title: Rhinoceros content: were hippopotamus-like in their ecology and appearance, inhabiting rivers and lakes, and sharing many of the same adaptations to aquatic life as hippos. The family of all modern rhinoceros, the Rhinocerotidae, first appeared in the Late Eocene in Eurasia. The earliest members of Rhinocerotidae were small and numerous; at least 26 genera lived in Eurasia and North America until a wave of extinctions in the middle Oligocene wiped out most of the smaller species. However, several independent lineages survived. "Menoceras", a pig-sized rhinoceros, had two horns side-by-side. The North American "Teleoceras" had short legs, a barrel chest and lived until


title: Rhinoceros content: about 5 million years ago. The last rhinos in the Americas became extinct during the Pliocene. Modern rhinos are thought to have begun dispersal from Asia during the Miocene. Two species survived the most recent period of glaciation and inhabited Europe as recently as 10,000 years ago: the woolly rhinoceros and "Elasmotherium". The woolly rhinoceros appeared in China around 1 million years ago and first arrived in Europe around 600,000 years ago. It reappeared 200,000 years ago, alongside the woolly mammoth, and became numerous. "Elasmotherium" was two meters tall, five meters long and weighed around five tons, with a single


title: Rhinoceros content: enormous horn, hypsodont teeth and long legs for running. Both the Coelodonta and "Elasmotherium" survived through the late Pleistocene when climate fluctuations, increased predation by newer predators such as hyenas and human hunting led to their extinction. There may have been a remnant population of "Elasmotherium", however, in the south of Western Siberia (the area that is today Kazakhstan) as recently as 29,000 years ago. Of the extant rhinoceros species, the Sumatran rhino is the most archaic, first emerging more than 15 million years ago. The Sumatran rhino was closely related to the woolly rhinoceros, but not to the other


title: Rhinoceros content: modern species. The Indian and Javan rhinos are closely related and form a more recent lineage of Asian rhino. The ancestors of early Indian and Javan rhino diverged 2–4 million years ago. The origin of the two living African rhinos can be traced to the late Miocene () species "Ceratotherium neumayri". The lineages containing the living species diverged by the early Pliocene (), when "Diceros praecox", the likely ancestor of the black rhinoceros, appears in the fossil record. The black and white rhinoceros remain so closely related that they can still mate and successfully produce offspring. Adult rhinoceros have no


title: Rhinoceros content: real predators in the wild, other than humans. Young rhinos can however fall prey to big cats, crocodiles, African wild dogs, and hyenas. Although rhinos are large and have a reputation for being tough, they are very easily poached; they visit water holes daily and can be easily killed while they drink. As of December 2009, poaching increased globally while efforts to protect the rhino are considered increasingly ineffective. The most serious estimate, that only 3% of poachers are successfully countered, is reported of Zimbabwe, while Nepal has largely avoided the crisis. Poachers have become more sophisticated. South African officials


title: Rhinoceros content: have called for urgent action against poaching after poachers killed the last female rhino in the Krugersdorp Game Reserve near Johannesburg. Statistics from South African National Parks show that 333 rhinoceros were killed in South Africa in 2010, increasing to 668 by 2012, over 1,004 in 2013. and over 1,338 killed in 2015. In some cases rhinos are drugged and their horns removed, while in other instances more than the horn is taken. The Namibian government has supported the practice of rhino trophy hunting as a way to raise money for conservation. Hunting licenses for five Namibian Black rhinos are


title: Rhinoceros content: auctioned annually, with the money going to the government's Game Products Trust Fund. Some conservationists and members of the public however oppose or question this practice. International trade in rhinoceros horn has been declared illegal by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) since 1977. A proposal by Swaziland to lift the international ban was rejected in October 2016. Domestic sale of rhinoceros horn in South Africa, home of 80% of the remaining rhino population, was banned as of 2009. However, that ban was overturned in a court case in 2017, and South


title: Rhinoceros content: Africa plans to draft regulations for the sale of rhino horn, possibly including export for "non-commercial purposes". The South African government has suggested that a legal trade of rhino horn be established, arguing that this could reduce poaching and prevent the extinction of this species. Rhinoceros horns, unlike those of other horned mammals, (which have a bony core), only consist of keratin, similar to human hair and nails. Rhinoceros horns are used in traditional medicines in parts of Asia, and for dagger handles in Yemen and Oman. Esmond Bradley Martin has reported on the trade for dagger handles in Yemen.


title: Rhinoceros content: In Europe, it was historically believed that rhino horns could purify water and could detect poisoned liquids, and likely as an aphrodisiac and an antidote to poison. The Vietnamese are currently the biggest consumers of rhino horn, and their demand drives most of the poaching, which has risen to record levels. The "Vietnam CITES Management Authority" has claimed that Hanoi recently experienced a 77% drop in the usage of rhino horn, but National Geographic has challenged these claims, noticing that there was no rise in the numbers of criminals who were apprehended or prosecuted. South African rhino poaching's main destination


title: Rhinoceros content: market is Vietnam. An average sized horn can bring in as much as a quarter of a million dollars in Vietnam and many rhino range states have stockpiles of rhino horn. It is a common misconception that rhinoceros horn in powdered form is used as an aphrodisiac or a cure for cancer in Traditional Chinese Medicine as "Cornu Rhinoceri Asiatici" (犀角, "xījiǎo", "rhinoceros horn"); no TCM text in history has ever mentioned such prescriptions. In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), rhino horn is considered an effective medicine sometimes prescribed for fevers and convulsions, a treatment not supported by evidence-based medicine and


title: Rhinoceros content: has been compared to consuming fingernail clippings in water. In 1993, China signed the CITES treaty and removed rhinoceros horn from the Chinese medicine pharmacopeia, administered by the Ministry of Health. In 2011, the Register of Chinese Herbal Medicine in the United Kingdom issued a formal statement condemning the use of rhinoceros horn. A growing number of TCM educators are also speaking out against the practice. Discussions with TCM practitioners to reduce the use of rhino horn, has met with mixed results, because some still believe that it is a life-saving medicine. In March 2013, some researchers suggested that the


title: Rhinoceros content: only way to reduce poaching would be to establish a regulated trade based on humane and renewable harvesting from live rhinos. The WWF however opposes legalization of the horn trade, as it may increase demand, while IFAW released a report by "EcoLarge", suggesting that more thorough knowledge of economic factors is required to justify the pro-trade option. To prevent poaching, in certain areas, rhinos have been tranquillized and their horns removed. Armed park rangers, particularly in South Africa, are also working on the front lines to combat poaching, sometimes killing poachers who are caught in the act. A recent spike


title: Rhinoceros content: in rhino killings has made conservationists concerned about the future of the species. In 2011, the Rhino Rescue Project, organized by Ed and Lorinda Hern of the Rhino & Lion Nature Reserve in Krugersdorp, South Africa, began a horn-trade control method consisting of infusing the horns (while on the living animal) with a mixture of a pink dye and an acaricide (to kill ticks)—which is safe for rhinos but toxic to humans. After sedating the animal, a worker drills holes into the horns, adds fittings, and connects the cavity with rubber hoses to a two-foot-by-four-inch diameter metal container of the


title: Rhinoceros content: liquid mixture, which they then pressurize. The infusion takes less than 20 minutes of the 45 minutes of anesthesia. Because of the high pressure on the animals' internal organs from their large body weight, workers turn them every seven minutes while they're sedated. The procedure also includes inserting three RFID identification chips and taking DNA samples. Because of the fibrous nature of rhino horn, the pressurized dye infuses the interior of the horn but does not color the surface or affect rhino behavior. Depending on the quantity of horn a person consumes, experts believe the acaricide would cause nausea, stomach-ache,


title: Rhinoceros content: and diarrhea, and possibly convulsions, depending on the quantity. It would not be fatal—the primary deterrent is the knowledge that the treatment has been applied, communicated by signs posted at the refuges. The original idea grew out of research into the horn as a reservoir for one-time tick treatments, and experts selected an acaricide they think is safe for the rhino, oxpeckers, vultures, and other animals in the preserve's ecosystem. Proponents claim that the dye can not be removed from the horns, and remains visible on x-ray scanners even when the horn is ground to a fine powder. The UK


title: Rhinoceros content: charity organization Save the Rhino has criticized horn poisoning on moral and practical grounds. The organization questions the assumptions that the infusion technique works as intended, and that even if the poison were effective, whether middlemen in a lucrative, illegal trade would care much about the effect it would have on buyers on another continent. They also claim that poisoned horns could heighten demand for non-poisoned horns among wealthier buyers or could fuel the belief in magical properties of the horn if people survive the poisoning. Additionally, rhino horn is increasingly purchased for decorative use, rather than for use in


title: Rhinoceros content: traditional medicine. Save the Rhino questions the feasibility of applying the technique to all African rhinos, since workers would have to reapply the acaricide every 4 years. It was also reported that one out of 150 rhinos treated did not survive the anesthesia. Another way to undercut the rhinoceros horn market has been suggested by Matthew Markus of Pembient, a biotechnology firm. He proposes the synthesis of an artificial substitute for rhinoceros horn. To enable authorities to distinguish the bioengineered horn from real rhinoceros horn, the genetic code of the bioengineered horn could be registered, similar to the DNA of


title: Rhinoceros content: living rhinoceros in the RhODIS (Rhino DNA Index System). Initial responses from many conservationists were negative, but a 2016 report from TRAFFIC—which monitors trade in wildlife and animal parts—conceded that it “...would be rash to rule out the possibility that trade in synthetic rhinoceros horn could play a role in future conservation strategies.” Albrecht Dürer created a famous woodcut of a rhinoceros in 1515, based on a written description and brief sketch by an unknown artist of an Indian rhinoceros that had arrived in Lisbon earlier that year. Dürer never saw the animal itself and, as a result, Dürer's Rhinoceros


title: Rhinoceros content: is a somewhat inaccurate depiction. Rhinoceros are depicted in the Chauvet Cave in France, pictures dated to 10,000–30,000 years ago. Greek historian and geographer Agatharchides (2nd century BC) mentions the rhinoceros in his book "On the Erythraean Sea". There are legends about rhinoceroses stamping out fire in Burma, India, and Malaysia. The mythical rhinoceros has a special name in Malay, "badak api", wherein "badak" means rhinoceros, and "api" means fire. The animal would come when a fire was lit in the forest and stamp it out. There are no recent confirmations of this phenomenon. This legend was depicted in the


title: Rhinoceros content: film "The Gods Must Be Crazy" (1980), which shows an African rhinoceros putting out two campfires. Rhinoceros A rhinoceros (, , ), commonly abbreviated to 'rhino', is one of any five extant species of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae, as well as any of the numerous extinct species. Two of the extant species are native to Africa and three to Southern Asia. The term "rhinoceros" is often more broadly applied to now extinct relatives of the superfamily Rhinocerotoidea. Members of the rhinoceros family are some of the largest remaining megafauna, with all species able to reach or exceed one


