The museum was established in 1924 as the Edmonton Museum of Arts, with a mandate to promote fine arts, and preserve historical relics from the region. The institution was established after Maud Bowman, the museums founding director and president enlisted the support of the Edmonton Art Club, and several other business, and political leaders.
The museum held its first exhibition in the Palm Room of the Hotel Macdonald, with work on loan from local collections that included members of the Edmonton Art Club in addition to 24 works on loan from the National Gallery of Canada collection. Growth of the museum's collection was slowed during the 1930s and 1940s, as a result of the Great Depression and the Second World War. During this period, the museum maintained a number of art education classes, as well as exhibiting works on loan from the National Gallery of Canada.
In the first half of the 20th century, the museum occupied various sites including a former Edmonton Public Library building, and the fourth floor of the Civic Block and the Edmonton Motors; building before settling into the former home of Richard Secord in 1952. Recognizing that the majority of its collection, and exhibition activities were in the area of fine arts, the institution opted to change its name to the Edmonton Art Gallery in 1956.
Efforts to construct a purpose-built facility for the art museum began in 1962, after A. E. Condell bequeathed funds to the museum on behalf of her son, Arthur Blow Condell. Designs by architects Donald G. Bittorf, and B. James Wensley were chosen for the building, with the City of Edmonton donating 2,400 square metres (0.59 acres) at Churchill Square for the site of the new building. The building was opened in 1969, and was named the "Arthur Blow Condell Memorial Building". Further renovations to the building in 1977 saw the creation a new wing, replacing an exterior courtyard.
Proposals to renovate the building were made in June 1998, although serious discussions about its funding did not begin until 2001. In 2005, the museum launched an architectural competition, with 27 architects submitting applications. In September 2005, the designs from Los Angeles-based architect Randall Stout was chosen as the winning design for the museum. The redevelopment doubles the exhibition space within its structure, as well as provided an off-site storage site for its collection. On the same day the winning design was announced, the museum was renamed the Art Gallery of Alberta, in an effort to reflect its expanding focus on art from all of Alberta.
In April 2007, the Arthur Blow Condell building was partially demolished with significant portions of the existing structure incorporated into Stout's design. Construction of the new building formally began in June 2007. The museum was closed to the public from March 2007 to January 2010 in order to facilitate the construction of the new building; with a museum exhibiting its collection in a former Hudson's Bay Company property at Enterprise Square from April 2007 to December 2009. The museum's inaugural exhibitions after the renovation included: Edgar Degas: Figures in Motion; Karsh: Image Maker; and The Murder of Crows, the North American premiere of Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller's sound installation. After the museum reopened on 31 January 2010, annual memberships to the Art Gallery of Alberta increased, with the museum seeing 30,000 visitors within the first six weeks of reopening.
In December 2009, the museum and the National Gallery of Canada issued a joint press release announcing a three-year partnership, which saw the use of the Art Gallery of Alberta's galleries to exhibit works from the National Gallery's collection. The program was the first "satellite program" between the National Gallery of Canada, and another art museum.


The property is located at Churchill Square, a public square in downtown Edmonton. The building takes up an area of 8,000 square metres (86,000 sq ft), including 3,000 square metres (32,000 sq ft) of climate-controlled exhibition spaces. The building was designed by Randall Stouts Architects, Inc., from Los Angeles and San Francisco. Local architects and engineering firms HIP Architects, Stantec, BPTEC Engineering, and Read Jones Christoffersen assisted Randall Stout's design team; while Ledcor Group of Companies provided construction management for the project. The original budget for the renovation was C$48 million, although it was later increased to C$88 million.
The patinated zinc and stainless steel design was intended to demonstrate the museum's "commitment to contemporary art". The exterior of the building features a 190 metres (620 ft) steel ribbon, intended to represent the North Saskatchewan River, and the aurora, geographical phenomenons and features of Edmonton. The building's interior also features an "aurora" inspired room. The building includes a restaurant, espresso bar, gift shop, and an educational facility with a 150-seat theatre known as the Singhmar Centre for Art Education. The building includes a rooftop patio known as the City of Edmonton Terrace. The building also includes rental spaces for the public, such as Manning Hall.
The original structure on the property that was used by the museum, the Arthur Blow Condell building, was opened in 1969 with designs from Donald G. Bittorf, and B. James Wensley. The Brutalist-styled building was partially demolished in 2007 to accommodate the reconstruction of the building. However, approximately 67 per cent of the older museum structure was retained during the reconstruction, with most of the retained portions used as the new building's foundation, or lower floors. The new building's third-floor terrace was the roof of the Arthur Blow Condell building.


The museum's permanent collection features over 6,000 works, the majority of which were produced after the 1950s. Many of these works were acquired by the museum through private and public donors. The museum's collection has an emphasis on art that was produced in Alberta, or western Canada. The museum's permanent collection began in 1924, although its growth was slowed during the 1930s and 1940s as a result of the Great Depression and the Second World War. From the 1960s to the 1985, the museum's focused its acquisition efforts on paintings and sculptures of modern art. In 2015, the museum's permanent collection was valued at approximately C$30 million. In 2017 the museum received $375,000 to acquire works by contemporary First Nations, Inuit and Metis artists for their permanent collection from the Canada Council for the Arts’ New Chapter program.
The museum's collection of historical Canadian art includes works by Jack Bush, Emily Carr, Henry George Glyde, Illingworth Kerr, Cornelius Krieghoff, Pegi Nicol MacLeod, James Wilson Morrice, Marion Nicoll, Paul Peel, Bill Reid, Jean-Paul Riopelle, Carl Schaefer, Lilias Torrance Newton, and members of the Group of Seven.
The museum's collection of modern and contemporary art feature works by Canadian artists including Robert Boyer, Janet Cardiff, Chris Cran, Marlene Creates, Dean Drever, Aganetha Dyck, Douglas Haynes, Alex Janvier, Brian Jungen, Rita Letendre, Amy Malbeuf, Liz Magor, Lyndal Osborne, Jane Ash Poitras, and Takao Tanabe.
The museum's collection of photographs was started in 1977 and presently has over 1,500 photographs. The museum's collection of photographs includes historical photographs by Edward Curtis, Karl Blossfeldt, Walker Evans, and Yousuf Karsh, and contemporary photographs by Lynne Cohen, and William Eakin. The museum also maintains a prints collection that includes over 850 works by Thomas Bewick.


The Art Gallery of Alberta has several programs to foster an environment accessible, such as free admission for minors and post-secondary students since 2017. The museum building was designed to accessible with automatic doors, and provides wheelchairs upon request, and free admission for accompanying care workers. The museum is breast-feeding friendly. The museum also operates an "equity committee" that serves to identify barriers rooted in ableism, racism, or exclusion; and advises the museum's board of directors and facility management on practice and changes.
The museum is accessible through public transit from Churchill station, a station for the Edmonton Light Rail Transit system. The museum provides a discount visitors who travelled by public transit. Parking spaces for automobiles and bicycles is not provided by the museum, with museum visitors reliant on surrounding parking spaces maintained by the municipal government.


The building designed by Stout incorporates portions of an older building designed by architects Donald G. Bittorf, and B. James Wensley.


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The Gallery is renowned for its collections of Australian art, including Indigenous Australian and colonial art, from about 1800 onwards. The collection is strong in nineteenth-century works (including silverware and furniture) and in particular Australian Impressionist (often referred to as Heidelberg School) paintings. Its twentieth-century Modernist art collection includes the work of many female artists, and there is a large collection of South Australian art, which includes 2,000 drawings by Hans Heysen and a large collection of photographs.
Heidelberg school works include Tom Roberts' A break away!, Charles Conder's A holiday at Mentone, and Arthur Streeton's Road to Templestowe.  The mid-twentieth century is represented by works by Russell Drysdale, Arthur Boyd, Margaret Preston, Bessie Davidson, and Sidney Nolan, and South Australian art includes works by James Ashton and Jeffrey Smart.
The Gallery became the first Australian gallery to acquire a work by an Indigenous artist in 1939, although systematic acquisition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art was not realised until the mid-1950s. The Gallery and now holds a large and diverse collection of older and contemporary works, including the Kulata Tjuta collaboration created by Aṉangu artists working in the north of SA.


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European landscape paintings include works by Jacob Isaakszoon van Ruisdael,  Salomon van Ruysdael, Joseph Wright of Derby, and Camille Pissarro. Other European works include paintings by Goya, Francesco Guardi, Pompeo Batoni and Camille Corot.
There is a large collection of British art, including many Pre-Raphaelite works, by artists Edward Burne-Jones, William Holman Hunt, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Morris & Co. Other works include John William Waterhouse's Circe Invidiosa (1892) and The Favourites of the Emperor Honorius (c.1883); William Holman Hunt's Christ and the Two Marys (1847) and The Risen Christ with the Two Marys in the Garden Of Joseph of Aramathea (1897); and John Collier's Priestess of Delphi (1891). Works by British portrait painters include Robert Peake, Anthony van Dyck, Peter Lely and  Thomas Gainsborough.
Sculpture includes works by Rodin, Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, Jacob Epstein and Thomas Hirschhorn.
The Asian art collection, begun in 1904, includes work from the whole region, with focuses on the pre-modern Japanese art, art of Southeast Asia, India and the Middle East. The Gallery holds Australia's only permanent display of Islamic art.


