater murderer than Genghis had been. In Isfahan, for instance, he was responsible for the murder of 70,000 people so that he could build towers with their skulls. He conquered a wide area and made his own city of Samarkand rich, but he made no effort to forge a lasting empire. The Persian Empire was essentially in ruins.<br /><br />For the next hundred years Persia was not a unified state. It was ruled for a while by descendants of Timur, called the Timurid emirs. Toward the end of the 15th century, Persia was taken over by the Emirate of the White Sheep Turkmen (Ak Koyunlu). But there was little unity and none of the sophistication that had defined Iran during the glory days of Islam.<br /><br />[edit] Safavid Dynasty (1500–1722)<br />Naghsh-i Jahan Square is one of the many monuments built during the Safavid era.<br />Naghsh-i Jahan Square is one of the many monuments built during the Safavid era.<br />Persian art and architecture reached an apex during the reign of the Safavid dynasty.<br />Persian art and architecture reached an apex during the reign of the Safavid dynasty.<br /><br />The Safavid Dynasty hailed from the town of Ardabil in the region of Azarbaijan. The Safavid Shah Ismail I overthrew the White Sheep (Akkoyunlu) Turkish rulers of Persia to found a new native Persian empire. Ismail expanded Persia to include all of present-day Azerbaijan, Iran, and Iraq, plus much of Afghanistan. Ismail's expansion was halted by the Ottoman Empire at the Battle of Chaldiran in 1514, and war with the Ottomans became a fact of life in Safavid Iran.<br /><br />Safavid Persia was a violent and chaotic state for the next seventy years, but in 1588 Shah Abbas I of Safavid ascended to the throne and instituted a cultural and political renaissance. He moved his capital to Isfahan, which quickly became one of the most important cultural centers in the Islamic world. He made peace with the Ottomans. He reformed the army, drove the Uzbeks out of Iran and into modern-day Uzbekistan, and (with English help) recaptured the island of Hormuz from the Portuguese. Abdur Razzaq was the Persian ambassador to Calicut, India, and wrote vividly of his experiences there.[5]<br /><br />The Safavids were followers of Shi'a Islam, and under them Persia (Iran) became the largest Shi'a country in the Muslim world, a position Iran still holds today.<br /><br />Under the Safavids Iran enjoyed its last period as a major imperial power. In 1639, a final border was agreed upon with the Ottoman Empire with the Treaty of Qasr-e Shirin; which delineates the border between the Republic of Turkey and Iran and also that of between Iraq and Iran, today.<br /><br />[edit] Persia and Europe (1722–1914)<br />An 18th-century Persian astrolabe. Throughout the Middle Ages, the natural philosophy and mathematics of ancient Greeks were furthered and preserved within the Muslim world. During this period, Persia became a centre for the manufacture of scientific instruments, retaining its reputation for quality well into the 19th century.<br />An 18th-century Persian astrolabe. Throughout the Middle Ages, the natural philosophy and mathematics of ancient Greeks were furthered and preserved within the Muslim world. During this period, Persia became a centre for the manufacture of scientific instruments, retaining its reputation for quality well into the 19th century.<br /><br />In 1722, the Safavid state collapsed. That year saw the first European invasion of Persia since the time of Alexander: Peter the Great, Emperor of Imperial Russia, invaded from the northwest as part of a bid to dominate central Asia. To make the situation truly hopeless, Ottoman forces accompanied the Russians, successfully laying siege to Isfahan.<br /><br />The country was able to weather the invasions; neither the Russians nor the Turks gained any territory. However, the Safavids were severely weakened, and that same year (1722), the Afghans launched a bloody battle in response to the Safavids' attempts on trying to forcefully convert them from Sunni to Shi'a sect of Islam. The last Safavid shah was executed, and the dynasty came to an end.<br /><br />The Persian empire experienced a temporary revival under Nadir Shah in the 1730s and 1740s. Nadir drove out the Russians and confined the Afghans to their present home in Afghanistan. He launched many successful campaigns against Persia's old enemies, the nomadic khanates of Central Asia; most of them were destroyed or absorbed into Persia. In 1739, he attacked and looted Delhi, the capital of Moghul India. However, his empire declined after his death. His rule was followed by the weak and short-lived Zand dynasty. Iran was left unprepared for the worldwide expansion of European colonial empires in the late 18th century and throughout the 19th century.<br /><br />Persia found relative stability in the Qajar dynasty, ruling from 1779 to 1925, but lost hope to compete with the new industrial powers of Europe; Persia found itself sandwiched between the growing Russian Empire in Central Asia and the expanding British Empire in India. Each carved out pieces from the Persian empire that became Bahrain, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Afghanistan amongst other previous provinces.<br /><br />Although Persia was never directly invaded, it gradually became economically dependent on Europe. The Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907 formalised Russian and British spheres of influence over the north and south of the country, respectively, where Britain and Russia each created a "sphere of influence", where the colonial power had the final "say" on economic matters.<br /><br />At the same time Mozzafar-al-Din shah had granted a concession to William Knox D'Arcy, later the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, to explore and work the newly-discovered oil fields at Masjid Soleiman in southwest Persia, which started production in 1914. Winston Churchill, as First Sea Lord to the British Admiralty, oversaw the conversion of the Royal Navy to oil-fired battleships and partially nationalized it prior to the start of war. A small Anglo-Persian force was garrisoned there to protect the field from some hostile tribal factions.<br /><br /> See also: The Great Game<br /><br />[edit] World War I and the interbellum (1914–1935)<br />Eram Garden, built in the Qajar era is an example of Persian architecture of that time.<br />Eram Garden, built in the Qajar era is an example of Persian architecture of that time.<br /><br />Persia was drawn into the periphery of World War I because of its strategic position between Afghanistan and the warring Ottoman, Russian, and British Empires. In 1914 Britain sent a military force to Mesopotamia to deny the Ottomans access to the Persian oilfields. The German Empire retaliated on behalf of its ally by spreading a rumour that Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany had converted to Islam, and sent agents through Iran to attack the oil fields and raise a Jihad against British rule in India. Most of those German agents were captured by Persian, British and Russian troops who were sent to patrol the Afghan border, and the rebellion faded away. This was followed by a German attempt, assisted by his mainly Swedish bodyguard, to abduct and control Ahmad Shah Qajar, which was foiled at the last moment.<br /><br />In 1916 the fighting between Russian and Ottoman forces to the north of the country had spilt down into Persia; Russia gained the advantage until most of her armies collapsed in the wake of the Russian Revolution of 1917. This left the Caucasus unprotected, and the Caucasian and Persian civilians starving after years of war and deprivation. In 1918 a small force of 400 British troops under General Dunsterville moved into the Trans-Caucasus from Persia in a bid to encourage local resistance to German and Ottoman armies who were about to invade the Baku oilfields. Although they later withdrew back into Persia, they did succeed in delaying the Turks access to the oil almost until the Armistice. In addition, the expedition’s supplies were used to avert a major famine in the region, and a camp for 30,000 displaced refugees was created near the Mesopotamian frontier.<br /><br />By World War I, Persia was not the world power it had once been. It had become a tool in the political battles of other empires. In 1919, northern Persia was occupied by the British General William Edmund Ironside to enforce the Turkish Armistice conditions and assist General Dunsterville and Colonel Bicherakhov contain Bolshevik influence (of Mirza Kuchak Khan) in the north. Britain also took tighter control over the increasingly lucrative oil fields.<br /><br />In 1925, Reza Shah Pahlavi seized power from the Qajars and established the new Pahlavi dynasty, the last Persian monarchy before the establishment of the Islamic Republic. However, Britain and the Soviet Union remained the influential powers in Persia into the early years of the Cold War.<br /><br />On March 21, 1935, Iran was officially accepted as the new name of the country. After Persian scholars' protests to this decision, in 1953 Mohammad Reza Shah announced both names "Iran" and "Persia" could be used.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-68847042934497022772007-03-05T04:54:00.001-08:002007-03-05T04:54:30.356-08:00syntaxIn linguistics, syntax is the study of the rules, or "patterned relations", that govern the way words combine to form phrases and phrases combine to form sentences. The word originates from the Greek words συν (syn), meaning "co-" or "together", and τάξις (táxis), meaning "sequence, order, or arrangement". The combinatory behavior of words is governed to a first approximation by their part of speech (noun, adjective, verb, etc., a categorization that goes back in the Western tradition to the Greek grammarian Dionysius Thrax). Modern research into natural language syntax attempts to systematize descriptive grammar and, for many practitioners, to find general laws that govern the syntax of all languages. It is unconcerned with prescriptive grammar (see prescription and description).<br /><br />Theories of syntax differ in the object of study. While formal grammars (especially in the generative grammar tradition) have focused on the mental process of language production (i-language), empirical grammars have focused on linguistic function, explaining the language in use (corpus linguistics). The latter often encodes frequency data in addition to production rules, and provide mechanisms for learning the grammar (or at least the probabilities) from usage data. One way of considering the space of grammars is to distinguish those that do not encode rule frequency (the majority) and those that do (probabilistic grammars).<br /><br />From a biological and neurobiological perspective syntax has recently played a crucial role. On the one hand, it has been proven that syntax (in that it involves recursion rules) is a specific characteristic of all and only human language; on the other, experiments in neuroimaging have shown that that a dedicated network in the human brain (crucially involving Broca's area, a portion of the left inferior frontal gyrus), is selectively activated by those languages that meet the Universal Grammar requirements characterizing all and only human languages as shown by generative grammar in the pioneering work of Noam Chomsky.<br />Contents<br />[hide]<br /><br /> * 1 History of syntax<br /> * 2 Formal syntax<br /> * 3 Empirical approaches to syntax<br /> * 4 See also<br /> o 4.1 Syntactic terms<br /> * 5 References<br /> * 6 External links<br /><br />[edit] History of syntax<br /><br />Syntax, literally "composition", is an Ancient Greek work, whereas the name of other domain of linguistics such semantics or morphology are recent (19th century). The history of this field is rather complicated: two landmarks in the field are the first complete Greek grammar, written by Dionysus Thrax in the 1st century BC - a model for Roman grammarians, whose work led to the medieval and Renaissance vernacular grammars - and the Grammaire of Port-Royal - a Cistercian convent in the Vallée de Chevreuse southwest of Paris that launched a number of culturally important institutions. The central role of syntax within theoretical linguistics became clear only in the last century which could reasonably called the "century of syntactic theory" as far as linguistics is concerned. For a detailed and critical survey of the history of syntax in the last two centuries see the monumental work by Graffi 2001 [1]<br /><br />[edit] Formal syntax<br /><br />There are many theories of formal syntax — theories that have in time risen or fallen in influence. Most theories of syntax share at least two commonalities. First, they hierarchically group subunits into constituent units (phrases). Second, they provide some system of rules to explain patterns of acceptability/grammaticality and unacceptability/ungrammaticality. Most formal theories of syntax offer explanations of the systematic relationships between syntactic form and semantic meaning. The earliest framework of semiotics was established by Charles W. Morris in his 1938 book Foundations of the Theory of Signs. Syntax is defined within the study of signs as the first of its three subfields, specifically the study of the interrelation of the signs. The second subfield is semantics and is the study of the relation between the signs and the objects to which they apply. The third is pragmatics which studies the relationship between the sign system and the user.<br /><br />In the framework of transformational-generative grammar (of which government and binding theory and minimalism are recent developments), the structure of a sentence is represented by phrase structure trees, otherwise known as phrase markers or tree diagrams. Such trees provide information about the sentences they represent by showing the hierarchical relations between their component parts.<br /><br />There are various theories for designing the best grammars such that by systematic application of the rules, one can arrive at every phrase marker in a language and hence every sentence in the language. The most common are Phrase structure grammars, preferred by Noam Chomsky's MIT school of linguistics, and ID/LP grammars, the latter of which some argue has an explanatory advantage (especially those in opposition to the MIT school of linguistics, such as Ivan Sag and Geoffrey Pullum.) Dependency grammar is a class of syntactic theories separate from generative grammar in which structure is determined by the relation between a word (a head) and its dependents. One difference from phrase structure grammar is that dependency grammar does not have phrasal categories. Algebraic syntax is a type of dependency grammar.<br /><br />A modern approach to combining accurate descriptions of the grammatical patterns of language with their function in context is that of systemic functional grammar, an approach originally developed by Michael A.K. Halliday in the 1960s and now pursued actively on all continents. Systemic-functional grammar is related both to feature-based approaches such as Head-driven phrase structure grammar and to the older functional traditions of European schools of linguistics such as British Contextualism and the Prague School.<br /><br />Tree adjoining grammar is a grammar formalism with interesting mathematical properties which has sometimes been used as the basis for the syntactic description of natural language. In monotonic and monostratal frameworks, variants of unification grammar are often preferred formalisms.<br /><br />With the publication of Gold's Theorem[2] 1967 it was claimed that grammars for natural languages governed by deterministic rules could not be learned based on positive instances alone. This was part of the argument from the poverty of stimulus, first presented in 1980[3]. This led to the nativist view, that a form of grammar (including a complete conceptual lexicon in certain versions) were hardwired from birth.<br /><br />[edit] Empirical approaches to syntax<br /><br />A grammar is a description of the syntax of a language. Theoretical models rarely consider the language in use, as revealed by corpus linguistics, but focus on a mental language or i-language as its "proper" object of study. In contrast, the "empirically responsible"[4] approach to syntax seeks to construct grammars that will explain language in use. A key class of grammars in the latter tradition are the stochastic context-free grammars.<br /><br />A problem faced in any formal syntax is that often more than one production rule may apply to a structure, thus resulting in a conflict. The greater the coverage, the higher this conflict, and all grammarians (starting with Panini) have spent considerable effort devising a prioritization for the rules, which usually turn out to be defeasible. Another difficulty is overgeneration, where unlicensed structures are also generated. Probabilistic grammars circumvent these problems by using the frequency of various productions to order them, resulting in a "most likely" (winner-take-all) interpretation, which by definition, is defeasible given additional data. As usage patterns are altered in diachronic shifts, these probabilistic rules can be re-learned, thus upgrading the grammar.<br /><br />One may construct a probabilistic grammar from a traditional formal syntax by assigning each non-terminal a probability taken from some distribution, to be eventually estimated from usage data. On most samples of broad language, probabilistic grammars that tune these probabilities from data typically outperform hand-crafted grammars (although some rule-based grammars are now approaching the accuracies of PCFG).<br /><br />Recently, probabilistic grammars appear to have gained some cognitive plausibility. It is well known that there are degrees of difficulty in accessing different syntactic structures (e.g. the Accessibility Hierarchy for relative clauses). Probabilistic versions of minimalist grammars have been used to compute information-theoretic entropy values which appear to correlate well with psycholinguistic data on understandability and production difficulty.[5]<br /><br />Statistical grammars are not subject to Gold's theorem since the learning is incremental.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-78777646606525105732007-03-05T04:48:00.000-08:002007-03-05T04:49:03.185-08:00galieoBiographical sketch<br /><br />Galileo was born in Pisa, in the Tuscany region of Italy, on February 15, 1564, the first of six children of Vincenzo Galilei. Although as a young man he seriously considered the priesthood, at his father's urging he enrolled for a medical degree at the University of Pisa. He did not complete this degree, but instead studied mathematics, in 1589 being appointed to the chair of mathematics in Pisa. In 1592 he moved to the University of Padua, teaching geometry, mechanics, and astronomy until 1610. During this period Galileo made significant discoveries in both pure science (e.g., kinematics of motion, and astronomy) and applied science (e.g., strength of materials, improvement of the telescope).<br /><br />Although a devout Roman Catholic, Galileo fathered three children out of wedlock with Marina Gamba. They had two daughters (Virginia in 1600 and Livia in 1601) and one son (Vincenzio, in 1606). Because of their illegitimate birth, both girls were sent to the convent of San Matteo in Arcetri at early ages and remained there for the rest of their lives. Virginia (b. 1600) took the name Maria Celeste upon entering the convent. Galileo's eldest child, she was also the most beloved, and inherited her father's sharp mind. She died on April 2, 1634, and is buried with Galileo at the Basilica di Santa Croce di Firenze. Livia (b. 1601) took the name Suor Arcangela and was ill for most of her life. Vincenzio (b. 1606) was later legitimized and married Sestilia Bocchineri.