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: Indian rhinoceros The Indian rhinoceros ("Rhinoceros unicornis"), also called the greater one-horned rhinoceros and great Indian rhinoceros, is a rhinoceros native to the Indian subcontinent. It is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, as populations are fragmented and restricted to less than . Moreover, the extent and quality of the rhino's most important habitat, alluvial grassland and riverine forest, is considered to be in decline due to human and livestock encroachment. As of 2008, a total of 2,575 mature individuals were estimated to live in the wild. The Indian rhinoceros once ranged throughout the entire stretch of the


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: Indo-Gangetic Plain, but excessive hunting and agricultural development reduced their range drastically to 11 sites in northern India and southern Nepal. In the early 1990s, between 1,870 and 1,895 rhinos were estimated to have been alive. In 1758, Carl Linnaeus first described a rhinoceros with one horn under the name "Rhinoceros unicornis". As type locality, he indicated Africa and India. The one-horned rhinoceros is monotypic. Several specimens were described since the end of the 18th century under different scientific names, which are all considered synonyms of "Rhinoceros unicornis" today: The modern scientific designation "Rhinoceros unicornis" is adopted from the Greek:


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: ρινό- ("rhino-" — nose) and -κερος ("-keros" — horn of an animal) and Latin: "uni-" meaning single and "-cornis" meaning horn. Ancestral rhinoceroses first diverged from other perissodactyls in the Early Eocene. Mitochondrial DNA comparison suggests the ancestors of modern rhinos split from the ancestors of Equidae around 50 million years ago. The extant family, the Rhinocerotidae, first appeared in the Late Eocene in Eurasia, and the ancestors of the extant rhino species dispersed from Asia beginning in the Miocene. Fossils of "R. unicornis" appear in the Middle Pleistocene. In the Pleistocene, the genus "Rhinoceros" ranged throughout South and Southeast


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: Asia, with specimens located on Sri Lanka. Into the Holocene, some rhinoceros lived as far west as Gujarat and Pakistan until as recently as 3,200 years ago. The Indian and Javan rhinoceroses, the only members of the genus "Rhinoceros", first appear in the fossil record in Asia around 1.6 million–3.3 million years ago. Molecular estimates, however, suggest the species may have diverged much earlier, around 11.7 million years ago. Although belonging to the type genus, the Indian and Javan rhinoceroses are not believed to be closely related to other rhino species. Different studies have hypothesized that they may be closely


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: related to the extinct "Gaindatherium" or "Punjabitherium". A detailed cladistic analysis of the Rhinocerotidae placed "Rhinoceros" and the extinct "Punjabitherium" in a clade with "Dicerorhinus", the Sumatran rhinoceros. Other studies have suggested the Sumatran rhinoceros is more closely related to the two African species. The Sumatran rhino may have diverged from the other Asian rhinos as long as 15 million years ago. The Indian rhinoceros has a thick grey-brown skin with pinkish skin folds and a black horn. Its upper legs and shoulders are covered in wart-like bumps. It has very little body hair, aside from eyelashes, ear fringes and


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: tail brush. Males have huge neck folds. Its skull is heavy with a basal length above and an occiput above . Its nasal horn is slightly back-curved with a base of about by that rapidly narrows until a smooth, even stem part begins about above base. In captive animals, the horn is frequently worn down to a thick knob. The rhino's single horn is present in both males and females, but not on newborn young. The black horn is pure keratin, like human fingernails, and starts to show after about six years. In most adults, the horn reaches a length


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: of about , but has been recorded up to in length and weight . Among terrestrial land mammals native to Asia, the Indian rhinoceros is second in size only to the Asian elephant. It is also the second-largest living rhinoceros, behind only the white rhinoceros. Males have a head and body length of with a shoulder height of , while females have a head and body length of and a shoulder height of . The male, averaging about is heavier than the female, at an average of about . The rich presence of blood vessels underneath the tissues in folds


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: gives it the pinkish colour. The folds in the skin increase the surface area and help in regulating the body temperature. The thick skin does not protect against bloodsucking "Tabanus" flies, leeches and ticks. The largest sized specimens range up to . The one-horned rhinoceros once ranged across the entire northern part of the Indian Subcontinent, along the Indus, Ganges and Brahmaputra River basins, from Pakistan to the Indian-Myanmar border, including Bangladesh and the southern parts of Nepal and Bhutan. It may have also occurred in Myanmar, southern China and Indochina. It inhabits the alluvial grasslands of the Terai and


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: the Brahmaputra basin. As a result of habitat destruction and climatic changes its range has gradually been reduced so that by the 19th century, it only survived in the Terai grasslands of southern Nepal, northern Uttar Pradesh, northern Bihar, northern West Bengal, and in the Brahmaputra Valley of Assam. The species was present in northern Bihar and Oudh at least until 1770 as indicated in maps produced by Colonel Gentil. On the former abundance of the species, Thomas C. Jerdon wrote in 1867: Today, its range has further shrunk to a few pockets in southern Nepal, northern West Bengal, and


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: the Brahmaputra Valley. In the 1980s, rhinos were frequently seen in the narrow plain area of Royal Manas National Park in Bhutan. Today, they are restricted to habitats surrounded by human-dominated landscapes, so that they often occur in adjacent cultivated areas, pastures, and secondary forests. The Indian rhinoceros is regionally extinct in Pakistan. In 2006, the total population was estimated to be 2,575 individuals, of which 2,200 lived in Indian protected areas: In 2000, about 2,000 rhinos were estimated in Assam. Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary shelters the highest density of Indian rhinos in the world — with 84 individuals in 2009


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: in an area of . By 2014, the population in Assam increased to 2,544 rhinos, an increase by 27% since 2006, although more than 150 individuals were killed by poachers during these years. The population in Nepal increased by 111 individuals from 2011 to 2015, increasing by 21%. The latest rhino count was conducted from 11 April to 2 May 2015 and revealed 645 individuals living in Parsa National Park, Chitwan National Park, Bardia National Park, Shuklaphanta Wildlife Reserve and respective buffer zones in the Terai Arc Landscape. In Pakistan's Lal Suhanra National Park, two rhinos from Nepal were introduced


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: in 1983 but have not bred so far. Adult male Indian rhinos are usually solitary. Groups consist of females with calves, or of up to six subadults. Such groups congregate at wallows and grazing areas. They are foremost active in early mornings, late afternoons and at night, but rest during hot days. They are excellent swimmers and can run at speeds of up to for short periods. They have excellent senses of hearing and smell, but relatively poor eyesight. Over 10 distinct vocalisations have been recorded. Males have home ranges of around that overlap each other. Dominant males tolerate males


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: passing through their territories except when they are in mating season, when dangerous fights break out. Indian rhinos bathe regularly. The folds in their skin trap water and hold it even when they come back on land. Indian rhinos have few natural enemies, except for tigers, which sometimes kill unguarded calves, but adult rhinos are less vulnerable due to their size. Mynahs and egrets both eat invertebrates from the rhino's skin and around its feet. "Tabanus" flies, a type of horse-fly, are known to bite rhinos. The rhinos are also vulnerable to diseases spread by parasites such as leeches, ticks,


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: and nematodes. Anthrax and the blood-disease septicemia are known to occur. In March 2017, of a group of four tigers consisting of an adult male, female and two cubs killed a 20-year-old male rhino in the Dudhwa Tiger Reserve. Indian rhinoceros are grazers. Their diets consist almost entirely of grasses, but they also eat leaves, branches of shrubs and trees, fruits, and submerged and floating aquatic plants. They feed in the mornings and evenings. They use their semi-prehensile lips to grasp grass stems, bend the stem down, bite off the top, and then eat the grass. They tackle very tall


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: grasses or saplings by walking over the plant, with legs on both sides and using the weight of their bodies to push the end of the plant down to the level of the mouth. Mothers also use this technique to make food edible for their calves. They drink for a minute or two at a time, often imbibing water filled with rhinoceros urine. The Indian rhinoceros forms a variety of social groupings. Adult males are generally solitary, except for mating and fighting. Adult females are largely solitary when they are without calves. Mothers will stay close to their calves for


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: up to four years after their birth, sometimes allowing an older calf to continue to accompany her once a newborn calf arrives. Subadult males and females form consistent groupings, as well. Groups of two or three young males will often form on the edge of the home ranges of dominant males, presumably for protection in numbers. Young females are slightly less social than the males. Indian rhinos also form short-term groupings, particularly at forest wallows during the monsoon season and in grasslands during March and April. Groups of up to 10 rhinos may gather in wallows—typically a dominant male with


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: females and calves, but no subadult males. The Indian rhinoceros makes a wide variety of vocalisations. At least 10 distinct vocalisations have been identified: snorting, honking, bleating, roaring, squeak-panting, moo-grunting, shrieking, groaning, rumbling and humphing. In addition to noises, the rhino uses olfactory communication. Adult males urinate backwards, as far as 3–4 m behind them, often in response to being disturbed by observers. Like all rhinos, the Indian rhinoceros often defecates near other large dung piles. The Indian rhino has pedal scent glands which are used to mark their presence at these rhino latrines. Males have been observed walking with