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The 2014 Biennial was titled "Dark Heart", an examination of changing national sensibilities, mounted by director Nick Mitzevitch, with 28 artists exhibiting.
In 2016, the gallery participated in the large "Biennial 2016" art festival with its "Magic Object" exhibitions.
In 2018, the title was "Divided Worlds", which aimed "...to describe the divide between ideas and ideologies, between geographies and localities, between communities and nations, and the subjective and objective view of experience and reality itself". Venues included the Museum of Economic Botany in Adelaide Botanic Garden. It drew record crowds, with more than 240,000 people over a 93-day season under curator Erica Green.
Curator for the 2020 Biennial, which was scheduled to run from 29 February to 8 June 2020, is Leigh Robb, inaugural Curator of Contemporary Art appointed in 2016. The title is "Monster Theatres", examining "our relationships with each other, the environment and technology" and featuring a lot of live art. Paintings, photography, sculpture, textiles, film, video, sound art, installation, and performance art by 23 artists are featured, including work by Abdul Abdullah, Stelarc, David Noonan, Garry Stewart and Australian Dance Theatre, Megan Cope, Karla Dickens, Julia Robinson, performance artist Mike Parr, Polly Borland, Willoh S. Weiland, Yhonnie Scarce (whose work In the Dead House was installed in the old Adelaide Lunatic Asylum morgue building in the Botanic Garen) and others. However, AGSA had to temporarily close from 25 March 2020 owing to the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia, so some of the exhibits were shown online, along with virtual tours of the exhibition. When the gallery reopened on 8 June, it was announced that the exhibition period would be extended to 2 August 2020.
The 2022 event is called Free/State, and among others features the work of Hossein Valamanesh, who died in February, and his wife Angela Valamanesh. It runs from 4 March to 5 June, and is curated by Sydney-based Burramattagal man Sebastian Goldspink. The theme was inspired by the history of South Australia as a "free colony", and also has resonances with states of being and psychology, and contrasting ideas of freedom. Other artists featured include Shaun Gladwell, JD Reformer, Tom Polo, Rhoda Tjitayi, Stanislava Pinchuk, and collaborators James Tylor and Rebecca Selleck.


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Diana Ramsay (7 May 1926 – 2017) and her husband James Ramsay (1923–1996) were art-lovers who gave generously to the art gallery. As of 2021 the gallery had acquired over 100 artworks thanks to their generosity, including paintings by Vanessa Bell, Clarice Beckett, Angelica Kauffmann and Camille Pissarro. Diana launched the Ramsay Art Prize in 2016, a year before her death, and the couple's legacy lives on in the James & Diana Ramsay Foundation, established in 2008. The bequest was established by James' will in 1994, and upon Diana's death in 2017, James' entire estate and part of Diana's was bequeathed to it. The Foundation supports the children and family programs, whereby more than 300,000 children and families have visited AGSA since the creation of the programs in 2013. In November 2019 it was announced that the couple had made a bequest of A$38 million} to AGSA, to be used for the purchase of major works. This was one of the largest bequests ever made to an art gallery in Australia. The family's wealth had accrued mainly thanks to James’ uncle William, who was responsible for developing Kiwi boot polish, and his artist brother Hugh Ramsay influenced the family's love of the visual arts. James' father was Sir John Ramsay, noted surgeon.


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The Aesthetic Movement inspired aspects of the Art Gallery's collection.
Ongoing exhibitions include Indigenous traditional and contemporary art from the Northern Territory and Western Australia, and Western Australian art from the 1820s to 1960s alongside topical displays on key themes drawn from the collection. Desert River Sea is a major project exploring indigenous art. Desert River Sea: Kimberley Art Then and Now is a ground-breaking six-year visual arts initiative developed by the Art Gallery of Western Australia with funding support from the Rio Tinto Community Investment Fund. Its aim is to bridge the cultural and geographic distance between Aboriginal artists of the diverse Kimberley region, the Gallery in Perth and national and international audiences, thereby forging a network of cultural and artistic exchange and understanding. An annual exhibition called "Year 12 Perspectives" celebrated 25 years in 2017 and highlights works from Western Australian Art and Art and Design students, including paintings, prints, digital art, fashion, design, and sculpture.


The idea of creating the gallery was first put forward by Croatian painter Vlaho Bukovac in the spring of 1895. In May 1896 a Millennium Exhibition was to be held in Budapest, celebrating 1,000 years of Hungarian statehood, and artists from what was then Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia were invited to attend. Urged by Bukovac, Croatian artists decided to present their works in a purpose-built Pavilion, constructed around a prefabricated iron skeleton so that it could easily be shipped to Zagreb after the exhibition. The Budapest Pavilion was designed by Hungarian architects Flóris Korb and Kálmán Giergl and was constructed by the Danubius building company.
After the exhibition had ended, the building's skeleton was transported to Zagreb and Austrian architects Fellner & Helmer (who were at the time active in Zagreb, and had earlier designed the Croatian National Theatre building) were hired to design a new version of the building based on the iron skeleton, while the Hönigsberg & Deutsch building company was contracted to perform the actual construction. The building's exterior was decorated with sculptures in the academic art style — the eastern facade displays busts of three Italian Renaissance painters — Giulio Clovio (Julije Klović), Andrea Schiavone (Andrija Medulić) and Vittore Carpaccio, and the western facade has busts of Michelangelo, Raphael and Titian.
The construction went on for two years between 1897 and 1898 and the Pavilion was officially inaugurated on 15 December 1898 with a large exhibition showcasing works of local artists called Croatian Salon (Croatian: Hrvatski salon). The exhibition was very popular and attracted some 10,000 visitors, at a time when Zagreb had a total population of 60,000.
The gallery has a total display area of 600 m² and does not have a permanent display as it specialises in one-off solo and group exhibitions representing notable oeuvres and art movements from all periods and styles, with works by both Croatian and foreign artists. Throughout its history the gallery organised around 700 exhibitions with artists ranging from the Earth Group collective to George Grosz, Henry Moore, Auguste Rodin, Andy Warhol, Mimmo Rotella, Joan Miró, Auguste Rodin, Alberto Giacometti and many others.
In recent years it featured retrospective exhibitions of artists such as Milivoj Uzelac, Gilles Aillaud, Edo Kovačević, Gerhard Richter, Vilko Gecan, Dušan Džamonja, Vlaho Bukovac, Boris Demur, Anto Jerković, Marijan Trepše, Bela Csikos Sesia, Nasta Rojc and group exhibitions which featured works of contemporary artists such as Santiago Sierra and Boris Mikhailov, as well as 19th-century artists such as Karl von Piloty, Nikolaos Gyzis, Gabriel von Max and Franz Stuck.
In 2006, the glass roof of the Pavilion was renovated and the lighting system was replaced,. The renovation works continued for seven years and were completed in 2013.
In 2020, the Pavilion was damaged by a strong earthquake. As of 2021, it remains closed to visitors.


Raising financial support for a new eight-lane bridge over the Cooper River was a struggle 20 years in the making, prolonged by the state's insistence that it could not afford such a bridge and by Charleston's reluctance to provide any funds for the project. Several proposals were made for a toll bridge, but the mayors of Charleston and Mount Pleasant objected. When officials revealed in 1995 that the Grace Bridge scored a 4 out of 100 for safety and integrity, retired US Congressman Arthur Ravenel Jr. ran for the South Carolina Senate with a goal of solving the funding problem. He helped to establish the S.C. Infrastructure Bank and worked with local, state, and federal officials to create partnerships that helped to materialize the final funding.
The State Infrastructure Bank (SIB) budgeted $325 million to accompany $96.6 million from the Federal Highway Administration. The project did not become a reality, however, until the SIB agreed to commit to a $215 million federal loan, provided that Charleston County would contribute $3 million a year for 25 years, including an 8.33% sales tax increase, to the federal loan, as well as yearly payments from the SCDOT and State Ports Authority. The overall price of the bridge totaled around $700 million.
Due to his efforts in passing laws for the new bridge's funding, fellow lawmakers voted to name bridge the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge. Some felt that the bridge should not be named after Ravenel, with the head of the South Carolina infrastructure bank saying in 1999, "Certainly, Arthur Ravenel is a fine, decent person, but that bridge is bigger than any one individual and it should reflect all the qualities of the state and not some state senator who happens to be in the Legislature the time the structure is being built."


The proximity and rivalry between Charleston, South Carolina and Savannah and Brunswick often lead to comparisons between the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge, the Sidney Lanier Bridge, and the Talmadge Memorial Bridge, all of which carry U.S. Route 17. Completed in 2005, the clearance under the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge is actually only one foot (0.30 m) taller than both the Sidney Lanier Bridge and the Talmadge Memorial Bridge. Unlike the Sidney Lanier Bridge and the Talmadge Memorial Bridge, however, the Ravenel Bridge has eight travel lanes; the Talmadge and the Sidney Lanier both have just four lanes. The Ravenel also features a dedicated bike–pedestrian lane. The Talmadge Memorial Bridge also has a similar design as the Alex Fraser Bridge in Vancouver, Canada.
As for the span of the three bridges, the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge is 1,546 feet (471 m), the Sidney Lanier Bridge is 1,250 feet (380 m), and the Talmadge Memorial Bridge is 1,100 feet (340 m).


The Artium Museum is a contemporary art museum located in Vitoria-Gasteiz, the capital of the province of Álava in northern Spain. Designed by the architect  José Luis Caton, it is owned by the Provincial Council of Álava and opened 26 April 2002 and its director is Daniel Castillejo. The Museum was a created by the initiative of the Provincial Council of Alava, which is the owner of most of the works that are in the museum, and it's the owner of the building too. The aim of this museum is to develop the critical view of the society and to make Alava be associated with art and culture.
The Museum has three tools: firstly, there's the collection of contemporary art, secondly, the temporary exhibitions and finally an intensive programme of educational and cultural activities, in which there's the option of groups of schools to go to the museum as an educational activity.
The museum holds works by numerous artists, including Miquel Barceló, Joseph Beuys, Joan Brossa, Juan Francisco Casas, Jake and Dinos Chapman, Eduardo Chillida, Salvador Dalí, Óscar Domínguez, Manolo Millares, Joan Miró, Juan Muñoz, Jorge Oteiza, Pablo Palazuelo, Pablo Picasso, Antonio Saura, Antoni Tàpies, Juan Uslé, and Darío Villalba. It also includes a library and documentation center, both of which are open to the public.
The Artium is one of the symbols of Vitoria-Gasteiz and it represents one of the fundamental assets of the art scene in Spain.


The building is located in the centre of Vitoria-Gasteiz, exactly on the Francia Street. It  stands on a trapezoidal, almost rectangular square and there is a main lobby, the Auditorium, the Plaza Room, the Cube Restaurant, ticket office and cloakroom, among others.