<br /><br />In 1610, Galileo published an account of his telescopic observations of the moons of Jupiter, using this observation to argue in favor of the sun-centered, Copernican theory of the universe against the dominant earth-centered Ptolemaic and Aristotelian theories. The next year Galileo visited Rome in order to demonstrate his telescope to the influential philosophers and mathematicians of the Jesuit Collegio Romano, and to let them see with their own eyes the reality of the four moons of Jupiter. While in Rome he was also made a member of the Accademia dei Lincei. In 1612, opposition arose to the Sun-centered solar system which Galileo supported. In 1614, from the pulpit of Santa Maria Novella, Father Tommaso Caccini (1574-1648) denounced Galileo's opinions on the motion of the Earth, judging them dangerous and close to heresy. Galileo went to Rome to defend himself against these accusations, but, in 1616, Cardinal Roberto Bellarmino personally handed Galileo an admonition enjoining him neither to advocate nor teach Copernican astronomy.[1] In 1622, Galileo wrote his first book, The Assayer (Saggiatore), which was approved and published in 1623. In 1624, he developed the first known example of the microscope. In 1630, he returned to Rome to apply for a license to print the Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, published in Florence in 1632. In October of that year, however, he was ordered to appear before the Holy Office in Rome.<br /><br />Scientific methods<br /><br />Galileo Galilei pioneered the use of quantitative experiments whose results could be analyzed with mathematical precision. (More typical of science at the time were the qualitative studies of William Gilbert, on magnetism and electricity.) By contrast, Galileo's father, Vincenzo Galilei, a lutenist and music theorist, had performed experiments establishing perhaps the oldest known non-linear relation in physics: for a stretched string, the pitch varies as the square root of the tension. These observations lay within the framework of the Pythagorean tradition of music, well-known to instrument makers, which included the fact that subdividing a string by a whole number produces a harmonious scale. Thus, a limited amount of mathematics had long related music and physical science, and young Galileo could see his own father's observations expand on that tradition. Galileo is perhaps the first to clearly state that the laws of nature are mathematical, writing that "the language of God is mathematics." His mathematical analyses are a further development of a tradition employed by late scholastic natural philosophers, which Galileo learned when he studied philosophy (Wallace, 1984).<br /><br />Although he tried to remain loyal to the Catholic Church, Galileo's adherence to experimental results, and their most honest interpretation, led to his rejection of blind allegiance to authority, both philosophical and religious, in matters of science. In broader terms, this helped separate science from both philosophy and religion, a major development in human thought.<br /><br />By the standards of his own time, Galileo was often willing to change his views in accordance with observation. Philosopher of science Paul Feyerabend also noted the supposedly improper aspects of Galileo's methodology, but he argued that Galileo's methods could be justified retroactively by their results. The bulk of Feyerabend's major work, Against Method (1975), was devoted to an analysis of Galileo, using his astronomical research as a case study to support Feyerabend's own anarchistic theory of scientific method. As he put it: 'Aristotelians [...] demanded strong empirical support while the Galileans were content with far-reaching, unsupported and partially refuted theories. I do not criticize them for that; on the contrary, I favour Niels Bohr's "this is not crazy enough."'[2]<br /><br />In order to perform his experiments, Galileo had to set up standards of length and time, so that measurements made on different days and in different laboratories could be compared in a reproducible fashion. For measurements of particularly short intervals of time, Galileo sang songs with whose timing he was familiar.<br /><br />Galileo also attempted to measure the speed of light, wisely concluding that his measurement technique was too imprecise to accurately determine its value.<br /><br /> * He climbed one hill and had an assistant to climb another hill; both had lanterns with shutters, initially closed.<br /> * He then opened the shutter of his lantern. His assistant was instructed to open his own shutter upon seeing Galileo's lantern. Galileo then measured the time interval for his assistant's shutter to open.<br /> * Knowing the time interval and the separation between the hills, he determined the apparent speed of light.<br /><br />On repeating the experiment with more distant hills, Galileo obtained the same time lapse, concluding that the time for the light to travel was much less than his and his assistant's reaction time, and therefore that the actual speed of light was beyond the sensitivity of his measurement technique.[citation needed]<br /><br />Galileo showed a remarkably modern appreciation for the proper relationship between mathematics, theoretical physics, and experimental physics. For example:<br /><br /> * He understood the parabola, both in terms of conic sections and in terms of the ordinate (y) varying as the square of the abscissa (x).<br /> * He asserted that the parabola was the theoretically-ideal trajectory for uniformly accelerated motion, in the absence of friction and other disturbances. Further, he noted that there are limits to the validity of this theory, stating that it was appropriate only for laboratory-scale and battlefield-scale trajectories, and noting on theoretical grounds that the parabola could not possibly apply to a trajectory so large as to be comparable to the size of the planet. (Two New Sciences, page 274 of the National Edition).<br /> * He recognized that his experimental data would never agree exactly with any theoretical or mathematical form, because of the imprecision of measurement, irreducible friction, and other factors.<br /><br />Albert Einstein, in appreciation, called Galileo the "father of modern science".<br /><br />Astronomy<br /><br />Contributions<br /><br />Based only on sketchy descriptions of the telescope, invented in the Netherlands in 1608, during that same year Galileo made one with about 3x magnification, and later made others with up to about 32x magnification. With this improved device he could see magnified, upright images on the earth - it was what is now known as a terrestrial telescope, or spyglass. He could also could use it to observe the sky; for a time he was one of very few who could construct telescopes good enough for that purpose. On August 25, 1609, he demonstrated his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers. His work on the device made for a profitable sideline with merchants who found it useful for their shipping businesses. He published his initial telescopic astronomical observations in March 1610 in a short treatise entitled Sidereus Nuncius (Starry Messenger).<br />It was on this page that Galileo first noted an observation of the moons of Jupiter. This observation upset the notion that all celestial bodies must revolve around the Earth. Galileo published a full description in Sidereus Nuncius in March 1610.<br />It was on this page that Galileo first noted an observation of the moons of Jupiter. This observation upset the notion that all celestial bodies must revolve around the Earth. Galileo published a full description in Sidereus Nuncius in March 1610.<br /><br />In the week of January 7, 1610 Galileo discovered three of Jupiter's four largest satellites (moons): Io, Europa, and Callisto. He discovered Ganymede four nights later. He noted that the moons would appear and disappear periodically, an observation which he attributed to their movement behind Jupiter, and concluded that they were orbiting the planet. He made additional observations of them in 1620. Later astronomers overruled Galileo's naming of these objects, changing his originally named Medicean stars (after his patrons, the Medici) to Galilean satellites. The demonstration that a planet had smaller planets orbiting it was problematic for the orderly, comprehensive picture of the geocentric model of the universe, in which everything circled around the Earth.<br /><br />From September 1610 Galileo observed that Venus exhibited a full set of phases similar to that of the Moon. The heliocentric model of the solar system developed by Copernicus predicted that all phases would be visible since the orbit of Venus around the Sun would cause its illuminated hemisphere to face the Earth when it was on the opposite side of the Sun and to face away from the Earth when it was on the Earth-side of the Sun. In contrast, the geocentric model of Ptolemy predicted that only crescent and new phases would be seen, since Venus was thought to remain between the Sun and Earth during its orbit around the Earth. Galileo's observations of the phases of Venus proved that it orbited the Sun and lent support to (but did not prove) the heliocentric model.<br /><br />Galileo also observed the planet Saturn, and at first mistook its rings for planets, thinking it was a three-bodied system. When he observed the planet later, Saturn's rings were directly oriented at Earth, causing him to think that two of the bodies had disappeared. The rings reappeared when he observed the planet in 1616, further confusing him. [3]<br /><br />Galileo was one of the first Europeans to observe sunspots. He also reinterpreted a sunspot observation from the time of Charlemagne, which formerly had been attributed (impossibly) to a transit of Mercury. The very existence of sunspots showed another difficulty with the unchanging perfection of the heavens as assumed in the older philosophy. And the annual variations in their motions, first noticed by Francesco Sizi, presented great difficulties for both the geocentric system and that of Tycho Brahe. A dispute over priority in the discovery of sunspots, and in their interpretation, led Galileo to a long and bitter feud with the Jesuit Christoph Scheiner; in fact, there is little doubt that both of them were beaten by David Fabricius and his son Johannes. Scheiner quickly adopted Kepler's 1615 proposal of the modern telescope design, which gave larger magnification at the cost of inverted images; Galileo apparently never changed to Kepler's design.<br /><br />Galileo was also the first to report lunar mountains and craters, whose existence he deduced from the patterns of light and shadow on the Moon's surface. He even estimated the mountains' heights from these observations. This led him to the conclusion that the Moon was "rough and uneven, and just like the surface of the Earth itself," rather than a perfect sphere as Aristotle had claimed. Galileo observed the Milky Way, previously believed to be nebulous, and found it to be a multitude of stars packed so densely that they appeared to be clouds from Earth. He located many other stars too distant to be visible with the naked eye. Galileo also observed the planet Neptune in 1612, but did not realize that it was a planet and took no particular notice of it. It appears in his notebooks as one of many unremarkable dim stars.<br /><br />Galileo made at least one major scientific error, in addition to opposing Kepler's hypothesis that the gravity of the moon is the origin of the tides. This was his view on the origin of the comets of 1618. He argued vehemently in The Assayer that they were an optical illusion, in opposition to the interpretation of the Jesuit Orazio Grassi that they were real, and quite distant from the Moon. His alienation of both Scheiner and Grazzi likely contributed to the hostile response of the Jesuit order to his publication of "Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems" in 1632, and the inquisition that followed.<br /><br />Galileo, Kepler, and theories of tides<br /><br />Cardinal Bellarmine had written in 1615 that the Copernican system could not be defended without "a true [physical] demonstration that the sun does not circle the earth but the earth circles the sun" (Finocchiaro 1989:67-9). Galileo considered his theory of the tides to provide the required physical proof of the motion of the earth. This theory was so important to Galileo that he originally intended to entitle his Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems the Dialogue on the Ebb and Flow of the Sea (Finocchiaro 1989:p. 354, n. 52). For Galileo, the tides were caused by the sloshing back and forth of water in the seas as a point on the Earth's surface speeded up and slowed down because of the Earth's rotation on its axis and revolution around the Sun. Galileo circulated his first account of the tides in 1616, addressed to Cardinal Orsini (Finocchiaro 1989:119-133).<br /><br />If this theory were correct, there would be only one high tide per day. Galileo and his contemporaries were aware of this inadequacy because there are two daily high tides at Venice instead of one, about twelve hours apart. Galileo dismissed this anomaly as the result of several secondary causes, including the shape of the sea, its depth, and other factors (Finocchiaro 1989:127-131; Drake 1953:432-6). Against the assertion that Galileo was deceptive in making these arguments, Albert Einstein expressed the opinion that Galileo developed his "fascinating arguments" and accepted them uncritically out of a desire for physical proof of the motion of the Earth (Einstein 1952:xvii).<br /><br />Galileo dismissed as a "useless fiction" the idea, held by his contemporary Johannes Kepler, that the moon caused the tides (Finocchiaro 1989:128). Galileo also refused to accept Kepler's elliptical orbits of the planets,[4] considering the circle the "perfect" shape for planetary orbits.<br /><br />Physics<br /><br />Galileo's theoretical and experimental work on the motions of bodies, along with the largely independent work of Kepler and René Descartes, was a precursor of the Classical mechanics developed by Sir Isaac Newton. He was a pioneer, at least in the European tradition, in performing rigorous experiments and insisting on a mathematical description of the laws of nature.<br /><br />Galileo is said to have dropped balls of different masses from the Leaning Tower of Pisa to demonstrate that their time of descent was independent of their mass (excluding the limited effect of air resistance). This was contrary to what Aristotle had taught: that heavy objects fall faster than lighter ones, in direct proportion to weight. Although the story of the tower first appeared in a biography by Galileo's pupil Vincenzo Viviani, it is not now generally accepted as true. Moreover, Giambattista Benedetti had reached the same scientific conclusion years before, in 1553. However, Galileo did perform experiments involving rolling balls down inclined planes, one of which is in Florence, called the bell and ball experiment, which proved the same thing: falling or rolling objects (rolling is a slower version of falling, as long as the distribution of mass in the objects is the same) are accelerated independently of their mass. (Although Galileo was the first person to demonstrate this via experiment, he was not — contrary to popular belief — the first to argue that it was true. John Philoponus had argued this centuries earlier: see also the Oxford Calculators).<br /><br />Galileo determined the correct mathematical law for acceleration: the total distance covered, starting from rest, is proportional to the square of the time (d \propto t^2). He expressed this law using geometrical constructions and mathematically-precise words, adhering to the standards of the day. (It remained for others to re-express the law in algebraic terms.) He also concluded that objects retain their velocity unless a force — often friction — acts upon them, refuting the generally accepted Aristotelian hypothesis that objects "naturally" slow down and stop unless a force acts upon them (again this was not a new idea: Ibn al-Haitham had proposed it centuries earlier, as had Jean Buridan, and according to Joseph Needham, Mo Tzu had proposed it centuries before either of them, but this was the first time that it had been mathematically expressed). Galileo's Principle of Inertia stated: "A body moving on a level surface will continue in the same direction at constant speed unless disturbed." This principle was incorporated into Newton's laws of motion (first law).<br />Dome of the cathedral of Pisa with the "lamp of Galileo"<br />Dome of the cathedral of Pisa with the "lamp of Galileo"<br /><br />Galileo also noted that a pendulum's swings always take the same amount of time, independently of the amplitude. The story goes that he came to this conclusion by watching the swings of the bronze chandelier in the cathedral of Pisa, using his pulse to time it. While Galileo believed this equality of period to be exact, it is only an approximation appropriate to small amplitudes. It is good enough to regulate a clock, however, as Galileo may have been the first to realize. (See Technology below)<br /><br />In the early 1600s, Galileo and an assistant tried to measure the speed of light. They stood on different hilltops, each holding a shuttered lantern. Galileo would open his shutter, and, as soon as his assistant saw the flash, he would open his shutter. At a distance of less than a mile, Galileo could detect no delay in the round-trip time greater than when he and the assistant were only a few yards apart. While he could reach no conclusion on whether light propagated instantaneously, he recognized that the distance between the hilltops was perhaps too small for a good measurement.<br /><br />Galileo is lesser known for, yet still credited with, being one of the first to understand sound frequency. By scraping a chisel at different speeds, he linked the pitch of the sound produced to the spacing of the chisel's skips, a measure of frequency.<br /><br />In his 1632 Dialogue Galileo presented a physical theory to account for tides, based on the motion of the Earth. If correct, this would have been a strong argument for the reality of the Earth's motion. (The original title for the book, in fact, described it as a dialogue on the tides; the reference to tides was removed by order of the Inquisition.) His theory gave the first insight into the importance of the shapes of ocean basins in the size and timing of tides; he correctly accounted, for instance, for the negligible tides halfway along the Adriatic Sea compared to those at the ends. As a general account of the cause of tides, however, his theory was a failure. Kepler and others correctly associated the Moon with an influence over the tides, based on empirical data; a proper physical theory of the tides, however, was not available until Newton.<br /><br />Galileo also put forward the basic principle of relativity, that the laws of physics are the same in any system that is moving at a constant speed in a straight line, regardless of its particular speed or direction. Hence, there is no absolute motion or absolute rest. This principle provided the basic framework for Newton's laws of motion and is the infinite speed of light approximation to Einstein's special theory of relativity.<br /><br />Mathematics<br /><br />While Galileo's application of mathematics to experimental physics was innovative, his mathematical methods were the standard ones of the day. The analysis and proofs relied heavily on the Eudoxian theory of proportion, as set forth in the fifth book of Euclid's Elements. This theory had become available only a century before, thanks to accurate translations by Tartaglia and others; but by the end of Galileo's life it was being superseded by the algebraic methods of Descartes.<br /><br />Galileo produced one piece of original and even prophetic work in mathematics: Galileo's paradox, which shows that there are as many perfect squares as there are whole numbers, even though most numbers are not perfect squares. Such seeming contradictions were brought under control 250 years later in the work of Georg Cantor.<br /><br />Technology<br />Galileo Galilei.-portrait in crayon by Leoni<br />Galileo Galilei.-portrait in crayon by Leoni<br />A replica of the earlest surviving telescope attributed to Galileo Galilei, on display at the Griffith Observatory<br />A replica of the earlest surviving telescope attributed to Galileo Galilei, on display at the Griffith Observatory<br /><br />Galileo made a few contributions to what we now call technology as distinct from pure physics, and suggested others. This is not the same distinction as made by Aristotle, who would have considered all Galileo's physics as techne or useful knowledge, as opposed to episteme, or philosophical investigation into the causes of things.