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: their heads to the ground as if sniffing, presumably following the scent of females. In aggregations, Indian rhinos are often friendly. They will often greet each other by waving or bobbing their heads, mounting flanks, nuzzling noses, or licking. Rhinos will playfully spar, run around, and play with twigs in their mouths. Adult males are the primary instigators in fights. Fights between dominant males are the most common cause of rhino mortality, and males are also very aggressive toward females during courtship. Males will chase females over long distances and even attack them face-to-face. Unlike African rhinos, the Indian rhino


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: fights with its incisors, rather than its horns. Captive males breed at five years of age, but wild males attain dominance much later when they are larger. In one five-year field study, only one rhino estimated to be younger than 15 years mated successfully. Captive females breed as young as four years of age, but in the wild, they usually start breeding only when six years old, which likely indicates they need to be large enough to avoid being killed by aggressive males. Their gestation period is around 15.7 months, and birth interval ranges from 34–51 months. In captivity, four


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: rhinos are known to have lived over 40 years, the oldest living to be 47. Sport hunting became common in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Indian rhinos were hunted relentlessly and persistently. Reports from the middle of the 19th century claim that some British military officers in Assam individually shot more than 200 rhinos. By 1908, the population in Kaziranga had decreased to around 12 individuals. In the early 1900s, the species had declined to near extinction. Poaching for rhinoceros horn became the single most important reason for the decline of the Indian rhino after conservation measures were put


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: in place from the beginning of the 20th century, when legal hunting ended. From 1980 to 1993, 692 rhinos were poached in India. In India's Laokhowa Wildlife Sanctuary, 41 rhinos were killed in 1983, virtually the entire population of the sanctuary. By the mid-1990s, poaching had rendered the species extinct there. In 1950, Chitwan’s forest and grasslands extended over more than and were home to about 800 rhinos. When poor farmers from the mid-hills moved to the Chitwan Valley in search of arable land, the area was subsequently opened for settlement, and poaching of wildlife became rampant. The Chitwan population


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: has repeatedly been jeopardized by poaching; in 2002 alone, poachers killed 37 animals to saw off and sell their valuable horns. Six methods of killing rhinos have been recorded: Poaching, mainly for the use of the horn in traditional Chinese medicine, has remained a constant and has led to decreases in several important populations. Apart from this, serious declines in quality of habitat have occurred in some areas, due to: The species is inherently at risk because over 70% of its population occurs at a single site, Kaziranga National Park. Any catastrophic event such as disease, civil disorder, poaching, or


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: habitat loss would have a devastating impact on the Indian rhino's status. However, small population of rhinos may be prone to inbreeding depression. "Rhinoceros unicornis" has been listed in CITES Appendix I since 1975. The Indian and Nepalese governments have taken major steps towards Indian rhinoceros conservation, especially with the help of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and other non-governmental organizations. In the early 1980s, a rhino translocation scheme was initiated. The first pair of rhinos was reintroduced from Nepal's Terai to Pakistan's Lal Suhanra National Park in Punjab in 1982. In 1910, all rhino hunting in India


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: became prohibited. In 1984, five rhinos were relocated to Dudhwa National Park — four from the fields outside the Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary and one from Goalpara. In 1957, the country's first conservation law ensured the protection of rhinos and their habitat. In 1959, Edward Pritchard Gee undertook a survey of the Chitwan Valley, and recommended the creation of a protected area north of the Rapti River and of a wildlife sanctuary south of the river for a trial period of 10 years. After his subsequent survey of Chitwan in 1963, he recommended extension of the sanctuary to the south. By


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: the end of the 1960s, only 95 rhinos remained in the Chitwan Valley. The dramatic decline of the rhino population and the extent of poaching prompted the government to institute the "Gaida Gasti" – a rhino reconnaissance patrol of 130 armed men and a network of guard posts all over Chitwan. To prevent the extinction of rhinos, the Chitwan National Park was gazetted in December 1970, with borders delineated the following year and established in 1973, initially encompassing an area of . Since 1973, the population has recovered well and increased to 645 animals in 2015. To ensure the survival


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: of rhinos in case of epidemics, animals were translocated annually from Chitwan to the Bardia National Park and the Sukla Phanta Wildlife Reserve since 1986. The Indian rhinoceros was initially difficult to breed in captivity. The first recorded captive birth of a rhinoceros was in Kathmandu in 1826, but another successful birth did not occur for nearly 100 years. In 1925, a rhino was born in Kolkata. No rhinoceros was successfully bred in Europe until 1956. On September 14, 1956, Rudra was born in Zoo Basel, Switzerland. In the second half of the 20th century, zoos became adept at breeding


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: Indian rhinoceros. By 1983, nearly 40 babies had been born in captivity. As of 2012, 33 Indian rhinos were born at Zoo Basel, which means that most animals kept in a zoo are somehow related to the population in the zoo of Basel, Switzerland. Due to the success of Zoo Basel's breeding program, the International Studbook for the species has been kept there since 1972. Since 1990, the Indian rhino European Endangered Species Programme is being coordinated there, as well, which ensures that the captive global Indian rhinoceros population stays genetically as healthy as possible. As of 2010, 174 rhinos


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: are kept in zoos worldwide. In June 2009, an Indian rhino was artificially inseminated using sperm collected four years previously and cryopreserved at the Cincinnati Zoo’s CryoBioBank before being thawed and used. She gave birth to a male calf in October 2010. The calf died 12 hours after birth. In June 2014, the first "successful" live-birth from an artificially inseminated rhino took place at the Buffalo Zoo in New York. As in Cincinnati, cryopreserved sperm was used to produce the female calf, Monica. The Rhinoceros Sutra is an early text in the Buddhist tradition, found in both the Gandhāran Buddhist


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: texts and the Pali Canon. It praises the solitary lifestyle and stoicism of the Indian rhinoceros and encourages readers to emulate these virtues. In China's ancient novel Journey to the West, when Tripitaka (Sanzang) and his crew travel nearer to the region of India (named as Tian Zu back then). 3 Indian Rhino demons: King of Cold Protection (辟寒大王), King of Heat Protection (辟暑大王) and King of Dust Protection (辟塵大王) whom were based in Xuanying Cave (玄英洞), Azure Dragon Mountain (青龍山) in Jinping Prefecture (金平府). They disguise themselves as Taoist deities and steal aromatic oil from lamps in a temple,


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: tricking worshippers into believing that the "deities" have accepted the oil offered to them. The Indian rhinoceros was the first rhino widely known outside its range. The first rhinoceros to reach Europe in modern times arrived in Lisbon on May 20, 1515. King Manuel I of Portugal planned to send the rhinoceros to Pope Leo X, but the rhino perished in a shipwreck. Before dying, the rhino had been sketched by an unknown artist. The German artist Albrecht Dürer saw the sketches and descriptions and carved a woodcut of the rhino, known ever after as" Dürer's Rhinoceros". Though the drawing


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: had some anatomical inaccuracies (notably the hornlet protruding from the rhino's shoulder), his sketch became the enduring image of a rhinoceros in western culture for centuries. The British public had their first chance to view a rhinoceros (presumably this species) in 1683; it unknowingly caused a political row when the notorious Judge Jeffreys, in one of his lighter moments, spread a rumour that his chief rival, Lord Guildford, had been seen riding on it. A steatite seal, popularly known as Pashupati Seal (around 2350–2000 BC) was discovered at the Mohenjo-daro archaeological site in 1928–29 of the Indus Valley Civilization. It


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: has a human figure at the center seated on a platform and the human figure is surrounded by four wild animals: an elephant and a tiger to its one side, and a water buffalo and a rhinoceros on the other. Rhinoceros is Vahana of Hindu Goddess Dhavdi. There is a temple dedicated to Maa (Mother) Dhavdi in Dhrangadhra, Gujarat. Many the mythological stories e.g. a boy named Rishyasringa with the horns of a deer, Karkadann, unicorn etc. may be inspired by Indian Rhinoceros. The Assam state of India uses the one-horned rhino as its official state animal. It is also


title: "Indian rhinoceros" content: the organizational logo for Assam Oil Company Ltd. Indian rhinoceros The Indian rhinoceros ("Rhinoceros unicornis"), also called the greater one-horned rhinoceros and great Indian rhinoceros, is a rhinoceros native to the Indian subcontinent. It is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, as populations are fragmented and restricted to less than . Moreover, the extent and quality of the rhino's most important habitat, alluvial grassland and riverine forest, is considered to be in decline due to human and livestock encroachment. As of 2008, a total of 2,575 mature individuals were estimated to live in the wild. The Indian rhinoceros


title: Arabization content: Iberia during Islamic rule. A similar process of Arabization and Islamization occurred in the Emirate of Sicily ("as-Siqilliyyah"), Emirate of Crete ("al-Iqritish"), and Malta ("al-Malta"), albeit for a much shorter time span than al-Andalus. However, this resulted in the now defunct Sicilian Arabic language to develop, from which the modern Maltese language derives. In the 12th century, the Arab Ja'alin tribe migrated into Nubia and Sudan and formerly occupied the country on both banks of the Nile from Khartoum to Abu Hamad. They trace their lineage to Abbas, uncle of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. They are of Arab origin, but


title: Arabization content: among these are: Arabization Arabization or Arabisation ( "") is either the conquest and/or colonization of a non-Arab area and growing Arabic and Islamic culture influence on non-Arab populations, causing a language shift by their gradual adoption of the Arabic language and/or their incorporation of the culture, mainly Islamic or Arab identity. Generally, elements of Arabian origin were combined in various forms with elements from conquered regions and ultimately denominated "Arab". Arabization also continued in modern times, most prominently being enforced by the Arab nationalist regimes of Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Mauritania, Algeria and Libya and enforcement of Arab identity and