Arts Centre Melbourne's site has long been associated with arts and entertainment; in the early 20th century it was occupied variously by a permanent circus venue, an amusement park, a cinema and a dance hall. The area was a popular venue featuring the Olympia Dancing Place, the Glaciarium Ice-Skating Rink, a Japanese tea house, Snowden Gardens, the Trocadero and the Princes Court with a miniature train and water-chute. The Wirth's Circus appeared in 1907 with a 5000-seat auditorium.
In the book A Place Across the River, Vicki Fairfax described the lot as a "oddly shaped piece of land" considered a sacred public spot by the locals.
During World War II there was a push to establish a new home for the National Gallery of Victoria, along with a state theatre, on the site. The construction was difficult due to the triangular parcel of land the construction was planned on. However, by the 1960s, all the entertainment had left and the lot had turned into an improvised parking for city workers. After many years of discussion, Roy Grounds was chosen as the architect, and his master plan of a gallery and an adjacent theater under a tall copper spire was approved in 1960. One of the main challenge of the construction was to dry up and retain the waters out of the base, as the construction went as deep as 7 meters below water levels.
The gallery was completed in 1968, with the theatres to be built in a second stage.
Responsibility for the project lay with the building committee, established in 1956 and chaired by Kenneth Myer from 1965 to 1989. For twenty-five years the committee was a consistent force in the completion of the complex. Actor and film director George Fairfax, having joined the project in 1972, was appointed the first general manager of the building committee and then the trust, a position he held until 1989. As a result, Fairfax played an influential role in administration of Arts Centre Melbourne's development.
In the early 1970s, due to the expansion of the size of both the theatre and the concert hall required, the addition of a smaller second theatre, and to accommodate difficulties associated with the geology of the site, Roy Grounds completely redesigned the project. The concert hall was separated out and placed in the riverbank, and the theatres building expanded above ground, with a latticework spire above.
Work began on the theatre site in 1973, but excavations were not completed until 1978, two years later than expected. Work began on the concert hall site in 1976. During the first phase of the project from 1972 until 1979 responsibility was with Rupert Hamer as Minister for the Arts (and premier) and during the main construction phase from 1979 to 1982 with Norman Lacy as Minister for the Arts (and Minister of Educational Services).
Once the buildings were nearly complete, and with the death of Roy Grounds in 1981, Academy Award-winning expatriate set designer John Truscott, was employed to decorate the interiors. His work was constrained only by a requirement to leave elements already constructed, such as Ground's faceted cave-like concert hall interior, to which he applied mineral finishes, and his steel mesh draped ceiling in the State Theatre, to which he added perforated brass balls.
During his tenure, Norman Lacy was constantly called on to defend the Victorian Arts Centre Trust and its construction program during some highly charged public debates in the parliament. He had to defend the acoustics, the design of the spire, the rejection of the proposed changes to the Concert Hall interiors, the BASS ticketing system of the project, as well as its delays and cost over runs.
The Victorian Arts Centre's management and administration was set up under the Victorian Arts Centre Act 1979 introduced into the Victorian parliament by Norman Lacy. The trustees were appointed by the Governor in Council, on the recommendation of the minister. The trust were given responsibility for the operation and programming of the publicly owned performing arts spaces that make up the Victorian Arts Centre – the Theatres Building beneath the Spire, Hamer Hall and the Sidney Myer Music Bowl.
Soon after the legislation to establish the trust was passed, Norman Lacy and George Fairfax undertook a study trip to North America and Europe to assess administrative arrangements, educational programs and community initiatives at major performing arts centres in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Washington, Toronto, Ottawa, London and Paris. The result was the development of Arts Centre Melbourne's management structure during 1981 and a suite of opening and on-going initiatives.
The Concert Hall opened in November 1982, while substantial work remained to be done on the Theatres site. The rest of Arts Centre Melbourne was opened progressively in 1984, with the Theatres building officially opened in October that year. This signified the completion of one of the largest public works projects in Victorian history, which had been undertaken over a period of almost twenty-five years.
Arts Centre Melbourne is unusual in that its theatres and concert hall are built largely underground. Hamer Hall, situated closest to the river, was initially planned to be almost entirely underground, thus providing a huge open vista between the theatre spire, the river and Flinders Street railway station. However, construction problems with the foundations, including water seepage, meant the structure had to be raised to three storeys above ground.
Similarly, budget constraints meant that Grounds' design for the Theatres Building, which included a copper-clad spire, were shelved, and a shortened un-clad design was substituted. This was eventually replaced with the current "full-height" un-clad spire.
In February 2016, serial protesters Katherine Woskett and Hannah Patchett climbed the spire of the center to protest Nauru deportations. They stayed on top of the spire for 11 hours, and disrupted a programmed light show. They unfurled a banner reading #letthemstay. The protesters were not arrested by the police.


The complex features a large steel spire with a wrap-around base.
The original spire envisaged by Roy Grounds was 115 metres tall and because of its complexity was one of the first structures in Australia to rely on computer-aided-design (CAD). After significant public controversy, political inquiry and financial reassessment, the spire was completed by the Minister for the Arts, Norman Lacy, installing the lightning conductor rod at its pinnacle on 20 October 1981.
By the mid-1990s, signs of deterioration became apparent on the upper spire structure and Arts Centre Melbourne's Trust decided to replace the spire. The new spire was completed in 1996, and reaches 162 metres, though it is still based on Grounds' original design. The spire is illuminated with some 6,600 metres (21,653 feet) of optic fibre tubing, 150 metres (492 feet) of neon tubing on the mast and 14,000 incandescent lamps on the spire's skirt. The metal webbing of the spire is influenced by the billowing of a ballerina's tutu and the Eiffel Tower.
A wedge-tailed eagle and peregrine falcon were utilised in early 2008 to deter groups of sulphur-crested cockatoos from damaging the spire's electrical fittings and thimble-sized lights.
On 1 January 2012 the spire was accidentally set afire by New Year's Eve fireworks. Two sides of the structure were set ablaze by fireworks that apparently discharged improperly, causing flaming debris to fall to the ground. The fire burned for about forty minutes, causing only cosmetic damage to the tower.


According to the Smithsonian Archives, "the Congressional appropriation for the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition contained an interesting proviso. It stated that the appropriation was considered a loan, and if income from the exhibition allowed the loan to be repaid, Congress would then allow part of those funds to be used to construct a new building for the National Museum."
The success of the exhibits allowed the loan to be paid off soon after the event. As promised, then, a bill was introduced in Congress two years later by the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian to build a suitable structure. The bill included plans developed by General Montgomery C. Meigs, which were based on the Government Building by James Windrim at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, which was itself inspired by structures at the 1873 Vienna Exposition. Funds were approved in 1879 and the design was executed by Cluss and Schulze, based on the Meigs plan.
During its construction, the materials featured at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition—up to "sixty box cars worth" of donations—were too numerous to fit in the Smithsonian Institution Building and so were temporarily stored in the District Armory Building at the corner of 7th Street SW and Independence Avenue.
According to the aforementioned Smithsonian Archives, "the first event to take place in the new National Museum Building was the Inaugural Ball for President James Garfield and Vice President Chester A. Arthur on March 4, 1881. A temporary wooden floor was laid, two electric lights were placed in the Rotunda, 10,000 bins for hats and coats were erected, 3,000 gas lights were installed, and festive buntings, state flags and seals decorated the halls. A colossal "Statue of America" stood in the Rotundia, illustrative of peace, justice and liberty, grasping in her uplifted hand an electric light "indicative of the skill, genius, progress, and civilization" of America in the 19th century."
Eight months later the museum officially opened to the public. "It contained 80,000 square feet of exhibit space with specially designed mahogany exhibit cases. The exhibit halls contained exhibits on geology, metallurgy, zoology, medicine, anthropology, art, history and technologies such as ceramics, printing, transportation, textiles, fisheries, and agriculture." Under the guidance of George Brown Goode, a historian and ichythyologist, a Division of Arts and Industries and Materia Medica was established that same year and materials from the museum were sent to many late nineteenth century expositions to teach people about the country's political and natural history.


By 1995, the building was reported to be in disrepair and at risk of closing down. By 2000, plastic tarps were in place to protect visitors from debris from the crumbling roof. In 2004, the building was closed to the public indefinitely, as funding for the necessary repairs was uncertain.
The building's uncertain future and deteriorating condition led the National Trust for Historic Preservation to name it in 2006 as one of America's Most Endangered Places, an annual list of endangered historic sites. In 2009 it was scheduled to receive $25 million in funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 for renovation work.
Revitalization of the shell alone was solicited in 2010. A complete restoration was projected to cost $200 million ($65 million in structural renovations alone) and last until the year 2014. It has also been discussed as a possible site for a national Latino American museum. In January 2014, the Smithsonian announced that the building would remain closed for the foreseeable future, citing funding concerns. But on April 12, 2015, Smithsonian Acting Secretary Albert Horvath said about 40 percent of the building would reopen in fall 2015 for use as a short-term exhibit space.  Smithsonian officials said that the building had been architecturally stabilized, and minor refurbishments made to the bathrooms, HVAC system, and interior paint scheme. Horvath said the building would not completely reopen and its fate had not yet been clarified or determined.
After 2015, the building was used occasionally for special events, such as the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. The Arts and Industries Building reopened in November 2021 for its first exhibition since 2004, Futures, scheduled to run through July 2022. Afterward, the building is scheduled to be closed for significant renovations, which would allow it to be permanently reopened as early as 2028. The building is being evaluated as a possible home for the National Museum of the American Latino or the Smithsonian American Women's History Museum.