<br /><br />In 1595–1598, Galileo devised and improved a "Geometric and Military Compass" suitable for use by gunners and surveyors. This expanded on earlier instruments designed by Niccolo Tartaglia and Guidobaldo del Monte. For gunners, it offered, in addition to a new and safer way of elevating cannons accurately, a way of quickly computing the charge of gunpowder for cannonballs of different sizes and materials. As a geometric instrument, it enabled the construction of any regular polygon, computation of the area of any polygon or circular sector, and a variety of other calculations.<br /><br />About 1593, Galileo constructed a thermometer, using the expansion and contraction of air in a bulb to move water in an attached tube.<br /><br />In 1609, Galileo was among the first to use a refracting telescope as an instrument to observe stars, planets or moons.<br /><br />In 1610, he used a telescope as a compound microscope, and he made improved microscopes in 1623 and after. This appears to be the first clearly documented use of the compound microscope.<br /><br />In 1612, having determined the orbital periods of Jupiter's satellites, Galileo proposed that with sufficiently accurate knowledge of their orbits one could use their positions as a universal clock, and this would make possible the determination of longitude. He worked on this problem from time to time during the remainder of his life; but the practical problems were severe. The method was first successfully applied by Giovanni Domenico Cassini in 1681 and was later used extensively for large land surveys; this method, for example, was used by Lewis and Clark. (For sea navigation, where delicate telescopic observations were more difficult, the longitude problem eventually required development of a practical portable chronometer, such as that of John Harrison).<br /><br />In his last year, when totally blind, he designed an escapement mechanism for a pendulum clock, a vectorial model of which may be seen here. The first fully operational pendulum clock was made by Christiaan Huygens in the 1650s.<br /><br />He created sketches of various inventions, such as a candle and mirror combination to reflect light throughout a building, an automatic tomato picker, a pocket comb that doubled as an eating utensil, and what appears to be a ballpoint pen.<br /><br />Church controversy<br /><br /> Main article: Galileo affair<br /><br />Cristiano Banti's 1857 painting Galileo facing the Roman Inquisition<br />Cristiano Banti's 1857 painting Galileo facing the Roman Inquisition<br /><br />Psalm 93:1, Psalm 96:10, and Chronicles 16:30 state that "the world is firmly established, it cannot be moved." Psalm 104:5 says, "[the LORD] set the earth on it's foundations; it can never be moved." Ecclesiastes 1:5 states that "the sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises."<br /><br />Galileo defended heliocentrism, and claimed it was not contrary to those Scripture passages. He took Augustine's position on Scripture: not to take every passage literally, particularly when the scripture in question is a book of poetry and songs, not a book of instructions or history. The writers of the Scripture wrote from the perspective of the terrestrial world, and from that vantage point the sun does rise and set. In fact, it is the earth's rotation which gives the impression of the sun in motion across the sky.<br /><br />By 1616 the attacks on Galileo had reached a head, and he went to Rome to try to persuade the Church authorities not to ban his ideas. In the end, Cardinal Bellarmine (who had recently had Giordano Bruno, another recent proponent of a sun-centered world view, burned at the stake for heresy[5]), acting on directives from the Inquisition, delivered him an order not to "hold or defend" the idea that the Earth moves and the Sun stands still at the centre. The decree did not prevent Galileo from discussing heliocentrism hypothetically. For the next several years Galileo stayed well away from the controversy.<br /><br />He revived his project of writing a book on the subject, encouraged by the election of Cardinal Barberini as Pope Urban VIII in 1623. Barberini was a friend and admirer of Galileo, and had opposed the condemnation of Galileo in 1616. The book, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, was published in 1632, with formal authorization from the Inquisition and papal permission.<br /><br />Pope Urban VIII personally asked Galileo to give arguments for and against heliocentrism in the book, and to be careful not to advocate heliocentrism. He made another request, that his own views on the matter be included in Galileo's book. Only the latter of those requests was fulfilled by Galileo. Whether unknowingly or deliberate, Simplicius, the defender of the Aristotelian Geocentric view in Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, was often caught in his own errors and sometimes came across as a fool. This fact made Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems appear as an advocacy book; an attack on Aristotelian geocentrism and defense of the Copernican theory. To add insult to injury, Galileo put the words of Pope Urban VIII into the mouth of Simplicius. Most historians agree Galileo did not act out of malice and felt blindsided by the reaction to his book. However, the Pope did not take the public ridicule lightly, nor the blatant bias. Galileo had alienated one of his biggest and most powerful supporters, the Pope, and was called to Rome to explain himself.<br /><br />With the loss of many of his defenders in Rome because of Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, Galileo was ordered to stand trial on suspicion of heresy in 1633. The sentence of the Inquisition was in three essential parts:<br /><br /> * Galileo was required to recant his heliocentric ideas; the idea that the Sun is stationary was condemned as "formally heretical." However, while there is no doubt that Pope Urban VIII and the vast majority of Church officials did not believe in heliocentrism, Catholic doctrine is defined by the pope when he speaks ex cathedra (from the Chair of Saint Peter) in matters of faith and morals. While Church officials did condemn Galileo, heliocentrism was never formally or officially condemned by the Catholic Church.<br /> * He was ordered imprisoned; the sentence was later commuted to house arrest.<br /> * His offending Dialogue was banned; and in an action not announced at the trial and not enforced, publication of any of his works was forbidden, including any he might write in the future.<br /><br />After a period with the friendly Ascanio Piccolomini (the Archbishop of Siena), Galileo was allowed to return to his villa at Arcetri near Florence, where he spent the remainder of his life under house arrest, dying from natural causes on January 8, 1642. It was while Galileo was under house arrest when he dedicated his time to one of his finest works, Two New Sciences. Here he summarized work he had done some forty years earlier, on the two sciences now called kinematics and strength of materials. This book has received high praise from both Sir Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein. As a result of this work, Galileo is often called, the "father of modern physics".<br />Tomb of Galileo Galilei, Santa Croce<br />Tomb of Galileo Galilei, Santa Croce<br /><br />Galileo was reburied on sacred ground at Santa Croce in 1737. He was formally rehabilitated in 1741, when Pope Benedict XIV authorized the publication of Galileo's complete scientific works (a censored edition had been published in 1718), and in 1758 the general prohibition against heliocentrism was removed from the Index Librorum Prohibitorum. On 31 October 1992, Pope John Paul II expressed regret for how the Galileo affair was handled, as the result of a study conducted by the Pontifical Council for Culture.[6]<br /><br />In modern scientific terms, we consider Galileo's views on heliocentricity to be no fundamental advance. Most of his discoveries were only further advances of Copernicus' views. The heliocentric model that Galileo presented was no more accurate than the Tychonic system model, the main competing theory at the time. Stellar parallax, the first evidence from outside the solar system that the Earth does indeed move, would not be observed until 1838 (Consolmagno 150-152). Today, we know the Sun is no more the center of the universe than the Earth is, as it has its own orbit in the Milky Way Galaxy, just like the Galilean moons of Jupiter have orbits around Jupiter while Jupiter orbits the Sun. He found this because he realized that the only orbit the moons could follow is that which orbits behind Jupiter.<br /><br />Galileo's writings<br />Statue outside the Uffizi, Florence<br />Statue outside the Uffizi, Florence<br /><br /> * The Little Balance 1586<br /> * The Starry Messenger 1610 Venice (in Latin, Sidereus Nuncius)<br /> * Letters on Sunspots 1613<br /> * Letter to Grand Duchess Christina 1615<br /> * The Assayer (In Italian, Il Saggiatore) 1623<br /> * Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems 1632 (in Italian, Dialogo dei due massimi sistemi del mondo)<br /> * Two New Sciences 1638 Lowys Elzevir (Louis Elsevier) Leiden (in Italian, Discorsi e Dimostrazioni Matematiche, intorno a due nuove scienze Leida, Appresso gli Elsevirii 1638)<br /><br />Galileo in popular culture<br /><br /> * Life of Galileo, a play by Bertolt Brecht, 1940<br /> * Galileo's Daughter, a memoir by Dava Sobel, 2000<br /> * Galileo Galilei, an opera by Philip Glass, Mary Zimmerman, and Arnold Weinstein, 2002<br /> * Galileo is mentioned in Queen's song Bohemian Rhapsody.<br /><br />Named after Galileo<br /><br /> * Galileo (unit of acceleration)<br /> * Galileo positioning system<br /> * Galileo Galilei Airport in the Italian city of Pisa<br /> * Galilei number (fluid dynamics)<br /> * The Galileo mission to Jupiter<br /> * The Galilean moons of Jupiter<br /> * Galileo Regio on Ganymede<br /> * Galileo stadium in Miami, Florida<br /> * Galileo High School in San Francisco, California<br /> * Galilaei crater on the Moon<br /> * Galilaei crater on Mars<br /> * Asteroid 697 Galilea (named on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of the discovery of the Galilean moons)<br /> * Galileo Commissions processing system at Sesame<br /><br />While in the University, Galileo did extensive experimentation with pendulums, finding that they nearly return to the height at which they were released, that different pendulums have different periods (independent of bob weight and amplitude), and that the square of the period varies directly with the pendulum's length (and it does not depend on the arc of the swing). He later used pendulums to make a clock (1641). Galileo also found that the speed at which bodies fall does not depend on their weight. He documented these discoveries in his book called, "De Motu" (meaning "On Motion"). Galileo was appointed professor of mathematics at the University of Padua (1592-1610). In 1593, Galileo invented the thermometer. Some of his many other inventions included a revolutionary water pump and a hydrostatic balance (a device that weighed things accurately in either air or water).Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-44887038062322135212007-03-05T04:39:00.000-08:002007-03-05T04:47:02.528-08:00wonders of world, Hindi: ताज महल) is a mausoleum located in Agra, India. The Mughal Emperor Shāh Jahān commissioned it as a mausoleum for his favourite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. Construction began in 1632 and was completed in 1648. Some dispute surrounds the question of who designed the Taj; it is clear a team of designers and craftsmen were responsible for the design, with Ustad Isa considered the most likely candidate as the principal designer.[1]<br /><br />The Taj Mahal (sometimes called "the Taj") is generally considered the finest example of Mughal architecture, a style that combines elements of Persian and Indian. While the white domed marble mausoleum is the most familiar part of the monument, the Taj Mahal is actually an integrated complex of structures. It was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983 when it was described as a "universally admired masterpieces of the world's heritage".[1]<br />Contents<br />[hide]<br /><br /> * 1 Origin and inspiration<br /> o 1.1 Influences<br /> * 2 The garden<br /> * 3 Outlying buildings<br /> * 4 The tomb<br /> o 4.1 Base<br /> o 4.2 Dome<br /> o 4.3 Finial<br /> o 4.4 Minarets<br /> * 5 Decoration<br /> o 5.1 Exterior decoration<br /> o 5.2 Calligraphy<br /> o 5.3 Abstract geometric decoration<br /> o 5.4 Vegetative motifs<br /> o 5.5 Interior decoration<br /> o 5.6 The inner chamber<br /> o 5.7 The jali<br /> o 5.8 The cenotaphs and tombs<br /> o 5.9 Details of lapidary<br /> * 6 Construction<br /> o 6.1 Water infrastructure<br /> o 6.2 Craftsmen<br /> o 6.3 Materials<br /> o 6.4 Costs<br /> * 7 History<br /> * 8 Visiting<br /> * 9 Legends and theories<br /> o 9.1 Origins of the name<br /> o 9.2 The "Black Taj"<br /> o 9.3 Shah Jahan's asymmetric tomb<br /> o 9.4 Mutilation of the craftsmen<br /> o 9.5 Stolen items<br /> o 9.6 British plan to demolish the Taj Mahal<br /> o 9.7 Controversial P.N. Oak hypotheses<br /> + 9.7.1 Other sources for alternate theories of origin<br /> * 10 See also<br /> * 11 References<br /> * 12 Bibliography<br /> * 13 External links<br /><br />Origin and inspiration<br />Location on map of India<br />Agra<br />Location of the Taj Mahal within India<br /><br />Shah Jahan, emperor of the Mughal Empire during a period of great prosperity, controlled extensive resources. In 1631 his second wife died during the birth of their daughter Gauhara Begum, their fourteenth child. Shah Jahan was reportedly inconsolable. Contemporary court chronicles contain many stories concerning Shah Jahan's grief at Mumtaz's death; these are the basis of the "love-story" traditionally held as the inspiration for the Taj Mahal.[2] 'Abd al-Hamid Lahawri, for example, noted that before her death the Emperor had "but twenty white hairs in his beard," but thereafter many more.[3]<br /><br />Construction of the Taj Mahal was begun in Agra soon after Mumtaz's death. The principal mausoleum was completed in 1648, and the surrounding buildings and garden five years later. Visiting Agra in 1663, the French traveller François Bernier wrote:<br /><br /> I shall finish this letter with a description of the two wonderful mausoleums which constitute the chief superiority of Agra over Delhi. One was erected by Jehan-guyre [sic] in honor of his father Ekbar; and Chah-Jehan raised the other to the memory of his wife Tage Mehale, that extraordinary and celebrated beauty, of whom her husband was so enamoured it is said that he was constant to her during life, and at her death was so affected as nearly to follow her to the grave.[4]<br /><br />Influences<br />The Tomb of Humayun constructed in 1560 shares substantially the same pattern as the Taj Mahal<br />The Tomb of Humayun constructed in 1560 shares substantially the same pattern as the Taj Mahal<br /><br />The Taj Mahal incorporates and expands on many design traditions, particularly Hindu, Persian and earlier Mughal architecture. Specific inspiration came from a number of successful Timurid and Mughal buildings. These include the Gur-e Amir (the tomb of Timur, progenitor of the Mughal dynasty, in Samarkand),[5] Humayun's Tomb, Itmad-Ud-Daulah's Tomb (sometimes called the Baby Taj), and Shah Jahan's own Jama Masjid in Delhi. Under his patronage, Mughal building reached new levels of refinement.[6] Whilst previous Mughal building had primarily been constructed of red sandstone, Shah Jahan promoted the use of white marble inlaid with semi-precious stones.<br /><br />Hindu craftsmen, particularly sculptors and stonecutters, plied their trade throughout Asia during this period, and their skills were particularly sought after by tomb builders. Whilst the rock-cut architecture which characterises much of the construction of this period had little influence on the Taj Mahal (carvings are only one form of the decorative element), other Indian buildings such as the Man Singh palace in Gwalior were an inspiration for much Mughal palace architecture and the source for the chhatris which can be seen on the Taj Mahal.<br /><br />The garden<br /><br />The complex is set in and around a large charbagh (a formal Mughal garden divided into four parts). Measuring 320 m × 300 m, the garden uses raised pathways which divide each quarter of the garden into 16 sunken parterres or flowerbeds. A raised marble water tank at the centre of the garden, halfway between the tomb and the gateway, and a linear reflecting pool on the North-South axis reflect the Taj Mahal. Elsewhere the garden is laid out with avenues of trees and fountains.<br /><br />The charbagh garden was introduced to India by the first Mughal emperor Babur, a design inspired by Persian gardens. The charbagh is meant to reflect the gardens of Paradise (from the Persian paridaeza -- a walled garden). In mystic Islamic texts of the Mughal period, paradise as described as ideal garden, filled with abundance. Water plays a key role in these descriptions: In Paradise, these text say, four rivers source at a central spring or mountain, and separate the garden into north, west, south and east.<br />Walkways beside reflecting pool<br />Walkways beside reflecting pool<br /><br />Most Mughal charbaghs are rectangular in form, with a central tomb or pavilion in the centre of the garden. The Taj Mahal garden is unusual in siting the main element, the tomb, at the end rather than at the centre of the garden. But the existence of the newly discovered Mahtab Bagh or "Moonlight Garden" on the other side of the Yamuna provides a different interpretation -- that the Yamuna itself was incorporated into the garden's design, and was meant to be seen as one of the rivers of Paradise.<br /><br />The layout of the garden, and its architectural features such as its fountains, brick and marble walkways, geometric brick-lined flowerbeds, and so on, are similar to Shalimar's, and suggest that the garden may have been designed by the same engineer, Ali Mardan.<br /><br />Early accounts of the garden describe its profusion of vegetation, including roses, daffodils, and fruit trees in abundance. As the Mughal Empire declined, the tending of the garden declined as well. When the British took over management of the Taj Mahal, they changed the landscaping to resemble more the formal lawns of London.<br /><br />Outlying buildings<br />Gateway to the Taj Mahal<br />Gateway to the Taj Mahal<br /><br />The Taj Mahal complex is bounded by a crenellated red sandstone wall on three sides. The river-facing side is unwalled. Outside the wall are several additional mausoleums, including those of many of Shah Jahan's other wives, and a larger tomb for Mumtaz's favourite servant. These structures, composed primarily of red sandstone, are typical of smaller Mughal tombs of the era.<br /><br />On the inner (garden) side, the wall is fronted by columned arcades, a feature typical of Hindu temples later incorporated into Mughal mosques. The wall is interspersed with domed kiosks (chattris), and small buildings which may have been viewing areas or watch towers (such as the so-called Music House, now used as a museum).<br /><br />The main gateway (darwaza) is a monumental structure built primarily of red sandstone. The style is reminiscent of that of Mughal architecture of earlier emperors. Its archways mirror the shape of the tomb's archways, and its pishtaq arches incorporate the calligraphy that decorates the tomb. It utilises bas-relief and pietra dura (inlaid) decorations with floral motifs. The vaulted ceilings and walls have elaborate geometric designs, like those found in the other sandstone buildings of the complex.<br />Interior of jawab<br />Interior of jawab<br /><br />At the far end of the complex, two grand red sandstone buildings open to the sides of the tomb. Their backs parallel the western and eastern walls.<br />Taj Mahal mosque or masjid<br />Taj Mahal mosque or masjid<br /><br />The two buildings are precise mirror images of each other. The western building is a mosque; its opposite is the jawab or "answer", whose primary purpose was architectural balance (and which may have been used as a guesthouse during Mughal times). The distinctions are that the jawab lacks a mihrab, a niche in a mosque's wall facing Mecca, and the floors of the jawab have a geometric design, while the mosque floor was laid out the outlines of 569 prayer rugs in black marble.