title: "Least bittern" content: Least bittern The least bittern ("Ixobrychus exilis") is a small heron, the smallest member of the family Ardeidae found in the Americas. The least bittern is one of the smallest herons in the world, with perhaps only the dwarf bittern and the black-backed bittern averaging smaller in length. It can measure from in length, and the wingspan ranges from . Body mass is from , with most least bitterns weighing between , making this perhaps the lightest of all herons. A recent manual of avian body masses cites another species in this genus, the stripe-backed bittern, as having a mean


title: "Least bittern" content: body mass slightly lower than the least bittern, which is credited with a mean mass of . The bird's underparts and throat are white with light brown streaks. Its face and the sides of the neck are light brown; it has yellow eyes and a yellow bill. The adult male is glossy greenish-black on the back and crown; the adult female is glossy brown on these parts. They show light brown parts on the wings in flight. The least bittern is an elusive bird. They spend much time straddling reeds. When alarmed, the least bittern freezes in place with its


title: "Least bittern" content: bill pointing up, turns its front and both eyes toward the source of alarm, and sometimes sways to resemble wind-blown marsh vegetation. This is perhaps a predator-avoidance behaviour, since its small size makes the bittern vulnerable to many potential predators. Thanks to its habit of perching among the reeds, the least bittern can feed from the surface of water that would be too deep for the wading strategy of other herons. The least bittern and much larger and different-looking American bittern often occupy the same wetlands but may have relatively little interaction because of differences in foraging habits, preferred prey,


title: "Least bittern" content: and timing of breeding cycles. The least bittern arrives on its breeding grounds about a month after the American bittern and leaves one or two months earlier. John James Audubon noted that a young captive least bittern was able to walk with ease between two books standing apart. When dead, the bird's body measured across, indicating that it could compress its breadth to an extraordinary degree. These birds nest in large marshes with dense vegetation from southern Canada to northern Argentina. The nest is a well-concealed platform built from cattails and other marsh vegetation. The female lays four or five


title: "Least bittern" content: eggs, in extreme cases from two to seven. The eggs are pale blue or green. Both parents feed the young by regurgitating food. A second brood is often produced in a season. These birds migrate from the northern parts of their range in winter for the southernmost coasts of the United States and areas further south, travelling at night. They mainly eat fish, frogs, crustaceans and insects, which they capture with quick jabs of their bill while climbing through marsh plants. The numbers of these birds have declined in some areas due to loss of habitat. They are still fairly


title: "Least bittern" content: common but are more often heard than seen. They prefer to escape on foot and hide than to take flight. These birds make cooing and clucking sounds, usually in early morning or near dusk. The least bittern was originally described in 1789 by J. F. Gmelin based on specimens from Jamaica. The least bittern forms a superspecies with the little bittern and yellow bittern. There are five widely recognised subspecies. Birds from Ecuador are sometimes assigned to a sixth subspecies, "I. e. limoncochae" . North American birds were formerly divided into two subspecies, eastern ("I. e. exilis") and western ("I.


title: "Least bittern" content: e. hesperis"), but this is no longer believed to be a valid distinction. A dark rufous morph, "I. e. neoxenus", termed "Cory's bittern" or "Cory's least bittern" was originally described by Charles Cory as a separate species in 1885 from a specimen collected on or near the Caloosahatchee River, near Lake Okeechobee, in southwest Florida. Cory stated that the specimen was "without doubt perfectly distinct from any other known species". Further specimens followed over the next decades from Florida, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Ontario. Initially, Cory's least bittern was accepted as a valid species, with Elliott Coues and Richard


title: "Least bittern" content: Bowdler Sharpe both including it in published species lists. As early as 1892, however, doubts were raised about the validity of Cory's least bittern as a separate species. Nonetheless, in 1896 Frank Chapman wrote a detailed paper supporting its retention as a valid species. Outram Bangs later argued, in 1915, that this view was wrong and proposed that Cory's should become a junior synonym of least bittern. This view eventually prevailed, with the American Ornithologists' Union removing the species from their list of North American birds in 1923, although others held dissenting views until at least 1928. Cory's least bittern


title: "Least bittern" content: was once fairly common, but it is now exceptionally rare, with only five sightings since 1950. More than 50% of the historical records are from the Toronto region of Ontario. Initially known only from the North American subspecies "exilis", it was first recorded in the South America subspecies "erthyromelas" in 1967. The bird has a large range and a large total population, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has assessed its conservation status as being of "Least Concern". The least bittern is protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918. Least bittern The least bittern ("Ixobrychus exilis")


title: "Culture of Indonesia" content: Borobudur in central Java. Approximately two miles of exquisite relief sculpture tell the story of the life of Buddha and illustrate his teachings. The temple was originally home to 504 statues of the seated Buddha. This site, as with others in central Java, show a clear Indian influence. The examples of notable Indonesian Hindu-Buddhist sculptures are; the statues of Hindu deities; Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma, Durga, Ganesha and Agastya enthroned in rooms of Prambanan temples, the Vishnu mounting Garuda statue of king Airlangga, the exquisite statue of Eastern Javanese Prajnaparamita and 3.7 meters tall Dvarapala dated from Singhasari period, and also


title: Manoa content: Manoa Mānoa (, ) is a valley and a residential neighborhood of Honolulu, Hawaii. The neighborhood is approximately three miles (5 km) east and inland from downtown Honolulu and less than a mile (1600 m) from Ala Moana and Waikīkī at . Similar to many Honolulu neighborhoods, Mānoa consists of an entire valley, running from Mānoa Falls at the mauka (inland-most) end to King Street. The valley receives almost daily rain, even during the dry season, and is thus richly vegetated – though the valley walls are often dry. Seeing rainbows in the valley is a common occurrence, and is


title: "History of technology" content: which largely adapted from earlier Greek, Roman and Persian empires, with improvements. While medieval technology has been long depicted as a step backwards in the evolution of Western technology, sometimes willfully so by modern authors intent on denouncing the church as antagonistic to scientific progress (see e.g. Myth of the Flat Earth), a generation of medievalists around the American historian of science Lynn White stressed from the 1940s onwards the innovative character of many medieval techniques. Genuine medieval contributions include for example mechanical clocks, spectacles and vertical windmills. Medieval ingenuity was also displayed in the invention of seemingly inconspicuous items


title: "Unusual types of gramophone records" content: vinyl colors became too high, but the different colored labels were continued, at least for popular music (black) and classical (red, as in "Red Seal"). In October 1945, RCA Victor put on the market its first "non-breakable" phonograph records. Made of a ruby-red, translucent vinyl resin plastic, they cost twice as much ($2 per disc) as the 12-inch Victor Red Seal. In the 1960s, a distinction was made in label colors of promotional copies of 45 RPM records as well, with pop music being issued on yellow labels and country on light green. In the 1970s, such gimmicks started to


title: "Photoemission electron microscopy" content: the work function of the sample. This wide electron distribution is the principal source of image aberration in the microscope. Using Einstein’s method, the following equations are used: Energy of photon=Energy needed to remove an electron + Kinetic energy of the emitted electron formula_1 "h" is Planck’s constant; "f" is the frequency of the incident photon; formula_2 is the work function; formula_3 is the maximum kinetic energy of ejected electrons; "f" is the threshold frequency for the photoelectric effect to occur; "m" is the rest mass of the ejected electron; "v" is the speed of the ejected electron. This is


title: "The Black Cauldron (film)" content: alienate children and family audiences. Since animated films were generally edited in storyboard form using Leica reels (later known as animatics: storyboards shot sequentially and set to temporary audio tracks), producer Joe Hale objected to Katzenberg's demands. Katzenberg responded by having the film brought into an edit bay and editing the film himself. Informed of what Katzenberg was doing by Hale, Disney CEO Michael Eisner called Katzenberg in the editing room and convinced him to stop. Though he did what Eisner insisted, Katzenberg requested that the film be modified, and delayed its scheduled Christmas 1984 release to July 1985 so


title: "Clintonville, Columbus, Ohio" content: Village apartment complex; scattered remains of the park could still be found in the woods by the river as recently as the late 1980s. The park's carousel was moved several times and in 1999 it was restored. This carousel can now be seen at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium. Columbus's first zoo was located in Clintonville. Opening in May 1905, the "Columbus Zoological Gardens" was located in what is now Old Beechwold at Beechwold Road and North High Street. The zoo closed only five months later in October 1905. The only remaining structures are the zoo's monkey house, now used


title: "Alfred, Hereditary Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha" content: the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. As a result, his first cousin Prince Charles Edward, Duke of Albany, became heir presumptive. As a male-line grandson of the British Sovereign, young Alfred bore the royal arms, with an inescutcheon of the shield of Saxony, all differenced by a label argent of five points, the odd bearing crosses gules and even anchors azure. Alfred, Hereditary Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha Alfred, Hereditary Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (Alfred Alexander William Ernest Albert; 15 October 1874 – 6 February 1899), was the only son and heir apparent of Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and


title: "Dorise Nielsen" content: children, one of whom died in infancy. Their youngest daughter was Thelma Nielsen, known as Sally (born 1931), who in 1980 married Dyson Carter, Dorise Nielsen's former superior at the Canadian-Soviet Friendship Association. Dorise Nielsen Dorise Winifred Nielsen (July 30, 1902 – December 9, 1980) was a Canadian communist politician, feminist and teacher. Born in London, England, Doris Webber arrived in Canada and settled in Saskatchewan in 1927 to work as a teacher and married Peter Nielsen, a homesteader, the same year. Adding an 'e' to her given name on her marriage certificate, she became Dorise Nielsen. She joined the


title: "Capacity (law)" content: Now persons routinely trade and travel across state boundaries (both physically and electronically), so the need is to provide stability across state lines given that laws differ from one state to the next. Thus, once defined by the personal law, persons take their capacity with them like a passport whether or however they may travel. In this way, a person will not gain or lose capacity depending on the accident of the local laws, e.g. if A does not have capacity to marry her cousin under her personal law (a rule of consanguinity), she cannot evade that law by travelling