The name was taken from the very popular medieval legend of King Arthur – a symbol of chivalry and gallantry. First in England, then in other European countries, his name was given to the houses where knights and aristocrats used to meet. In Poland Artus courts were founded and visited by bourgeoisie. There were several courts in Rzeczpospolita but the one in Gdańsk was by far the most famous. In the early 14th century Artus Courts existed in the Hanseatic towns of Elbing (Elbląg), Riga and Stralsund and similar courts like the House of the Blackheads at Riga and Tallinn. It was home to six fraternities which took their names from benches (Banken), the Reinhold's, St. Christopher's or Lübecker, Marienburger, Biblical Magi's, Counsillors' and the Dutch bench. These Confraternities were usually organized according to the merchant's or shipowner's trade relations, e.g. with Lübeck, the Netherlands or Poland and gathered the local elite - members of aristocracy and wealthy bourgeoisie. Already in 1492 merchants from England were allowed to appear at the Court.
The entrance was banned for craftsmen, stall-keepers and hired workers. Wealthy merchants and visitors from abroad gathered here in the evenings. They paid for beverages in advance: 3 Schillings in the 17th century. Initially, at least in theory, talking about dealings was forbidden in the Court as the yard in front of it was designated for such purposes. Different performances took place in the evenings - musicians, singers, rope-dancers and jugglers came to amuse the visitors. Although they were officially banned, gambling, dice and card games as well as various bets were very popular. Normally only beverages and small snacks were served, but sometimes big feasts, which lasted even for a couple of days, were organized there. Especially at the end of the 17th century the feasts organized with great splendour began to turn into all-night drinking bouts. More and more complaints about the customs in the Court were made.
However, not only social meetings took place in the Court. In the 17th century librarians presenting books printed in Danzig appeared there, as well as painters with their art; the banning order for other tradesmen did not apply to them.
The heyday of the Artus Court falls into 16th and 17th century, but its history is much longer. The name of the building "curia regis Artus" (The Court of King Artus), which was built in the years 1348-1350, appeared for the first time in 1357 in the municipal note about the land rental from 1350.
Another building was probably built in 1379. Its traces were probably found during the archeological excavations in 1991.
This building of the Court burnt down in 1476. It was reconstructed few years later, and in 1552 a new façade was constructed which was once more rebuilt in 1617 by Abraham van den Blocke in the style of Dutch Mannerism. The building was adorned with statues of antique heroes (Scipio Africanus, Themistocles, Marcus Furius Camillus and Judas Maccabeus), allegories of strength and justice above and the statue of Fortuna on the gable. Medallions with busts of King of Poland Sigismund III Vasa and his son Władysław IV Vasa, who was a prince at that time, were placed on each side of the portal.
Throughout the Lutheran Reformation the Reinhold's bench organized an anti-Catholic carnival play in 1522, which was staged inside the court.


The interior is one big Gothic hall. Since 1531 it has been completely redecorated - the walls have been covered with wainscot and friezes of mythological and historical character. The richly ornamented furniture and numerous paintings add to the splendour of the hall. The most famous ones are, among others, the works by anonymous artists from the late 15th century - Siege of Marienburg, The Ship of the Church, Orpheus among animals by Hans Vredeman de Vries from 1596 and Last Judgment by Anton Möller. The last painting caused much controversy, as the artist has used the scenery of the city and depicted some significant figures of the period as allegorical characters, such as Pride or Faithlessness. The hall was decorated not only with paintings but also tapestries, ship models, armours, coats of arms, or a cage with exotic birds. The other interesting decoration is the 11-metre high furnace made by Georg Stelzner between 1545-1546. It is covered with 520 tiles depicting the greatest European leaders, both the Protestants - supporters of the Schmalkaldic League, and the Catholics, among which are portraits of Isabella of Portugal and Charles V.
The Artus Court was designed as an exclusive meeting venue for the local elite. Only in 1742, at the request of the town's mercantile companies, the Council agreed to change the Court into the town's stock exchange and the city lost its most famous inn.


Lennart Torstensson (1603–51), a successful general, bought the area west of the square and had his palace built there 1646-51. The main entrance of this building was facing Fredsgatan, the street passing north of the site, while the southern part of the site was still occupied by one-story wooden structures. This was a German-Dutch Renaissance palace in brick in a style widely favoured all over Europe at this time. One of the rooms from this era is still preserved; the former kitchen now serving as the office of the Chief of Protocol. Lennart's son Anders, governor of Estland, made unsuccessful attempts to sell the property to save his economy, and the palace was subsequently taken over by the Crown in 1696 but eventually given back to Torstensson's heir.
King Gustav III's sister Princess Sophia Albertina bought the property in 1793. The king, who wished to give his sister a residence in accordance to her station, commissioned architect Erik Palmstedt to create a new palace which should include the old and adopt the plans for the area north of the Royal Palace.
The architect not only had to create a copy of the building on the opposite side of the square, he was also ordered to ensure the old Renaissance palace would be included into the new, a demand which reflects Gustav III's passion for Gustavus Adolphus and his era.
While Sophia Albertina, before her death in 1829, had the palace bequeathed to the Swedish heir presumptive (i.e. the hereditary prince), it was during the ensuing decades used by court officials and as offices for various authorities, a faith which would eventually prevail. Before Oscar II became king in 1872, he and his wife Sofia used the palace as their residence, where their son, Gustav V, and other members of the royal family, including Prince Eugén, spent parts of their childhood.
The ministry for Foreign Affairs moved there in 1906, but had to share the building with several other authorities until 1936. A comprehensive restoration was made 1948–1952, which among other things resulted in the addition of a building on the courtyard.


The new house of worship completed in 2001 differs entirely from previous Aryan temples, as the Dutch architect Arthur E. de Groot devised in good coöperation with the members of the board and the building committee of Arya Dewaker an octagonal building of two floors. The ground flour includes various meeting rooms and a library and the upper floor is the space where the ceremonies are performed. The place for burning the fire is in the centre of the hall, whereas the benches are placed in circles surrounding the fireplace, which emphasizes that all people attending the fire ceremony are in principle equal. The building is octagonal, so it gives the impression that it is round, which reflects the circular form of the sun, the moon and the earth. The three towers refer to the three eternal units in our universal existence: the absolute God, human being and nature. The roofs of the two smaller towers and the tower on the big dome of the temple all have four floors, a number referring to the four Vedas, the oldest scriptures of Hinduism. The building does not contain any image of a divinity, since the worship of images is forbidden in the Ārya Samāj. Swastikas, Om-syllables and Sanskrit and Hindi sentences in devanagari script are painted on the walls and the ceilings. Some of these texts have a ritual character, such as the Gayatri Mantra, a holy formula derived from the Rig Veda (3,62,10), while other sentences are ethical exhortations derived, for example, from the Manusmrti (Mānava Dharmashāstra). The swastika stands for salvation and the Om-syllable refers to the absolute God, whereas a recitation of Vedic verses is considered to be very powerful.
The architect wished to erect a 'tropical temple', in which the qualities of the buildings in Suriname with their large eaves and verandas and their white painted checkered windows can be recognized. At the same time, the architecture is clearly inspired by the forms and patterns of the era of the Moghuls in India and the time of the Moors in Spain. Some pillars could come directly from the Red Fort in Agra.
During the restoration of 2016-2018 the ceiling is covered with white synthetic plates, which makes the temple room much lighter. Unfortunately the southern fence including its mantras is removed to make space for a parking place for a nearby supermarket.


Located in the western extremity of Sapporo, the park’s lookout, located 137.5 mt above sea level, is surrounded by sculpted gardens with a large lawn, fountain, a terraced Italian flowerbed, French geometric garden and Chinese arbor. Surrounding these are the Learning Forest, which offers hiking paths, with the background of Ezo alder, Ezo spruce, magnolia and false acacia trees.
The Asahiyama Memorial Park also contains a rest house, food and drink stands, a hanging bridge, playground, and space for kids. At night the illuminated fountain and lights of the buildings in central Sapporo beyond, create a popular spot for couples to enjoy the night views of Sapporo.
The park is also the venue of the Sapporo Asahiyama Music Festival held every year in July, with the background of the Toyohira Hanabi.


An example of the gongen-zukuri style of architecture, Asakusa Shrine was commissioned by Tokugawa Iemitsu and constructed in 1649 during Japan's Edo period. It was constructed in order to honor the three men who established and constructed the Sensō-ji. The legend states that two brothers, fishermen named Hinokuma Hamanari and Hinokuma Takenari, found a bosatsu Kannon statuette caught in a fishing-net in the Sumida River on May 17, 628.
The third man, a wealthy landlord named Haji no Matsuchi (Haji no Nakatomo), heard about the discovery and approached the brothers to whom he delivered an impassioned sermon about the Buddha. The brothers were very impressed and subsequently converted to the Buddhist religion. The Kannon statue was consecrated in a small temple by the landlord and the brothers who thereafter devoted their lives to preaching the way of Buddhism. This temple is now known as the Sensō-ji. Asakusa Shrine was built in order to worship these men as deities. The shrine and its surrounding area and buildings have also been the site of many Shinto and Buddhist festivals for centuries. The most important and famous of these festivals is Sanja Matsuri, held in late May.
Unlike many other structures in the area, including the Sensō-ji, the shrine (along with the Nitenmon) survived the Tokyo air raids of 1945. Because of this rich history, it was designated an Important Cultural Property by the Japanese Government in 1951.


