Most of today's Budapest is the result of a late-nineteenth-century renovation, but the wide boulevards laid out then only bordered and bisected much older quarters of activity created by centuries of Budapest's city evolution.
Budapest's vast urban area is often described using a set of district names. These are either informal designations, reflect the names of villages that have been absorbed by sprawl, or are superseded administrative units of former boroughs.
Such names have remained in use through tradition, each referring to a local area with its own distinctive character, but without official boundaries.
Originally Budapest had 10 districts after coming into existence upon the unification of the three cities in 1873. Since 1950, Greater Budapest has been divided into 22 boroughs (and 23 since 1994). At that time there were changes both in the order of districts and in their sizes. The city now consists of 23 districts, 6 in Buda, 16 in Pest and 1 on Csepel Island between them.
The city centre itself in a broader sense comprises the District V, VI, VII, VIII, IX and XIII on the Pest side, and the I, II, XI and XII on the Buda side of the city.
District I is a small area in central Buda, including the historic Buda Castle. District II is in Buda again, in the northwest, and District III stretches along in the northernmost part of Buda. To reach District IV, one must cross the Danube to find it in Pest (the eastern side), also at north. With District V, another circle begins, it is located in the absolute centre of Pest. Districts VI, VII, VIII and IX are the neighbouring areas to the east, going southwards, one after the other.
District X is another, more external circle also in Pest, while one must jump to the Buda side again to find Districts XI and XII, going northwards. No more districts remaining in Buda in this circle, we must turn our steps to Pest again to find Districts XIII, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII, XVIII, XIX and XX (mostly external city parts), almost regularly in a semicircle, going southwards again.
District XXI is the extension of the above route over a branch of the Danube, the northern tip of a long island south from Budapest. District XXII is still on the same route in southwest Buda, and finally District XXIII is again in southernmost Pest, irregular only because it was part of District XX until 1994.


Budapest, strategically placed at the centre of the Carpathian Basin, lies on an ancient route linking the hills of Transdanubia with the Great Plain.  By road it is 216 kilometres (134 mi) south-east of Vienna, 545 kilometres (339 mi) south of Warsaw, 1,565 kilometres (972 mi) south-west of Moscow, 1,122 kilometres (697 mi) north of Athens, 788 kilometres (490 mi) north-east of Milan, and 443 kilometres (275 mi) south-east of Prague.
The 525 square kilometres (203 sq mi) area of Budapest lies in Central Hungary, surrounded by settlements of the agglomeration in Pest county. The capital extends 25 and 29 km (16 and 18 mi) in the north–south, east–west direction respectively. The Danube enters the city from the north; later it encircles two islands, Óbuda Island and Margaret Island. The third island Csepel Island is the largest of the Budapest Danube islands, however only its northernmost tip is within city limits. The river that separates the two parts of the city is 230 m (755 ft) wide at its narrowest point in Budapest. Pest lies on the flat terrain of the Great Plain while Buda is rather hilly.
The wide Danube was always fordable at this point because of a small number of islands in the middle of the river. The city has marked topographical contrasts: Buda is built on the higher river terraces and hills of the western side, while the considerably larger Pest spreads out on a flat and featureless sand plain on the river's opposite bank. Pest's terrain rises with a slight eastward gradient, so the easternmost parts of the city lie at the same altitude as Buda's smallest hills, notably Gellért Hill and Castle Hill.
The Buda hills consist mainly of limestone and dolomite, the water created speleothems, the most famous ones being the Pálvölgyi cave (total length 7,200 m or 23,600 ft) and the Szemlőhegyi cave (total length 2,200 m or 7,200 ft). The hills were formed in the Triassic Period. The highest point of the hills and of Budapest is János Hill, at 527 metres (1,729 feet) above sea level. The lowest point is the line of the Danube which is 96 metres (315 feet) above sea level.  Budapest is also rich in green areas. Of the 525 square kilometres (203 square miles) occupied by the city, 83 square kilometres (32 square miles) is green area, park and forest. The forests of Buda hills are environmentally protected.
The city's importance in terms of traffic is very central, because many major European roads and European railway lines lead to Budapest. The Danube was and is still an important water-way and this region in the centre of the Carpathian Basin lies at the cross-roads of trade routes.
Budapest is one of only three capital cities in the world which has thermal springs (the others being Reykjavík in Iceland and Sofia in Bulgaria). Some 125 springs produce 70 million litres (15,000,000 imperial gallons; 18,000,000 US gallons) of thermal water a day, with temperatures ranging up to 58 Celsius. Some of these waters have been claimed to have medicinal effects due to their high mineral contents.


Budapest has a humid subtropical climate (Cfa in Köppen climate classification), thus being the northernmost major city in the world with such a climate, with relatively cold winters (near of a humid continental climate when the 0 °C isotherm is used) and warm summers (near of an oceanic climate) according to the 1971–2000 climatological norm. Winter (November until early March) can be cold and the city receives little sunshine. Snowfall is fairly frequent in most years, and nighttime temperatures of −10 °C (14 °F) are not uncommon between mid-December and mid-February. The spring months (March and April) see variable conditions, with a rapid increase in the average temperature. The weather in late March and in April is often very agreeable during the day and fresh at night. Budapest's long summer – lasting from May until mid-September – is warm or very warm. Sudden heavy showers also occur, particularly in May and June. The autumn in Budapest (mid-September until late October) is characterised by little rain and long sunny days with moderate temperatures. Temperatures often turn abruptly colder in late October or early November.
Mean annual precipitation in Budapest is around 23.5 inches (596.9 mm). On average, there are 84 days with precipitation and 1988 hours of sunshine (of a possible 4383) each year. From March to October, average sunshine totals are roughly equal to those seen in northern Italy (Venice).
The city lies on the boundary between Zone 6 and Zone 7 in terms of the hardiness zone.


Budapest (UK: /ˌb(j)uːdəˈpɛst, ˌbʊd-, ˈb(j)uːdəpɛst, ˈbʊd-/, US: /ˈbuːdəpɛst, -pɛʃt, ˌbuːdəˈpɛʃt/; [ˈbudɒpɛʃt] (listen)) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on Danube river; the city has an estimated population of 1,752,286 over a land area of about 525 square kilometres (203 square miles). Budapest, which is both a city and county, forms the centre of the Budapest metropolitan area, which has an area of 7,626 square kilometres (2,944 square miles) and a population of 3,303,786, comprising 33% of the population of Hungary.
The history of Budapest began when an early Celtic settlement transformed into the Roman town of Aquincum, the capital of Lower Pannonia. The Hungarians arrived in the territory in the late 9th century, but the area was pillaged by the Mongols in 1241–42. Re-established Buda became one of the centres of Renaissance humanist culture by the 15th century. The Battle of Mohács, in 1526, was followed by nearly 150 years of Ottoman rule. After the reconquest of Buda in 1686, the region entered a new age of prosperity, with Pest-Buda becoming a global city after the unification of Buda, Óbuda and Pest on 17 November 1873, with the name 'Budapest' given to the new capital. Budapest also became the co-capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a great power that dissolved in 1918, following World War I. The city was the focal point of the Hungarian Revolution of 1848, the Battle of Budapest in 1945, as well as the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.
Budapest is a Beta + global city with strengths in commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education and entertainment. Hungary's financial centre, it is the second richest capital and city in the region after Bucharest. Budapest is the headquarters of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology, the European Police College and the first foreign office of the China Investment Promotion Agency. Over 40 colleges and universities are located in Budapest, including the Eötvös Loránd University, the Corvinus University, Semmelweis University, University of Veterinary Medicine Budapest and the Budapest University of Technology and Economics. Opened in 1896, the city's subway system, the Budapest Metro, serves 1.27 million, while the Budapest Tram Network serves 1.08 million passengers daily.
The central area of Budapest along the Danube River is classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and has several notable monuments of classical architecture, including the Hungarian Parliament and the Buda Castle. The city also has around 80 geothermal springs, the largest thermal water cave system, second largest synagogue, and third largest Parliament building in the world. Budapest attracts around 12 million international tourists per year, making it a highly popular destination in Europe. It also topped the Best European Destinations 2020 list by Big7Media. Budapest also ranks as the third-best European city in a similar poll conducted by Which?.