<br /><br />The mosque's basic design is similar to others built by Shah Jahan, particularly to his Jama Masjid in Delhi: a long hall surmounted by three domes. Mughal mosques of this period divide the sanctuary hall into three areas: a main sanctuary with slightly smaller sanctuaries to either side. At the Taj Mahal, each sanctuary opens on to an enormous vaulting dome.<br /><br />The tomb<br /><br />Base<br />Simplified diagram of the Taj Mahal floor plan.<br />Simplified diagram of the Taj Mahal floor plan.<br />Main iwan and side pishtaqs<br />Main iwan and side pishtaqs<br /><br />The focus of the Taj Mahal is the white marble tomb. Like most Mughal tombs, the basic elements are Persian in origin: a symmetrical building with an iwan, an arch-shaped doorway, topped by a large dome.<br /><br />The tomb stands on a square plinth. The base structure is a large, multi-chambered structure. The main chamber houses the cenotaphs of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz (the actual graves are a level below).<br /><br />The base is essentially a cube with chamfered edges, roughly 55 metres on each side (see floor plan, right). On the long sides, a massive pishtaq, or vaulted archway, frames the iwan, with a similar arch-shaped balcony above. These main arches extend above the roof of the building by use of an integrated facade.<br /><br />To either side of the main arch, additional pishtaqs are stacked above and below. This motif of stacked pishtaqs is replicated on the chamfered corner areas.<br /><br />The design is completely uniform and consistent on all sides of the building. Four minarets, one at each corner of the plinth, facing the chamfered corners, frame the tomb.<br /><br />Dome<br />Base, dome, and minaret<br />Base, dome, and minaret<br /><br />The marble dome that surmounts the tomb is its most spectacular feature. Its height is about the same size as the base of the building, about 35 m. Its height is accentuated because it sits on a cylindrical "drum" about 7 m high.<br /><br />Because of its shape, the dome is often called an onion dome (also called an amrud or guava dome). The top of the dome is decorated with a lotus design, which serves to accentuate its height. The dome is topped by a gilded finial, which mixes traditional Persian and Hindu decorative elements.<br />Finial<br />Finial<br /><br />The dome shape is emphasised by four smaller domed chattris (kiosks) placed at its corners. The chattri domes replicate the onion shape of main dome. Their columned bases open through the roof of the tomb, and provide light to the interior. The chattris also are topped by gilded finials.<br /><br />Tall decorative spires (guldastas) extend from the edges of the base walls, and provide visual emphasis of the dome height.<br /><br />The lotus motif is repeated on both the chattris and guldastas.<br /><br />Finial<br /><br />The main dome is crowned by a gilded spire or finial.The finial was made of gold until the early 1800s, and it is now made of bronze. The finial provides a clear example of the integration of traditional Persian and Hindu decorative elements. The finial is topped by a moon, a typical Islamic motif, whose horns point heavenward. Because of its placement on the main spire, the horns of the moon and the finial point combine to create a trident shape -- reminiscent of the traditional Hindu symbols of Shiva.<br /><br />Similarly, the spire is made up of a number of bulbous forms. The central form bears a striking resemblance to a Hindu sacred water vessel (kalash or kumbh).<br /><br />Minarets<br /><br />At the corners of the plinth stand minarets: four large towers each more than 40 m tall. The minarets again display the Taj Mahal's basic penchant for symmetrical, repeated design.<br /><br />The towers are designed as working minarets, a traditional element of mosques, a place for a muezzin to call the Islamic faithful to prayer. Each minaret is effectively divided into three equal parts by two working balconies that ring the tower. At the top of the tower is a final balcony surmounted by a chattri that mirrors the design of those on the tomb.<br /><br />The minaret chattris share the same finishing touches: a lotus design topped by a gilded finial. Each of the minarets was constructed slightly out of plumb to the outside of the plinth, so that in the event of collapse (a typical occurrence with many such tall constructions of the period) the material would tend to fall away from the tomb.<br /><br />Decoration<br /><br />Exterior decoration<br />Calligraphy on large pishtaq<br />Calligraphy on large pishtaq<br /><br />Nearly every surface of the entire complex has been decorated. The exterior decorations of the Taj Mahal are among the finest to be found in Mughal architecture of any period.<br /><br />Once again, decoration motifs are repeated throughout the complex. As the surface area changes -- a large pishtaq has more area than a smaller -- the decorations are refined proportionally.<br /><br />The decorative elements come in basically three categories:<br /><br /> * Calligraphy<br /> * Abstract geometric elements<br /> * Vegetative motifs<br /><br />Islamic strictures forbade the use of anthropomorphic forms.<br /><br />The decorative elements were created in three ways:<br /><br /> * Paint or stucco applied to the wall surface<br /> * Stone inlay<br /> * Carvings<br /><br />Calligraphy<br />Herringbone<br />Herringbone<br /><br />Throughout the complex passages from the Qur'an are used as decorative elements. The calligraphy is a florid and practically illegible thuluth script, created by the Mughal court's Persian calligrapher, Amanat Khan, who was resident at the Mughal court. He has signed several of the panels. As one enters through the Taj Mahal Gate the calligraphy reads "O Soul, thou art at rest. Return to the Lord at peace with Him, and He at peace with you."<br /><br />The calligraphy is made by jasper inlaid in white marble panels. Some of the work is extremely detailed and delicate (especially that found on the marble cenotaphs in the tomb). Higher panels are written slightly larger to reduce the skewing effect when viewed from below.<br /><br />Recent scholarship suggests that Amanat Khan chose the passages as well. The texts refer to themes of judgment: of doom for nonbelievers, and the promise of Paradise for the faithful. The passages include: Surah 91 (The Sun), Surah 112 (The Purity of Faith), Surah 89 (Daybreak), Surah 93 (Morning Light), Surah 95 (The Fig), Surah 94 (The Solace), Surah 36 (Ya Sin), Surah 81 (The Folding Up), Surah 82 (The Cleaving Asunder), Surah 84 (The Rending Asunder), Surah 98 (The Evidence), Surah 67 (Dominion), Surah 48 (Victory), Surah 77 (Those Sent Forth) and Surah 39 (The Crowds).<br /><br />Abstract geometric decoration<br />Incised painting<br />Incised painting<br /><br />Abstract forms are used especially in the plinth, minarets, gateway, mosque, and jawab, and to a lesser extent on the surfaces of the tomb. The domes and vaults of the sandstone buildings are worked with tracery of incised painting to create elaborate geometric forms. (The incised painting technique is to scratch a channel in the stone, and to then lay a thick paint or stucco plaster across the surface. The paint is then scraped off the surface of the stone, leaving paint in the incision.)<br /><br />On most joining areas, herringbone inlays define the space between adjoining elements. White inlays are used in the sandstone buildings, dark or black inlays on the white marble of the tomb and minarets. Mortared areas of the marble buildings have been stained or painted dark, creating geometric patterns of considerable complexity.<br /><br />Floors and walkways throughout use contrasting tiles or blocks in tessellation patterns.<br /><br />Vegetative motifs<br /><br /> <br /><br />The lower walls of the tomb are white marble dados that have been sculpted with realistic bas relief depictions of flowers and vines. The marble has been polished to emphasise the exquisite detailing of these carvings.<br /><br />The dado frames and archway spandrels have been decorated with pietra dura inlays of highly stylised, almost geometric vines, flowers and fruits. The inlay stones are yellow marble, jasper and jade, levelled and polished to the surface of the walls.<br /> <br />Spandrel detail<br />Spandrel detail<br /><br />Interior decoration<br />Jali screen surrounding the cenotaphs<br />Jali screen surrounding the cenotaphs<br />Detail of the Jali screen<br />Detail of the Jali screen<br /><br />The interior chamber of the Taj Mahal steps far beyond traditional decorative elements. One may say without exaggeration that this chamber is a work of jewellery. Here the inlay work is not pietra dura, but lapidary. The inlay material is not marble or jade but precious and semiprecious gemstones. Every decorative element of the tomb's exterior has been redefined with jeweler's art.<br /><br />The inner chamber<br /><br />The inner chamber of the Taj Mahal contains the cenotaphs of Mumtaz and Shah Jahan. It is a masterpiece of artistic craftsmanship, virtually without precedent or equal.<br /><br />The inner chamber is an octagon. While the design allows for entry from each face, only the south (garden facing) door is used.<br /><br />The interior walls are about 25 m high, topped by a "false" interior dome decorated with a sun motif.<br /><br />Eight pishtaq arches define the space at ground level. As is typical with the exterior, each lower pishtaq is crowned by a second pishtaq about midway up the wall. The four central upper arches form balconies or viewing areas; each balcony's exterior window has an intricate screen or jali cut from marble.<br /><br />In addition to the light from the balcony screens, light enters through roof openings covered by the chattris at the corners of the exterior dome.<br /><br />Each of the chamber walls has been highly decorated with dado bas relief, intricate lapidary inlay and refined calligraphy panels, reflecting in miniature detail the design elements seen throughout the exterior of the complex.<br /><br />The jali<br /><br />The octagonal marble screen or jali which borders the cenotaphs is made from eight marble panels. Each panel has been carved through with intricate piercework. The remaining surfaces have been inlaid with semiprecious stones in extremely delicate detail, forming twining vines, fruits and flowers.<br /><br />The cenotaphs and tombs<br />Cenotaphs, interior of the Taj Mahal<br />Cenotaphs, interior of the Taj Mahal<br />The actual tombs of Shah Jehan and Mumtaz Mahal, in the crypt of the Taj Mahal<br />The actual tombs of Shah Jehan and Mumtaz Mahal, in the crypt of the Taj Mahal<br /><br />Mumtaz's cenotaph is placed at the precise centre of the inner chamber. On a rectangular marble base about 1.5 by 2.5 m is a smaller marble casket. Both base and casket are elaborately inlaid with precious and semiprecious gems. Calligraphic inscriptions on the casket identify and praise Mumtaz. On the lid of the casket is a raised rectangular lozenge meant to suggest a writing tablet.<br /><br />Muslim tradition forbids elaborate decoration of graves, so the bodies of Mumtaz and Shah Jahan are laid in a relatively plain Crypt beneath the inner chamber of the Taj Mahal. They are buried on a north-south axis, with faces turned right (west) toward Mecca.<br /><br />Shah Jahan's cenotaph is beside Mumtaz's to the western side. It is the only visible asymmetric element in the entire complex (see below). His cenotaph is bigger than his wife's, but reflects the same elements: A larger casket on slightly taller base, again decorated with astonishing precision with lapidary and calligraphy which identifies Shah Jahan. On the lid of this casket is a sculpture of a small pen box. (The pen box and writing tablet were traditional Mughal funerary icons decorating men's and women's caskets respectively.)<br /><br />"O Noble, O Magnificent, O Majestic, O Unique, O Eternal, O Glorious... " These are only six of the Ninety Nine Names of God, which are to be found as calligraphic inscriptions on the sides of the true tomb of Mumtaz Mahal, down in the crypt. The tomb of Shah Jahan bears a calligraphic inscription, not taken from the Qur'an, but referring to the resting place of this Mughal Emperor. Part of the inscription reads; "He traveled from this world to the banquet-hall of Eternity on the night of the twenty-sixth of the month of Rajab, in the year one-thousand-and-seventy-six Hijri."<br /><br />Details of lapidary<br /><br />(craftsmanship is best seen in enlarged version -- click image to see enlargement)<br /><br />Arch of jali, entry to cenotaphs<br /><br /><br /> <br /><br />Delicate piercework<br /><br /><br /> <br /><br />Inlay detail<br /><br /><br /> <br /><br />Inlay detail<br /><br /><br />Construction<br /><br />The Taj Mahal was built on a stretch of land to the south of the walled city of Agra which had belonged to Maharajah Jai Singh: Shah Jahan presented him with a large palace in the centre of Agra in exchange.[7] Construction began with setting foundations for the tomb. An area of roughly three acres was excavated and filled with dirt to reduce seepage from the river. The entire site was levelled to a fixed height about 50 m above the riverbank. The Taj Mahal is 180 feet tall. The dome itself measures 60 feet in diameter and 80 feet high.<br />View from the Agra Fort.<br />View from the Agra Fort.<br /><br />In the tomb area, wells were then dug down to the point that water was encountered. These wells were later filled with stone and rubble, forming the basis for the footings of the tomb. An additional well was built to same depth nearby to provide a visual method to track water level changes over time.<br /><br />Instead of lashed bamboo, the typical scaffolding method, workmen constructed a colossal brick scaffold that mirrored the inner and outer surfaces of the tomb. The scaffold was so enormous that foremen estimated it would take years to dismantle. According to legend, Shah Jahan decreed that anyone could keep bricks taken from the scaffold, and it was dismantled by peasants overnight.<br /><br />A fifteen-kilometre tamped-earth ramp was built to transport marble and materials from Agra to the construction site. According to contemporary accounts teams of twenty or thirty oxen strained to pull the blocks on specially constructed wagons.<br /><br />To raise the blocks into position required an elaborate post-and-beam pulley system. Teams of mules and oxen provided the lifting power.<br /><br />The order of construction was<br /><br /> * The plinth<br /> * The tomb<br /> * The four minarets<br /> * The mosque and jawab<br /> * The gateway<br /><br />The plinth and tomb took roughly 12 years to complete. The remaining parts of the complex took an additional 10 years. (Since the complex was built in stages, contemporary historical accounts list different "completion dates"; discrepancies between so-called completion dates are probably the result of differing opinions about the definition of "completion". For example, the mausoleum itself was essentially complete by 1643, but work continued on the rest of the complex.)<br /><br />Water infrastructure<br /><br />Water for the Taj Mahal was provided through a complex infrastructure. Water was drawn from the river by a series of purs -- an animal-powered rope and bucket mechanism. The water flowed into a large storage tank, where, by thirteen additional purs, it was raised to large distribution tank above the Taj Mahal ground level.<br /><br />From this distribution tank, water passed into three subsidiary tanks, from which it was piped to the complex. A 0.25 m earthenware pipe lies about 1.5 m below the surface, in line with the main walkway; this filled the main pools of the complex. Additional copper pipes supplied the fountains in the north-south canal. Subsidiary channels were dug to irrigate the entire garden.<br /><br />The fountain pipes were not connected directly to the feed pipes. Instead, a copper pot was provided under each fountain pipe: water filled the pots allowing equal pressure in each fountain.<br /><br />The purs no longer remain, but the other parts of the infrastructure have survived.<br /><br />Craftsmen<br /><br />The Taj Mahal was not designed by a single person. The project demanded talent from many people.<br /><br />The names of many of the builders who participated in the construction of the Taj Mahal in different capacities have come down through various sources.<br /><br />The Persian architect, Ustad Isa and Isa Muhammad Effendi, trained by the great Ottoman architect Koca Mimar Sinan Agha are frequently credited with a key role in the architectural design of the complex,[8][9] but in fact there is little evidence to support this tradition, and the connection with Sinan (who died in 1588) is clearly a fairy-tale.<br /><br />'Puru' from Benarus, Persia (Iran), has been mentioned supervising architect in Persian language texts (e.g. see ISBN 964-7483-39-2).<br /><br />The main dome was designed by Ismail Khan from the Ottoman Empire,[10] considered to be the premier designer of hemispheres and builder of domes of that age.<br /><br />Qazim Khan, a native of Lahore, cast the solid gold finial that crowned the Turkish master's dome.<br /><br />Chiranjilal, a lapidary from Delhi, was chosen as the chief sculptor and mosaicist.<br /><br />Amanat Khan from Persian Shiraz, Iran was the chief calligrapher (this fact is attested on the Taj Mahal gateway itself, where his name has been inscribed at the end of the inscription).<br /><br />Muhammad Hanif was the supervisor of masons.<br /><br />Mir Abdul Karim and Mukkarimat Khan of Shiraz, Iran handled finances and the management of daily production.<br /><br />The creative team included sculptors from Bukhara, calligraphers from Syria and Persia, inlayers from southern India, stonecutters from Baluchistan, a specialist in building turrets, another who carved only marble flowers — thirty seven men in all formed the creative nucleus. To this core was added a labour force of twenty thousand workers recruited from across northern India.<br />Shah Jahan, who commissionated the Taj Mahal<br />Shah Jahan, who commissionated the Taj Mahal<br /><br />European commentators, particularly during the early period of the British Raj, suggested that some or all of the Taj Mahal was the work of European artisans. Most of these suggestions were purely speculative, but one dates back to 1640, when a Spanish Friar who visited Agra wrote that Geronimo Veroneo, an Italian adventurer in Shah Jahan's court, was primarily responsible for the design. There is no reliable scholarly evidence to back up this assertion, nor is Veroneo's name mentioned in any surviving documents relating to the construction. E.B. Havell, the principal British scholar of Indian art in the later Raj, dismissed this theory as unsupported by any evidence, and as inconsistent with the known methods employed by the designers. His conclusions were further supported by the research of Muhammad Abdullah Chaghtai, who examined carefully the origin of the tradition that the Taj was designed by a European, and concluded that it was a spurious 19th century invention, based on the misapprehension that "Ustad Isa", so often credited with the Taj's design, must have been a Christian because he bore the name "Isa" (Jesus). In fact this is a common Muslim name as well - and furthermore there is no source earlier than the 19th century which mentions an "Ustad Isa" in connection with the Taj Mahal (even if he existed he cannot, in any case, have been trained by Sinan, because the latter died in 1588). Chaghtai thought it more likely that the chief architect was Ustad Ahmad, the designer of Shahjahanabad, but admitted that this could not be conclusively proved from existing sources.[11]<br /><br />Materials<br /><br />The Taj Mahal was constructed using materials from all over India and Asia. Over 1,000 elephants were used to transport building materials during the construction. The translucent white marble was brought from Rajasthan, the jasper from Punjab and the jade and crystal from China. The turquoise was from Tibet and the Lapis lazuli from Afghanistan, while the sapphire came from Sri Lanka and the carnelian from Arabia. In all, 28 types of precious and semi-precious stones were inlaid into the white marble.