The warm and cold water exhibits at the aquarium (a total of 45 tanks containing 720 cubic metres (190,000 US gal) of water) feature marine animals such as sea otters, sea lions, seals, penguins, and dolphins. The dolphin show tank is the largest in the facility and holds 310 cubic metres (82,000 US gal). The seawater tank on the first floor includes a 15-metre (49 ft) acrylic tunnel for viewing the inhabitants from underneath.
First floor
Amphibian display
Seawater tank (tunnel tank)
Warm water creatures (tropical tank)
Marine life
Cold water creatures
Rare fresh water creatures
Delfino gift shop
Second Floor
Tropical rainforest display
Environmental "touch tank"
Dolphin show pool
Dolphins


WikiWeb_Ascension Cathedral (Veliko Tarnovo)_2

The Patriarchal Cathedral of the Holy Ascension of God is located on top of the Tsarevets hill, overlooking the modern city of Veliko Tarnovo. The church was part of a group of buildings which constituted the seat of the Bulgarian Patriarchate and acted as the city and the country's main cathedral. The patriarchate on Tsarevets was a fortress of its own, with two defensive towers and an entrance on its west wall. The Patriarchal Cathedral stood in the middle of its courtyard.
The Patriarchal Cathedral features a triple apse, the central part of which matches the apse of the original basilica on the site. The three-naved church follows the traditional Byzantine cross-in-square design. Built out of crushed stones and mortar with limited brickwork, it measures 26 by 12 metres (85 ft × 39 ft). The cathedral includes two narthices, a bell tower and two other premises attached to the south church wall. The presence of a bell tower is considered to be a rarity in Balkan church architecture. Six columns support the interior and distinguish the altar from the cella (naos). It is unclear whether the church housed a synthronon (stone benches for the clergy) in the apse, as there are doubts that its remains may actually be part of the older basilica.
The church featured ample exterior and interior decoration. While the facades were decorated with arches and ceramic tiles, the interior floor mosaics were made of white, yellow and pink marble as well as semi-precious gemstones like sapphire and porphyry. The interior walls were covered with frescoes and mosaics. However, none of the interior decoration has survived. During the church's 20th-century reconstruction, its interior was repainted by artist Teofan Sokerov, who depicted important moments of medieval Bulgarian history in a modernist style. Due to these murals, the church has never been reconsecrated and remains inactive. The facade of the cathedral also includes a stone with a donor's inscription of a Bulgarian ruler, which ended up as part of the building material.
There are a total of four burial grounds in and around the church, two of which are burials for priests. One of the burial grounds is inside the exonarthex, where overarched tombs were built in the 14th century. Besides Michael the Warrior's relics, the cathedral also housed the remains of Bulgarian patriarchs Joachim I, Macarius and Joachim III.


The historian Mario Sabatucci has attributed a symbolic reading to the form of Ascoli's baptistery according to Christian doctrine. According to his interpretation, the square base represents the earth and its four elements (air, earth, fire, and water), the four points of the compass, the four seasons, and the four periods of a human life-span. The octagonal tiburio calls to mind baptism as described by St. Peter in his first letter: (3,20-21) « while God patiently waited to receive them, in Noah's time when the ark was being built. In it only a few, that is eight souls, were saved through water. It is the baptism corresponding to this water which saves you now ... » The round cupola, like a circle or a sphere, represents eternity and paradise.


On the death of Mrs. Leopold de Rothschild in 1937 the house was inherited by her son Anthony Gustav de Rothschild. He and his wife, the former Yvonne D'Anvers, enlarged the house further, and were responsible for the present interiors, full of notable paintings and (unusually for a Rothschild House) a large collection of 18th-century English furniture.
The ground floor contains the principal suite of large reception rooms, and while these rooms are furnished with works of art and furniture, they are low ceilinged, and, continuing the informal concept of the design, are in no way intended to be state rooms. The entrance hall is notable for its large paintings by Thomas Gainsborough, George Romney, and Joshua Reynolds and the large work by George Stubbs, "Five Mares". The dining room, now decorated with what appear to be Dutch tiles but is in fact trompe-l'œil, contains a collection of small, mainly Dutch, paintings from the 16th and 17th centuries by such artists as Aelbert Cuyp, Adriaen van Ostade and Jan Steen.
The works of art continue through the common room, with its portrait of a prelate attributed to Lorenzo Lotto. The Drawing Room today displays a collection of blue Chinese ceramics with examples from the Han dynasty circa 206 BC, to the Qing dynasty which lasted from 1644 until 1911. This room contains the painting of the Madonna and Child with St. John by Andrea del Sarto of 1520.
In 1936 the Billiards Room was transformed into a library to house the many volumes amassed by Anthony de Rothschild. One of the most comfortable rooms in the house, its book-lined walls are only interrupted by Gainsborough's full-length portrait of the Duchess of Richmond, and various other masterpieces. Standing on a console table is Tiepolo's "The Assumption of the Virgin". The room also contains furniture by Thomas Chippendale and ancient Chinese ceramics.


Ascott House, with some of its important art collection and a small part of the estate, was given in 1947 to the National Trust by Anthony de Rothschild. The National Trust market the property under the name "Ascott". However, as at nearby Waddesdon Manor, the Rothschild family retain a very close control over Ascott, and the present resident of the house is the son of the donor, Sir Evelyn de Rothschild. He has added further works of art and ceramics to the collection and much of what is seen in the collection is still privately owned by the Rothschild family.
Sir Evelyn de Rothschild has also expanded the estate to its present size of approximately 3200 acres (13 km²). The estate contains many miles of new road-side tree planting, well-kept hedging, and cropping and planting of new woodland but retains some of the older permanent pasture and small fields. A major new road, the A505 ploughs through the area between the house and its Stud Farm, but has been disguised by dense woodland planting.
Postcards and guidebooks are available for sale within Ascott House. The house retains very much the feel of a private house, and is open to the public in the afternoon of many weekdays during summer.


The Ashbel Smith Building, also known as Old Red, is a Romanesque Revival building located in Galveston, Texas. It was built in 1891 with red brick and sandstone.
 Nicholas J. Clayton was the architect. It was the first University of Texas Medical Branch building.
In 1949, the building named for Ashbel Smith, a Republic of Texas diplomat and one of the founders of the University of Texas System. The building was registered as a Texas Historical Landmark in 1969 and renovated in 1985.
In 2008, Old Red was flooded with six feet of water by Hurricane Ike. It was also one of the few buildings to survive the Galveston Hurricane of 1900.


In 1845, the Midland Railway were planning to build the Atherstone, Ashby-de-la-Zouch and Burton-on-Trent railway, and offered to buy the canal for £110,000. They agreed to maintain the canal until the railway was built, but there was no longer-term agreement on its future. Since most of the coal which used the canal travelled onwards via the Coventry Canal and the Oxford Canal, these companies faced a big drop in toll revenues, and fought hard to get the Midland Railway's bill amended. As well as a commitment to maintaining the canal, they also had a clause added which allowed the Coventry Canal to undertake maintenance and charge the railway for the work if the railway company failed in their obligations. An Act of Parliament was passed in 1846, which authorised the takeover, but the railway line as envisioned was not built. It was nearly 30 years later that serious railway competition arrived, when the London and North Western Railway and the Midland Railway jointly opened the Ashby and Nuneaton Joint Railway from Overseal to Nuneaton in 1873. The following year, the Midland reused the section of tramway from Ashby to Worthington, Leicestershire, enlarging the Old Parks tunnel, as part of a line that ran through Melbourne to Derby. The remainder of the tramway lines were kept for local use, with the branch to Ticknall closing in 1915.
The canal continued to carry significant tonnages, which gradually decreased, from 138,117 tons in 1862 to 113,659 tons in 1882. After that, the decline was more rapid, dropping to 33,329 tons by 1893. By the 1890s, the railway owners had reduced maintenance on the canal, knowing that the Coventry Canal were unlikely to invoke their powers under the 1846 Act, since they too were in trouble. On 2 January 1918, there was a major breach in the canal when an embankment some 2 miles (3.2 km) below Moira collapsed. The cost of reinstatement was £9,864, and the canal reopened on 23 July 1919. The upper section was increasingly affected by subsidence from the coal mining. Despite this, the Moira Coal Company shipped 20,807 tons along the canal in 1943, and the total tonnage on the canal that year was 43,733 tons. The owners, by now the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS), tried to give the canal to the Coventry Canal company in 1944, but they refused it unless there was money to fund the maintenance. The 2.5-mile (4 km) section from Moira to Donisthorpe was promptly abandoned, allowing the Moira Coal Company to mine under its course. Another 5 miles (8 km) were closed in 1957, under an Act of Parliament obtained by the British Transport Commission, and the Measham to Snarestone section was closed in 1966, even though coal was regularly loaded there.
Traces of the old railway can still be seen, particularly towards Ticknall. A low embankment, still with some stone sleeper blocks crosses a field and a tunnel passes under the drive to Calke Abbey. There is also an arch bridge in Ticknall village where the line ran into the quarries.


The 6-mile (9.7 km) stretch between Carlton Bridge, north of Market Bosworth, and Turnover Bridge, north of Snarestone is a 15.4 hectare biological Site of Special Scientific Interest in Leicestershire, designated in 1989.
The site has diverse aquatic flora and invertebrates, and the submerged plants are of particular interest. These include mare's tail, spiked water-milfoil and perfoliate pondweed. Nine species of dragonfly have been recorded, and there are also water shrews and the nationally rare water beetle Haliplus mucronatus. In 2013, the Canal and River Trust received a grant of nearly £20,000 from Natural England to enable them to tackle invasive species such as mink, terrapins, zander, Japanese knotweed and giant hogweed.


A manor had existed at Ashby-de-la-Zouch from at least 1086, when the location was known as Ascebi. The lands were acquired by Robert de Beaumont, the Count of Meulan and later Earl of Leicester, in 1100. He established the Belmeis family there as his tenants and, after the Belmeis family line died out in 1160, the earls of Leicester reassigned the estate to the le Zouch family, from whom the manor took its later name.
At some point during this period, a manor house was constructed on the same site as the later castle, with a hall and a solar. A settlement grew up alongside the house and, by 1334, the town was probably the sixth-largest in the county. By the mid-1300s, the manor house reportedly included a hall, a chamber, a long house containing service facilities, and was surrounded by a dovecote, orchard and a rabbit warren, accompanied by a 60-acre (24 ha) deer park. The hall and solar were rebuilt by the le Zouches during the second half of the 14th century, but the building remained what the historian Norman Pounds has called a "rather modest manor house".
The le Zouch line died out in 1399, leaving the inheritance of the family estates uncertain. The manor probably passed to Sir Hugh Burnell and, around 1420, onto James Butler, the Earl of Ormond and Wiltshire. The Wars of the Roses broke out in England during 1455 between the rival supporters of the Lancastrian and Yorkist factions. James, a Lancastrian, was captured at the Battle of Towton by the Yorkist leader Edward IV in 1461 and executed; the Crown seized his estates, including the manor of Ashby de la Zouch.
Ashby de la Zouch was converted into a castle by William, Lord Hastings, a favourite of Edward IV; as a minor nobleman he had fought alongside Edward at Towton, but was then knighted and later became the chamberlain of the royal household and the Lieutenant of Calais. William acquired extensive estates across the Midlands during the wars, much of them confiscated from his enemies. Amongst these was Ashby de la Zouch, which was given to William in 1462. His father, Sir Leonard, had maintained the family seat at nearby Kirby Muxloe, but after 1471 William began to use Ashby de la Zouch as his primary residence.
In 1474, Edward granted William the right to crenellate, or fortify, four of his manors and to build deer parks around them. William set about developing the old manorial complex at Ashby de la Zouch with new buildings, and was authorised to create a huge 3,000-acre (1,200 ha) park around it. His intent appears to have been to construct a substantial castle, similar to the royal fortifications at Tutbury and Nottingham, with four huge towers. Work appears to have already started on the site the year before permission was formally given, although it is uncertain whether this referred to the construction of the castle's chapel, or if William had already begun work on the first tower, gambling that the King would subsequently approve it.
Edward IV died in 1483, leaving the kingdom to his young son, Edward V, but his uncle, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, had his own ambitions for the throne. Lord Hastings was unwilling to support the deposition of Edward V and, as a consequence, Richard summarily executed him that June, ahead of his own coronation. Ashby de la Zouch Castle, only partially completed, and Lord Hastings' other estates were then restored to his widow, Katherine.