Budapest has architecturally noteworthy buildings in a wide range of styles and from distinct time periods, from the ancient times as Roman City of Aquincum in Óbuda (District III), which dates to around 89 AD, to the most modern Palace of Arts, the contemporary arts museum and concert hall.
Most buildings in Budapest are relatively low: in the early 2010s there were around 100 buildings higher than 45 metres (148 ft). The number of high-rise buildings is kept low by building legislation, which is aimed at preserving the historic cityscape and to meet the requirements of the World Heritage Site. Strong rules apply to the planning, authorisation and construction of high-rise buildings and consequently much of the inner city does not have any. Some planners would like see an easing of the rules for the construction of skyscrapers, and the possibility of building skyscrapers outside the city's historic core has been raised.
In the chronological order of architectural styles Budapest is represented on the entire timeline, starting with the Roman City of Aquincum representing ancient architecture.
The next determinative style is the Gothic architecture in Budapest. The few remaining Gothic buildings can be found in the Castle District. Buildings of note are no. 18, 20 and 22 on Országház Street, which date back to the 14th century and No. 31 Úri Street, which has a Gothic façade that dates back to the 15th century. Other buildings with Gothic features are the Inner City Parish Church, built in the 12th century, and the Mary Magdalene Church, completed in the 15th century. The most characteristic Gothic-style buildings are actually Neo-Gothic, like the most well-known Budapest landmarks, the Hungarian Parliament Building and the Matthias Church, where much of the original material was used (originally built in Romanesque style in 1015).
The next chapter in the history of human architecture is Renaissance architecture. One of the earliest places to be influenced by the Renaissance style of architecture was Hungary, and Budapest in particular. The style appeared following the marriage of King Matthias Corvinus and Beatrice of Naples in 1476. Many Italian artists, craftsmen and masons came to Buda with the new queen. Today, many of the original renaissance buildings disappeared during the varied history of Buda, but Budapest is still rich in renaissance and neo-renaissance buildings, like the famous Hungarian State Opera House, St. Stephen's Basilica and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.
During the Turkish occupation (1541–1686), Islamic culture flourished in Budapest; multiple mosques and baths were built in the city. These were great examples of Ottoman architecture, which was influenced by Muslims from around the world including Turkish, Iranian, Arabian and to a larger extent, Byzantine architecture as well as Islamic traditions. After the Holy League conquered Budapest, they replaced most of the mosques with churches and minarets were turned into bell towers and cathedral spires. At one point the distinct sloping central square in Budapest became a bustling Oriental bazaar, which was filled with "the chatter of camel caravans on their way to Yemen and India". Budapest is in fact one of the few places in the world with functioning original Turkish bathhouses dating back to the 16th century, like Rudas Baths or Király Baths. Budapest is home to the northernmost place where the tomb of influential Islamic Turkish Sufi Dervish, Gül Baba is found. Various cultures converged in Hungary seemed to coalesce well with each other, as if all these different cultures and architecture styles are digested into Hungary's own way of cultural blend. A precedent to show the city's self-conscious is the top section of the city's main square, named as Szechenyi. When Turks came to the city, they built mosques here which was aggressively replaced with Gothic church of St. Bertalan. The rationale of reusing the base of the former Islamic building mosque and reconstruction into Gothic Church but Islamic style architecture over it is typically Islamic are still visible. An official term for the rationale is spolia. The mosque was called the djami of Pasha Gazi Kassim, and djami means mosque in Arabic. After Turks and Muslims were expelled and massacred from Budapest, the site was reoccupied by Christians and reformed into a church, the Inner City Parish Church (Budapest). The minaret and Turkish entranceway were removed. The shape of the architecture is its only hint of exotic past—"two surviving prayer niches facing Mecca and an ecumenical symbol atop its cupola: a cross rising above the Turkish crescent moon".
After 1686, the Baroque architecture designated the dominant style of art in catholic countries from the 17th century to the 18th century. There are many Baroque-style buildings in Budapest and one of the finest examples of preserved Baroque-style architecture is the Church of St. Anna in Batthyhány square. An interesting part of Budapest is the less touristy Óbuda, the main square of which also has some beautiful preserved historic buildings with Baroque façades. The Castle District is another place to visit where the best-known landmark Buda Royal Palace and many other buildings were built in the Baroque style.
The Classical architecture and Neoclassical architecture are the next in the timeline. Budapest had not one but two architects that were masters of the Classicist style. Mihály Pollack (1773–1855) and József Hild (1789–1867), built many beautiful Classicist-style buildings in the city. Some of the best examples are the Hungarian National Museum, the Lutheran Church of Budavár (both designed by Pollack) and the seat of the Hungarian president, the Sándor Palace. The most iconic and widely known Classicist-style attraction in Budapest is the Széchenyi Chain Bridge. Budapest's two most beautiful Romantic architecture buildings are the Great Synagogue in Dohány Street and the Vigadó Concert Hall on the Danube Promenade, both designed by architect Frigyes Feszl (1821–1884). Another noteworthy structure is the Budapest Western Railway Station, which was designed by August de Serres and built by the Eiffel Company of Paris in 1877.
Art Nouveau came into fashion in Budapest by the exhibitions which were held in and around 1896 and organised in connection with the Hungarian Millennium celebrations. Art Nouveau in Hungary (Szecesszió in Hungarian) is a blend of several architectural styles, with a focus on Hungary's specialities. One of the leading Art Nouveau architects, Ödön Lechner (1845–1914), was inspired by Indian and Syrian architecture as well as traditional Hungarian decorative designs. One of his most beautiful buildings in Budapest is the Museum of Applied Arts. Another examples for Art Nouveau in Budapest is the Gresham Palace in front of the Chain Bridge, the Hotel Gellért, the Franz Liszt Academy of Music or Budapest Zoo and Botanical Garden.
The second half of the 20th century also saw, under the communist regime, the construction of blocks of flats (panelház), as in other Eastern European countries. In the 21st century, Budapest faces new challenges in its architecture. The pressure towards the high-rise buildings is unequivocal among today's world cities, but preserving Budapest's unique cityscape and its very diverse architecture, along with green areas, is force Budapest to balance between them. The Contemporary architecture has wide margin in the city. Public spaces attract heavy investment by business and government also, so that the city has gained entirely new (or renovated and redesigned) squares, parks and monuments, for example the city central Kossuth Lajos square, Deák Ferenc square and Liberty Square. Numerous landmarks are created in the last decade in Budapest, like the National Theatre, Palace of Arts, Rákóczi Bridge, Megyeri Bridge, Budapest Airport Sky Court among others, and millions of square meters of new office buildings and apartments. But there are still large opportunities in real estate development in the city.


Year 302 (CCCII) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Constantius and Valerius or, less frequently, year 1055 Ab urbe condita. The denomination 302 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.


1650 (MDCL) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar, the 1650th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 650th  year of the 2nd millennium, the 50th  year of the 17th century, and the  1st   year of the 1650s decade. As of the start of 1650, the Gregorian calendar was 10 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.


Year 961 (CMLXI) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.


UNESCO implements its activities through the five programme areas: education, natural sciences, social and human sciences, culture, and communication and information.
UNESCO supports research in comparative education, provides expertise and fosters partnerships to strengthen national educational leadership and the capacity of countries to offer quality education for all. This includes the
UNESCO Chairs, an international network of 644 UNESCO Chairs, involving over 770 institutions in 126 countries
Environmental Conservation Organisation
Convention against Discrimination in Education adopted in 1960
Organization of the International Conference on Adult Education (CONFINTEA) in an interval of 12 years
Publication of the Education for All Global Monitoring Report
Publication of the Four Pillars of Learning seminal document
UNESCO ASPNet, an international network of 8,000 schools in 170 countries
UNESCO does not accredit institutions of higher learning.
UNESCO also issues public statements to educate the public:
Seville Statement on Violence: A statement adopted by UNESCO in 1989 to refute the notion that humans are biologically predisposed to organised violence.
Designating projects and places of cultural and scientific significance, such as:
Global Geoparks Network
Biosphere reserves, through the Programme on Man and the Biosphere (MAB), since 1971
City of Literature; in 2007, the first city to be given this title was Edinburgh, the site of Scotland's first circulating library. In 2008, Iowa City, Iowa, became the City of Literature.
Endangered languages and linguistic diversity projects (UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger)
Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity
Memory of the World International Register, since 1997
Water resources management, through the International Hydrological Programme (IHP), since 1965
World Heritage Sites
World Digital Library
Encouraging the "free flow of ideas by images and words" by:
Promoting freedom of expression, including freedom of the press and freedom of information legislation, through the Division of Freedom of Expression and Media Development, including the International Programme for the Development of Communication
Promoting the safety of journalists and combatting impunity for those who attack them, through coordination of the UN Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists and the Issue of Impunity
Promoting universal access to and preservation of information and open solutions for sustainable development through the Knowledge Societies Division, including the Memory of the World Programme and Information for All Programme
Promoting pluralism, gender equality and cultural diversity in the media
Promoting Internet Universality and its principles, that the Internet should be (I) human Rights-based, (ii) Open, (iii) Accessible to all, and (iv) nurtured by Multi-stakeholder participation (summarized as the acronym R.O.A.M.)
Generating knowledge through publications such as World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development, the UNESCO Series on Internet Freedom, and the Media Development Indicators, as well as other indicator-based studies.
Promoting events, such as:
International Decade for the Promotion of a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World: 2001–2010, proclaimed by the UN in 1998
World Press Freedom Day, 3 May each year, to promote freedom of expression and freedom of the press as a basic human right and as crucial components of any healthy, democratic and free society.
Criança Esperança in Brazil, in partnership with Rede Globo, to raise funds for community-based projects that foster social integration and violence prevention.
International Literacy Day, 8 September each year
International Year for the Culture of Peace, 2000
Health Education for Behavior Change programme in partnership with the Ministry of Education of Kenya which was financially supported by the Government of Azerbaijan to promote health education among 10-19-year-old young people who live in informal camp in Kibera, Nairobi. The project was carried out between September 2014 – December 2016.
World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development 21 May each year
Founding and funding projects, such as:
Migration Museums Initiative: Promoting the establishment of museums for cultural dialogue with migrant populations.
UNESCO-CEPES, the European Centre for Higher Education: established in 1972 in Bucharest, Romania, as a de-centralized office to promote international co-operation in higher education in Europe as well as Canada, USA and Israel. Higher Education in Europe is its official journal.
Free Software Directory: since 1998 UNESCO and the Free Software Foundation have jointly funded this project cataloguing free software.
FRESH, Focusing Resources on Effective School Health
OANA, Organization of Asia-Pacific News Agencies
International Council of Science
UNESCO Goodwill Ambassadors
ASOMPS, Asian Symposium on Medicinal Plants and Spices, a series of scientific conferences held in Asia
Botany 2000, a programme supporting taxonomy, and biological and cultural diversity of medicinal and ornamental plants, and their protection against environmental pollution
The UNESCO Collection of Representative Works, translating works of world literature both to and from multiple languages, from 1948 to 2005
GoUNESCO, an umbrella of initiatives to make heritage fun supported by UNESCO, New Delhi Office
The UNESCO transparency portal has been designed to enable public access to information regarding the Organization's activities, such as its aggregate budget for a biennium, as well as links to relevant programmatic and financial documents. These two distinct sets of information are published on the IATI registry, respectively based on the IATI Activity Standard and the IATI Organization Standard.
There have been proposals to establish two new UNESCO lists. The first proposed list will focus on movable cultural heritage such as artifacts, paintings, and biofacts. The list may include cultural objects, such as the Jōmon Venus of Japan, the Mona Lisa of France, the Gebel el-Arak Knife of Egypt, The Ninth Wave of Russia, the Seated Woman of Çatalhöyük of Turkey, the David (Michelangelo) of Italy, the Mathura Herakles of India, the Manunggul Jar of the Philippines, the Crown of Baekje of South Korea, The Hay Wain of the United Kingdom and the Benin Bronzes of Nigeria. The second proposed list will focus on the world's living species, such as the komodo dragon of Indonesia, the panda of China, the bald eagle of North American countries, the aye-aye of Madagascar, the Asiatic lion of India, the kakapo of New Zealand, and the mountain tapir of Colombia, Ecuador and Peru.