<br /><br />Costs<br /><br />A rough indication of the cost of the construction of the Taj Mahal can be gained by comparing the price of gold at the time of building and the price of gold now: The total cost of the Taj Mahal's construction was about 32 million rupees. [citation needed] At that time, 1 gram of gold was sold for about 1.4 rupees. [citation needed] Based on the October 2005 gold price that would translate to more than 300 million US$. Interpretation of such a comparison of the value of gold must take into account the multifarious differences in the two different economic eras<br /><br />History<br /><br />Soon after its completion, Shah Jahan was deposed and put under house arrest at nearby Agra Fort by his son Aurangzeb. Legend has it that he spent the remainder of his days gazing through the window at the Taj Mahal. Upon Shah Jahan's death, Aurangzeb buried him in the Taj Mahal next to his wife, the only disruption of the otherwise perfect symmetry in the architecture. By the late 19th century parts of the Taj Mahal had fallen badly into disrepair. During the time of the Indian rebellion of 1857 the Taj Mahal faced defacement by British soldiers and government officials who chiseled out precious stones and lapis lazuli from its walls.<br />Protective wartime scaffolding<br />Protective wartime scaffolding<br /><br />At the end of the 19th century British viceroy Lord Curzon ordered a massive restoration project, completed in 1908. He also commissioned the large lamp in the interior chamber (modelled on one hanging in a Cairo mosque when local craftsmen failed to provide adequate designs). It was during this time the garden was remodelled with the more English looking lawns visible today. By the 20th century the Taj Mahal was being better taken care of. In 1942 the government erected a behemoth scaffolding over it in anticipation of an air attack by the German Luftwaffe and later by the Japanese Air Force (see photo). During the India-Pakistan wars of 1965 and 1971 scaffoldings were erected by the government to mislead would-be bomber pilots.<br /><br />Its most recent threats came from environmental pollution on the banks of the Yamuna River including acid rain occurring due to the Mathura oil refinery (something opposed by Supreme Court of India directives).<br /><br />As of 1983 the Taj Mahal was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Today it is a major tourist destination.<br /><br />Recently the Taj Mahal was claimed to be Sunni Wakf property, on the grounds that it is the grave of a woman whose husband Emperor Shah Jahan was a Sunni. The Indian government has dismissed claims by the Muslim trust to administer the property, saying their claims are baseless and the Taj Mahal is Indian national property.<br /><br />The poet Tagore, a Nobel laureate, called Taj Mahal "a drop of tear on the cheek of history".<br /><br />Visiting<br /><br />The Taj Mahal is often described as one of the seven wonders of the modern world. Millions of tourists have visited the site - more than three million in 2004, according to the BBC - making it one of the most popular international attractions in India.<br /><br />Legends and theories<br /><br />Origins of the name<br /><br />The name Taj comes from Persian, the language of the Mughal court, meaning crown, and Mahal, also Persian, means place, area, or neighborhood. Together, the term Taj Mahal translated into rough English from the original Persian means "Crown Place" or "The Place of the Crown." Some sources suggest that Taj Mahal is a shorter variant of Mumtaz Mahal, the formal court name and title of Arjumand Banu Begum, meaning First Lady of the Palace. As early as 1663, the French traveller François Bernier referred to the place as Tage Mehale.<br /><br />The "Black Taj"<br /><br />A longstanding popular tradition holds that an identical mausoleum complex was originally supposed to be built on the other side of the river, in black marble instead of white, for Shah Jahan himself. The story suggests that Shah Jahan was overthrown by his son Aurangzeb before the black version could be built. Ruins of dark marble found across the river are, the story suggests, the unfinished base of this "Black Taj".<br /><br />Recent scholarship disputes this theory, and throws some interesting light on the design of the Taj Mahal. All other major Mughal tombs were sited in gardens that form a cross, with the tomb at the intersection of the vertical and horizontal pieces. The Taj Mahal gardens, by contrast, form a great 'T', with the tomb at the centre of the crosspiece. But the outline of the ruins on the other river bank would extend the design of the Taj Mahal gardens to form a cross of proportions typical of other Mughal tombs. Further, the marble in the ruins opposite the Taj Mahal, while dark from staining, were originally white. In addition, an octagonal pool in these ruins would have reflected the Taj Mahal. Scholars have called these ruins the Mahtab Bagh or "Moonlight Garden".<br /><br />Scholars now believe that the reflection of the Taj Mahal in this pool is in fact what was meant when people referred to the 'black taj'.<br /><br />Shah Jahan's asymmetric tomb<br />Shah Jehan's cenotaph, offset from center. Shah Jahan was interred at the tomb eight years after its completion.<br />Shah Jehan's cenotaph, offset from center. Shah Jahan was interred at the tomb eight years after its completion.<br /><br />Aurangzeb had Shah Jahan's tomb and cenotaph placed in the Taj Mahal rather than building him a separate mausoleum such as other emperors had. He thus "destroyed" the symmetry of the Taj Mahal design, although careful inspection shows several non-symmetric doorways, etc, in the original construction. A variation on the Black Taj legend suggests that Aurangzeb's decision was made from malice or parsimony. In Itmad-Ud-Daulah's Tomb however, which was a major influence on the Taj Mahal design, Aurangzeb's grandparents were interred in a similar asymmetric fashion. Note: main chamber contains cenotaphs (false tombs); the actual tombs, configured identically, are in the crypt below.<br />Mutilation of the craftsmen<br /><br />A seemingly endless number of stories describe, often in horrific detail, deaths, dismemberments and mutilations which Shah Jahan inflicted on various craftsmen associated with the tomb. No evidence for these legends exists, and no respected authority finds them credible.<br /><br />Stolen items<br /><br />Legends abound concerning items originally attached to the Taj Mahal which were stolen. Some original items have been removed over time, but many are mere legends only. These legends include:<br /><br /> * Gold leaf, supposed to have covered all or part of the dome.<br /> * A golden railing supposed to have circled the cenotaphs (suggested perhaps by a temporary enamel railing that was replaced after completion of the marble jali)<br /> * Diamonds supposedly inlaid in the cenotaphs<br /> * A blanket woven of pearls supposedly covering Mumtaz's cenotaph<br /><br />Numerous items from the Taj Mahal have gone missing however; these include the following<br /><br /> * An entrance door of carved jasper<br /> * Gold leaf that adorned the cast iron joints of the jali screen around the cenotaphs<br /> * Numerous rich carpets that covered the interior of the tomb<br /> * Enamelled lamps from the interior of the tomb<br /><br />British plan to demolish the Taj Mahal<br /><br />There is an often-repeated story that Lord William Bentinck, governor of India in the 1830s, planned to demolish the Taj Mahal and auction off the marble. In some versions of the tale, the demolition crew were ready to begin their work but were stopped only because Bentinck was unable to make the scheme financially viable. There is no contemporary evidence for this story, which may have emerged in the late nineteenth century when Bentinck was being criticised for his penny-pinching Utilitarianism, and when Lord Curzon was emphasising earlier neglect of the monument, and presenting himself as a saviour of Indian antiquities. According to Bentinck's biographer John Rosselli, the story arose from Bentinck's fund-raising sale of discarded marble from Agra Fort and of the metal from a famous but obsolete Agra cannon.[12] However, others, led by the Archaeological Survey of India, still believe and argue that a sale by the British East India Company was planned under Lord Bentinck watch, though no satisfactory buyers were found.[13][14]<br /><br />Controversial P.N. Oak hypotheses<br /><br />An hypothesis proposed by P.N. Oak,[15] President of The Institute for Rewriting Indian History, asserts that the Taj Mahal was a Hindu temple of the god Shiva, usurped and remodeled by Shah Jahan.[16] The temple's name, he says, was originally "Tejo Mahalaya" which was corrupted over time to "Taj Mahal". Oak also claims that the tombs of Humayun, Akbar and Itmiad-u-Dallah — as well as the Vatican in Rome,[17] the Kaaba in Mecca, Stonehenge and "all historic buildings" in India — were also Hindu temples or palaces.<br /><br /> The Taj is only a typical illustration of how all historic buildings and townships from Kashmir to Cape Comorin though of Hindu origin have been ascribed to this or that Muslim ruler or courtier.[18]<br /><br />Considering the possibility that if Taj Mahal was not a Shiva temple, he claims that it might then have been the palace of a Rajput king. In any case (he says), the Taj Mahal was Hindu in origin, stolen by Shah Jahan and adapted as a tomb — although Oak also claims that Mumtaz is not buried there. Oak further states that the numerous eyewitness accounts of Taj Mahal construction, and Shah Jahan's construction orders and voluminous financial records, are elaborate frauds meant to hide its Hindu origin. Such assertions have gained a lot of popular interest and made Oak a well-known media figure. Oak's assertions are not accepted by legitimate scholars, but his theories are have been publicized by some contemporary Hindutva (Hindu nationalist) activists.<br /><br />He has sued to break open the cenotaphs, and to tear down brick walls in the lower plinth: In these "fake tombs" and "sealed apartments", Oak says Shivalingams or other temple items were hidden by Shah Jahan.[18] According to Oak, the Indian government's refusal to allow him unfettered access amounts to a conspiracy against Hinduism. In 2000 India's Supreme Court dismissed Oak's petition to declare that a Hindu king built the Taj Mahal and reprimanded him for bringing the action.[19] In 2005 a similar petition was dismissed by the Allahabad High Court. This case was brought by Amar Nath Mishra, a social worker and preacher who claims that the Taj Mahal was built by the Hindu King Parmar Dev in 1196.[20]Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-44617858863805262932007-03-05T04:36:00.000-08:002007-03-05T04:37:06.741-08:00indian culturewas moulded throughout various eras of history, all the while absorbing customs, traditions and ideas from both invaders and immigrants. Many cultural practices, languages, customs and monuments are examples of this co-mingling over centuries.<br /><br />In modern India there is cultural and religious diversity throughout the country. This has been influenced by the various regions of India, namely South, North, and North-East, have their own distinct identities and almost every state has carved out its own cultural niche. In spite of this unique cultural diversity, the whole country is bound as a civilization due to its common history, thereby preserving the national identity.<br /><br />India was the birth place of religious systems such as Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism, which have a strong influence not only over India, but also the whole world. Following the Islamic invasions and the subsequent foreign domination from the tenth century onwards, the culture of India was heavily influenced by Persian, Arabic and Turkic cultures. In turn, the various religions and the multihued traditions of India have influenced South East Asia and other parts of the world. Mark Twain wrote, India is the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great grand mother of tradition. Our most valuable and most astrictive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only!<br />Contents<br />[hide]<br /><br /> * 1 Overview<br /> o 1.1 Regions<br /> o 1.2 Language<br /> o 1.3 Cultural policy<br /> * 2 Literature<br /> o 2.1 History<br /> o 2.2 Poetry<br /> o 2.3 Epics<br /> * 3 Performing arts<br /> o 3.1 Music<br /> o 3.2 Dance<br /> o 3.3 Drama and theatre<br /> * 4 Visual arts<br /> o 4.1 Painting<br /> o 4.2 Sculpture<br /> o 4.3 Architecture<br /> * 5 Recreation and sports<br /> * 6 Cuisine<br /> * 7 Popular media<br /> o 7.1 Cinema<br /> o 7.2 Television<br /> o 7.3 Radio<br /> * 8 Religion and philosophy<br /> o 8.1 Philosophy<br /> o 8.2 Religion<br /> * 9 See also<br /> * 10 References<br /> * 11 External links<br /><br />[edit] Overview<br /><br />[edit] Regions<br /><br /> Main article: List of regions in India<br /><br />Cultural regions of India.<br />Cultural regions of India.<br /><br />Indian culture can be classified into many varied form which are existent in their totality throughout the territory of India. The culture of India has been influenced by various religions and customs of the world, which resulted in the mingling of religious values, folk idioms and art forms. While the religious influence is quite evident in the "classical" Indian culture mostly found in smaller towns and villages, the urban India is now widely influenced by globalization.<br /><br />[edit] Language<br /><br /> Main article: Languages of India<br /><br />As well as regional diversity, languages have created diverse traditions of culture in India. There are a large number of languages in India; 216 of them are spoken by a group of 10,000 persons or more. There are many other languages in India which are spoken by fewer than 10,000 people. If these languages are included then there are 415 living languages in India. [1] The two major families of languages are those of the Indo-Aryan languages and those of the Dravidian languages , the former largely confined to the North India and the latter to the South India. The Constitution of India has stipulated the usage of Hindi and English to be the two official languages of communication for the national government. There is another language family in India which is spoken by about 3% of the people. These languages falls in the language family Tibeto-Burman, which is a subgroup of the language family Sino-Tibetan. Besides this, many other languages in India can be divided into 10 other languages families.<br /><br />A further 22 languages are scheduled for official use, mainly by state governments. Sanskrit has served as a classical language of India and South-Eastern Asia, and is equated in importance to Latin or Greek in Europe. It is studied as far away as Japan and the West due its cultural and religious significance. The classical language of the Dravidian family is regarded to be old Tamil. The number of speakers of state languages and dialects is very high.<br /><br />[edit] Cultural policy<br /><br />The cultural policy of the Government of India has three major objectives. One of them is to preserve the cultural heritage of India; to inculcate Indian art consciousness amongst countrymen and to promote high standards in creative and performing arts fields. [citation needed]<br /><br />[edit] Literature<br /> This article or section may contain original research or unattributed claims.<br />Please help Wikipedia by adding references. See the talk page for details.<br />Rabindranath Tagore became Asia's first Nobel laureate when he won the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature<br />Rabindranath Tagore became Asia's first Nobel laureate when he won the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature<br /><br />[edit] History<br /><br /> Main article: Indian literature<br /><br />The earliest literary traditions were mostly oral and passed through descendants by the citizens. They were later transcribed. Most of these spring from Hindu tradition and are represented by sacred works such as the Vedas, the epics of the Mahabharata and Ramayana. Tamil Sangam literature represents some of India's oldest secular traditions.[citation needed] Many Buddhist and Jain works are in Prakrit languages like Pali. The classical works of playwright Kalidasa even today exert an important influence on Indian litterateurs. The Tamil Ramayana (translated from the original Valmiki Ramayana) by Kamban is considered to be a classical masterpiece.[citation needed] Kamban[citation needed] and Kalidasa have been rightly given the title of "Kavi Chakravarthi" (King among Poets).<br /><br />Upon the arrival of Mughal dynasty, Islamic culture also influenced the medieval Indian literature. This was due to the spreading influence of Persian and the rise of famous poets such as Amir Khusro. Colonial rule prepared the stage for modern literature exemplified by the works of Rabindranath Tagore, Subhramanya Bharati,Kuvempu, Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, Michael Madhusudan Dutt, Munshi Premchand, Devaki Nandan Khatri, among many others. Indian writers in modern times, like R. K. Narayan, Poornachandra Tejaswi, Vaikom Muhammad Basheer,Mahasweta Devi, Amrita Pritam, Arundhati Roy, Vikram Seth, Khushwant Singh, Salman Rushdie, Moncy Pothen have been the cynosures of wide acclaim, both in Indian languages and English.<br /><br />[edit] Poetry<br /><br /> Main article: Indian poetry<br /><br />India has strong traditions of poetry, as well as prose writing. This is often closely related to musical traditions, and most poetry can be attributed to religious movements. Writers and philosophers were often also skilled poets. In modern times, poetry served as an important non-violent tool of nationalism during the Indian freedom movement. A famous modern example of this tradition can be found in such figures as Rabindranath Tagore in modern times and poets such as Kabir in medieval times, as well as the epics of ancient times. Two examples of poetry from Tagore's Gitanjali serve as the national anthems of both India and Bangladesh.<br /><br />[edit] Epics<br /><br /> Main article: Indian epic poetry<br /><br />The Ramayana and Mahabharata are not only considered epics of India and Hinduism, but serve as the folk epics of other Asian countries like Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. In this respect, they are considered by many to be the 'eastern' equivalents of the classical epics of Europe, namely Iliad and Odyssey. Similarly there are five epics in the classical Tamil language -they being Silappadhikaram, Manimegalai, Jeevaga-chintamani, Valayaapathi, Kundalakesi.[citation needed] Other regional variations of these stories, and unrelated epics include such as the Tamil Kamba Ramayanam, Kannada Pampa Bharata, Karnata Bharata KathaManjari by Kumaravyasa, Hindi Ramacharitamanasa,Malayalam Adhyathmaramayanam.<br />The Sitar is one of the most popular Indian musical instruments<br />The Sitar is one of the most popular Indian musical instruments<br /><br />[edit] Performing arts<br /><br />[edit] Music<br /><br /> Main article: Music of India<br /><br />The music of India includes multiples varieties of folk, popular, pop, and classical music. India's classical music tradition, including Carnatic and Hindustani music, noted for the use of several Raga, has a history spanning millennia and, developed over several eras, remains instrumental to the religious inspiration, cultural expression and pure entertainment. Alongside distinctly subcontinental forms there are major similarities with other types of oriental music . Indian genres like filmi and bhangra have become popular throughout the United Kingdom, South and East Asia, and around the world.[citation needed]<br />Classical Indian dance<br />Classical Indian dance<br /><br />In the book "Shiva's Fire" a girl called Parvati is shunned because of her dancing talent<br /><br />[edit] Dance<br /><br /> Main article: Indian dance<br /><br />India offers a number of Classical Indian dance forms, each of which can be traced to different parts of the country. Each form represents the culture and ethos of a particular region or a group of people. The eight main styles are Bharatanatyam, Kathak, Odissi, Yakshagana, Kuchipudi, Mohiniattam, Bhangra, Manipuri and Kathakali.