title: "Roller derby" content: Roller derby Roller derby is a contact sport played by two teams of five members roller skating counter-clockwise around a track. Roller derby is played by approximately 1,250 amateur leagues worldwide, mostly inside the United States. Game play consists of a series of short match-ups (jams) in which both teams designate a jammer (who wears a star on the helmet). The jammer scores points by lapping members of the opposing team. The teams attempt to hinder the opposing jammer while assisting their own jammer—in effect, playing both offense and defense simultaneously. While the sport has its origins in the banked-track


title: "Roller derby" content: roller-skating marathons of the 1930s, Leo Seltzer and Damon Runyon are credited with evolving the sport to its competitive form. Professional roller derby quickly became popular; in 1940, more than 5 million spectators watched in about 50 American cities. In the ensuing decades, however, it predominantly became a form of sports entertainment, where theatrical elements overshadowed athleticism. Gratuitous showmanship largely ended with the sport's grassroots revival in the first decade of the 21st century. Although roller derby retains some sports entertainment qualities such as player pseudonyms and colorful uniforms, it has abandoned scripted bouts with predetermined winners. Modern roller derby


title: "Roller derby" content: is an international sport, mostly played by amateurs. Most teams are all-female teams, but there is a growing number of male, unisex, and junior roller derby teams. It was under consideration as a roller sport for the 2020 Summer Olympics. FIRS, recognized by the International Olympic Committee as the official international governing body of roller sports, released its first set of Roller Derby Rules for the World Roller Games that took place September 2017 in Nanjing, China. Most modern leagues (and their back-office volunteers) share a strong "do-it-yourself" ethic that combines athleticism with the styles of punk and camp. ,


title: "Roller derby" content: the Women's Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA) had 423 full member leagues and 46 apprentice leagues. Contemporary roller derby has a basic set of rules, with variations reflecting the interests of a governing body's member leagues. The summary below is based on the rules of the Women's Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA). In March 2010, Derby News Network claimed that more than 98% of roller derby competitions were conducted under WFTDA rules. For example, members of the United Kingdom Roller Derby Association are required to play by WFTDA rules, while members of the former Canadian Women's Roller Derby Association were


title: "Roller derby" content: encouraged to join the WFTDA. Roller derby is played in two periods of 30 minutes. Two teams of up to 15 players each field up to five members for episodes called "jams." Jams last two minutes unless called off prematurely. Each team designates a scoring player (the "jammer"); the other four members are "blockers." One blocker can be designated as a "pivot"—a blocker who is allowed to become a jammer in the course of play. The next jam may involve different players of the 15 roster players, and different selections for jammer and pivot. During each jam, players skate counterclockwise


title: "Roller derby" content: on a circuit track. Points are scored only by a team's jammer. After breaking through the pack and skating one lap to begin another "trip" through the pack, the jammer scores one point for passing any member of the opposing team. The rules describe an "earned" pass; notably, the jammer must be in-bounds and upright. The jammer's first earned pass scores a point for passing that opponent and a point for each opponent not on the track (for instance, serving a penalty, or when the opposition did not field five players for the jam). If the jammer passes the entire


title: "Roller derby" content: pack and the opposing jammer too, it is a five-point scoring trip, commonly called a "grand slam." Each team's blockers use body contact, changing positions, and other tactics to help their jammer score while hindering the opposing team's jammer. Play begins by blockers lining up on the track anywhere between the "jammer line" and the "pivot line" 30 feet in front. The jammers start behind the jammer line. Jams begin on a single short whistle blast, upon which both jammers and blockers may begin engaging immediately. The pack is the largest single group of blockers containing members of both teams


title: "Roller derby" content: skating in proximity, arranged such that each player is within 10 feet of the next. Blockers must maintain the pack, but can skate freely within 20 feet behind and ahead of it, an area known as the "engagement zone." The first jammer to break through the pack earns the status of "lead jammer." A designated referee blows the whistle twice, and skates near, and points at, the lead jammer. Once earned, lead jammer status cannot be transferred to other skaters, but certain actions (notably, being sent to the penalty box) can cause it to be lost. The lead jammer can


title: "Roller derby" content: stop the jam at any time by repeatedly placing both hands on their hips. If the jam is not stopped early, it ends after two minutes. If time remains in the period, teams then have 30 seconds to get on the track and line up for the next jam. If the period expires, it does not halt a jam that is underway. A skater may block an opponent to impede their movement or to force them out of bounds. The blocker must be upright, skating counterclockwise, in bounds, and within the engagement zone. Blocking with hands, elbows, head, and feet


title: "Roller derby" content: is prohibited, as is contact above the shoulders or below mid-thigh, and blocking from behind. Referees penalize rules violations. A player receiving a penalty is removed from play to sit in a penalty box for 30 seconds of jam time. If the jam ends during this interval, the player remains in the penalty box during the subsequent jam until the interval ends. The penalized player's team plays short-handed, as in ice hockey. However, the "power jam", derived from hockey's "power play", does not cover any short-handed situation but only the case where the jammer is penalized. In this case, that


title: "Roller derby" content: team cannot score. While the lead jammer is penalized, no one can prematurely end the jam. It would be pointless to play if neither team could score; thus, a jammer is released from the penalty box early if the opponents' jammer enters the box. The second jammer's penalty is then only as long as the amount of time the first jammer spent in the box. A player "fouls out" of the game on the seventh penalty, and is required to return to the locker room. Players skate on four-wheeled ("quad") roller skates, and are required to wear protective equipment, including


title: "Roller derby" content: a helmet, wrist guards, elbow pads, knee pads, and mouth guards. All current sets of roller derby rules explicitly forbid inline skates for players. (USARS requires quad skates for all skaters. WFTDA and MRDA permit inline skates for referees, but virtually all referees wear quad skates.) Individual teams may mandate additional gear, such as padded knee length pants, similar to what aggressive skateboarders wear, and biologically specific gear such as a hard-case sports bra for female players and protective cups for males. Offense and defense are played simultaneously, a volatile aspect that complicates strategy and tactics. For example, blockers may


title: "Roller derby" content: create a large hole for their jammer to pass through and score, but this same maneuver might also allow the opposing team's jammer to score. Strategies (high-level plans toward achieving the game's goal, which is to outscore the opposition) include the following: Tactics (deliberate conceptual tasks in support of the strategy) may include the following: WFTDA bouts are officiated by three to seven skating referees and many non-skating officials (NSOs). Volunteer leagues adapt when fewer than the optimal number of officials are present. Referees skate on the inside of the track; in flat-track derby, some also skate on the outside


title: "Roller derby" content: of the track. They call penalties, award points, and ensure safe game play. Referees must wear skates and typically wear white and black stripes. NSOs take up a range of positions inside and outside the track, start and time the jams, record and display scores and penalties communicated by referees, record the number of each skater on track for a given jam, and time and record skaters in the penalty box. The growing popularity of roller skating in the United States led to the formation of organized multi-day endurance races for cash prizes, as early as the mid-1880s. Speed and


title: "Roller derby" content: endurance races continued to be held on both flat and banked tracks in the century's first three decades and spectators enjoyed the spills and falls of the skaters. The term "derby" was used to refer to such races by 1922. The endurance races began to transform into the contemporary form of the sport in the mid-1930s, when promoter Leo Seltzer created the Transcontinental Roller Derby, a month-long simulation of a road race between two-person teams of professional skaters. The spectacle became a popular touring exhibition. In the late 1930s, sportswriter Damon Runyon persuaded Seltzer to change the Roller Derby rules


title: "Roller derby" content: to increase skater contact. By 1939, after experimenting with different team and scoring arrangements, Seltzer's created a touring company of four pairs of teams (always billed as the local "home" team versus either New York or Chicago), with two five-person teams on the track at once, scoring points when its members lapped opponents. On November 29, 1948, before television viewership was widespread, "Roller Derby" debuted on New York television. The broadcasts increased spectator turnout for live matches. For the 1949–1950 season, Seltzer formed the National Roller Derby League (NRDL), comprising six teams. NRDL season playoffs sold out Madison Square Garden


title: "Roller derby" content: for a week. During the late 1950s and 1960s, the sport was broadcast on several networks, but attendance declined. Jerry Seltzer (Leo's son), the "Roller Derby" "commissioner", hoped to use television to expand the live spectator base. He adapted the sport for television by developing scripted story lines and rules designed to improve television appeal, but derby's popularity declined. 1989 saw the debut of "RollerGames," an even more theatrical variant of roller derby for national audiences. It used a figure-8 track and rules adapted for this track. Bill Griffiths, Sr. served as commissioner while his son, Bill Griffiths, Jr., managed


title: "Roller derby" content: the L.A. T-Birds, who (according to the storyline) were seeking revenge on the Violators (led by Skull) for cheating in the Commissioner's Cup. The other teams included the Maniacs (led by Guru Drew), Bad Attitude (led by Ms. Georgia Hase), the Rockers (led by DJ Terringo and consisting of skaters who were also professional rock and roll musicians), and Hot Flash (led by Juan Valdez Lopez). It ran one season, because some of its syndicators went bankrupt. In 1999, TNN (now Spike TV) debuted "RollerJam," which used the classic rules and banked oval track, but allowed inline skates (although some


title: "Roller derby" content: skaters wore traditional quad skates). Jerry Seltzer was commissioner for this version. Roller derby began its modern revival in Austin, Texas in the early 2000s as an all-female, woman-organized amateur sport. By August 2006, there were over 135 similar leagues. Leagues outside the U.S. also began forming in 2006, and international competition soon followed. There are over 2,000 amateur leagues worldwide in countries including Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, France, Brazil, New Zealand, Germany, Belgium, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Israel, Singapore, Dubai, and Egypt. In many international leagues, gear and equipment must be imported. Roller derby's contemporary resurgence has been


title: "Roller derby" content: regarded as an aspect of globalization which demonstrates "the speed with which pop culture is now transported by highly mobile expatriates and social media, while also highlighting the changing role of women in many societies." Many roller derby leagues are amateur, self-organized and all-female and were formed in a do-it-yourself spirit by relatively new enthusiasts. In many leagues (especially in the U.S.), a punk aesthetic and/or third-wave feminist ethic is prominent. Members of fledgling leagues often practice and strategize together, regardless of team affiliation, between bouts. Most compete on flat tracks, though several leagues skate on banked tracks, with more