UNESCO admitted Palestine as a member in 2011.
Laws passed in the United States after Palestine applied for UNESCO and WHO membership in April 1989 mean that the US cannot contribute financially to any UN organisation that accepts Palestine as a full member. As a result, the US withdrew its funding, which had accounted for about 22% of UNESCO's budget. Israel also reacted to Palestine's admittance to UNESCO by freezing Israeli payments to UNESCO and imposing sanctions on the Palestinian Authority, stating that Palestine's admittance would be detrimental "to potential peace talks". Two years after they stopped paying their dues to UNESCO, the US and Israel lost UNESCO voting rights in 2013 without losing the right to be elected; thus, the US was elected as a member of the Executive Board for the period 2016–19. In 2019, Israel left UNESCO after 69 years of membership, with Israel's ambassador to the UN Danny Danon writing: "UNESCO is the body that continually rewrites history, including by erasing the Jewish connection to Jerusalem... it is corrupted and manipulated by Israel's enemies... we are not going to be a member of an organisation that deliberately acts against us".


Among the major achievements of the organization is its work against racism, for example through influential statements on race starting with a declaration of anthropologists (among them was Claude Lévi-Strauss) and other scientists in 1950 and concluding with the 1978 Declaration on Race and Racial Prejudice.
In 1956, member Blake R. Van Leer was president at Georgia Tech and fought to allow the first African American to play in the 1956 Sugar Bowl. Later in In 1956, the Republic of South Africa withdrew from UNESCO saying that some of the organization's publications amounted to "interference" in the country's "racial problems". South Africa rejoined the organization in 1994 under the leadership of Nelson Mandela.
UNESCO's early work in the field of education included the pilot project on fundamental education in the Marbial Valley, Haiti, started in 1947.
This project was followed by expert missions to other countries, including, for example, a mission to Afghanistan in 1949.
In 1948, UNESCO recommended that Member States should make free primary education compulsory and universal. In 1990, the World Conference on Education for All, in Jomtien, Thailand, launched a global movement to provide basic education for all children, youths and adults. Ten years later, the 2000 World Education Forum held in Dakar, Senegal, led member governments to commit to achieving basic education for all by 2015.
UNESCO's early activities in culture included the Nubia Campaign, launched in 1960. The purpose of the campaign was to move the Great Temple of Abu Simbel to keep it from being swamped by the Nile after the construction of the Aswan Dam. During the 20-year campaign, 22 monuments and architectural complexes were relocated. This was the first and largest in a series of campaigns including Mohenjo-daro (Pakistan), Fes (Morocco), Kathmandu (Nepal), Borobudur (Indonesia) and the Acropolis of Athens (Greece). The organization's work on heritage led to the adoption, in 1972, of the Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage. The World Heritage Committee was established in 1976 and the first sites inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1978. Since then important legal instruments on cultural heritage and diversity have been adopted by UNESCO member states in 2003 (Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage) and 2005 (Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions).
An intergovernmental meeting of UNESCO in Paris in December 1951 led to the creation of the European Council for Nuclear Research, which was responsible for establishing the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) later on, in 1954.
Arid Zone programming, 1948–1966, is another example of an early major UNESCO project in the field of natural sciences.
In 1968, UNESCO organized the first intergovernmental conference aimed at reconciling the environment and development, a problem that continues to be addressed in the field of sustainable development. The main outcome of the 1968 conference was the creation of UNESCO's Man and the Biosphere Programme.
UNESCO has been credited with the diffusion of national science bureaucracies.
In the field of communication, the "free flow of ideas by word and image" has been in UNESCO's constitution from its beginnings, following the experience of the Second World War when control of information was a factor in indoctrinating populations for aggression. In the years immediately following World War II, efforts were concentrated on reconstruction and on the identification of needs for means of mass communication around the world. UNESCO started organizing training and education for journalists in the 1950s. In response to calls for a "New World Information and Communication Order" in the late 1970s, UNESCO established the International Commission for the Study of Communication Problems, which produced the 1980 MacBride report (named after the chair of the commission, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Seán MacBride). The same year, UNESCO created the International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC), a multilateral forum designed to promote media development in developing countries. In 1991, UNESCO's General Conference endorsed the Windhoek Declaration on media independence and pluralism, which led the UN General Assembly to declare the date of its adoption, 3 May, as World Press Freedom Day. Since 1997, UNESCO has awarded the UNESCO / Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize every 3 May. In the lead up to the World Summit on the Information Society in 2003 (Geneva) and 2005 (Tunis), UNESCO introduced the Information for All Programme.


UNESCO and its mandate for international cooperation can be traced back to a League of Nations resolution on 21 September 1921, to elect a Commission to study the feasibility of having nations freely share cultural, educational and scientific achievements. This new body, the International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation (ICIC), was created in 1922 and counted such figures as Henri Bergson, Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, Robert A. Millikan, and Gonzague de Reynold among its members (being thus a small commission of the League of Nations essentially centred on Western Europe). The International Institute for Intellectual Cooperation (IIIC) was then created in Paris in September 1924, to act as the executing agency for the ICIC. However, the onset of World War II largely interrupted the work of these predecessor organizations. As for private initiatives, the International Bureau of Education (IBE) began to work as a non-governmental organization in the service of international educational development since December 1925  and joined UNESCO in 2021, after having established a joint commission in 1952.


After the signing of the Atlantic Charter and the Declaration of the United Nations, the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education (CAME) began meetings in London which continued from 16 November 1942 to 5 December 1945. On 30 October 1943, the necessity for an international organization was expressed in the Moscow Declaration, agreed upon by China, the United Kingdom, the United States and the USSR. This was followed by the Dumbarton Oaks Conference proposals of 9 October 1944. Upon the proposal of CAME and in accordance with the recommendations of the United Nations Conference on International Organization (UNCIO), held in San Francisco in April–June 1945, a United Nations Conference for the establishment of an educational and cultural organization (ECO/CONF) was convened in London 1–16 November 1945 with 44 governments represented. The idea of UNESCO was largely developed by Rab Butler, the Minister of Education for the United Kingdom, who had a great deal of influence in its development. At the ECO/CONF, the Constitution of UNESCO was introduced and signed by 37 countries, and a Preparatory Commission was established. The Preparatory Commission operated between 16 November 1945, and 4 November 1946—the date when UNESCO's Constitution came into force with the deposit of the twentieth ratification by a member state.
The first General Conference took place from 19 November to 10 December 1946, and elected Dr. Julian Huxley to Director-General. U.S. Colonel, University president and civil rights advocate Dr. Blake R. Van Leer joined as a member as well. The Constitution was amended in November 1954 when the General Conference resolved that members of the Executive Board would be representatives of the governments of the States of which they are nationals and would not, as before, act in their personal capacity. This change in governance distinguished UNESCO from its predecessor, the ICIC, in how member states would work together in the organization's fields of competence. As member states worked together over time to realize UNESCO's mandate, political and historical factors have shaped the organization's operations in particular during the Cold War, the decolonization process, and the dissolution of the USSR.


UNESCO and its specialized institutions issue a number of magazines.
The UNESCO Courier magazine states its mission to "promote UNESCO's ideals, maintain a platform for the dialogue between cultures and provide a forum for international debate". Since March 2006 it has been available online, with limited printed issues. Its articles express the opinions of the authors which are not necessarily the opinions of UNESCO. There was a hiatus in publishing between 2012 and 2017.
In 1950, UNESCO initiated the quarterly review Impact of Science on Society (also known as Impact) to discuss the influence of science on society. The journal ceased publication in 1992. UNESCO also published Museum International Quarterly from the year 1948.


UNESCO has official relations with 322 international non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Most of these are what UNESCO calls "operational"; a select few are "formal".The highest form of affiliation to UNESCO is "formal associate", and the 22 NGOs with formal associate (ASC) relations occupying offices at UNESCO are:


In the 1800s, rammed earth was popularized in the United States by the book Rural Economy by S. W. Johnson. The technique was used to construct the Borough House Plantation and the Church of the Holy Cross in Stateburg, South Carolina, both being National Historic Landmarks.
Constructed in 1821, the Borough House Plantation complex contains the oldest and largest collection of 'high style' pise de terre (rammed earth) buildings in the United States. Six of the 27 dependencies and portions of the main house were constructed using this ancient technique which was introduced to this country in 1806 through the book Rural Economy, by S. W. Johnson
An outstanding example of a rammed-earth edifice in Canada is St. Thomas Anglican Church in Shanty Bay, Ontario, erected between 1838 and 1841.
From the 1920s through the 1940s rammed-earth construction in the US was studied. South Dakota State College extensively researched and constructed almost one hundred weathering walls of rammed earth. For over 30 years the college investigated the use of paints and plasters in relation to colloids in soil. In 1945, Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina published the results of their research of rammed earth in a pamphlet titled "Rammed Earth Building Construction". In 1936, on a homestead near Gardendale, Alabama, the United States Department of Agriculture constructed an experimental rammed-earth edifices with architect Thomas Hibben. The houses were inexpensively constructed and were sold to the public along with sufficient land for gardens and small plots for livestock. The project was successful providing homes to low-income families.
The US Agency for International Development is working with developing countries to improve the engineering of rammed-earth houses. It also financed the authorship of the Handbook of Rammed Earth by Texas A&M University and the Texas Transportation Institute.
Interest in rammed earth declined after World War II when the cost of modern construction materials decreased. Rammed earth is considered substandard, and is opposed by many contractors, engineers, and tradesmen. The prevailing perception that such materials and techniques perform poorly in regions prone to earthquakes has prevented their use in much of the world. In Chile, for example, rammed earth edifices normally cannot be conventionally insured against damage or even be approved by the government.
A notable example of 21st-century use of rammed earth is the façade of the Nk'Mip Desert Cultural Centre in southern British Columbia, Canada. As of 2014 it is the longest rammed earth wall in North America.


Building a strong rammed earth wall requires good knowledge and understanding of soil types. A number of factors influence the strength and durability of rammed earth structures, which need rigorous quality checks.
Rammed earth walls require additional insulators in colder climates (if following modern building codes and practices).
Although rain won't wash away a rammed earth wall, they need overhang roof protection to keep walls safe against erosion. This is important in areas with high rainfall.
Building rammed earth is a labour-intensive process. It may be expensive in certain situations.
Rammed earth buildings might take more to get approved by building authorities, bankers and insurers.
Once a wall is built, it cannot easily be corrected like brick work.