[citation needed] Besides, there are several forms of Indian folk dances, and special dances observed in regional festivals.<br /><br />[edit] Drama and theatre<br /><br /> Main article: Theatre in India<br /><br />Indian drama and theatre is perhaps as old as its music and dance. Kalidas' plays like Shakuntala and Meghadoot are some of the oldest plays from literary traditions. The tradition of folk theatre is alive in nearly all the linguistic regions of the country. [citation needed] In addition, there is a rich tradition of puppet theatre in rural India. Group Theatre is also thriving in the cities, initiated by the likes of Utpal Dutt, Khwaja Ahmad Abbas and still maintained by groups like Nandikar and Prithvi Theatre.<br /><br />[edit] Visual arts<br /><br /> Main article: Indian art<br /><br />[edit] Painting<br /><br /> Main article: Indian painting<br /><br />an 18th century Rajput painting.<br />an 18th century Rajput painting.<br /><br />The earliest Indian paintings were the rock paintings of pre-historic times, the petroglyphs as found in places like Bhimbetka, and some of them are older than 55500 BC. Ancient texts outline theories of darragh and anecdotal accounts suggesting that it was common for households to paint their doorways or indoor rooms where guests resided.<br /><br />Cave paintings from Ajanta, Bagh, Ellora and Sittanavasal and temple paintings testify to a love of naturalism and God. Most rock art in India is Hindu or Buddhist. A freshly made coloured flour design (Rangoli) everyday is still a common sight outside the doorstep of many (mostly South Indian) Indian homes.<br /><br />Madhubani painting, Rajput painting, Tanjore painting, Mughal painting are some notable Genres of Indian Art; while Raja Ravi Varma, Nandalal Bose, Geeta Vadhera,Jamini Roy are some modern painters. Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai, has on display several good Indian paintings.<br /> This section is a stub. You can help by expanding it.<br /><br />[edit] Sculpture<br />Some information in this article or section does not attribute its sources and may not be reliable.<br />Please check for inaccuracies, and modify and cite sources as needed.<br /><br /> Main article: Sculpture in India<br /><br />Sculpture in Khajuraho<br />Sculpture in Khajuraho<br /><br />The first sculptures in India date back to the Indus Valley civilization, where stone and bronze carvings have been discovered. This is one of the earliest instances of sculpture in the world. Later, as Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism developed further, India produced some of the most intricate bronzes in the world, as well as unrivalled temple carvings. Some huge shrines, such as the one at Ellora were not actually constructed using blocks, but instead carved out of solid rock, making them perhaps the largest and most intricate sculptures in the world.<br /><br />The pink sandstone sculptures of Mathura evolved during the Gupta period (4th to 6th century) to reach a very high fineness of execution and delicacy in the modeling. Newer sculptures in northwest, in stucco, schist, or clay, display very strong blending of Indian post-Gupta mannerism and Classical influence, Hellenistic or possibly even Greco-Roman. Meanwhile, elsewhere in India, less anatomically accurate styles of human representation evolved leading to the classical art that the world is now familiar with and contributing to Buddhist and Hindu sculpture throughout Asia.<br /> This section is a stub. You can help by expanding it.<br /><br />[edit] Architecture<br /><br /> Main article: Indian architecture<br /><br />The Ellora temples were not constructed, but in fact carved out of solid rock<br />The Ellora temples were not constructed, but in fact carved out of solid rock<br /><br />Indian architecture is that vast tapestry of production of the Indian Subcontinent that encompasses a multitude of expressions over space and time, transformed by the forces of history considered unique to the sub-continent, sometimes destroying, but most of the time absorbing new ideas. The result is an evolving range of architectural production that none the less retains a certain amount of continuity across history. The earliest production in the Indus Valley Civilization was characterised by well planned cities and houses where religion did not seem to play an active role, but which demonstrated world-famous city planning.<br /><br />During the reign of the Gupta and Maurya empires, several Buddhist architectural examples like caves of Ajanta and Ellora and the monumental Sanchi Stupa were built. South India contains several Hindu temples like Brihadeeswara Temple, Thanjavur, the Sun Temple, Konark, Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple at Srirangam, and the Buddha stupa (Chinna Lanja dibba and Vikramarka kota dibba) at Bhattiprolu. Angkor Wat and other Buddhist and Hindu temples carry the evidence of Indian influence on South East Asian architecture, as they are built in styles almost identical to traditional Indian temple building.<br /><br />With the advent of Islamic influence from the west, the erstwhile Indian architecture was slightly adapted to allow the traditions of the new religion. Fatehpur Sikri, Taj Mahal, Gol Gumbaz, Qutub Minar, Red Fort of Delhi are the creations of this era, and are often used as the stereotypical symbols of India, despite the greater antiquity and originality of traditional architecture. The colonial rule of the British Indian Empire saw the development of Indo-Saracenic style, and mixing of several other styles, such as European gothic. Victoria Memorial, Victoria Terminus are notable examples. Recent creations such as Lotus Temple, and the various modern urban developments of India, are also notable.<br /><br />The traditional system of Vaastu Shastra serves as India's version of Feng Shui, influencing town planning, architecture, and ergonomics. It is unclear which system is older, but they contain many similarities. Though Vastu is conceptually similar to Feng Shui in that it also tries to harmonize the flow of energy, (also called life-force or Prana in Sanskrit and Chi/Ki in Chinese/Japanese), through the house, it differs in the details, such as the exact directions in which various objects, rooms, materials etc are to be placed.<br /><br />Indian architecture has influence the world, especially eastern Asia, due to the spread of ideas with Buddhism. A number of Indian architectural features such as the temple mound or stupa, temple spire or sikhara, temple tower or pagoda and temple gate or torana, have become famous symbols of Asian culture, used extensively in East Asia and South East Asia. The central spire is also sometimes called a vimanam. The variant southern temple gate, or gopuram is noted for its intricacy and majesty. The arch, a cornerstone of world architecture, was first developed by the Indus Valley civilization and would later be a staple of Indian architecture.<br /><br />[edit] Recreation and sports<br /><br /> Main article: Sports in India<br /><br />In the area of recreation and sports India had evolved a number of games. The modern eastern martial arts originated as ancient games and martial arts in India and it was from here that these games were transmitted to foreign countries, where they were further modernized. Additionally, a few games introduced during the British Raj have grown quite popular in India, field hockey, football (soccer) and especially cricket.<br /><br />Although field hockey is India's official national sport, cricket is by far the most popular sport not only in India, but the entire subcontinent, thriving recreationally and professionally. Cricket has even been used recently as a forum for diplomatic relations between India and long-standing rival, Pakistan. The two nations' cricket teams face off annually and such contests are quite impassioned on both sides. Traditional indigenous sports include kabaddi and gilli-danda, which are played in most parts of the country. Indoor and outdoor games like Chess, Snakes and Ladders, Playing cards, Polo, Carrom, Badminton are popular.<br /><br />[edit] Cuisine<br /><br /> Main article: Cuisine of India<br /><br />Tandoori chicken, a popular Indian dish<br />Tandoori chicken, a popular Indian dish<br /><br />The earliest Indians, the Harappans, probably ate mainly wheat, rice and lentils, and occasionally meats such as pork, lamb, goat and chicken. Some believe that vegetarianism became popular with the arrival of Buddhism and Jainism that emphasised ahimsa (non-violence).<br /><br />The cuisine of Modern India has great variety and each region has its own distinctive flavours. The staple cereals are rice and wheat. North Indian staple meals consist of chapatis or rotis, wheat based and rice as staples, eaten with a wide variety of side dishes like dals, curries, yogurt, chutney and achars. South India staple dishes consist of rice, sambhar, rasam, yoghurt and curries being important side dishes.<br /><br />Another important ingredient in south Indian food is coconut and most popular snacks like idli dosa are also rice-based. Fish is popular in coastal states, especially West Bengal, Orissa and Kerala. Several kind of street foods like Panipuri, Vada pav, Bhelpuri, samosa, vada are popular, though they are known by different names in different regions. Indian Chinese cuisine, an Indianized version of the Chinese cuisine is especially popular amongst the urban crowd. This cuisine is supposed to have originated from east of India generally and Darjeeling specifically. As in other Asian countries, Tea is widely enjoyed, while coffee is quite popular in South India. Nimbu pani (lemonade), lassi, and coconut milk are popular drinks. Although many foreign countries eat Indian dishes such as Curry (especially Great Britain), many of the variations are not in fact Indian at all. For example, Chicken Tikka Masala is thought to have originated from Glasgow.<br /><br />[edit] Popular media<br /><br />[edit] Cinema<br /> This article or section may contain original research or unattributed claims.<br />Please help Wikipedia by adding references. See the talk page for details.<br /><br /> Main article: Cinema of India<br /><br />A Bollywood movie poster for the romantic film Devdas<br />A Bollywood movie poster for the romantic film Devdas<br /><br />Bollywood is the informal name given to the popular Mumbai-based film industry in India. Bollywood and the other major cinematic hubs (Bengali, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu) constitute the broader Indian film industry, whose output is considered to be the largest in the world in terms of number of films produced and, possibly, number of tickets sold.<br /><br />Bollywood films are usually musicals, though not in the Western sense of the word. Indian movies have a regular plot, with songs and dances interspersed to add to the entertainment value of the movie. Few movies are made without at least one song-and-dance number. Indian audiences expect full value for their money; they want songs and dances, love interest, comedy and dare-devil thrills, all mixed up in a three hour long extravaganza with intermission. Such movies are called masala movies, after the Indian spice mixture masala. Like masala, these movies are a mixture of many things. Approximately, 95% of Bollywood movies are this type of movie, because Indians enjoy this type of movie very much. Plots tend to be melodramatic. They frequently employ formulaic ingredients such as star-crossed lovers and angry parents, corrupt politicians, kidnappers, conniving villains, courtesans with hearts of gold, long-lost relatives and siblings separated by fate, dramatic reversals of fortune, and convenient coincidences, and even movies with tri polar changes that can turn a movie and its plot upside down.<br /><br />Bollywood is becoming increasingly popular in other countries including several places in Europe and the U.S. Some Bollywood actors have adapted to more Hollywood-type films in movies like Bend It Like Beckham and Bride and Prejudice. Bollywood's fame is increasing internationally as more and more people across the globe are exposed to its style.<br /><br />Besides the regular masala film, India has also produced many critically acclaimed cinema-makers like Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Girish Kasaravalli, Ram Gopal Varma, Mani Ratnam, G. Aravindan etc. (See Indian film directors). In fact, with the opening up of the economy in the recent years & consequent exposure to world cinema, audience tastes have been changing. Indian commercial movies have also started following authentic, real world themes with a lower amount of melodrama & some do not even contain songs. In addition, multiplexes have mushroomed in most cities, changing the revenue patterns & allowing film makers greater liberty & scope for executing bold & innovative ideas which would not have been possible even a decade ago.<br /><br />[edit] Television<br /><br /> Main article: Television in India<br /><br />A sampling of cable TV media in India<br />A sampling of cable TV media in India<br /><br />Indian television started off in 1959 in New Delhi with tests for educational telecasts.[2] Indian small screen programming started off in the early 1980s. At that time there was only one national channel Doordarshan, which was government owned. The Ramayana and Mahabharat were some among the popular television series produced. By the late 1980s more and more people started to own television sets. Though there was a single channel, television programming had reached saturation. Hence the government opened up another channel which had part national programming and part regional. This channel was known as DD 2 later DD Metro. Both channels were broadcasted terrestrially.<br /><br />In 1994, the government liberated its markets, opening them up to cable television. Since then, there has been a spurt in the number of channels available. Today, Indian silver screen is a huge industry by itself, and has thousands of programmes in all the states of India. The small screen has produced numerous celebrities of their own kind some even attaining national fame. TV soaps are extremely popular with housewives as well as working women, and even men of all kinds. Some small time actors have made it big in Bollywood. Indian TV has evolved to be similar to Western TV, including stations such as Cartoon Network, Nikelodeon, and Indian MTV.<br /><br /> See also: List of Indian television stations<br /><br />[edit] Radio<br /><br />Radio broadcasting began in India in 1927, with two privately owned transmitters at Mumbai and Calcutta. These were nationalised in 1930 and operated under the name "Indian Broadcasting Service" until 1936, when it was renamed All India Radio (AIR). Although officially renamed again to Akashwani in 1957, it is still popularly known as All India Radio. All India Radio is a division of Prasar Bharati (Broadcasting Corporation of India), an autonomous corporation of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India. It is the sister service of Prasar Bharati's Doordarshan, the national television broadcaster.<br /><br /> See also: All India Radio<br /><br />[edit] Religion and philosophy<br /><br />[edit] Philosophy<br /><br /> Main article: Indian philosophy<br /><br />Hindu philosopher Adi Shankara with the Four Disciples<br />Hindu philosopher Adi Shankara with the Four Disciples<br /><br />Indian philosophy throughout the ages has had a tremendous impact on world thought, especially in the east. Various theistic schools of philosophy, such as the many schools of Buddhism and Hinduism, have has huge influences, but also, India produced some of the longest and most influential secular traditions of logic, rationalism, science, mathematics, materialism, atheism, agnosticism, etc, which are often overlooked due to popular conception that India is a 'mystical' country.<br /><br />Many of the complex scientific and mathematical concepts such as the idea of zero, found their way to Europe via Arab intermediaries. The most famous school of Indian atheism, is Carvaka, considered by some to be the oldest materialistic school of thought in the world, composed around the same time as the Hindu Upanishads, as well as the philosophy of Buddhism and Jainism. This period around 600-400 BCE marked a huge leap in both Indian philosophy and world philosophy in general, with contemporary Greek schools emerging simultaneously. Some philosophical concepts from India were introduced to the Greeks, especially during the campaigns of Alexander the Great, and vis a vis, leading some schools of classical Greek philosophy to be almost identical to prior Indian schools.<br /><br />In addition to the unbroken high emphasis placed on philosophy in India, which has existed since ancient times, modern India has produced some of the world's most influential philosophers of modern times, who have written both in their native languages, and often English. During the British occupation of India, various thinkers, both secular and religious, achieved a new level of recognition across the world as both ancient Indian texts, and the work of contemporary Indian philosophers was translated into English, German and other languages. Swami Vivekananda travelled to America and participated in the 1893 World Parliament of Religions, impressing delegates with a groundbreaking speech that for the first time gave access to eastern, Indian, Hindu and dharmic philosophy to western intellectuals.<br /><br />As well as various religious thinkers Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore and other members of the Indian freedom movement, generated political philosophy, and formed the basis of modern Indian democracy, secularism and liberalism. Today, economists such as Amartya Sen, who won Asia's first Nobel Prize in economics, continue to give India a reputation as an important contributor to world thought.<br /><br />[edit] Religion<br /><br /> Main article: Religion in India<br /><br />The Dharmic religions, one of the two main families of world religion (the other being the Abrahamic), originated in India. Every dharmic religion originated in India, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Jainism and other schools of language. Today, Hinduism and Buddhism are the world's third and fourth largest religions respectively, with a collective 1.4 billion followers, despite being free of any evangelistic traditions. Unlike the sectarianism that has often marked differences among the Abrahamic schools, the philosophical-like treatment of these religions has generally made the idea of rivalry and conversion alien, leading to extremely close relationships between these faiths.<br /><br />India is one of the most religiously diverse nations in the world, with one of the most deeply religious societies and cultures. Religion plays a central and definitive role in the life of the country and most of its people. The religion of more than 80.4% of the people is Hinduism, considered the world's oldest religious and philosophical system. Islam is practiced by around 13.4% of all Indians.[3] Sikhism,Buddhism and Jainism are systems that are strong and influential not only in India but across the world. Christianity, Zoroastrianism, Judaism and the Bahá'í Faith are also influential but their numbers are smaller. Despite the strong role of religion in Indian life, atheism and agnostics are also visible influences.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-65676587405659302942007-03-05T04:34:00.000-08:002007-03-05T04:36:06.116-08:00pc virusComputer virus<br />From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia<br />Jump to: navigation, search<br /><br />A computer virus is a computer program that can copy itself and infect a computer without permission or knowledge of the user. The original may modify the copies or the copies may modify themselves, as occurs in a metamorphic virus. A virus can only spread from one computer to another when its host is taken to the uninfected computer, for instance by a user sending it over a network or carrying it on a removable medium. Additionally, viruses can spread to other computers by infecting files on a network file system or a file system that is accessed by another computer. Viruses are sometimes confused with computer worms and Trojan horses. A worm, however, can spread itself to other computers without needing to be transferred as part of a host. A Trojan horse is a form of malware that presents itself as a legitimate program. In contrast to viruses, Trojan horses do not insert their code into other computer files. Many personal computers are now connected to the Internet and to local-area networks, facilitating their spread. Today's viruses may also take advantage of network services such as the World Wide Web, e-mail, and file sharing systems to spread, blurring the line between viruses and worms. Furthermore, some sources use an alternative terminology in which a virus is any form of self-replicating malware.