title: "Roller derby" content: in the planning stages. Each league typically features local teams in public bouts that are popular with a diverse fan base. Some venues host audiences ranging up to 7,000. Successful local leagues have formed traveling teams comprising the league's best players to compete with comparable teams from other cities and regions. In February 2012, the International Olympic Committee considered roller derby, among eight sports, for inclusion in the 2020 Olympic Games. In 2009, the feature film "Whip It" was based on roller derby and introduced viewers to its rules and culture. The WFTDA encouraged leagues to coordinate with promotions during


title: "Roller derby" content: the film's release to increase awareness of the leagues. Corporate advertising has used roller derby themes in television commercials for insurance, a breakfast cereal, and an over-the-counter analgesic. Most players in roller leagues skate under pseudonyms, also called "derby names" or "skater names." These typically use word play with satirical, mock-violent or sexual puns, alliteration, and allusions to pop culture. Referees use derby names as well, often shown on the backs of their striped uniforms. Some players claim their names represent alter egos that they adopt while skating. Whether a team should skate under real names or derby names is


title: "Roller derby" content: sometimes debated. Some derby names are obscene, and this attracts controversy among other skaters. Copying of derby names has attracted legal and sociological analysis as an example of indigenous development of property rights. New players are encouraged to check derby names against an international roster to ensure they are not already in use. The names of roller derby events are also sardonic and convoluted—for example, Night of the Rolling Dead (Night of the Living Dead), Knocktoberfest (Oktoberfest), Spanksgiving (Thanksgiving), Seasons Beatings (Seasons Greetings), Grandma Got Run Over By a Rollergirl (Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer), Cinco de May-hem


title: "Roller derby" content: (Cinco de Mayo), and War of the Wheels (War of the Worlds). Roller derby is a contact sport, and injuries can occur. Superficial injuries include torn eyelashes and "fishnet burn", a stippled effect of falling while wearing fishnet hose. However, torn ligaments, broken bones, and concussions also occur. Some leagues prominently display their injuries, to embellish the image of violence or machismo. However, some skaters say the sport is reasonably safe if skaters take precautions. The rules require appropriate medical professionals on-site at every bout, even if not required by laws or arena regulations. The WFTDA offers insurance for leagues


title: "Roller derby" content: in the United States with legal liability and accident coverage, but it recommends that skaters also carry their own primary medical insurance. Although the early 2000s revival of roller derby was initially all-female, some leagues later introduced all-male teams and all-gender games; there were over 140 junior roller derby programs in the United States, and many more around the world. Roller derby bouts are now streamed online, and there is archived video of past bouts and tournaments. The WFTDA offers live streaming video of its tournaments at codice_1. Derby News Network (codice_2) offered live streaming video and archived video including


title: "Roller derby" content: events outside the WFTDA. FiveOnFive magazine covers roller derby and diverse aspects such as business, training, junior roller derby, and nutrition. The largest governing body for the sport is the Women's Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA), with 397 full member leagues and 48 apprentice leagues. WFTDA membership is a major goal of aspiring leagues. Other associations support either coed or men-only derby; the largest organization supporting male roller derby is the Men's Roller Derby Association (MRDA). Within the United States, the Junior Roller Derby Association governs play by those under 18. It modifies the WFTDA rules for minors, such as


title: "Roller derby" content: prohibiting hitting and accelerating into a block. Some U.S. leagues decline affiliation with a national organization because they prefer local governance. USA Roller Sports (USARS) is recognized by the International Roller Sports Federation (FIRS) and the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) as the National Governing Body of competitive roller sports in the United States, including speed, figure, hockey, roller derby and slalom. WFTDA and USARS maintain a reciprocity agreement for insurance purposes. Outside the United States, many roller derby leagues enjoy support from their national skate federations, such as Skate Australia, the British Roller Sports Federation, and Roller Sports Canada.


title: "Roller derby" content: In Europe, roller derby was recognized as a sport in Paris in 2010 by the Federation Internationale de Roller Sports (FIRS), which reports directly to the International Olympic Committee. As of 2017, FIRS has been accepted as the international rule set by the International Olympic Committee. Teams competed under the FIRS rules at The World Roller Games 2017 in Nanjing, China. The former Canadian Women's Roller Derby Association worked with the American federation. Since 2006, the WFTDA has sponsored an annual championship. In 2008, it took the current "Big 5" format: four regional playoffs and a final championship tournament. The


title: "Roller derby" content: WFTDA also recognizes eligible tournaments hosted by member leagues. Internationally, the first Roller Derby World Cup took place in Toronto, Canada, in December 2011. The second World Cup took place in Dallas, Texas, in December 2014. Since 2012, USARS has held an annual Roller Derby National Championship. In 2017, FIRS and the USOC recognized USARS to participate in the Nanjing games. Zaina Arafat asserts in "Virginia Quarterly Review" that roller derby defies heteronormativity and patriarchal standards. In Egypt, Arafat says, there are expectations that a woman will not show visible scars, will have an unblemished body for her husband, and


title: "Roller derby" content: will refrain from activities that may damage her body. She says roller derby in Egypt is subversive, as it acts as an indirect political statement. Carly Giesler states that skaters enact sexualities that create or reclaim an identity, and their role parodies "hegemonic scripts of sexuality" through the use of costumes, derby names and personas. Roller derby acts as a unique stage for female athletes, letting them rebut constraints society places on women and female athletes. Giesler argues that female sports objectifies them for the male gaze, but roller derby turns this on its head by disregarding gender roles and


title: "Roller derby" content: norms. Roller derby Roller derby is a contact sport played by two teams of five members roller skating counter-clockwise around a track. Roller derby is played by approximately 1,250 amateur leagues worldwide, mostly inside the United States. Game play consists of a series of short match-ups (jams) in which both teams designate a jammer (who wears a star on the helmet). The jammer scores points by lapping members of the opposing team. The teams attempt to hinder the opposing jammer while assisting their own jammer—in effect, playing both offense and defense simultaneously. While the sport has its origins in the


title: "Alex Alben" content: selected in 2012 for the speaker roster for Humanities Washington. Alben ran a centrist campaign, according to "September Primary A Necessary Vote," The Seattle Post Intelligencer, August 5, 2004, emphasizing his experience in the high tech world and his active participation in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and other issues affecting the software industry. Alben won the endorsement of the Seattle Times, the Seattle Post Intelligencer and the King County Journal. The Seattle Times, September 12, 2004, "The Times Endorses . . ." "In The Northwest: Finding 8th District front-runner is no Dunn deal," By Joel Connelly, The Seattle Post-Intelligencer,


title: "Herb Pennock" content: Pennock threw a no-hitter to catcher Earle Mack, the son of Connie Mack, manager of the Philadelphia Athletics, in 1910. Pennock agreed to sign with the Athletics at a later date. Mack signed Pennock in 1912 to play for his collegiate team based in Atlantic City. Pennock's father insisted that he sign under an alias in order to protect his collegiate eligibility. Pennock threw a no-hitter against a traveling Negro league baseball team, and Mack promoted him to the Athletics. Mack intended for Pennock to be one of the prospects who would replace star pitchers Eddie Plank, Chief Bender, and


title: "Luray Caverns" content: Luray Caverns Luray Caverns, originally called Luray Cave, is a cave just west of Luray, Virginia, United States, which has drawn many visitors since its discovery in 1878. The underground cavern system is generously adorned with speleothems such as columns, mud flows, stalactites, stalagmites, flowstone, and mirrored pools. The caverns are perhaps best known for the Great Stalacpipe Organ, a lithophone made from solenoid-fired strikers that tap stalactites of various sizes to produce tones similar to those of xylophones, tuning forks, or bells. Visitors enter the cave via a path that curves downward through the caverns, eventually reaching Dream Lake,


title: "Luray Caverns" content: The Saracen's Tent, The Great Stalacpipe Organ and some large stalactites and stalagmites. The path proceeds to the Wishing Well and a war memorial honoring veterans from Page County. It then ascends to a small passage past the Fried Eggs rock formation and returns to ground level through a smaller passage to the entrance. The entire trek is long and can be completed in 45 minutes to 1 hour. Luray Caverns was discovered on August 13, 1878 by five local men, including Andrew J. Campbell (a local tinsmith), his 13-year-old nephew Quint, and local photographer Benton Stebbins. Their attention had


title: "Luray Caverns" content: been attracted by a protruding limestone outcrop and by a nearby sinkhole noted to have cool air issuing from it. Seeking an underground cavern, the men started to dig and, about four hours later, a hole was created for the smallest men (Andrew and Quint) to squeeze through, slide down a rope and explore by candlelight. The first column they saw was named the Washington Column, in honor of the first United States President. Upon entering the area called Skeleton's Gorge, bone fragments (among other artifacts) were found embedded in calcite. Other traces of previous human occupation included pieces of


title: "Luray Caverns" content: charcoal, flint, and human bone fragments embedded in stalagmite. A skeleton, thought to be that of a Native American girl, found in one of the chasms, was estimated, from the current rate of stalagmitic growth, to be not more than 500 years old. Her remains may have slipped into the caverns after her burial hole collapsed due to a sinkhole, although the real cause is unknown. Sam Buracker of Luray owned the land on which the cavern entrance was found. Because of uncollected debts, a court-ordered auction of all his land was held on September 14, 1878. Andrew Campbell, William


title: "Luray Caverns" content: Campbell, and Benton Stebbins purchased the cave tract, but kept their discovery secret until after the sale. Because the true value of the property was not realized until after the purchase, legal wrangling ensued for the next two years with attempts to prove fraud and decide rightful ownership. In April 1881, the Supreme Court of Virginia nullified the purchase by the cave discoverers. William T. Biedler of Baltimore (Buracker's in-law and major creditor) then sold the property to The Luray Cave and Hotel Company, a subsidiary of the Shenandoah Railroad Company. (The SRC became the Norfolk and Western Railroad Company