Ashdown Forest is an ancient area of open heathland occupying the highest sandy ridge-top of the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It is situated some 30 miles (48 km) south of London in the county of East Sussex, England. Rising to an elevation
of 732 feet (223 m) above sea level, its heights provide expansive vistas across the heavily wooded hills of the Weald to the chalk escarpments of the North Downs and South Downs on the horizon.
Ashdown Forest's origins lie as a medieval hunting forest created soon after the Norman conquest of England. By 1283 the forest was fenced in by a 23 miles (37 km) pale enclosing an area of some 20 square miles (52 km²; 13,000 acres; 5,200 ha). Thirty-four gates and hatches in the pale, still remembered in place names such as Chuck Hatch and Chelwood Gate, allowed local people to enter to graze their livestock, collect firewood, and cut heather and bracken for animal bedding. The forest continued to be used by the monarchy and nobility for hunting into Tudor times, including notably Henry VIII, who had a hunting lodge at Bolebroke Castle, Hartfield and who courted Anne Boleyn at nearby Hever Castle.
Ashdown Forest has a rich archaeological heritage. It contains much evidence of prehistoric human activity, with the earliest evidence of human occupation dating back to 50,000 years ago. There are important Bronze Age, Iron Age, and Romano-British remains.
The forest was the centre of a nationally important iron industry on two occasions, during the Roman occupation of Britain and in the Tudor period when, in 1496, England's first blast furnace was built at Newbridge, near Coleman's Hatch, marking the beginning of Britain's modern iron and steel industry.
In 1693, more than half the forest was taken into private hands, with the remainder set aside as common land. The latter today covers 9.5 square miles (25 km²; 6,100 acres; 2,500 ha) and is the largest area with open public access in South East England.
The ecological importance of Ashdown Forest's heathlands is reflected by its designation as a Site of Special Scientific Interest, as a Special Protection Area for birds, and as a Special Area of Conservation for its heathland habitats. It is part of the European Natura 2000 network as it hosts some of Europe's most threatened species and habitats.
Ashdown Forest is famous as the setting for the Winnie-the-Pooh stories written by A. A. Milne, who lived on the northern edge of the forest and took his son, Christopher Robin, walking there. The artist E. H. Shepard drew on the landscapes of Ashdown Forest as inspiration for many of the illustrations he provided for the Pooh books.


Ashdown Forest notably lacks any significant settlements within the large boundary defined by its medieval pale. There are however a number of villages situated on the edge of the forest adjacent to the pale or close to it. These include Nutley, Fairwarp, Danehill and Maresfield to the south and Forest Row and Hartfield to the north. The town of Crowborough abuts the forest on its eastern side while the town of East Grinstead lies 3 miles (4.8 km) to the north-west.


The underlying geology of Ashdown Forest is mostly sandstone, predominantly the Lower Cretaceous Ashdown Formation. This forms a layer varying from 500 feet (150 m) to 700 feet (210 m) thick, consists of fine-grained, silty interbedded sandstones and siltstones with subordinate amounts of shale and mudstone. It is the oldest Cretaceous geological formation that crops out in the Weald.
The Ashdown Formation has been exposed by the erosion, over many millions of years, of a geological dome, the Weald-Artois Anticline, a process which has left the dome's oldest layers, the resistant sandstones that form its central east–west axis, as a high forest ridge that includes Ashdown, St. Leonard's, and Worth forests. This forest ridge, the most prominent part of the High Weald, is surrounded by successive concentric bands of younger sandstones and clays, and finally chalk. These form hills or vales depending on their relative resistance to erosion. Consequently, what the viewer sees when looking north or south across the Weald from the heights of Ashdown Forest is a series of successively younger geological formations. These include heavily wooded lowlands formed on Weald Clay, the high Greensand Ridge escarpment that rises prominently to the north, and, on the horizon, the chalk escarpments of the North Downs and South Downs (see diagram, right).
The Ashdown Formation is the lowest (oldest) layer of the Hastings Beds, which comprise (in sequence) the Ashdown Formation, Wadhurst Clay Formation, and Tunbridge Wells Sand Formation, and which are now thought to be predominantly fluvial flood-plain deposits. The Hastings Beds in turn represent the oldest part of the series of Cretaceous geological formations that make up the Weald-Artois Anticline, comprising (in sequence, from oldest to youngest) the Hastings Beds, Weald Clay, Lower Greensand, Gault, Upper Greensand, and Chalk. The anticline, which stretches from South East England into northern France, and is breached by the English Channel, was created soon after the end of the Cretaceous period as a result of the Alpine orogeny. Ashdown Forest is itself situated on a local dome, the Crowborough Anticline.
Much of the iron ore that provided the raw material for the iron industry of Ashdown Forest was obtained from the Wadhurst Clay, which is sandwiched between the Ashdown Sands and Tunbridge Wells Sands (the latter encircles Ashdown Forest forming an extensive district of hilly, wooded countryside). Outcrops of Wadhurst Clay, which occurs as both nodules and in tabular masses, are distributed discontinuously in a horseshoe shape around Ashdown Forest, which has influenced the historical geography of iron-working around the forest.
Like the rest of the Weald, Ashdown lay beyond the southern limits of Quaternary ice sheets, but the whole area was subject at times to a severe periglacial environment that has contributed to its geology and shaped its landforms.


Ashdown Forest is one of the largest single continuous blocks of lowland heath, semi-natural woodland and valley bog in south east England. Its geology is a major influence on its biology and ecology. The underlying sandstone geology of the Ashdown Sands, when combined with a local climate that is generally wetter, cooler and windier than the surrounding area owing to the forest's elevation, which rises from 200 feet (61 m) to over 700 feet (210 m) above sea level, gives rise to sandy, largely podzolic soils that are characteristically acid, clay, and nutrient-poor. On these poor, infertile soils have developed heathland, valley mires and damp woodland. These conditions have never favoured cultivation and have been a barrier to agricultural improvement.
The forest predominantly consists of lowland heathland. Of the 2,472 ha of forest common land, 55% (1365 ha) is heathland while 40% (997 ha) is mixed woodland. Lowland heathland is a particularly valuable but increasingly threatened habitat harbouring rare plant and animal species, which lends the forest importance at a European level. The survival of the forest's extensive heathlands has become all the more important when set against the large-scale loss of English lowland heathland over the last 200 years; within the county of East Sussex, heathland has shrunk by 50% over the last 200 years, and most of what remains is in Ashdown Forest.


Forest streams, often lined by alder trees such as Alnus glutinosa, and grey sallow Salix cinerea, birch and oak, cut through the soft sandstone forming steep-sided valleys (ghylls) that are sheltered from winter frosts and remain humid in summer, creating conditions more familiar in the Atlantic-facing western coastal regions of Britain. Uncommon bryophytes such as the liverwort Nardia compressa and a range of ferns including the mountain fern Oreopteris limbosperma and the hay-scented buckler fern Dryopteris aemula thrive in this “Atlantic” microclimate.
The damming of streams, digging for marl, and quarrying have produced several large ponds containing, particularly in former marl pits, localised rafts of broad-leaved pondweed Potamogeton natans, beds of bulrush (reedmace) Typha latifolia and water horsetail Equisetum fluviatile.


Woodland covers nearly 1,000 hectares (2,500 acres) of the forest, 40% of its area Most of the woodland on the common land of the forest is young and contains few older trees; there is little ancient woodland, defined as woodland that has been continuously wooded since 1600. Almost all the latter that exists within the medieval forest pale is found on land that was set aside in the 1693 division of the forest for private ownership and exploitation. Some wooded ghylls however do contain older trees and there are a few individual old trees, especially beech, that mark former boundaries.
The two most common forms of forest woodland are oak woods on acid brown earth soils, including hazel and chestnut coppice (62% of the total woodland area), and birch woods with oak in degenerating heathlands (27%). Alder trees growing in wet and waterlogged peaty soils account for about 1% of the woodland, while birch and willow trees growing in wet areas each account for less than 1%. Beechwoods growing on acid brown earth soils account for another 3%.
The clumps of Scots pine that form such a distinctive, iconic hilltop feature of Ashdown Forest were first planted in 1816 by the Lord of the Manor to provide habitats for blackgame. 20th-century plantings comprise Macmillan Clump near Chelwood Gate (commemorating former British prime-minister Harold Macmillan, who lived at Birch Grove, on the edge of the forest at Chelwood Gate), Kennedy Clump (commemorating a visit to the area by John F. Kennedy, when he stayed with Macmillan), Millennium Clump and Friends Clump, planted in 1973 to mark the Year of the Tree.


The forest supports a rich invertebrate fauna, with many heathland specialities. Half of Britain's 46 breeding species of damselflies and dragonflies (the Odonata) have been recorded, the scarcer among them being the black darter, brilliant emerald and small red damselfly. It is also an important home for the golden-ringed dragonfly, which flies from mid-June to early September. Of the forest's 34 species of butterfly, the most spectacular, the purple emperor, can be hard to see. Another speciality, the silver-studded blue, is by contrast plentiful, with the main food plants of its caterpillars being gorses and heathers.