Rammed earth is a technique for constructing foundations, floors, and walls using compacted natural raw materials such as earth, chalk, lime, or gravel. It is an ancient method that has been revived recently as a sustainable building method.
Edifices formed of rammed earth are on every continent except Antarctica, in a range of environments including temperate, wet, semiarid desert, montane, and tropical regions. The availability of suitable soil and a building design appropriate for local climatic conditions are the factors that favour its use.


Edifices of rammed earth are more sustainable and environmentally friendly than other building techniques that use more cement and other chemicals. Because rammed-earth edifices use locally available materials, they usually have low embodied energy and generate very little waste. The soils used are typically subsoil which conserve the topsoil for agriculture. When the soil excavated in preparation for a foundation can be used, the cost and energy consumption of transportation are minimal. Rammed earth is probably the least environmentally detrimental construction material and technique that is readily and commercially available today to construct solid edifices. Rammed earth has potentially low manufacturing impact, contingent on the amount of cement and the amount that is locally sourced; it is often quarried aggregates rather than "earth".
Formwork is removable and can be reused, reducing the need for lumber.
Rammed earth can contribute to the overall energy efficiency of edifices: the density, thickness, and thermal conductivity of rammed earth render it an especially suitable material for passive solar heating. Warmth requires almost 12 hours to be conducted through a wall 35 cm (14 in) thick.
Mixing cement with the soil can counteract sustainable benefits such as low embodied energy because manufacture of the cement itself creates 1.25 tonnes of carbon dioxide per tonne of cement produced. Although it has low greenhouse gas emissions in theory, transportation and the production of cement can add significantly to the overall emissions of modern rammed earth construction. The most basic kind of traditional rammed earth has very low greenhouse gas emissions but the more engineered and processed variant of rammed earth has the potential for significant emissions.


Henry VII died on 21 April 1509, and the 17-year-old Henry succeeded him as king. Soon after his father's burial on 10 May, Henry suddenly declared that he would indeed marry Catherine, leaving unresolved several issues concerning the papal dispensation and a missing part of the marriage portion. The new king maintained that it had been his father's dying wish that he marry Catherine. Whether or not this was true, it was certainly convenient. Emperor Maximilian I had been attempting to marry his granddaughter Eleanor, Catherine's niece, to Henry; she had now been jilted. Henry's wedding to Catherine was kept low-key and was held at the friar's church in Greenwich on 11 June 1509.
On 23 June 1509, Henry led the now 23-year-old Catherine from the Tower of London to Westminster Abbey for their coronation, which took place the following day. It was a grand affair: the king's passage was lined with tapestries and laid with fine cloth. Following the ceremony, there was a grand banquet in Westminster Hall. As Catherine wrote to her father, "our time is spent in continuous festival".
Two days after his coronation, Henry arrested his father's two most unpopular ministers, Sir Richard Empson and Edmund Dudley. They were charged with high treason and were executed in 1510. Politically motivated executions would remain one of Henry's primary tactics for dealing with those who stood in his way. Henry also returned some of the money supposedly extorted by the two ministers. By contrast, Henry's view of the House of York – potential rival claimants for the throne – was more moderate than his father's had been. Several who had been imprisoned by his father, including Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dorset, were pardoned. Others went unreconciled; Edmund de la Pole was eventually beheaded in 1513, an execution prompted by his brother Richard siding against the king.
Soon after marrying Henry, Catherine conceived. She gave birth to a stillborn girl on 31 January 1510. About four months later, Catherine again became pregnant. On 1 January 1511, New Year's Day, a son Henry was born. After the grief of losing their first child, the couple were pleased to have a boy and festivities were held, including a two-day joust known as the Westminster Tournament. However, the child died seven weeks later. Catherine had two stillborn sons in 1513 and 1515, but gave birth in February 1516 to a girl, Mary. Relations between Henry and Catherine had been strained, but they eased slightly after Mary's birth.
Although Henry's marriage to Catherine has since been described as "unusually good", it is known that Henry took mistresses. It was revealed in 1510 that Henry had been conducting an affair with one of the sisters of Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham, either Elizabeth or Anne Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon. The most significant mistress for about three years, starting in 1516, was Elizabeth Blount. Blount is one of only two completely undisputed mistresses, considered by some to be few for a virile young king. Exactly how many Henry had is disputed: David Loades believes Henry had mistresses "only to a very limited extent", whilst Alison Weir believes there were numerous other affairs. Catherine is not known to have protested. In 1518 she fell pregnant again with another girl, who was also stillborn.
Blount gave birth in June 1519 to Henry's illegitimate son, Henry FitzRoy. The young boy was made Duke of Richmond in June 1525 in what some thought was one step on the path to his eventual legitimisation. In 1533, FitzRoy married Mary Howard, but died childless three years later. At the time of his death in June 1536, Parliament was considering the Second Succession Act, which could have allowed him to become king.


On 8 January 1536, news reached the king and queen that Catherine of Aragon had died. The following day, Henry dressed all in yellow, with a white feather in his bonnet. Queen Anne was pregnant again, and she was aware of the consequences if she failed to give birth to a son. Later that month, the king was unhorsed in a tournament and was badly injured; it seemed for a time that his life was in danger. When news of this accident reached the queen, she was sent into shock and miscarried a male child at about 15 weeks' gestation, on the day of Catherine's funeral, 29 January 1536. For most observers, this personal loss was the beginning of the end of this royal marriage.
Although the Boleyn family still held important positions on the Privy Council, Anne had many enemies, including the Duke of Suffolk. Even her own uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, had come to resent her attitude to her power. The Boleyns preferred France over the Emperor as a potential ally, but the king's favour had swung towards the latter (partly because of Cromwell), damaging the family's influence. Also opposed to Anne were supporters of reconciliation with Princess Mary (among them the former supporters of Catherine), who had reached maturity. A second annulment was now a real possibility, although it is commonly believed that it was Cromwell's anti-Boleyn influence that led opponents to look for a way of having her executed.
Anne's downfall came shortly after she had recovered from her final miscarriage. Whether it was primarily the result of allegations of conspiracy, adultery, or witchcraft remains a matter of debate among historians. Early signs of a fall from grace included the king's new mistress, the 28-year-old Jane Seymour, being moved into new quarters, and Anne's brother, George Boleyn, being refused the Order of the Garter, which was instead given to Nicholas Carew. Between 30 April and 2 May, five men, including George Boleyn, were arrested on charges of treasonable adultery and accused of having sexual relationships with the queen. Anne was also arrested, accused of treasonous adultery and incest. Although the evidence against them was unconvincing, the accused were found guilty and condemned to death. The accused men were executed on 17 May 1536. Henry and Anne's marriage was annulled by Archbishop Cranmer at Lambeth on the same day. Cranmer appears to have had difficulty finding grounds for an annulment and probably based it on the prior liaison between Henry and Anne's sister Mary, which in canon law meant that Henry's marriage to Anne was, like his first marriage, within a forbidden degree of affinity and therefore void. At 8 am on 19 May 1536, Anne was executed on Tower Green.


Saint Petersburg (Russian: Санкт-Петербург, tr. Sankt-Peterburg, IPA: [ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk] (listen)), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), is the second-largest city in Russia. It is situated on the Neva River, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea, with a population of roughly 5.4 million residents. Saint Petersburg is the fourth-most populous city in Europe after Istanbul, Moscow and London, the most populous city on the Baltic Sea, as well as the world's northernmost city of more than 1 million residents. As Russia's Imperial capital, and a historically strategic port, it is governed as a federal city.
The city was founded by Tsar Peter the Great on 27 May 1703 on the site of a captured Swedish fortress, and was named after apostle Saint Peter. In Russia, Saint Petersburg is historically and culturally associated with the birth of the Russian Empire and Russia's entry into modern history as a European great power. It served as a capital of the Tsardom of Russia, and the subsequent Russian Empire, from 1713 to 1918 (being replaced by Moscow for a short period of time between 1728 and 1730). After the October Revolution in 1917, the Bolsheviks moved their government to Moscow.
As Russia's cultural center, Saint Petersburg received over 15 million tourists in 2018. It is considered an important economic, scientific, and tourism centre of Russia and Europe. In modern times, the city has the nickname of being "the Northern Capital of Russia" and is home to notable federal government bodies such as the Constitutional Court of Russia and the Heraldic Council of the President of the Russian Federation. It is also a seat for the National Library of Russia and a planned location for the Supreme Court of Russia, as well as the home to the headquarters of the Russian Navy, and the Western Military District of the Russian Armed Forces. The Historic Centre of Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments constitute a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Saint Petersburg is home to the Hermitage, one of the largest art museums in the world, the Lakhta Center, the tallest skyscraper in Europe, and was one of the host cities of the 2018 FIFA World Cup and the UEFA Euro 2020.


On 12 June 1991, simultaneously with the first Russian presidential elections, the city authorities arranged for the mayoral elections and a referendum upon the city's name, when the name reverted to Saint Petersburg. The turnout was 65%; 66.13% of the total count of votes went to Anatoly Sobchak, who became the first directly elected mayor of the city.
Meanwhile, economic conditions started to deteriorate as the country tried to adapt to major changes. For the first time since the 1940s, food rationing was introduced, and the city received humanitarian food aid from abroad. This dramatic time was depicted in photographic series of Russian photographer Alexey Titarenko. Economic conditions began to improve only at the beginning of the 21st century. In 1995 a northern section of the Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya Line of the Saint Petersburg Metro was cut off by underground flooding, creating a major obstacle to the city development for almost ten years. On 13 June 1996 Saint Petersburg, alongside Leningrad Oblast and Tver Oblast, signed a power-sharing agreement with the federal government, granting it autonomy. This agreement was abolished on 4 April 2002.
In 1996, Vladimir Yakovlev defeated Anatoly Sobchak in the elections for the head of the city administration. The title of the city head was changed from "mayor" to "governor". In 2000 Yakovlev won re-election. His second term expired in 2004; the long-awaited restoration of the broken subway connection was expected to finish by that time. But in 2003 Yakovlev suddenly resigned, leaving the governor's office to Valentina Matviyenko.
The law on election of the City Governor was changed, breaking the tradition of democratic election by universal suffrage. In 2006 the city legislature re-approved Matviyenko as governor. Residential building had intensified again; real-estate prices inflated greatly, which caused many new problems for the preservation of the historical part of the city.
Although the central part of the city has a UNESCO designation (there are about 8,000 architectural monuments in Petersburg), the preservation of its historical and architectural environment became controversial. After 2005, the demolition of older buildings in the historical centre was permitted. In 2006 Gazprom announced an ambitious project to erect a 403 m (1,322 ft) skyscraper (the Okhta Center) opposite to Smolny, which could result in the loss of the unique line of Petersburg landscape. Urgent protests by citizens and prominent public figures of Russia against this project were not considered by Governor Valentina Matviyenko and the city authorities until December 2010, when after the statement of President Dmitry Medvedev, the city decided to find a more appropriate location for this project. In the same year, the new location for the project was relocated to Lakhta, a historical area northwest of the city centre, and the new project would be named Lakhta Center. Construction was approved by Gazprom and the city administration and commenced in 2012. The 462 m (1,516 ft) high Lakhta Center has become the first tallest skyscraper in Russia and Europe outside of Moscow.