title: "Luray Caverns" content: in April 1881.) David Kagery of Luray and George Marshall of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, purchased the property in July 1890 and in October of that year the tract was sold to the Valley Land and Improvement Company. Under bankruptcy proceedings in 1893, the property was bought by Luray Caverns Company, owned by J. Kemp Bartlett of Baltimore. Despite the legal disputes, rumors of the caverns' impressive formations spread quickly. Professor Jerome J. Collins, the Arctic explorer, postponed his departure on an ill-fated North Pole expedition to visit the caverns. The Smithsonian Institution sent a delegation of nine scientists to investigate. The


title: "Luray Caverns" content: next edition of the "Encyclopædia Britannica" devoted an unprecedented page and a half to the cave's wonders and Alexander J. Brand, Jr., a correspondent for the "New York Times", was the first professional travel writer to visit and popularize the caverns. In 1901, the cool, supposedly pure air of Luray Caverns was forced through the rooms of the Limair Sanatorium, erected on the summit of Cave Hill by Colonel T.C. Northcott, former president of the Luray Caverns Corporation. The Colonel billed the sanatorium as the first air-conditioned home in the United States. On the hottest day in summer, the interior


title: "Luray Caverns" content: of the house was kept at a cool and comfortable . By sinking a shaft in diameter down to a cavern chamber and installing a fan powered by a electric motor, Northcott's system could change out the air through the entire house about every four minutes. Tests made over successive years by means of culture media and sterile plates were considered to have demonstrated the "perfect bacteriologic purity" of the air, purportedly a benefit to those suffering various respiratory illnesses. This "purity" was explained by a natural filtration process with air drawn into the caverns through myriad rocky crevices, then


title: "Luray Caverns" content: further cleansing by air floating over the transparent springs and pools, the product finally being supplied to the inmates of the sanatorium. The "Limair" burned down in the early 1900s but was subsequently rebuilt as a brick building. The Luray Caverns Corporation, which was chartered by Northcott, purchased the caverns in February 1905 and continues to hold the property today. Portions of the caverns are open to the public and have long been electrically lighted. The registered number of visitors in 1906 was 18,000, but now, approximately 500,000 guests visit each year. In 1974, the National Park Service and the


title: "Luray Caverns" content: Department of the Interior designated Luray Caverns as a National Natural Landmark. Luray Caverns is home to a commercial rope course and hedge maze. The maze contains 1,500 dark American arborvitae which create a path for visitors. Three museums are also on site and included with the general admission. The Toy Town Junction Museum offers an array of vintage miniature trains, dolls, and other collectible toys on display. The Car and Carriage Caravan Museum features an impressive collection of over 140 items relating to early transportation including a Conestoga wagon and an 1892 Mercedes-Benz. The Luray Valley Museum is home


title: "Luray Caverns" content: to a collection of historic Shenandoah Valley buildings from rustic 19th-century life along with many regional artifacts including a 1536 Luther Bible and a patented dog-powered butter churn. The caverns are situated in the Shenandoah Valley, just to the west of the Blue Ridge of the Appalachian Mountains in Luray, Virginia. The valley extends northeast to southwest along the northwest side of the Blue Ridge. Cave Hill, above sea level, had long been an object of local interest on account of its pits and oval hollows or sinkholes (known as karst) through one of which the discoverers of Luray Caverns


title: "Luray Caverns" content: entered. Luray Caverns does not date beyond the Tertiary period. The cave is developed in dolostones of the lower Beekmantown Dolomite (Lower Ordovician). At some period, niches and already formed chambers were completely filled with water, highly charged with acid, which then slowly began to eat away at much of the softer material composing much of the walls, ceilings and floors. The one particular area that shows this high level of water is Elfin Ramble where water marks of oscillation are highly visible on the ceiling. The temperature inside the caverns is uniformly , comparable to that of Mammoth Cave


title: "Luray Caverns" content: in Kentucky. As with other limestone or "solution" caves, formations at Luray Caverns result from a solution of calcium carbonate giving up some of its carbon dioxide, thus allowing a precipitation of lime to form. This precipitation begins as a thin deposit ring of crystallized calcite, but continues to collect, creating stalactites and other types of dripstone and flowstone. Formations at Luray Caverns are white in color if the calcium carbonate is in its pure form. Other colors reflect impurities in the calcite resulting from elements absorbed from the soil or rock layers: Reds and yellows due to iron and


title: "Luray Caverns" content: iron-stained clays; black from manganese dioxide; blues and greens from solutions of copper compounds. Luray Caverns remains an active cave where new formation deposits accumulate at the rate of about every 120 years. After the water had been mostly removed by a lowering in the water table, these eroded forms remained and growth began to take hold via stalactites, stalagmites, columns, etc. Some notable formations include the Leaning Column, undermined and tilting like the campanile of Pisa; The Great Stalacpipe Organ, a large shield formation, that was used from very early on as an instrument for a variety of folk


title: "Luray Caverns" content: and religious songs; and a vast bed of disintegrated carbonates left by the water in its retreat through the great space called the Elfin Ramble. The cavern is yellow, brown or red because of water, chemicals and minerals. The new stalactites growing from the old, and made of hard carbonates that had already once been used, are usually white as snow though often pink or amber-colored. The Empress Column is a stalagmite high, rose-colored, and elaborately draped. The Double Column, named from Professors Henry and Baird, is made of two fluted pillars side by side, the one the other high,


title: "Luray Caverns" content: a mass of snowy alabaster. Several stalactites in Giant's Hall exceed in length. The Pluto's Ghost, a pillar, is a ghostly white. The cascades are formations like foaming cataracts caught in mid-air and transformed into milk-white or amber alabaster. Brands Cascade is high and wide, and is a wax-like white. Flowstone draperies are abundant throughout the cavern and one of the best examples is Saracen's Tent. The drapery formation can be found in all major rooms and ring like bells when struck heavily by the hand. Their origin and also that of certain so-called scarfs and blankets is from carbonates


title: "Luray Caverns" content: deposited by water trickling down a sloping and corrugated surface. Sixteen of these alabaster scarfs hang side by side in Hoveys Balcony, three white and fine as crape shawls, thirteen striated like agate with various shades of brown. Streams and true springs are absent, but there are hundreds of basins, varying from in diameter, and from to in depth. The water in them contains carbonate of lime, which often forms concretions, called pearls, eggs, and snowballs, according to their size. On the fracture these spherical growths are found to be radiated in structure. Calcite crystals line the sides and bottom


title: "Luray Caverns" content: of water-filled cavities. Variations of level at different periods are marked by rings, ridges and ruffled margins. These are strongly marked about Broaddus Lake and the curved ramparts of the Castles on the Rhine. Here also are polished stalagmites, a rich buff slashed with white, and others, like huge mushrooms, with a velvety coat of red, purple or olive-tinted crystals. In some of the smaller basins with an excess of carbonic acid, there is formed, besides the crystal bed below, a film above, shot like a sheet of ice across the surface. One pool wide is thus covered so as


title: "Luray Caverns" content: to show but a third of its surface. The quantity of water in the cavern varies greatly at different seasons. Hence some stalactites have their tips under water long enough to allow tassels of crystals to grow on them, which, in a drier season, are again coated over with stalactitic matter; and thus singular distortions are occasioned. Contiguous stalactites are often inwrapped thus until they assume an almost globular form, through which by making a section the primary tubes appear. Contorted stalactites may be caused by lateral outgrowths of crystals growing from the side of an active stalactite, or to


title: "Luray Caverns" content: deflections caused by currents of air, or to the existence of a diminutive fungus peculiar to the locality and designated from its habitat "Mucor stalaclitis". The dimensions of the chambers included in Luray Caverns cannot be easily stated, due to the great irregularity of their outlines. There are several tiers of galleries, and the vertical depth from the highest to the lowest is . There is a spring of water called Dream Lake that has an almost mirror-like appearance. Stalactites are reflected in the water making them appear to be stalagmites. This illusion is often so convincing that people are


title: "Luray Caverns" content: unable to see the real bottom. It looks quite deep, as the stalactites are higher above the water, but at its deepest point the water is only around deep. The lake is connected to a spring that continues deeper into the caverns. The Wishing Well is a green pond with coins deep at the bottom. Like Dream Lake, the well also gives an illusion, however it is reversed. The pond looks deep but at its deepest point it is actually deep. Luray Caverns Luray Caverns, originally called Luray Cave, is a cave just west of Luray, Virginia, United States, which


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: Japanese spider crab The , "Macrocheira kaempferi", is a species of marine crab that lives in the waters around Japan. It has the largest leg span of any arthropod. It is the subject of fishery and is considered a delicacy. Two fossil species belonging to the same genus have been found, "Macrocheira ginzanensis" and "Macrocheira yabei," both from the Miocene of Japan. The Japanese spider crab has the greatest leg span of any arthropod, reaching up to from claw to claw. The body may grow to a size of in carapace width and the whole crab can weigh up to


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: —second only to the American lobster among all living arthropod species. The males have the longer chelipeds; females have much shorter chelipeds, which are shorter than the following pair of legs. Apart from its outstanding size, the Japanese spider crab differs from other crabs in a number of ways. The first pleopods of males are unusually twisted, and its larvae appear primitive. The crab is orange, with white spots along the legs. It is reported to have a gentle disposition, despite its ferocious appearance. The Japanese name for this species is taka-ashi-gani literally translating to “tall legs crab.” Their armored


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: exoskeletons help protect them from larger predators such as octopuses, but giant spider crabs also use camouflage. The crab's bumpy carapace blends into the rocky ocean floor. To further the illusion, a spider crab will adorn its shell with sponges and other animals. Japanese spider crabs are mostly found off the southern coasts of the Japanese island of Honshū, from Tokyo Bay to Kagoshima Prefecture. Outlying populations have been found in Iwate Prefecture and off Su-ao in Taiwan. Adults can be found at depths between . They like to inhabit vents and holes in the deeper parts of the ocean.