Deer have been a major feature of Ashdown Forest at least since its days as a medieval hunting forest. Red deer, an essential part of Wealden culture as long as 6-8,000 years ago, and fallow deer, already present in Sussex in the Romano-British era and particularly favoured by the Normans for hunting, were both hunted in the forest until the 17th century. By the end of the 17th century, however, the red deer had disappeared completely from the forest while fallow deer had declined to very low numbers. The depletion of the woodlands, which provided deer with cover, the deterioration of the forest pale, which allowed them to escape, and the depredations of poachers were all factors in their decline.
Fallow deer returned in the 20th century, probably as a result of escapes from the Sackville estate, Buckhurst Park. The population roaming the forest has grown sharply in the last three decades, in common with deer herds elsewhere in England, and they now number in their thousands. Also present are roe deer (the only native deer roaming the forest) and two recently introduced species, muntjac and sika deer.
Many deer are involved in collisions with motor vehicles on local roads as they move around the forest to feed at dawn and dusk, and many are killed. In 2009 the forest rangers dealt with 244 deer casualties compared with 266 the year before. However, this is likely to be a significant underestimate as the rangers do not deal with all the casualties that occur. The forest conservators have identified a need to reduce the deer population and have been working with major neighbouring private landowners on measures to cull them.


Ashdown Forest is the largest public access space in south east England, and the largest area of open, uncultivated countryside. A 2008 visitor survey estimated that at least 1.35 million visits are made each year. The most common reason given for visiting the forest was its "openness". Most visitors (85%) coming by car travelled 10 km or less and there were 62 dogs for every 100 visitors.
Despite such large numbers of visitors, the forest has retained its celebrated tranquillity and sense of openness. The commons are freely open to the public, who are attracted by the large, elevated expanse of unspoiled heaths and woodlands where they may walk, picnic or simply sit while taking in the glorious views. Various bye-laws passed by the conservators help protect the forest environment for the public good, prohibiting such activities as, for example, mountain biking, off-road driving of motor vehicles, camping and the lighting of fires.


Most visitors come by car, and access is straightforward. The forest is crossed by a major road, the A22, which provides access from the M25 and M23 motorways. There are over 40 car parks across the forest to discourage drivers from parking their vehicles on roadsides. In January 2022 the Conservators announced the findings of a public consultation and then voted to introduce car parking charges to the forest for the first time   The nearest railway station is at East Grinstead, which receives frequent train services from London. The railway stations at Tunbridge Wells, Eridge, Crowborough and Uckfield are also nearby. Two bus services cross the forest, the 261 service from East Grinstead railway station to Uckfield and the 270 service from East Grinstead railway station to Haywards Heath. London Gatwick Airport is about 30 minutes away by car, and London Heathrow Airport is around 1 hour away by car.


Ashdown Forest is very popular with walkers. Two long-distance footpaths, the Vanguard Way and Wealdway cross the forest and meet near Old Lodge. The Wealdway passes through Five Hundred Acre Wood, the Hundred Acre Wood of the Winnie-the-Pooh stories. The Ashdown Forest Centre produces a series of leaflets detailing walks in various parts of the forest, which may also be downloaded from its website.
There are 82 miles (132 km) of tracks on the forest that may be ridden by horse once an annual permit has been obtained from the conservators. The main horse-riding organisation is the Ashdown Forest Riding Association, which has around 200 members.
The forest, with its attractive landscapes, vistas and hills, is a popular destination for road cyclists, races and cyclosportives such as the Hell of the Ashdown. Former Tour de France rider Sean Yates lives at Forest Row and has taken Lance Armstrong training here. Off-road cycling and mountain biking is prohibited for environmental reasons, except along public bridleways. A local pressure group is campaigning for this ban to be lifted.
The Royal Ashdown Forest Golf Club occupies a large area of leasehold land in the northern part of the forest near Forest Row. It is a traditional members' club founded in 1888 at the instigation of Earl De La Warr, lord of the manor, who became its first president. Its two 18-hole heathland courses are notable for the absence of bunkers (at the insistence of the conservators). As elsewhere in Ashdown Forest, trees and bracken scrub have invaded following the cessation of grazing and decreased wood cutting by the commoners, and the club is working with the conservators to restore the golf courses to their original heathland character.
The principal hotel within the forest is the Ashdown Park Hotel & Country Club, a listed 19th-century mansion house set in 186 acres (0.75 km²).


The Ashdown Forest Centre, situated opposite Ashdown Park Hotel between Wych Cross and Coleman's Hatch, houses a visitor centre and is the administrative base for the Board of Conservators of Ashdown Forest. Completed in 1983, it consists of three old reconstructed barns. The visitor centre has a permanent display about the forest's history and wildlife, details of walks in the forest and much other useful information for visitors, and an exhibition area for local craft and art work. It is open 7 days a week during the summer, weekends in the winter, and on bank holidays except Christmas Day and Boxing Day.


Possibly as early as the 13th century, Ashdown Forest was enclosed as a hunting park, mainly for deer, by a 24-mile (39 km) long pale. This consisted of an earth bank 4–5 feet high surmounted by an oak paling fence with a deep ditch on the forest side that allowed deer to enter but not to leave. It enclosed an area of over 20½ square miles (5,300 hectares). Entry was via 34 gates and hatches, gates being used for access by wheeled vehicles, commoners' animals and mounted groups, hatches by pedestrians. These names survive in local place-names such as Chuck Hatch and Chelwood Gate. Some of these entrances were, and still are, marked by pubs, for example the 18th-century Hatch Inn at Coleman's Hatch, which occupies three former cottages believed to date to 1430 that later may have housed ironworkers from the nearby blast furnace at Newbridge.
It is not known precisely when the pale was built. Forest management accounts of 1283 refer to the cost of repairing the pale and building new lengths. However, the granting of the "Free-chase of Ashdon" to John of Gaunt in 1372 and its renaming as Lancaster Great Park (see below) implies that the forest may only have been recently enclosed (chase denoted an open hunting ground, park an enclosed one).
The condition of the forest pale seems to have deteriorated significantly during the Tudor period. This coincided with, and may be partly linked to, the rapid growth under the Tudors of the local iron-making industry with its huge demand for raw materials in and around Ashdown Forest, such as charcoal and ironstone. This ultimately led to an appeal to King James, soon after his accession to the throne, for Ashdown's forest fences to be repaired in order to preserve the king's game. However, the pale seems to have fallen into almost complete disrepair by the end of the 17th century.
The bank and ditch associated with the pale are still visible in places around Ashdown Forest today, for example at Legsheath and adjacent to the car-park for Poohsticks Bridge on Chuck Hatch Lane.


During the 17th century, under both the Stuart monarchy and during the Interregnum, there were repeated proposals to inclose (enclose) and develop the forest. Under James I and Charles I parcels of land were sold off piecemeal. During the Interregnum the condition of the forest deteriorated so much that by the time of the Restoration, in 1660, it was in a state where "the whole forest [is] laid open and made waste". Attempts to enclose and improve the forest (for example, by introducing rabbit farming, or sowing crops) were however strongly opposed throughout by the local commoners, who claimed rights of common on the forest, having exercised them "from time out of mind", as well as by neighbouring estates who claimed right of pasture there.
In 1662 the forest was granted to one of Charles II's closest allies, George Digby, Earl of Bristol, and it was formally disafforested to allow Bristol a free hand to improve it. His attempts to do so were however frustrated "by the crossness of the neighbourhood"; the fences he erected were thrown down and the crops he sowed were trampled by cattle.  He defaulted on his rental payments to the Crown and left.  Subsequent Lords of the Manor suffered similar opposition from the commoners.  Compromise proposals were made to divide up the forest that would leave sufficient common land to meet the needs of commoners, while giving the rest up for improvement.
These unresolved tensions came to a head when, in 1689, a major landowner and 'Master of the Forest', Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset, brought a legal suit against 133 commoners in the court of the Duchy of Lancaster.  The court decided to appoint commissioners to divide up Ashdown Forest's 13,991 acres (5,662 ha) in a way that would meet the needs of both defendants and plaintiffs.  The commissioners made their award on 9 July 1693.  They set aside 6,400 acres (2,600 ha), mostly in the vicinity of farms and villages, as common land, where the commoners were granted sole right of pasturage and the right to cut birch, alder and willow (but no other trees).  The commoners were however excluded forever from the rest of the forest, about 55 per cent of its area, which was assigned for "inclosure and improvement" (though substantial areas had already been enclosed by then, so in such cases the decree was merely confirming the status quo).
The land award of 1693 is largely responsible for shaping the map of Ashdown Forest today. The common land is highly fragmented and irregular in shape, broken up by many private enclosures, large and small. It tends to lie on the periphery of the forest near existing settlements. Some of the largest enclosures, such as Hindleap Warren, Prestridge Warren, Broadstone Warren and Crowborough Warren, mostly lying towards the centre of the forest, were used for a time for intensive rabbit farming.  Some of these enclosures have today acquired interesting uses: Pippingford Park, in the very centre of the forest, occupied by the army in 1939 as a defence against Operation Sea Lion, remains an important military training area,  Broadstone Warren is a scout camp and activity centre, while Hindleap Warren is an outdoor education centre.
Although the 1693 land award envisaged enclosure and improvement for profitable gain, the land it allotted to private exploitation has in fact largely remained uncultivated; this has helped Ashdown Forest to retain the appearance of being an extensive area of wild country that is so valued today. That said, there is nevertheless a visible contrast between the areas of common land, maintained by the conservators, which are predominantly heathland, and the extensive privately held lands, which are generally either quite heavily wooded or cleared for pasture.