In October 1946 some territories along the northern coast of the Gulf of Finland, which had passed to the USSR from Finland in 1940 under the peace treaty following the Winter War, were transferred from Leningrad Oblast to Leningrad and divided into Sestroretsky District and Kurortny District. These included the town of Terijoki (renamed Zelenogorsk in 1948). Leningrad and many of its suburbs were rebuilt over the post-war decades, partially according to pre-war plans. The 1948 general plan for Leningrad featured radial urban development in the north as well as in the south. In 1953 Pavlovsky District in Leningrad Oblast was abolished, and parts of its territory, including Pavlovsk, merged with Leningrad. In 1954 the settlements Levashovo, Pargolovo and Pesochny merged with Leningrad.
Leningrad gave its name to the Leningrad Affair (1949–1952), a notable event in the postwar political struggle in the USSR. It was a product of rivalry between Stalin's potential successors where one side was represented by the leaders of the city Communist Party organization—the second most significant one in the country after Moscow. The entire elite leadership of Leningrad was destroyed, including the former mayor Kuznetsov, the acting mayor Pyotr Sergeevich Popkov, and all their deputies; overall 23 leaders were sentenced to the death penalty, 181 to prison or exile (exonerated in 1954). About 2,000 ranking officials across the USSR were expelled from the party and the Komsomol and removed from leadership positions. They were accused of Russian nationalism.
The Leningrad Metro underground rapid transit system, designed before the war, opened in 1955 with its first eight stations decorated with marble and bronze. However, after Stalin's death in 1953, the perceived ornamental excesses of the Stalinist architecture were abandoned. From the 1960s to the 1980s many new residential boroughs were built on the outskirts; while the functionalist apartment blocks were nearly identical to each other, many families moved there from kommunalkas in the city centre to live in separate apartments.


The area of Saint Petersburg city proper is 605.8 km² (233.9 square miles). The area of the federal subject is 1,439 km² (556 sq mi), which contains Saint Petersburg proper (consisting of eighty-one municipal okrugs), nine municipal towns – (Kolpino, Krasnoye Selo, Kronstadt, Lomonosov, Pavlovsk, Petergof, Pushkin, Sestroretsk, Zelenogorsk) – and twenty-one municipal settlements.
Petersburg is on the middle taiga lowlands along the shores of the Neva Bay of the Gulf of Finland, and islands of the river delta. The largest are Vasilyevsky Island (besides the artificial island between Obvodny canal and Fontanka, and Kotlin in the Neva Bay), Petrogradsky, Dekabristov and Krestovsky. The latter together with Yelagin and Kamenny Island are covered mostly by parks. The Karelian Isthmus, North of the city, is a popular resort area. In the south, Saint Petersburg crosses the Baltic-Ladoga Klint and meets the Izhora Plateau.
The elevation of Saint Petersburg ranges from the sea level to its highest point of 175.9 m (577 ft) at the Orekhovaya Hill in the Duderhof Heights in the south. Part of the city's territory west of Liteyny Prospekt is no higher than 4 m (13 ft) above sea level, and has suffered from numerous floods. Floods in Saint Petersburg are triggered by a long wave in the Baltic Sea, caused by meteorological conditions, winds and shallowness of the Neva Bay. The five most disastrous floods occurred in 1824 (4.21 m or 13 ft 10 in above sea level, during which over 300 buildings were destroyed); 1924 (3.8 m, 12 ft 6 in); 1777 (3.21 m, 10 ft 6 in); 1955 (2.93 m, 9 ft 7 in); and 1975 (2.81 m, 9 ft 3 in). To prevent floods, the Saint Petersburg Dam has been constructed.
Since the 18th century, the city's terrain has been raised artificially, at some places by more than 4 m (13 ft), making mergers of several islands, and changing the hydrology of the city. Besides the Neva and its tributaries, other important rivers of the federal subject of Saint Petersburg are Sestra, Okhta and Izhora. The largest lake is Sestroretsky Razliv in the north, followed by Lakhtinsky Razliv, Suzdal Lakes, and other smaller lakes.
Due to its northerly location at c. 60° N latitude the day length in Petersburg varies across seasons, ranging from 5 hours 53 minutes to 18 hours 50 minutes. A period from mid-May to mid-July during which twilight may last all night is called the white nights.
Saint Petersburg is about 165 km (103 miles) from the border with Finland, connected to it via the M10 highway (E18), along which there is also a connection to the historic city of Vyborg.


Under the Köppen climate classification, Saint Petersburg is classified as Dfb, a humid continental climate. The distinct moderating influence of Baltic Sea cyclones results in warm, humid, and short summers and long, moderately cold wet winters. The climate of Saint Petersburg is close to that of Helsinki, although colder in winter and warmer in summer because of its more eastern location.
The average maximum temperature in July is 23 °C (73 °F), and the average minimum temperature in February is −8.5 °C (16.7 °F); an extreme temperature of 37.1 °C (98.8 °F) occurred during the 2010 Northern Hemisphere summer heat wave. A winter minimum of −35.9 °C (−32.6 °F) was recorded in 1883. The average annual temperature is 5.8 °C (42.4 °F). The Neva River within the city limits usually freezes up in November–December and break-up occurs in April. From December to March there are 118 days on average with snow cover, which reaches an average snow depth of 19 cm (7.5 in) by February. The frost-free period in the city lasts on average for about 135 days. Despite St. Petersburg's northern location, its winters are warmer than Moscow's due to the Gulf of Finland and some Gulf Stream influence from Scandinavian winds that can bring temperature slightly above freezing. The city also has a slightly warmer climate than its suburbs. Weather conditions are quite variable all year round.
Average annual precipitation varies across the city, averaging 660 mm (26 in) per year and reaching maximum in late summer. Due to the cool climate, soil moisture is almost always high because of lower evapotranspiration. Air humidity is 78% on average, and there are, on average, 165 overcast days per year.


The form Nazara is also found in the earliest non-scriptural reference to the town, a citation by Sextus Julius Africanus dated about AD 221 (see "Middle Roman to Byzantine Periods" below). The Church Father Origen (c. AD 185 to 254) knows the forms Nazará and Nazarét. Later, Eusebius in his Onomasticon (translated by St. Jerome) also refers to the settlement as Nazara. The nașirutha of the scriptures of the Mandeans refers to "priestly craft", not to Nazareth, which they identified with Qom.
The first non-Christian reference to Nazareth is an inscription on a marble fragment from a synagogue found in Caesarea Maritima in 1962. This fragment gives the town's name in Hebrew as נצרת (n-ṣ-r-t). The inscription dates to c. AD 300 and chronicles the assignment of priests that took place at some time after the Bar Kokhba revolt, AD 132–35. (See "Middle Roman to Byzantine Periods" below.) An 8th-century AD Hebrew inscription, which was the earliest known Hebrew reference to Nazareth prior to the discovery of the inscription above, uses the same form.


Trinity refers to the teaching that the one God comprises three distinct, eternally co-existing persons: the Father, the Son (incarnate in Jesus Christ), and the Holy Spirit. Together, these three persons are sometimes called the Godhead, although there is no single term in use in Scripture to denote the unified Godhead. In the words of the Athanasian Creed, an early statement of Christian belief, "the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not three Gods but one God". They are distinct from another: the Father has no source, the Son is begotten of the Father, and the Spirit proceeds from the Father. Though distinct, the three persons cannot be divided from one another in being or in operation. While some Christians also believe that God appeared as the Father in the Old Testament, it is agreed that he appeared as the Son in the New Testament, and will still continue to manifest as the Holy Spirit in the present. But still, God still existed as three persons in each of these times. However, traditionally there is a belief that it was the Son who appeared in the Old Testament because, for example, when the Trinity is depicted in art, the Son typically has the distinctive appearance, a cruciform halo identifying Christ, and in depictions of the Garden of Eden, this looks forward to an Incarnation yet to occur. In some Early Christian sarcophagi the Logos is distinguished with a beard, "which allows him to appear ancient, even pre-existent."
The Trinity is an essential doctrine of mainstream Christianity. From earlier than the times of the Nicene Creed (325) Christianity advocated the triune mystery-nature of God as a normative profession of faith. According to Roger E. Olson and Christopher Hall, through prayer, meditation, study and practice, the Christian community concluded "that God must exist as both a unity and trinity", codifying this in ecumenical council at the end of the 4th century.
According to this doctrine, God is not divided in the sense that each person has a third of the whole; rather, each person is considered to be fully God (see Perichoresis). The distinction lies in their relations, the Father being unbegotten; the Son being begotten of the Father; and the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and (in Western Christian theology) from the Son. Regardless of this apparent difference, the three "persons" are each eternal and omnipotent. Other Christian religions including Unitarian Universalism, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Mormonism, do not share those views on the Trinity.
The Greek word trias is first seen in this sense in the works of Theophilus of Antioch; his text reads: "of the Trinity, of God, and of His Word, and of His Wisdom". The term may have been in use before this time; its Latin equivalent, trinitas, appears afterwards with an explicit reference to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, in Tertullian. In the following century, the word was in general use. It is found in many passages of Origen.