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: The temperature preference of adults is unknown, but the species is regular at a depth of in Suruga Bay where the water generally is about . Based on results from public aquariums, Japanese spider crabs tolerate at least between , but are typically maintained at . Female crabs carry the fertilized eggs attached to their abdominal appendages until they hatch into tiny planktonic larvae. Development of the planktonic larvae is temperature-dependent and takes between 54 and 72 days at . During the larval stage the young crab looks nothing like its parents. It is small and transparent with a round,


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: legless body and usually drifts as plankton at the surface of the ocean. The Japanese spider crab is an omnivore, consuming both plant matter and animals. It also sometimes acts as a scavenger consuming dead animals. Some have been known to scrape the ocean floor for plants and algae while others pry open the shells of mollusks. They live at depths of or more. The giant spider crabs migrate up to a depth of around during breeding season. The Japanese spider crab was originally described by Western science in 1836 by Coenraad Jacob Temminck under the name "Maja kaempferi", based


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: on material from Philipp Franz von Siebold collected near the artificial island Dejima. The specific epithet commemorates Engelbert Kaempfer, a German naturalist who lived in Japan from 1690 to 1692 and wrote about the country's natural history. It was moved to the genus "Inachus" by Wilhem de Haan in 1839, but placed in a new subgenus, "Macrocheira". That subgenus was raised to the rank of genus in 1886 by Edward J. Miers. Placed in the family Inachidae, "M. kaempferi" does not fit cleanly into that group, and it may be necessary to erect a new family just for the genus


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: "Macrocheira". As well as the single existent species, four species belonging to the genus "Macrocheira" are known from fossils: Temminck, in his original description, noted that the crab was known to the Japanese for the serious injuries it can cause with its strong claws. The Japanese spider crab is "occasionally collected for food," and even considered a delicacy in many parts of Japan and other areas in the region. A total of were collected in 1976, but only in 1985. The fishery is centred on Suruga Bay. The crabs are typically caught using small trawling nets. The population has decreased


title: "Japanese spider crab" content: in number due to overfishing, forcing fishermen into exploring deeper waters to catch them. Harvesting of the crab is forbidden during the spring, when crabs move to shallower water to reproduce. Populations of this species of crab have diminished over recent years and there are many efforts to protect them. The average size caught by fishermen is a leg span of . Japanese spider crab The , "Macrocheira kaempferi", is a species of marine crab that lives in the waters around Japan. It has the largest leg span of any arthropod. It is the subject of fishery and is considered


title: "Wop May" content: the way, they stayed with family and friends; his two-year-old cousin, Mary Lumsden, could not pronounce Wilfrid and called him "Woppie". This gave him his nickname "Wop". He attended the Edmonton High School (now Victoria School of Performing and Visual Arts) while in Edmonton. May joined the Canadian Army in February 1916 during the First World War. He rose through the enlisted ranks to sergeant and spent most of 1916 as a gunnery instructor in Canada. In 1917, his battalion, the 202nd battalion C.E.F. (Edmonton Sportsmen), was shipped to England, where he and his friend Ray Ross applied to join


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (), also known as the Holocaust Memorial (German: "Holocaust-Mahnmal"), is a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, designed by architect Peter Eisenman and engineer Buro Happold. It consists of a site covered with 2,711 concrete slabs or "stelae", arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field. The stelae are long, wide and vary in height from . They are organized in rows, 54 of them going north–south, and 87 heading east–west at right angles but set slightly askew. An attached


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: underground "Place of Information" () holds the names of approximately 3 million Jewish Holocaust victims, obtained from the Israeli museum Yad Vashem. Building began on April 1, 2003, and was finished on December 15, 2004. It was inaugurated on May 10, 2005, sixty years after the end of World War II, and opened to the public two days later. It is located one block south of the Brandenburg Gate, in the Mitte neighborhood. The cost of construction was approximately €25 million. The memorial is located on Cora-Berliner-Straße 1, 10117 in Berlin, a city with one of the largest Jewish populations


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: in Europe before the Second World War. Adjacent to the Tiergarten, it is centrally located in Berlin's Friedrichstadt district, close to the Reichstag building and the Brandenburg Gate. The monument is situated on the former location of the Berlin Wall, where the "death strip" once divided the city. During the war, the area acted as the administrative center of Hitler's killing machine, with the Chancellery building and his bunker both nearby. The memorial is located near many of Berlin's foreign embassies. The monument is composed of 2711 rectangular concrete blocks, laid out in a grid formation, the monument is organized


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: into a rectangle-like array covering . This allows for long, straight, and narrow alleys between them, along which the ground undulates. According to Eisenman's project text, the stelae are designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture aims to represent a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason. The Foundation Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe official English website states that the design represents a radical approach to the traditional concept of a memorial, partly because Eisenman said the number and design of the monument had no symbolic significance. However, observers have noted


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: the memorial's resemblance to a cemetery. The abstract installation leaves room for interpretation, the most common being that of a graveyard. "The memorial evokes a graveyard for those who were unburied or thrown into unmarked pits, and several uneasily tilting stelae suggest an old, untended, or even desecrated cemetery." Many visitors have claimed that from outside the memorial, the field of grey slabs resemble rows of coffins. While each stone slab is approximately the size and width of a coffin, Eisenman has denied any intention to resemble any form of a burial site. The memorial's grid can be read as


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: both an extension of the streets that surround the site and an unnerving evocation of the rigid discipline and bureaucratic order that kept the killing machine grinding along. Wolfgang Thierse, the president of Germany's parliament, described the piece as a place where people can grasp "what loneliness, powerlessness and despair mean". Thierse talked about the memorial as creating a type of mortal fear in the visitor. Visitors have described the monument as isolating, triggered by the massive blocks of concrete, barricading the visitor from street noise and sights of Berlin. Many visitors and Berliners have also interpreted the contrast between


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: the grey flat stones and the blue sky as a recognition of the "dismal times" of the Holocaust. As one slopes downwards into the memorial entrance, the grey pillars begin to grow taller until they completely consume the visitor. Eventually the grey pillars become smaller again as visitors ascend towards the exit. Some have interpreted this as the rise and fall of the Third Reich or the Regime's gradual momentum of power that allowed them to perpetrate such atrocities on the Jewish community. The space in between the concrete pillars offers a brief encounter with the sunlight. As visitors wander


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: through the slabs the sun disappears and reappears. One is constantly tormented with the possibility of a warmer, brighter life. Some have interpreted this use of space as a symbolic remembrance of the volatile history of European Jews whose political and social rights constantly shifted. Many visitors have claimed walking through the memorial makes one feel trapped without any option other than to move forward. Some claim the downward slope that directs you away from the outside symbolically depicts the gradual escalation of the Third Reich's persecution of the European Jewish community. First, they were forced into ghettos and removed


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: from society and eventually they were removed from existence. The more a visitor descends into the memorial, he or she is without any visible contact of the outside world. He or she is completely ostracized and hidden from the world. It is common for groups of visitors to lose each other as they wander deeper into the memorial. This often reminds one of the separation and loss of family among the Jewish community during the Holocaust. Some have interpreted the shape and color of the grey slabs to represent the loss of identity during the Nazi regime. As one moves


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: into the memorial, the space between the shapes widen. Identity in a regime is largely shaped by belongingness defined through 'sameness' and the "repetition of the same". Some blocks are spaced father apart and are isolated from other blocks. This is often understood as a symbolic representation of the forced segregation and confinement of Jews during the Nazi regime. The continuation of "sameness" and unity in the Nazi regime depended on the act of exclusion. Architectural historian Andrew Benjamin has written that the spatial separation of certain blocks represents "a particular [as] no longer an instance of the whole". The


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: lack of unified shape within the group of blocks has also been understood as a symbolic representation of the "task of remembering". Some of the blocks appear to be unfinished. Many see this unfinished appearance as asserting that the task of remembering the Holocaust is never over. Benjamin has said "The monument works to maintain the incomplete". As the effects of the Holocaust are impossible to fully represent, the memorial's structures have remained unfinished. The missing parts of the structure illustrate the missing members of the Jewish community that will never return. The destruction of the Holocaust has resulted in


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: a missing epoch of Jewish heritage. The memorial's structures also deny any sense of collectivity. Some have interpreted this to reflect the lack of collective guilt amongst the German population. Others have interpreted the spatial positioning of the blocks to represent an individual guilt for the Holocaust. Many Germans have viewed the memorial as targeting German society and claim the memorial is presented as "an expression of our – non-Jewish Germans' – responsibility for the past". The site is also enclosed by borders of trees and Berlin's center city. The enclosure from these borders has often evoked feelings of entrapment.


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: This can be understood as a symbolic representation of the closure of European and American borders following the Evian Conference that forced Jews to stay in Germany. Three years after the official opening of the memorial, half of the blocks made from compacting concrete started to crack. While some interpret this defect as an intentional symbolization of the immortality and durability of the Jewish community, the Memorials' Foundation deny this. Many analyze the lack of individual names on the monument as an illustration of the unimaginable number of murdered Jews in the Holocaust. In this way, the memorial illustrates that


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: the number of Jewish individuals lost in the Holocaust was so colossal that is impossible to physically visualize. Several have noted that the number of stelae is identical to the number of pages in the Babylonian Talmud. The information center, which is located at the site's eastern edge, begins with a timeline that lays out the history of the Final Solution, from when the National Socialists took power in 1933 through the murder of 500,000 Soviet Jews in 1941. The rest of the exhibition is divided into four rooms dedicated to personal aspects of the tragedy, e.g. the individual families


title: "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" content: or the letters thrown from the trains that transported them to the death camps. The "Room of Families" focuses on the fates of 15 specific Jewish families. In the "Room of Names", names of all known Jewish Holocaust victims obtained from the Yad Vashem memorial in Israel are read out loud. Each chamber contains visual reminders of the stelae above: rectangular benches, horizontal floor markers and vertical illuminations. Critics have questioned the placement of the center. It is discreetly placed on the eastern edge of the monument. Architecturally, the information center's most prominent feature lies in its coffered concrete ceilings.