<br /><br />The term comes from the term virus in biology. A computer virus reproduces by making, possibly modified, copies of itself in the computer's memory, storage, or over a network. This is similar to the way a biological virus works.<br /><br />Some viruses are programmed to damage the computer by damaging programs, deleting files, or reformatting the hard disk. Others are not designed to do any damage, but simply replicate themselves and perhaps make their presence known by presenting text, video, or audio, messages. Even these benign viruses can create problems for the computer user. They typically take up computer memory used by legitimate programs. As a result, they often cause erratic behavior and can result in system crashes. In addition, many viruses are bug-ridden, and these bugs may lead to system crashes and data loss.<br /><br />There are many viruses operating in the general Internet today, and new ones are discovered every day.<br />Contents<br />[hide]<br /><br /> * 1 History<br /> * 2 Etymology<br /> * 3 Classification<br /> o 3.1 Macro viruses<br /> o 3.2 Network viruses<br /> o 3.3 Logic bomb<br /> o 3.4 Cross-site scripting virus<br /> o 3.5 Sentinels<br /> o 3.6 Archaic Forms<br /> + 3.6.1 Companion virus<br /> + 3.6.2 Boot sector viruses<br /> + 3.6.3 Multipartite viruses<br /> * 4 Why people create computer viruses<br /> * 5 Replication strategies<br /> o 5.1 Nonresident viruses<br /> o 5.2 Resident viruses<br /> * 6 Vectors and Hosts<br /> o 6.1 Inhospitable Vectors<br /> * 7 Methods to avoid detection<br /> o 7.1 Avoiding bait files and other undesirable hosts<br /> o 7.2 Stealth<br /> o 7.3 Self-modification<br /> + 7.3.1 Simple self-modifications<br /> + 7.3.2 Encryption with a variable key<br /> + 7.3.3 Polymorphic code<br /> + 7.3.4 Metamorphic code<br /> * 8 Vulnerability and countermeasures<br /> o 8.1 The vulnerability of operating systems to viruses<br /> o 8.2 The role of software development<br /> o 8.3 Anti-virus software and other preventive countermeasures<br /> o 8.4 Recovery Methods<br /> + 8.4.1 Data Recovery<br /> + 8.4.2 Virus Removal<br /> + 8.4.3 Operating System Reinstallation<br /> * 9 See also<br /> * 10 References<br /> * 11 External links<br /> o 11.1 Other texts<br /><br />[edit] History<br /><br />A program called "Elk Cloner" is credited with being the first computer virus to appear "in the wild" — that is, outside the single computer or lab where it was created. Written in 1982 by Rich Skrenta, it attached itself to the Apple DOS 3.3 operating system and spread by floppy disk. This virus was originally a joke, created by the high school student and put onto a game. The game was set to play, but release the virus on the 50th time of starting the game. Only this time, instead of playing the game, it would change to a blank screen that read a poem about the virus named Elk Cloner. The computer would then be infected.<br /><br />The first PC virus was a boot sector virus called (c)Brain, created in 1986 by two brothers, Basit and Amjad Farooq Alvi, operating out of Lahore, Pakistan. The brothers reportedly created the virus to deter pirated copies of software they had written. However, analysts have claimed that the Ashar virus, a variant of Brain, possibly predated it based on code within the virus.<br /><br />Before computer networks became widespread, most viruses spread on removable media, particularly floppy disks. In the early days of the personal computer, many users regularly exchanged information and programs on floppies. Some viruses spread by infecting programs stored on these disks, while others installed themselves into the disk boot sector, ensuring that they would be run when the user booted the computer from the disk.<br /><br />Traditional computer viruses emerged in the 1980s, driven by the spread of personal computers and the resultant increase in BBS and modem use, and software sharing. Bulletin board driven software sharing contributed directly to the spread of Trojan horse programs, and viruses were written to infect popularly traded software. Shareware and bootleg software were equally common vectors for viruses on BBS's. Within the "pirate scene" of hobbyists trading illicit copies of commercial software, traders in a hurry to obtain the latest applications and games were easy targets for viruses.<br /><br />Since the mid-1990s, macro viruses have become common. Most of these viruses are written in the scripting languages for Microsoft programs such as Word and Excel. These viruses spread in Microsoft Office by infecting documents and spreadsheets. Since Word and Excel were also available for Mac OS, most of these viruses were able to spread on Macintosh computers as well. Most of these viruses did not have the ability to send infected e-mail. Those viruses which did spread through e-mail took advantage of the Microsoft Outlook COM interface.<br /><br />Macro viruses pose unique problems for detection software. For example, some versions of Microsoft Word allowed macros to replicate themselves with additional blank lines. The virus behaved identically but would be misidentified as a new virus. In another example, if two macro viruses simultaneously infect a document, the combination of the two, if also self-replicating, can appear as a "mating" of the two and would likely be detected as a virus unique from the "parents".[1]<br /><br />A computer virus may also be transmitted through instant messaging. A virus may send a web address link as an instant message to all the contacts on an infected machine. If the recipient, thinking the link is from a friend (a trusted source) follows the link to the website, the virus hosted at the site may be able to infect this new computer and continue propagating.<br /><br />The newest species of the virus family is the cross-site scripting virus. The virus emerged from research and was academically demonstrated in 2005. This virus utilises cross-site scripting vulnerabilities to propagate. Since 2005 there have been multiple instances of the cross-site scripting viruses in the wild, most notable sites affected have been MySpace and Yahoo.<br /><br />[edit] Etymology<br /><br />The word virus is derived from and used in the same sense as the biological equivalent. The term "virus" is often used in common parlance to describe all kinds of malware (malicious software), including those that are more properly classified as worms or Trojans. Most popular anti-virus software packages defend against all of these types of attack. In some technical communities, the term "virus" is also extended to include the authors of malware, in an insulting sense. The English plural of "virus" is "viruses". Some people use "virii" or "viri" as a plural, but this is rare. For a discussion about whether "viri" and "virii" are correct alternatives of "viruses", see plural of virus.<br /><br />The term "virus" was first used in an academic publication by Fred Cohen in his 1984 paper Experiments with Computer Viruses, where he credits Len Adleman with coining it. However, a 1972 science fiction novel by David Gerrold, When H.A.R.L.I.E. Was One, includes a description of a fictional computer program called "VIRUS" that worked just like a virus (and was countered by a program called "VACCINE"). The term "computer virus" with current usage also appears in the comic book Uncanny X-Men #158, written by Chris Claremont and published in 1982. Therefore, although Cohen's use of "virus" may, perhaps, have been the first "academic" use, the term had been used earlier.<br /><br />[edit] Classification<br /><br />Viruses can be subdivided into a number of types based on their features.<br /><br />[edit] Macro viruses<br /><br />A macro virus, often written in the scripting languages for programs such as Word and Excel, is spread by infecting documents and spreadsheets. Since macro viruses are written in the language of the application and not in that of the operating system, they are known to be platform-independent. They can spread between Windows, Mac and any other system, so long as they are running the required application. With the ever-increasing capabilities of macro languages in applications, and the possibility of infections spreading over networks, these viruses are major threats.<br /><br />The first macro virus was written for Microsoft Word and was discovered in August 1995. Today, there are thousands of macro viruses in existence—some examples are Relax, Melissa.A and Bablas. pc.<br /><br />[edit] Network viruses<br /><br />This kind of virus is proficient in quickly spreading across a Local Area Network (LAN) or even over the Internet. Usually, it propagates through shared resources, such as shared drives and folders. Once it infects a new system, it searches for potential targets by searching the network for other vulnerable systems. Once a new vulnerable system is found, the network virus infects the other system, and thus spreads over the network. Some of the most notorious network viruses are Nimda and SQLSlammer.<br /><br />[edit] Logic bomb<br /><br />A logic bomb employs code that lies inert until specific conditions are met. The resolution of the conditions will trigger a certain function (such as printing a message to the user and/or deleting files). Logic bombs may reside within standalone programs, or they may be part of worms or viruses. An example of a logic bomb would be a virus that waits to execute until it has infected a certain number of hosts. A time bomb is a subset of logic bomb, which is set to trigger on a particular date and/or time. An example of a time bomb is the infamous ‘Friday the 13th’ virus.<br /><br />[edit] Cross-site scripting virus<br /><br />A cross-site scripting virus (XSSV) is a type of virus that utilizes cross-site scripting vulnerabilities to replicate. A XSSV is spread between vulnerable web applications and web browsers creating a symbiotic relationship<br /><br />[edit] Sentinels<br /><br />A sentinel is a highly advanced virus capable of empowering the creator or perpetrator of the virus with remote access control over the computers that are infected. They are used to form vast networks of zombie or slave computers which in turn can be used for malicious purposes such as a Distributed Denial-of-service attack.<br /><br />[edit] Archaic Forms<br /><br />Some forms of virus were very common in the 1980s and early 1990s, but have become much less prevalent.<br /><br />[edit] Companion virus<br /><br />A companion virus[2] does not have host files per se, but exploits MS-DOS. A companion virus creates new files (typically .COM but can also use other extensions such as ".EXD") that have the same file names as legitimate .EXE files. When a user types in the name of a desired program, if a user does not type in ".EXE" but instead does not specify a file extension, DOS will assume he meant the file with the extension that comes first in alphabetical order and run the virus. For instance, if a user had "(filename).COM" (the virus) and "(filename).EXE" and the user typed "filename", he will run "(filename).COM" and run the virus. The virus will spread and do other tasks before redirecting to the legitimate file, which operates normally. Some companion viruses are known to run under Windows 95 and on DOS emulators on Windows NT systems. Path companion viruses create files that have the same name as the legitimate file and place new virus copies earlier in the directory paths. These viruses have become increasingly rare with the introduction of Windows XP,which does not use the MS-DOS command prompt.<br /><br />[edit] Boot sector viruses<br /><br />A boot sector virus alters or hides in the boot sector, usually the 1st sector, of a bootable disk or hard drive. The boot sector is where your computer starts reading your operating system. By inserting its code into the boot sector, a virus guarantees that it loads into memory during every boot sequence. A boot virus does not affect files; instead, it affects the disks that contain them.<br /><br />In the 1980s boot sector viruses were common and spread rapidly from one computer to another on rewritable floppy disks which contained programs. However, with the CD-ROM revolution, it became impossible to infect read-only CDs. Though boot viruses still exist, they are much less common than in the 1980s. Additionally, modern operating systems do not allow ordinary programs to write to the boot sector. Examples of boot viruses are Polyboot.B and AntiEXE.<br /><br />[edit] Multipartite viruses<br /><br />Multipartite viruses are a combination of boot sector viruses and file viruses. These viruses come in through infected media and reside in memory. They then move on to the boot sector of the hard drive. From there, the virus infects executable files on the hard drive and spreads across the system.<br /><br />There aren’t too many multipartite viruses in existence today, but in the 1980s, they accounted for some major problems due to their capacity to combine different infection techniques. A well-known multipartite virus is Ywinz.<br /><br />[edit] Why people create computer viruses<br /><br />Unlike biological viruses, computer viruses do not simply evolve by themselves. Computer viruses do not come into existence spontaneously, nor are they likely to be created by bugs in regular programs. They are deliberately created by programmers, or by people who use virus creation software. Computer viruses can only do what the programmers have programmed them to do.<br /><br />Virus writers can have various reasons for creating and spreading malware. Viruses have been written as research projects, pranks, vandalism, to attack the products of specific companies, to distribute political messages, and financial gain from identity theft, spyware, and cryptoviral extortion. Some virus writers consider their creations to be works of art, and see virus writing as a creative hobby. Additionally, many virus writers oppose deliberately destructive payload routines. Many writers consider the systems they attack an intellectual challenge or a logical problem to be solved; this multiplies when a cat-and-mouse game is anticipated against anti-virus software. Some viruses were intended as "good viruses". They spread improvements to the programs they infect, or delete other viruses. These viruses are, however, quite rare, still consume system resources, may accidentally damage systems they infect, and, on occasion, have become infected and acted as vectors for malicious viruses. A poorly written "good virus" can also inadvertently become a virus in and of itself (for example, such a 'good virus' may misidentify its target file and delete an innocent system file by mistake). Moreover, they normally operate without asking for the permission of the computer owner. Since self-replicating code causes many complications, it is questionable if a well-intentioned virus can ever solve a problem in a way that is superior to a regular program that does not replicate itself. In short, no single answer is likely to cover the broad demographic of virus writers.<br /><br />Releasing computer viruses (as well as worms) is a crime in most jurisdictions.<br /><br />See also the BBC News article.[3]<br /><br />[edit] Replication strategies<br /><br />In order to replicate itself, a virus must be permitted to execute code and write to memory. For this reason, many viruses attach themselves to executable files that may be part of legitimate programs. If a user tries to start an infected program, the virus' code may be executed first. Viruses can be divided into two types, on the basis of their behavior when they are executed. Nonresident viruses immediately search for other hosts that can be infected, infect these targets, and finally transfer control to the application program they infected. Resident viruses do not search for hosts when they are started. Instead, a resident virus loads itself into memory on execution and transfers control to the host program. The virus stays active in the background and infects new hosts when those files are accessed by other programs or the operating system itself.<br /><br />[edit] Nonresident viruses<br /><br />Nonresident viruses can be thought of as consisting of a finder module and a replication module. The finder module is responsible for finding new files to infect. For each new executable file the finder module encounters, it calls the replication module to infect that file.<br /><br />For simple viruses the replicator's tasks are to:<br /><br /> 1. Open the new file<br /> 2. Check if the executable file has already been infected (if it is, return to the finder module)<br /> 3. Append the virus code to the executable file<br /> 4. Save the executable's starting point<br /> 5. Change the executable's starting point so that it points to the start location of the newly copied virus code<br /> 6. Save the old start location to the virus in a way so that the virus branches to that location right after its execution.<br /> 7. Save the changes to the executable file<br /> 8. Close the infected file<br /> 9. Return to the finder so that it can find new files for the replicator to infect.<br /><br />[edit] Resident viruses<br /><br />Resident viruses contain a replication module that is similar to the one that is employed by nonresident viruses. However, this module is not called by a finder module. Instead, the virus loads the replication module into memory when it is executed and ensures that this module is executed each time the operating system is called to perform a certain operation. For example, the replication module can be called each time the operating system executes a file. In this case, the virus infects every suitable program that is executed on the computer.<br /><br />Resident viruses are sometimes subdivided into a category of fast infectors and a category of slow infectors. Fast infectors are designed to infect as many files as possible. For instance, a fast infector can infect every potential host file that is accessed. This poses a special problem to anti-virus software, since a virus scanner will access every potential host file on a computer when it performs a system-wide scan. If the virus scanner fails to notice that such a virus is present in memory, the virus can "piggy-back" on the virus scanner and in this way infect all files that are scanned. Fast infectors rely on their fast infection rate to spread. The disadvantage of this method is that infecting many files may make detection more likely, because the virus may slow down a computer or perform many suspicious actions that can be noticed by anti-virus software. Slow infectors, on the other hand, are designed to infect hosts infrequently. For instance, some slow infectors only infect files when they are copied. Slow infectors are designed to avoid detection by limiting their actions: they are less likely to slow down a computer noticeably, and will at most infrequently trigger anti-virus software that detects suspicious behavior by programs. The slow infector approach does not seem very successful however.<br /><br />[edit] Vectors and Hosts<br /><br />Viruses have targeted various types of transmission media or hosts. This list is not exhaustive:<br /><br /> * Binary executable files (such as COM files and EXE files in MS-DOS, Portable Executable files in Microsoft Windows, and ELF files in Linux)<br /> * Volume Boot Records of floppy disks and hard disk partitions<br /> * The master boot record (MBR) of a hard disk<br /> * General-purpose script files (such as batch files in MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows, VBScript files, and shell script files on Unix-like platforms).