Concise doctrinal statements or confessions of religious beliefs are known as creeds. They began as baptismal formulae and were later expanded during the Christological controversies of the 4th and 5th centuries to become statements of faith. "Jesus is Lord" is the earliest creed of Christianity and continues to be used, as with the World Council of Churches.
The Apostles' Creed is the most widely accepted statement of the articles of Christian faith. It is used by a number of Christian denominations for both liturgical and catechetical purposes, most visibly by liturgical churches of Western Christian tradition, including the Latin Church of the Catholic Church, Lutheranism, Anglicanism, and Western Rite Orthodoxy. It is also used by Presbyterians, Methodists, and Congregationalists. This particular creed was developed between the 2nd and 9th centuries. Its central doctrines are those of the Trinity and God the Creator. Each of the doctrines found in this creed can be traced to statements current in the apostolic period. The creed was apparently used as a summary of Christian doctrine for baptismal candidates in the churches of Rome. Its points include:
Belief in God the Father, Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and the Holy Spirit
The death, descent into hell, resurrection and ascension of Christ
The holiness of the Church and the communion of saints
Christ's second coming, the Day of Judgement and salvation of the faithful
The Nicene Creed was formulated, largely in response to Arianism, at the Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople in 325 and 381 respectively, and ratified as the universal creed of Christendom by the First Council of Ephesus in 431.
The Chalcedonian Definition, or Creed of Chalcedon, developed at the Council of Chalcedon in 451, though rejected by the Oriental Orthodox, taught Christ "to be acknowledged in two natures, inconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably": one divine and one human, and that both natures, while perfect in themselves, are nevertheless also perfectly united into one person.
The Athanasian Creed, received in the Western Church as having the same status as the Nicene and Chalcedonian, says: "We worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance."
Most Christians (Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Protestant alike) accept the use of creeds, and subscribe to at least one of the creeds mentioned above.
Certain Evangelical Protestants, though not all of them, reject creeds as definitive statements of faith, even while agreeing with some or all of the substance of the creeds. For example, most Baptists do not use creeds "in that they have not sought to establish binding authoritative confessions of faith on one another." Also rejecting creeds are groups with roots in the Restoration Movement, such as the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), the Evangelical Christian Church in Canada, and the Churches of Christ.


October 3 – Franz Christoph Janneck, Austrian painter in the Baroque style (d. 1761)
October 5 – Jonathan Edwards, North American revivalist preacher (d. 1758)
October 6 – Louis de Beaufort, French-Dutch historian known for his critical approach to the history of Rome (d. 1795)
October 7 – Frederick, Hereditary Prince of Baden-Durlach, German hereditary prince (d. 1732)
October 13
Andrea Belli, Maltese architect and businessman (d. 1772)
Otto Thott, Danish Count (d. 1785)
October 15 – Benigna Gottliebe von Trotta genannt Treyden, Duchess consort of Courland (d. 1782)
October 16
Joachim Faiguet de Villeneuve, French economist (d. 1781)
Henry Fane of Wormsley, English politician (d. 1777)
October 22 – Edward Rudge, English politician (d. 1763)
October 23 – Sir Alexander Dick, 3rd Baronet, Scottish landowner and physician (d. 1785)
October 28
Andreas Bjørn, Danish merchant (d. 1750)
Antoine Deparcieux, French mathematician (d. 1768)
October 30 – James Hill, Scottish surgeon who advocated curative excision for cancer (d. 1776)
November 1 – Frederik Danneskiold-Samsøe, Danish politician (d. 1770)
November 10 – Carlo Zuccari, Italian composer and violinist (d. 1792)
November 17 – Adam Miller, German-born pioneer in the colony of Virginia (d. 1783)
November 18 – Andrew Rollo, 5th Lord Rollo, Scottish army commander in Canada and Dominica during the Seven Years' War (d. 1765)
November 22
Walter Pompe, Flemish master-sculptor (d. 1777)
Balthasar Riepp, German-Austrian painter (d. 1764)
November 23 – Louise Levesque, French femme de lettres (d. 1743)
November 25 – Jean-François Séguier, French astronomer and botanist (d. 1784)
November 26 – Theophilus Cibber, English actor and writer (d. 1758)
November 27 – James De Lancey, colonial governor of the Province of New York (d. 1760)
December 2 – Ferdinand Konščak, Croatian Jesuit missionary, explorer and cartographer (d. 1759)
December 9 – Chester Moore Hall, British lawyer and inventor who produced the first achromatic lenses (d. 1771)
December 12 – Simon Carl Stanley, Danish sculptor of English parentage (d. 1761)
December 15
Johann Martin Boltzius, German born (d. 1765)
Frederick Ernest of Brandenburg-Kulmbach, member of the Brandenburg-Kulmbach branch of the House of Hohenzollern (d. 1762)
December 23 – Stephen Cornwallis, career British Army officer and politician (d. 1743)
December 24
Aleksei Chirikov, Russian navigator (d. 1748)
Christen Lindencrone, Danish landowner and supercargo of the Danish Asia Company (d. 1772)
unknown date – Johann Gottlieb Graun, German Baroque/Classical era composer and violinist (d. 1771)


Archaeological digs show that the site of today's Moscow and the surrounding area have been inhabited since time immemorial. Among the earliest finds are relics of the Lyalovo culture, which experts assign to the Neolithic period, the last phase of the Stone Age.
They confirm that the first inhabitants of the area were hunters and gatherers. Around 950 AD, two Slavic tribes, Vyatichi and Krivichi, settled here. Possibly the Vyatichi formed the core of Moscow's indigenous population.


The name of the city is thought to be derived from the name of the Moskva River. Several theories of the origin of the name of the river have been proposed. Finno-Ugric Merya and Muroma people, who were among the several pre-Slavic tribes which originally inhabited the area, called the river supposedly Mustajoki, in English: Black river. It has been suggested that the name of the city derives from this term.
The most linguistically well-grounded and widely accepted is from the Proto-Balto-Slavic root *mŭzg-/muzg- from the Proto-Indo-European *meu- "wet", so the name Moskva might signify a river at a wetland or a marsh. Its cognates include Russian: музга, muzga "pool, puddle", Lithuanian: mazgoti and Latvian: mazgāt "to wash", Sanskrit: májjati "to drown", Latin: mergō "to dip, immerse". In many Slavic countries Moskov is a surname, most common in Bulgaria, Russia, Ukraine and North Macedonia. Additionally, there are similarly named places in Poland like Mozgawa.
The original Old Russian form of the name is reconstructed as *Москы, *Mosky, hence it was one of a few Slavic ū-stem nouns. As with other nouns of that declension, it had been undergoing a morphological transformation at the early stage of the development of the language, as a result, the first written mentions in the 12th century were Московь, Moskovĭ (accusative case), Москви, Moskvi (locative case), Москвe/Москвѣ, Moskve/Moskvě (genitive case). From the latter forms came to the modern Russian name Москва, Moskva, which is a result of morphological generalization with the numerous Slavic ā-stem nouns.
However, the form Moskovĭ has left some traces in many other languages, such as English: Moscow, German: Moskau, French: Moscou, Georgian: მოსკოვი, Latvian: Maskava, Ottoman Turkish: Moskov, Bashkir: Мәскәү, Tatar: Mäskäw, Muskav, Portuguese: Moscovo, Mäskew, Finnish Moskova, Erzya Moskov, Chuvash: Мускав, Muskav, etc. In a similar manner the Latin name Moscovia has been formed, later it became a colloquial name for Russia used in Western Europe in the 16th–17th centuries. From it as well came English Muscovy and muscovite.
Various other theories (of Celtic, Iranian, Caucasic origins), having little or no scientific ground, are now largely rejected by contemporary linguists.


After losing the status as the capital of the empire, the population of Moscow at first decreased, from 200,000 in the 17th century to 130,000 in 1750. But after 1750, the population grew more than tenfold over the remaining duration of the Russian Empire, reaching 1.8 million by 1915. The 1770–1772 Russian plague killed up to 100,000 people in Moscow.
By 1700, the building of cobbled roads had begun. In November 1730, the permanent street light was introduced, and by 1867 many streets had a gaslight. In 1883, near the Prechistinskiye Gates, arc lamps were installed. In 1741 Moscow was surrounded by a barricade 40 kilometres (25 mi) long, the Kamer-Kollezhskiy barrier, with 16 gates at which customs tolls were collected. Its line is traced today by a number of streets called val (“ramparts”).
Between 1781 and 1804 the Mytischinskiy water pipe (the first in Russia) was built. In 1813, following the destruction of much of the city during the French occupation, a Commission for the Construction of the City of Moscow was established. It launched a great program of rebuilding, including a partial replanning of the city-centre. Among many buildings constructed or reconstructed at this time was the Grand Kremlin Palace and the Kremlin Armoury, the Moscow University, the Moscow Manege (Riding School), and the Bolshoi Theatre. In 1903 the Moskvoretskaya water supply was completed.
In the early 19th century, the Arch of Konstantino-Elenensky gate was paved with bricks, but the Spassky Gate was the main front gate of the Kremlin and used for royal entrances. From this gate, wooden and (following the 17th-century improvements) stone bridges stretched across the moat. Books were sold on this bridge and stone platforms were built nearby for guns – "raskats". The Tsar Cannon was located on the platform of the Lobnoye mesto.
The road connecting Moscow with St. Petersburg, now the M10 highway, was completed in 1746, its Moscow end following the old Tver road, which had existed since the 16th century. It became known as Peterburskoye Schosse after it was paved in the 1780s. Petrovsky Palace was built in 1776–1780 by Matvey Kazakov.
When Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812, the Moscovites were evacuated. It is suspected that the Moscow fire was principally the effect of Russian sabotage. Napoleon's Grande Armée was forced to retreat and was nearly annihilated by the devastating Russian winter and sporadic attacks by Russian military forces. As many as 400,000 of Napoleon's soldiers died during this time.
Moscow State University was established in 1755. Its main building was reconstructed after the 1812 fire by Domenico Giliardi. The Moskovskiye Vedomosti newspaper appeared from 1756, originally in weekly intervals, and from 1859 as a daily newspaper.
The Arbat Street had been in existence since at least the 15th century, but it was developed into a prestigious area during the 18th century. It was destroyed in the fire of 1812 and was rebuilt completely in the early 19th century.
In the 1830s, general Alexander Bashilov planned the first regular grid of city streets north from Petrovsky Palace. Khodynka field south of the highway was used for military training. Smolensky Rail station (forerunner of present-day Belorussky Rail Terminal) was inaugurated in 1870. Sokolniki Park, in the 18th century the home of the tsar's falconers well outside Moscow, became contiguous with the expanding city in the later 19th century and was developed into a public municipal park in 1878. The suburban Savyolovsky Rail Terminal was built in 1902. In January 1905, the institution of the City Governor, or Mayor, was officially introduced in Moscow, and Alexander Adrianov became Moscow's first official mayor.
When Catherine II came to power in 1762, the city's filth and the smell of sewage were depicted by observers as a symptom of disorderly lifestyles of lower-class Russians recently arrived from the farms. Elites called for improving sanitation, which became part of Catherine's plans for increasing control over social life. National political and military successes from 1812 through 1855 calmed the critics and validated efforts to produce a more enlightened and stable society. There was less talk about the smell and the poor conditions of public health. However, in the wake of Russia's failures in the Crimean War in 1855–56, confidence in the ability of the state to maintain order in the slums eroded, and demands for improved public health put filth back on the agenda.