Ashdown Forest's iron industry flourished in the two eras when the Weald was the main iron-producing region of Britain, namely in the first 200 years of the Roman period (1st to 3rd centuries AD) and in the Tudor period (late 15th and 16th centuries). Ashdown was favoured by the widespread presence of iron-ore, extensive woodlands for the production of charcoal, and deep, steep-sided valleys (locally known as ghylls) that could be dammed to provide water power for furnaces and forges.
The forest is the site of Britain's first confirmed blast furnace, at Newbridge, which began operation in 1496. Henry VII commissioned it for the production of heavy metalwork for gun carriages for his war against the Scots. Immigrants from Northern France brought with them the technology for a furnace that they would operate.
Spurred by the development of blast furnaces, the iron industry grew very rapidly during the 16th century and would become noted for the casting of cannons and cannonballs for the English navy. The celebrated ironmaster and gunfounder Ralph Hogge, who in 1543 made the first one-piece, cast-iron cannon in England at nearby Buxted, drew his raw materials from the southern part of the forest. However, the huge demand for raw materials and fuel, particularly charcoal, heavily depleted Ashdown Forest's woodlands, causing much concern and prompting commissions of enquiry by the king. In due course coppice management was used to ensure a more sustainable supply.
In the 17th century the industry would die out as a result of competition from lower-cost iron-producing areas.


The common land of Ashdown Forest, amounting to some 6,400 acres (2,600 ha), consists of specific areas of the forest, registered under the Commons Registration Act 1965, which only those who possess particular rights of common - commoners - are entitled to use and exploit in certain specified ways. These common rights are attached to certain landholdings around the forest, not to individual people, and are passed on when properties are sold or inherited. Since 1885 the common land has been regulated and protected by a statutory Board of Conservators.
Contrary to widespread belief, a 'common' in England is not 'public land'. However, in the case of Ashdown Forest, the conservators have given the public open access to the common land, subject to compliance with bye-laws that largely aim to preserve the special character of the forest.
A right of common may be defined as:
...a right, which one or more persons may have, to take or use some portion of that which another man's soil naturally produces...
On Ashdown Forest the rights of common have varied over time. Those that remain today, which are subject to local byelaws and are under the control of the conservators, are:
pasturage (or grazing rights): the right to graze sheep, cattle, goats, geese or mill horses (horses that provide power for the mill) on the forest.
estovers: today, understood to be the right to cut birch, willow or alder for use in the "ancestral hearth", which may only be exercised at certain times and in certain areas designated by the conservators.
brakes and litter: the right to cut brake (bracken) and heather and to collect litter for the principal purpose of bedding down livestock in winter on the land-holding.
Today, to a varying degree, every property possessing common rights has some or all of these rights over the registered common land of the forest.
To become a commoner a person must acquire commonable land; conversely, a person selling a commonable property ceases to be a commoner. Where a commonable property is sold off in smaller portions, the commonable rights are apportioned in accordance with the area of each portion. All commoners are obliged to pay a Forest Rate (based on the area of commonable land held) to contribute towards the administration of the forest by the Board of Conservators, and they are entitled to elect five commoners' representatives to the Board.
A sharp decline in commoning after the end of World War II resulted in a rapid loss of the forest's open heathland to scrub and trees, threatening the many specialised and rare plants and animals that depend on the heathland and jeopardising the forest's famous open landscape with its magnificent vistas, so well captured in EH Shepard's Winnie-the-Pooh illustrations. The Board of Conservators has responded by moving beyond its original administrative and regulatory functions to play a more active, interventionist role in combating the invasion of scrub and trees with the aim of restoring the heathland to a favourable condition.


There are various theories and controversies as to when the Ashikaga Gakkō was founded, ranging from the early Heian period to the Kamakura period, with sometime around the year 839 or 842 being the most likely based on documentary evidence. The school had declined in the first half of the Muromachi period but was revived by Uesugi Norizane in 1432 when he became lord of the surrounding Shimotsuke Province. Ujizane invited priest from Engaku-ji in Kamakura and donated books from his own collection to revitalize the schools and as a result Ashikaga Gakkō again attracted were students from all over the country. He also fixed the curriculum around Chinese classical literature, Confucianism, Liezi, Zhuangzi, Shiji, I Ching and Chinese medicine. Although the instructors were mostly Zen monks, the school was a center for Confucianism and secular learning, with the teaching of Buddhist theology and doctrines expressly excluded. During the Sengoku period studies also included practical sciences, and an alternative "light curriculum" was devised for the sons of military commanders rather than full-time scholars. Tuition was free and students were expected to find accommodation at local private houses. The school had a garden to grow its own food and an herb garden to raise medicinal herbs.
The Ashikaga Gakkō suffered from a fire in 1530, but was rebuilt under the patronage of Hōjō Ujimasa and its number of students around that time was estimated at 3000. The Jesuit missionary Francisco Xavier described the school in his reports to Rome as "the largest and most famous academy in Bando" and the largest of the eleven universities and academies in Japan. However, with the rise to power of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the Late Hōjō clan was destroyed in 1590 and the Ashikaga clan no longer had any power or influence. The Ashikaga Gakkō lost the estates that provided it with financial support and a part of its collection was looted by Hideyoshi and taken to Kyoto. Under the Tokugawa shogunate, the Ashikaga Gakkō's fortunes revived, but only slightly. Tokugawa Ieyasu granted the school a fief of 100 koku for its upkeep, and the school was also protected by the daimyō of Ashikaga Domain. However, by the middle to end of the Edo period, its teachings were increasingly regarded as obsolete, as the Neo-Confucianism of the Cheng–Zhu school became orthodoxy. By the end of the Edo period, the Ashikaga Gakkō was regarded by leading scholars as little more than a library.
After the Meiji restoration, Confucianism itself fell from favor. Ashikaga Gakkō was closed and half the site was converted into a local elementary school. Many of its buildings were removed or destroyed. In addition, the new Tochigi Prefecture attempted to appropriate its library. In 1903, the local government established the first public library in Tochigi Prefecture, on the grounds of the Ashikaga Gakkō to preserve the old collections and to collect general books. In 1928, the site of Ashikaga Gakkō and existing buildings such as the Confucius Temple and gate received protection as a National Historic Site. A large scale restoration project began in the 1980s, which involved removing the elementary school and restoring the buildings and gardens to reproduce the Ashikaga Gakkō as it was during the middle of the Edo period.


Ashkelon National Park (Hebrew: גן לאומי אשקלון) is an Israeli national park  along the shore of the Mediterranean Sea southwest of the city of Ashkelon.
The national park is situated in the heart of ancient Ashkelon. It is surrounded by a wall built in the mid-12th century by the Fatimid Caliphate. The wall was originally 2,200 meters in length, 50 meters in width and 15 meters in height. The remains of the wall are located in the eastern and southern parts of the national park.
The site contains archeological remains of the different civilizations that lived in the area, including Canaanites, Philistines, Persians, Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Muslims and Crusaders. Roman remains include marble and granite columns and capitals, a Roman basilica and Roman statues. The site also features a Middle Bronze Age gate with the world's earliest arch, dating back to approximately 1850 BCE.


In 1815, Lady Hester Stanhope's expedition to Ashkelon constituted the first modern archaeological excavation in Palestine. Using a medieval Italian manuscript as her guide, she persuaded the Ottoman authorities to allow her to excavate the site in search of a large hoard of gold coins allegedly buried under the ruins of the Ashkelon mosque. The governor of Jaffa, Abu Nabbut (Father of the Cudgel) was ordered to accompany her. On the second day of digging, the lower foundation walls of the mosque were discovered at a depth of three or four feet, along with fragments of marble pillars, a Corinthian capital, a faience vessel, and two small pottery phials. Further exploration revealed several distinct phases in the history of the structure, leading to the conclusion that the site had originally been a pagan temple converted into a church and then a mosque. Stanhope's main find was a seven-foot headless marble statue, which was smashed and thrown into the sea.
In 1921, the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem began excavations at Ashkelon, focusing on the same columns and semi-circular wall explored by Lady Hester. They dated the earliest structure, featuring Corinthian columns and a row of pedestals, to Herod. The foot and arm of a colossal marble statue were found at this level. The British excavators identified the structure as a municipal council hall.
In 1985, Harvard University archaeologist Lawrence Stager led an excavation of the seaport. Beginning in 2007, excavation projects have focused on the Early Iron and Late Bronze Age phases in Grid 38, the only area with a sequence that traces all periods, from Early Bronze through the Islamic and Crusader eras. This area also provides a complete record of Philistine occupation, from their arrival in the early 12th century BC to the destruction of Ashkelon by Nebuchadnezzar in 604 BC.
In 2007, ground penetrating radar (GPR) was used to find remains of the Islamic ramparts and a major basilica in the Roman Forum. In 2009, GPR and probes were used in combination to study the city's medieval fortifications.
Excavations have revealed the largest known dog cemetery in the ancient world.
In May 2021, archaeologists from the Israel Antiquities Authority led by Dr. Rachel Bar Nathan have announced the discovery of remains of a 2,000-year-old Roman basilica complex- dates to the reign of Herod the Great. The building was contained 3 sections -a central hall and two side parts. According to the excavators, big marble columns and capitals surrounded the main hall imported from Asia Minor in merchant ship. Remains of column capitals with plant motifs, some bearing an eagle were the symbol of the Roman Empire.


Ashton Court is a mansion house and estate to the west of Bristol in England. Although the estate lies mainly in North Somerset, it is owned by the City of Bristol. The mansion and stables are a Grade I listed building. Other structures on the estate are also listed.
Ashton Court has been the site of a manor house since the 11th century, and has been developed by a series of owners since then. From the 16th to 20th centuries it was owned by the Smyth family with each generation changing the house. Designs by Humphry Repton were used for the landscaping in the early 19th century. It was used as a military hospital in the First World War. In 1936 it was used as the venue for the Royal Show and, during the Second World War as an army transit camp. In 1946 the last of the Smyth family died and the house fell into disrepair before its purchase in 1959 by Bristol City Council.
The estate developed from the original deer park and is Grade II* listed on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens of special historic interest in England. It is the venue for a variety of leisure activities, including the now-defunct Ashton Court Festival, Bristol International Kite Festival and the Bristol International Balloon Fiesta. It is home to charity The Forest of Avon Trust.