<br /> * Application-specific script files (such as Telix-scripts)<br /> * Documents that can contain macros (such as Microsoft Word documents, Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, AmiPro documents, and Microsoft Access database files)<br /><br />[edit] Inhospitable Vectors<br /><br />It is difficult, but not impossible, for viruses to tag along in source files, seeing that computer languages are built also for human eyes and experienced operators. It is very probably impossible for viruses to tag along in data files like MP3s, MPGs, OGGs, JPGs, GIFs, PNGs, MNGs, PDFs, and DVI files (this is not an exhaustive list of generally trusted file types). Even if a virus were to 'infect' such a file, it would be inoperative, since there would be no way for the viral code to be executed. A caveat must be mentioned from PDFs, that like HTML, may link to malicious code. Further, an exploitable buffer overflow in a program which reads the data files could be used to trigger the execution of code hidden within the data file, but this attack is substantially mitigated in computer architectures with an execute disable bit.<br /><br />It is worth noting that some virus authors have written an .EXE extension on the end of .PNG (for example), hoping that users would stop at the trusted file type without noticing that the computer would start with the final type of file. See Trojan horse (computing).<br /><br />[edit] Methods to avoid detection<br /><br />In order to avoid detection by users, some viruses employ different kinds of deception. Some old viruses, especially on the MS-DOS platform, make sure that the "last modified" date of a host file stays the same when the file is infected by the virus. This approach does not fool anti-virus software, however, especially that which maintains and dates Cyclic Redundancy Codes on file changes.<br /><br />Some viruses can infect files without increasing their sizes or damaging the files. They accomplish this by overwriting unused areas of executable files. These are called cavity viruses. For example the CIH virus, or Chernobyl Virus, infects Portable Executable files. Because those files had many empty gaps, the virus, which was 1 KB in length, did not add to the size of the file.<br /><br />Some viruses try to avoid detection by killing the tasks associated with antivirus software before it can detect them.<br /><br />As computers and operating systems grow larger and more complex, old hiding techniques need to be updated or replaced. Defending your computer against viruses may demand that your file system migrate towards detailed and explicit permission for every kind of file access.<br /><br />[edit] Avoiding bait files and other undesirable hosts<br /><br />A virus needs to infect hosts in order to spread further. In some cases, it might be a bad idea to infect a host program. For example, many anti-virus programs perform an integrity check of their own code. Infecting such programs will therefore increase the likelihood that the virus is detected. For this reason, some viruses are programmed not to infect programs that are known to be part of anti-virus software. Another type of host that viruses sometimes avoid is bait files. Bait files (or goat files) are files that are specially created by anti-virus software, or by anti-virus professionals themselves, to be infected by a virus. These files can be created for various reasons, all of which are related to the detection of the virus:<br /><br /> * Anti-virus professionals can use bait files to take a sample of a virus (i.e. a copy of a program file that is infected by the virus). It is more practical to store and exchange a small, infected bait file, than to exchange a large application program that has been infected by the virus.<br /> * Anti-virus professionals can use bait files to study the behavior of a virus and evaluate detection methods. This is especially useful when the virus is polymorphic. In this case, the virus can be made to infect a large number of bait files. The infected files can be used to test whether a virus scanner detects all versions of the virus.<br /> * Some anti-virus software employs bait files that are accessed regularly. When these files are modified, the anti-virus software warns the user that a virus is probably active on the system.<br /><br />Since bait files are used to detect the virus, or to make detection possible, a virus can benefit from not infecting them. Viruses typically do this by avoiding suspicious programs, such as small program files or programs that contain certain patterns of 'garbage instructions'.<br /><br />A related strategy to make baiting difficult is sparse infection. Sometimes, sparse infectors do not infect a host file that would be a suitable candidate for infection in other circumstances. For example, a virus can decide on a random basis whether to infect a file or not, or a virus can only infect host files on particular days of the week!<br /><br />[edit] Stealth<br /><br />Some viruses try to trick anti-virus software by intercepting its requests to the operating system. A virus can hide itself by intercepting the anti-virus software’s request to read the file and passing the request to the virus, instead of the OS. The virus can then return an uninfected version of the file to the anti-virus software, so that it seems that the file is "clean". Modern anti-virus software employs various techniques to counter stealth mechanisms of viruses. The only completely reliable method to avoid stealth is to boot from a medium that is known to be clean.<br /><br />[edit] Self-modification<br /><br />Most modern antivirus programs try to find virus-patterns inside ordinary programs by scanning them for so-called virus signatures. A signature is a characteristic byte-pattern that is part of a certain virus or family of viruses. If a virus scanner finds such a pattern in a file, it notifies the user that the file is infected. The user can then delete, or (in some cases) "clean" or "heal" the infected file. Some viruses employ techniques that make detection by means of signatures difficult but probably not impossible. These viruses modify their code on each infection. That is, each infected file contains a different variant of the virus.<br /><br />[edit] Simple self-modifications<br /><br />In the past, some viruses modified themselves only in simple ways. For example, they regularly exchanged subroutines in their code for others that would perform the same action - for example, 2+2 could be swapped for 1+3. This poses no problems to a somewhat advanced virus scanner.<br /><br />[edit] Encryption with a variable key<br /><br />A more advanced method is the use of simple encryption to encipher the virus. In this case, the virus consists of a small decrypting module and an encrypted copy of the virus code. If the virus is encrypted with a different key for each infected file, the only part of the virus that remains constant is the decrypting module, which would (for example) be appended to the end. In this case, a virus scanner cannot directly detect the virus using signatures, but it can still detect the decrypting module, which still makes indirect detection of the virus possible. Since these would be symmetric keys, stored on the infected host, it is in fact entirely possible to decrypt the final virus, but that probably isn't required, since self-modifying code is such a rarity that it may be reason for virus scanners to at least flag the file as suspicious.<br /><br />An old, but compact, encryption involved XORing each byte in a virus with a constant, such that a XOR b = c, and c XOR b = a, so that the exclusive or operation had only to be repeated for decryption. It is suspicious code that modifies itself, so the code to do this may be part of the signature in many virus definitions.<br /><br />[edit] Polymorphic code<br /><br />Polymorphic code was the first technique that posed a serious threat to virus scanners. Just like regular encrypted viruses, a polymorphic virus infects files with an encrypted copy of itself, which is decoded by a decryption module. In the case of polymorphic viruses however, this decryption module is also modified on each infection. A well-written polymorphic virus therefore has no parts that stay the same on each infection, making it very difficult to detect directly using signatures. Anti-virus software can detect it by decrypting the viruses using an emulator, or by statistical pattern analysis of the encrypted virus body. To enable polymorphic code, the virus has to have a polymorphic engine (also called mutating engine or mutation engine) somewhere in its encrypted body. See Polymorphic code for technical detail on how such engines operate.<br /><br />Some viruses employ polymorphic code in a way that constrains the mutation rate of the virus significantly. For example, a virus can be programmed to mutate only slightly over time, or it can be programmed to refrain from mutating when it infects a file on a computer that already contains copies of the virus. The advantage of using such slow polymorphic code is that it makes it more difficult for anti-virus professionals to obtain representative samples of the virus, because bait files that are infected in one run will typically contain identical or similar samples of the virus. This will make it more likely that the detection by the virus scanner will be unreliable, and that some instances of the virus may be able to avoid detection.<br /><br />[edit] Metamorphic code<br /><br />To avoid being detected by emulation, some viruses rewrite themselves completely each time they are to infect new executables. Viruses that use this technique are said to be metamorphic. To enable metamorphism, a metamorphic engine is needed. A metamorphic virus is usually very large and complex. For example, W32/Simile consisted of over 14000 lines of Assembly language code, 90% of it part of the metamorphic engine.<br /><br />[edit] Vulnerability and countermeasures<br /><br />[edit] The vulnerability of operating systems to viruses<br /><br />Another analogy to biological viruses: just as genetic diversity in a population decreases the chance of a single disease wiping out a population, the diversity of software systems on a network similarly limits the destructive potential of viruses.<br /><br />This became a particular concern in the 1990s, when Microsoft gained market dominance in desktop operating systems and office suites. The users of Microsoft software (especially networking software such as Microsoft Outlook and Internet Explorer) are especially vulnerable to the spread of viruses. Microsoft software is targeted by virus writers due to their desktop dominance, and is often criticized for including many errors and holes for virus writers to exploit. Integrated applications, applications with scripting languages with access to the file system (for example Visual Basic Script (VBS), and applications with networking features) are also particularly vulnerable.<br /><br />Although Windows is by far the most popular operating system for virus writers, some viruses also exist on other platforms. Any operating system that allows third-party programs to run can theoretically run viruses. Some operating systems are less secure than others. Unix-based OS's (and NTFS-aware applications on Windows NT based platforms) only allow their users to run executables within their protected space in their own directories.<br /><br />As of 2006, there are relatively few security exploits [4] targeting Mac OS X (with a Unix-based file system); the known vulnerabilities fall under the classifications of worms and Trojans. The number of viruses for the older Apple operating systems, known as Mac OS Classic, varies greatly from source to source, with Apple stating that there are only four known viruses, and independent sources stating there are as many as 63 viruses. It is safe to say that Macs are less likely to be exploited due to their secure Unix base, and because a Mac-specific virus could only infect a small proportion of computers (making the effort less desirable). Virus vulnerability between Macs and Windows is a chief selling point Apple Computers use to get users to switch away from Microsoft (Get a Mac). Ironically if a change in the user base away from PCs and towards Macs was to occur then the Mac OS X platform would become a much more desirable target to virus writers. As there are currently few or no anti virus solutions available (or needed) on the OS X platform, there is the possibility that this would become a considerable problem for Mac users very quickly, Apple literally becoming a victim of their own success [5].<br /><br />Windows and Unix have similar scripting abilities, but while Unix natively blocks normal users from having access to make changes to the operating system environment, Windows does not. In 1997, when a virus for Linux was released – known as "Bliss" – leading antivirus vendors issued warnings that Unix-like systems could fall prey to viruses just like Windows.[6] The Bliss virus may be considered characteristic of viruses – as opposed to worms – on Unix systems. Bliss requires that the user run it explicitly (making it a trojan), and it can only infect programs that the user has the access to modify. Unlike Windows users, most Unix users do not log in as an administrator user except to install or configure software; as a result, even if a user ran the virus, it could not harm their operating system. The Bliss virus never became widespread, and remains chiefly a research curiosity. Its creator later posted the source code to Usenet, allowing researchers to see how it worked.[7]<br /><br />[edit] The role of software development<br /><br />Because software is often designed with security features to prevent unauthorized use of system resources, many viruses must exploit software bugs in a system or application to spread. Software development strategies that produce large numbers of bugs will generally also produce potential exploits.<br /><br />[edit] Anti-virus software and other preventive countermeasures<br /><br />There are two common methods that an anti-virus software application uses to detect viruses. The first, and by far the most common method of virus detection is using a list of virus signature definitions. The disadvantage of this detection method is that users are only protected from viruses that pre-date their last virus definition update. The second method is to use a heuristic algorithm to find viruses based on common behaviors. This method has the ability to detect viruses that anti-virus security firms’ have yet to create a signature for.<br /><br />Many users install anti-virus software that can detect and eliminate known viruses after the computer downloads or runs the executable. They work by examining the content heuristics of the computer's memory (its RAM, and boot sectors) and the files stored on fixed or removable drives (hard drives, floppy drives), and comparing those files against a database of known virus "signatures". Some anti-virus programs are able to scan opened files in addition to sent and received emails 'on the fly' in a similar manner. This practice is known as "on-access scanning." Anti-virus software does not change the underlying capability of host software to transmit viruses. Users must update their software regularly to patch security holes. Anti-virus software also needs to be regularly updated in order to gain knowledge about the latest threats.<br /><br />One may also prevent the damage done by viruses by making regular backups of data (and the Operating Systems) on different media, that are either kept unconnected to the system (most of the time), read-only or not accessible for other reasons, such as using different file systems. This way, if data is lost through a virus, one can start again using the backup (which should preferably be recent). If a backup session on optical media like CD and DVD is closed, it becomes read-only and can no longer be affected by a virus. Likewise, an Operating System on a bootable can be used to start the computer if the installed Operating Systems become unusable. Another method is to use different Operating Systems on different file systems. A virus is not likely to affect both. Data backups can also be put on different file systems. For example, Linux requires specific software to write to NTFS partitions, so if one does not install such software and uses a separate installation of MS Windows to make the backups on an NTFS partition (and preferably only for that reason), the backup should remain safe from any Linux viruses. Likewise, MS Windows can not read file systems like ext3, so if one normally uses MS Windows, the backups can be made on an ext3 partition using a Linux installation.<br /><br />[edit] Recovery Methods<br /><br />Once a computer has been compromised by a virus, it is usually unsafe to continue using the same computer without completely reinstalling the operating system. However, there are a number of recovery options that exist after a computer has a virus. These actions depend on severity of the type of virus.<br /><br />[edit] Data Recovery<br /><br />See main article Data Recovery.<br /><br />[edit] Virus Removal<br /><br />One possibility on Windows XP is a tool known as System Restore, which restores the registry and critical system files to a previous checkpoint. Often a virus will cause a system to hang, and a subsequent hard reboot will render a system restore point from the same day corrupt. Restore points from previous days should work provided the virus is not designed to corrupt the restore files. Some viruses, however, disable system restore and other important tools such as Task Manager and Command Prompt. Examples of viruses that do this would be CiaDoor.<br /><br />Administrators have the option to disable such tools from limited users for various reasons. The virus modifies the registry to do the same, except, when the Administrator is controlling the computer, it blocks all users from accessing the tools. When an infected tool activates it gives the message "Task Manager has been disabled by your administrator.", even if the user trying to open the program is the administrator.<br /><br />[edit] Operating System Reinstallation<br /><br />As a last ditch effort, if a virus is on your system, and it has infected everything you know and some things you don't, and anti-virals can't clean it, then reinstalling the operating system may be required. To do this properly, the hard drive is completely erased (partition deleted and formatted) and the operating system is installed from media known not to be infected. Important files should first be backed up, if possible, and separately scanned for infection before erasing the original hard drive and reinstalling the operating system.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4477504124507946619.post-15110500011778246252007-03-05T04:32:00.000-08:002007-03-05T04:33:52.588-08:00search enginesSEO Trends<br /> Marketing Eclipses Optimization. See how some of the lines have blurred between search engine optimization and search engine marketing.<br />Real Link Popularity<br /> Your links say a lot about you to the search engines. That's why webmasters vie for inbound links. Getting more links, however, does not necessarily translate to increased link popularity. In fact, getting it wrong can harm your rankings. The old methods no longer work. It's time to rethink the link.<br />Industrial Marketing<br /> Know your industry. Many traditional rules of marketing also apply to online marketing. We take on US Manufacturing to explore the impact of sector-specific factors on search advertising campaigns.<br />The Rules of the Game<br /> Not exciting...but still the best thing going in SEO. While some webmasters are on a constant quest for a winning formula, others find success sticking to some of the obvious answers. See how you can achieve higher search rankings by following guidelines provided for you by the search engines.<br />Hiring Professionals<br /> Navigating a complex field: Site owners can take their pick from a tremendous range of optimization and search marketing services.<br />Natural Search Engine Optimization<br /> What does it take to improve your search engine rankings - naturally? Start by looking at the basic elements of your web pages. It's all part of a process called organic or natural search engine optimization (SEO). We'll explain everything from the nuts and bolts of tags and titles to the art of proper keyword placement.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0