The first known reference to Moscow dates from 1147 as a meeting place of Yuri Dolgoruky and Sviatoslav Olgovich. At the time it was a minor town on the western border of Vladimir-Suzdal Principality. The chronicle says, "Come, my brother, to Moskov" (Приди ко мне, брате, в Москов).
In 1156, Knyaz Yuri Dolgorukiy fortified the town with a timber fence and a moat. In the course of the Mongol invasion of Kievan Rus', the Mongols under Batu Khan burned the city to the ground and killed its inhabitants.
The timber fort na Moskvě "on the Moscow River" was inherited by Daniel, the youngest son of Alexander Nevsky, in the 1260s, at the time considered the least valuable of his father's possessions.
Daniel was still a child at the time, and the big fort was governed by tiuns (deputies), appointed by Daniel's paternal uncle, Yaroslav of Tver.
Daniel came of age in the 1270s and became involved in the power struggles of the principality with lasting success, siding with his brother Dmitry in his bid for the rule of Novgorod. From 1283 he acted as the ruler of an independent principality alongside Dmitry, who became Grand Duke of Vladimir.
Daniel has been credited with founding the first Moscow monasteries, dedicated to the Lord's Epiphany and to Saint Daniel.


Daniel ruled Moscow as Grand Duke until 1303 and established it as a prosperous city that would eclipse its parent principality of Vladimir by the 1320s.
On the right bank of the Moskva River, at a distance of eight kilometres (5 mi) from the Kremlin, not later than in 1282, Daniel founded the first monastery with the wooden church of St. Daniel-Stylite, which is now the Danilov Monastery. Daniel died in 1303, at the age of 42. Before his death, he became a monk and, according to his will, was buried in the cemetery of the St. Daniel Monastery.
Moscow was quite stable and prosperous for many years and attracted a large number of refugees from across Russia. The Rurikids maintained large landholdings by practicing primogeniture, whereby all land was passed to the eldest sons, rather than dividing it up among all sons. By 1304, Yury of Moscow contested with Mikhail of Tver for the throne of the principality of Vladimir. Ivan I eventually defeated Tver to become the sole collector of taxes for the Mongol rulers, making Moscow the capital of Vladimir-Suzdal. By paying high tribute, Ivan won an important concession from the Khan.
While the Khan of the Golden Horde initially attempted to limit Moscow's influence, when the growth of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania began to threaten all of Russia, the Khan strengthened Moscow to counterbalance Lithuania, allowing it to become one of the most powerful cities in Russia. In 1380, prince Dmitry Donskoy of Moscow led a united Russian army to an important victory over the Mongols in the Battle of Kulikovo. Afterward, Moscow took the leading role in liberating Russia from Mongol domination. In 1480, Ivan III had finally broken the Russians free from Tatar control, and Moscow became the capital of an empire that would eventually encompass all of Russia and Siberia, and parts of many other lands.
In 1462 Ivan III, (1440–1505) became Grand Prince of Moscow (then part of the medieval Muscovy state). He began fighting the Tatars, enlarged the territory of Muscovy, and enriched his capital city. By 1500 it had a population of 100,000 and was one of the largest cities in the world. He conquered the far larger principality of Novgorod to the north, which had been allied to the hostile Lithuanians. Thus he enlarged the territory sevenfold, from 430,000 to 2,800,000 square kilometres (170,000 to 1,080,000 square miles). He took control of the ancient "Novgorod Chronicle" and made it a propaganda vehicle for his regime.
The original Moscow Kremlin was built in the 14th century. It was reconstructed by Ivan, who in the 1480s invited architects from Renaissance Italy, such as Petrus Antonius Solarius, who designed the new Kremlin wall and its towers, and Marco Ruffo who designed the new palace for the prince. The Kremlin walls as they now appear are those designed by Solarius, completed in 1495. The Kremlin's Great Bell Tower was built in 1505–08 and augmented to its present height in 1600.
A trading settlement, or posad, grew up to the east of the Kremlin, in the area known as Zaradye (Зарядье). In the time of Ivan III, the Red Square, originally named the Hollow Field (Полое поле) appeared.
In 1508–1516, the Italian architect Aleviz Fryazin (Novy) arranged for the construction of a moat in front of the eastern wall, which would connect the Moskva and Neglinnaya and be filled in with water from Neglinnaya. This moat, known as the Alevizov moat and having a length of 541 metres (1,775 feet), width of 36 metres (118 feet), and a depth of 9.5 to 13 metres (31–43 feet) was lined with limestone and, in 1533, fenced on both sides with low, four-metre-thick (13-foot) cogged-brick walls.


In the 16th and 17th centuries, the three circular defenses were built: Kitay-gorod (Китай-город), the White City (Белый город) and the Earthen City (Земляной город). However, in 1547, two fires destroyed much of the town, and in 1571 the Crimean Tatars captured Moscow, burning everything except the Kremlin. The annals record that only 30,000 of 200,000 inhabitants survived.
The Crimean Tatars attacked again in 1591, but this time were held back by new defense walls, built between 1584 and 1591 by a craftsman named Fyodor Kon. In 1592, an outer earth rampart with 50 towers was erected around the city, including an area on the right bank of the Moscow River. As an outermost line of defense, a chain of strongly fortified monasteries was established beyond the ramparts to the south and east, principally the Novodevichy Convent and Donskoy, Danilov, Simonov, Novospasskiy, and Andronikov monasteries, most of which now house museums. From its ramparts, the city became poetically known as Bielokamennaya, the "White-Walled." The city's limits as marked by the ramparts built in 1592 are now marked by the Garden Ring.
Three square gates existed on the eastern side of the Kremlin wall, which in the 17th century, were known as Konstantino-Eleninsky, Spassky, Nikolsky (owing their names to the icons of Constantine and Helen, the Saviour and St. Nicholas that hung over them). The last two were directly opposite the Red Square, while the Konstantino-Elenensky gate was located behind Saint Basil's Cathedral.
The Russian famine of 1601–03 killed perhaps 100,000 in Moscow. From 1610 through 1612, troops of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth occupied Moscow, as its ruler Sigismund III tried to take the Russian throne. In 1612, the people of Nizhny Novgorod and other Russian cities conducted by prince Dmitry Pozharsky and Kuzma Minin rose against the Polish occupants, besieged the Kremlin, and expelled them. In 1613, the Zemsky sobor elected Michael Romanov tsar, establishing the Romanov dynasty. The 17th century was rich in popular risings, such as the liberation of Moscow from the Polish–Lithuanian invaders (1612), the Salt Riot (1648), the Copper Riot (1662), and the Moscow Uprising of 1682.
During the first half of the 17th century, the population of Moscow doubled from roughly 100,000 to 200,000. It expanded beyond its ramparts in the later 17th century. It is estimated, that in the middle of the 17th century, 20% of Moscow suburb's inhabitants were from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, practically all of them being driven from their homeland to Moscow by Muscovite invaders. By 1682, there were 692 households established north of the ramparts, by Ukrainians and Belarusians abducted from their hometowns in the course of the Russo-Polish War (1654–1667). These new outskirts of the city came to be known as the Meshchanskaya sloboda, after Ruthenian meshchane "town people". The term meshchane (мещане) acquired pejorative connotations in 18th-century Russia and today means "petty bourgeois" or "narrow-minded philistine".
The entire city of the late 17th century, including the slobodas that grew up outside the city ramparts, are contained within what is today Moscow's Central Administrative Okrug.
Numerous disasters befell the city. The plague epidemics ravaged Moscow in 1570–1571, 1592 and 1654–1656. The plague killed upwards of 80% of the people in 1654–55. Fires burned out much of the wooden city in 1626 and 1648.
In 1712 Peter the Great moved his government to the newly built Saint Petersburg on the Baltic coast. Moscow ceased to be Russia's capital, except for a brief period from 1728 to 1732 under the influence of the Supreme Privy Council.


Moscow (/ˈmɒskoʊ/ MOS-koh, US chiefly /ˈmɒskaʊ/ MOS-kow; Russian: Москва, tr. Moskva, IPA: [mɐskˈva] (listen)) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 12.4 million residents within the city limits, over 17 million residents in the urban area, and over 20 million residents in the metropolitan area. The city covers an area of 2,511 square kilometers (970 sq mi), while the urban area covers 5,891 square kilometers (2,275 sq mi), and the metropolitan area covers over 26,000 square kilometers (10,000 sq mi). Moscow is among the world's largest cities; being the most populous city entirely in Europe, the largest urban and metropolitan area in Europe, and the largest city by land area on the European continent.
First documented in 1147, Moscow grew to become a prosperous and powerful city that served as the capital of the Grand Duchy that bears its name. When the Grand Duchy of Moscow evolved into the Tsardom of Russia, Moscow remained the political and economic center for most of the Tsardom's history. When the Tsardom was reformed into the Russian Empire, the capital was moved from Moscow to Saint Petersburg diminishing the influence of the city. The capital was then moved back to Moscow following the October Revolution and the city was brought back as the political center of the Russian SFSR and then the Soviet Union. In the aftermath of the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Moscow remained the capital city of the contemporary and newly established Russian Federation.
The northernmost and coldest megacity in the world, with a history that spans eight centuries, Moscow is governed as a federal city (since 1993) that serves as the political, economic, cultural, and scientific center of Russia and Eastern Europe. As an alpha world city, Moscow has one of the world's largest urban economies. The city is one of the fastest-growing tourist destinations in the world, and is one of Europe's most visited cities. Moscow is home to the seventh-highest number of billionaires of any city in the world.  The Moscow International Business Center is one of the largest financial centers in Europe and the world, and features some of Europe's tallest skyscrapers. Moscow was the host city of the 1980 Summer Olympics, and one of the host cities of the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
As the historic core of Russia, Moscow serves as the home of numerous Russian artists, scientists, and sports figures due to the presence of its various museums, academic and political institutions, and theaters. The city is home to several UNESCO World Heritage Sites and is well known for its display of Russian architecture, particularly its historic Red Square, and buildings such as the Saint Basil's Cathedral and the Moscow Kremlin, of which the latter serves as the seat of power of the Government of Russia. Moscow is home to many Russian companies in numerous industries and is served by a comprehensive transit network, which includes four international airports, ten railway terminals, a tram system, a monorail system, and most notably the Moscow Metro, the busiest metro system in Europe, and one of the largest rapid transit systems in the world. The city has over 40 percent of its territory covered by greenery, making it one of the greenest cities in Europe and the world.


A settlement had been established on the site of the current Kaunas old town, at the confluence of two large rivers, at least by the 10th century AD. Kaunas is first mentioned in written sources in 1361 when the brick Kaunas Castle was constructed. In 1362, the castle was captured after a siege and destroyed by the Teutonic Order. Commander Vaidotas of the Kaunas castle garrison, with 36 men, tried to break through but was taken prisoner. It was one of the largest and important military victories of the Teutonic Knights in the 14th century against the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The Kaunas castle was rebuilt at the beginning of the 15th century.
In 1408, the town was granted Magdeburg rights by Vytautas the Great and became a centre of Kaunas Powiat in Trakai Voivodeship in 1413. Vytautas ceded Kaunas the right to own the scales used for weighing the goods brought to the city or packed on site, wax processing, and woolen cloth-trimming facilities. The power of the self-governing Kaunas was shared by three interrelated major institutions: vaitas (the Mayor), the Magistrate (12 lay judges and 4 burgomasters), and the so-called Benchers' Court (12 persons). Kaunas began to gain prominence, since it was at an intersection of trade routes and a river port. In 1441 Kaunas joined the Hanseatic League, and Hansa merchant office Kontor was opened—the only one in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. By the 16th century, Kaunas also had a public school and a hospital and was one of the best-formed towns in the whole country.
In 1665, the Russian army attacked the city several times, and in 1701 the city was occupied by the Swedish Army during the Great Northern War. The bubonic plague struck the area in 1657 and 1708, killing many residents. Fires destroyed parts of the city in 1731 and 1732.


A 16th century legend claims, that Kaunas was established by the Romans in ancient times. These Romans were supposedly led by a patrician named Palemon, who had three sons: Barcus, Kunas and Sperus. Palemon fled from Rome because he feared the mad Emperor Nero. Palemon, his sons and other relatives travelled to Lithuania. After Palemon's death, his sons divided his land. Kunas got the land where Kaunas now stands. He built a fortress near the confluence of the Nemunas and Neris rivers and the city that grew up there was named after him. A suburban region in the vicinity is named "Palemonas".


The city's name is of Lithuanian origin and most likely derives from a personal name.
Before Lithuania regained independence, the city was generally known in English as Kovno, the traditional Slavicized form of its name. The Polish name is Kowno [ˈkɔvnɔ]; the Belarusian name is Koўна, Kowna [ˈkɔu̯na]. An earlier Russian name was Ковно Kovno, although Каунас Kaunas has been used since 1940. The Yiddish name is קאָװנע Kovne, and the names in German include Kaunas and Kauen. The city and its elderates also have names in other languages (see Names of Kaunas in other languages and names of Kaunas elderates in other languages).


On 30 June 1993, the historical coat of arms of Kaunas city was re-established by a special presidential decree. The coat of arms features a white aurochs with a golden cross between its horns, set against a deep red background. The aurochs was the original heraldic symbol of the city, established in 1400. The heraldic seal of Kaunas, introduced in the early 15th century during the reign of Grand Duke Vytautas, is the oldest city heraldic seal known in the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The current emblem was the result of much study and discussion on the part of the Lithuanian Heraldry Commission, and realized by the artist Raimondas Miknevičius. An aurochs has replaced a wisent, which was depicted in the Soviet-era emblem that was used since 1969.
Blazon: Gules, an aurochs passant guardant argent ensigned with a cross Or between his horns.
Kaunas also has a greater coat of arms, which is mainly used for purposes of Kaunas city representation. The sailor, three golden balls, and Latin text "Diligite justitiam qui judicatis terram" (English: Cherish justice, you who judge the earth) in the greater coat of arms refers to Saint Nicholas, patron saint of merchants and seafarers, who was regarded as a heavenly guardian of Kaunas by Queen Bona Sforza.


Theodosius II (Greek: Θεοδόσιος, translit. Theodosios; 10 April 401 – 28 July 450), also known as Theodosius the Younger, (Latin: Theodosius minor) was Roman emperor for most of his life, proclaimed Augustus as an infant in 402 and ruling as the eastern Empire's sole emperor after the death of his father Arcadius in 408. His reign was marked by the promulgation of the Theodosian law code and the construction of the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople. He also presided over the outbreak of two great Christological controversies, Nestorianism and Eutychianism.


Theodosius died on 28 July 450 as the result of a riding accident. On 25 August, his sister Pulcheria married the newly elected emperor Marcian, a domesticus under the influential general Aspar. The eunuch Chrysaphius was executed shortly after by the new imperial couple.
Like Constantine I and several of his successors, he was buried in the Church of the Holy Apostles, in a porphyry sarcophagus that was described in the 10th century by Constantine VII in the De Ceremoniis.
Saint Right-Believing Theodosius II the Younger is commemorated in Eastern Orthodox Church on 29 July.


Theodosius was born in 401 as the only son of Emperor Arcadius and his wife Aelia Eudoxia. On 10 January 402 he was proclaimed co-Augustus by his father, thus becoming the youngest person ever to bear this title in Roman history. In 408, his father died and the seven-year-old boy became emperor of the Eastern half of the Roman Empire.


The county was established in 1182, and came to be bordered by Cumberland, Westmorland, Yorkshire, and Cheshire. It was divided into the hundreds of Amounderness, Blackburn, Leyland, Lonsdale, Salford and West Derby. Lonsdale was further partitioned into Lonsdale North, the detached part north of the sands of Morecambe Bay including Furness and Cartmel, and Lonsdale South.


Lancashire (/ˈlæŋkəʃər/ LAN-kə-shər, /-ʃɪər/ -sheer; abbreviated Lancs.) is a county in North West England. Lancashire is a historic, ceremonial and non-metropolitan county and the county boundaries differ between these different forms. Its county town is Lancaster. The non-metropolitan county was created by the Local Government Act 1972 and is administered by the Lancashire County Council and twelve district councils. Its administrative centre is Preston. The ceremonial county has a population of 1,449,300 and an area of 1,189 square miles (3,080 km²).
The historic County Palatine of Lancashire is still recognised today and includes the large cities of Manchester and Liverpool as well as the Furness and Cartmel peninsulas in the Lake District, and an area of 1,909 square miles (4,940 km²). Many of these places still identify strongly with the county, with Lancashire still being used as part of the postal address. The historic county was subject to a significant boundary reform for administrative purposes in 1974. This created the current ceremonial county and removed Liverpool and Manchester, and most of their surrounding conurbations, to form the metropolitan and ceremonial counties of Merseyside and Greater Manchester. The detached northern part of Lancashire in the Lake District, including the Furness Peninsula and Cartmel, was merged with Cumberland and Westmorland to form Cumbria. Administratively, Lancashire lost 709 square miles of land to other counties – about two fifths of its original area – although it did gain some land from the West Riding of Yorkshire. The historic county is celebrated in November on Lancashire Day.
The history of Lancashire begins with its founding in the 12th century. In the Domesday Book of 1086, some of its lands were treated as part of Yorkshire.  The land that lay between the Ribble and Mersey, Inter Ripam et Mersam, was included in the returns for Cheshire. Lancashire emerged as a major commercial and industrial region during the Industrial Revolution. Liverpool and Manchester grew into its largest cities, with economies built around the docks and the cotton mills respectively. These cities dominated global trade and the birth of modern industrial capitalism. The county contained several mill towns and the collieries of the Lancashire Coalfield. By the 1830s, approximately 85% of all cotton manufactured worldwide was processed in Lancashire. A number of towns and cities were major cotton mill towns during this time. Blackpool was a centre for tourism for the inhabitants of Lancashire's mill towns, particularly during wakes week.
Today, the county borders Cumbria to the north, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and North and West Yorkshire to the east; with a coastline on the Irish Sea to the west.  The historic county's boundaries remain the same as those of the county palatine with Lancaster serving as the county town, and the Duke of Lancaster (i.e. the Queen) exercising sovereignty rights, including the appointment of lords lieutenant in Greater Manchester and Merseyside.


During Roman times the area was part of the Brigantes tribal area in the military zone of Roman Britain. The towns of Manchester, Lancaster, Ribchester, Burrow, Elslack and Castleshaw grew around Roman forts. In the centuries after the Roman withdrawal in 410AD the northern parts of the county probably formed part of the Brythonic kingdom of Rheged, a successor entity to the Brigantes tribe. During the mid-8th century, the area was incorporated into the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Northumbria from the north of the River Ribble and the Kingdom of Mercia from the south, which both became parts of England in the 10th century.
In the Domesday Book, land between the Ribble and Mersey were known as "Inter Ripam et Mersam" and included in the returns for Cheshire. Although some historians consider this to mean south Lancashire was then part of Cheshire, it is by no means certain.  It is also claimed that the territory to the north formed part of the West Riding of Yorkshire.