title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: By 1984, the educational game market had shifted from one in which programs were almost invariably mainframe computer games created by amateur programmers like Rawitsch to a commercial market containing numerous companies selling educational games for home computers. MECC had moved into this market the year before, hiring programmers to create original software titles for schools and home consumers. These titles had proven successful, and MECC decided to create modern updates to their three most popular titles of the 1970s: "Lemonade Stand", "Odell Lake", and "The Oregon Trail". All three games had received ports to the "Apple II" by 1980, but had not been changed substantially and did not compete graphically with contemporary titles. Development of a new version of "The Oregon Trail" began in October 1984, with R. Philip Bouchard as the lead designer and team lead. Bouchard was instructed to design an entirely new game based on the concept of the original "Oregon Trail", intended for the Apple II and as MECC's first game with home consumers as the primary market, with a target release date of autumn 1985.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: As the game was intended for the home market rather than school settings, it needed to be entertaining as well as educational; Bouchard set as a guiding principle that the entertainment "should arise from immersing the player in a historically accurate experience", and conversely that the educational aspect should arise from that immersion rather than explicitly instructing the player about history. Bouchard also intended the game to appeal to girls as well as boys, who he felt had been more interested in the original version of the game. He measured the game as it was being developed by the metric of whether children that liked the original game enjoyed the new game more. Development of the game took ten months, from October 1984 through July 1985, and was primarily done by a team of five people: Bouchard, lead programmer John Krenz, lead artist Charolyn Kapplinger, researcher Shirley Keran, and programmer Bob Granvin. While prior games at MECC had been developed using a system where the lead designer created a design document of notes and sketches that was then given to the programmers and artists to accomplish, Bouchard instead designed the game with the help of the other team members as a set of interconnected gameplay systems, all based on mathematical models in turn based on historical data, which would be refined in an iterative process as development proceeded.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: For many parts of the game which resemble the original, the team added complexity and detail. In the 1975 game, the player plays through twelve rounds of decision making, each representing two weeks on the trail, with random events occurring in the rounds based on their historical probability at that point on the trail. For the new version, the team instead divided the game into 16 segments of varying lengths, each ending at a "landmark"; the player has a set of "activities" that could take place at each landmark, such as crossing a river, and a different set of activities, including hunting and having a random event occur, that they could do or have happen to them while traveling between landmarks. Each segment of the game had different environmental settings and probabilities, and the traveling periods are composed of some number of days which then act as the unit of time. Bouchard worked with Keran to pick the sixteen landmarks, as well as alternate "cutoff" routes that the player could take. The team removed the medicine and doctor system of the original as historically inaccurate, and instead added multiple types of disease. They also added music to the game, which was based on melodies popular at the time of the actual Oregon trail.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: The hunting minigame had been a popular part of the original game, where the player typed "BANG" to fire; as such the team felt it was an essential component to include in the new game. Bouchard wanted to include educational lessons as part of the game, including showing different landscape features based on where the player was on their journey, having different species of animal be present based also on where in the country they could be found, and limiting how many pounds of meat the player could take back from a hunt. The team was concerned that their design was not going to be possible using the Applesoft BASIC programming language on an Apple II like the rest of the game as it would not be fast enough; most other action games or sequences created at the time used assembly language for this reason. They first created a prototype to test it, and found that it ran too slowly; assembly programmer Roger Shimada was added to the team to create the final version. As he did so, the team discovered that the original design, which called for eighteen different animals, was too large for the memory space on the Apple II, and it was cut down to six animals with less complex animations. During the user testing in March 1985, as the "dead state" graphics had not yet been completed by Kapplinger, Shimada instead flipped animals upside down to indicate their deaths; this was kept in the final game, as the team and child playtesters found it humorous.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: While designing the game, Bouchard planned to have a minigame at the end of the game involving rafting down the Columbia River, which would involve rapids, portaging, and the option to hire Native American guides. Development of the minigame was pushed towards the end of the project, however, as it was deemed less important than parts of the game that would be seen more than once per playthrough. In March 1985, however, Bouchard was instructed to stop development on any part of the game that had not already been started, eliminating the minigame. Bouchard was concerned, as this left the game without a climactic ending, though it would have been difficult to create the entire design at that point in the project. Late in the project, his supervisor agreed to reinstate the minigame, but only if it could be done simply and in Applesoft BASIC, unlike the hunting minigame. The team was able to borrow programmer Steve Splinter to develop the rafting portion, and quickly created a much simpler version based on dodging rocks in the river.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: Bouchard's primary design goal for the project was to incorporate accurate geography into the game with the segments; his second goal was to add human characters into the game, which had not been present in the 1975 version. Many of his ideas for this goal had to be cut from the game due to both the limitations of the game's budget as well as the size available for the game on a 5¼-inch floppy disk. He retained the addition of player-named characters to the traveling party, as well as named characters to talk to at the start and landmarks, and including people in the graphics. One idea he was not able to keep, which he later described as his biggest regret about the game, was complex interactions with Native Americans, though he was able to include some simpler ones. Other priorities were including river crossings, for which the team built a system that takes into account the location and weather of the crossing, and adding replayability, which he accomplished by adding a point system with difficult high scores to beat, multiple starting options, and a challenging hunting minigame. The team accomplished all of the goals they set out to do, and although the project ran over the original budget and timeline—as Bouchard had originally estimated they would be complete by March but they instead finished in July—"The Oregon Trail" was published in autumn 1985 as planned.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: After the initial Apple II release in 1985, "The Oregon Trail" was ported by MECC to several other platforms. A DOS version for IBM PC compatible computers was released in 1990, with slightly modified graphics. It was followed by a version published for the Macintosh Mac OS 6 in 1991 and DOS in 1992; both releases had altered the game's interface to be controlled with a mouse instead of a keyboard and added simple sound effects and eight different profession options. The graphics of the game were also overhauled, though the Macintosh version was monochrome black and white and the new DOS version had support for 256-color VGA. To differentiate the new DOS version from the 1990 version, it was titled "The Oregon Trail Deluxe". A final port for Microsoft Windows under the original title was released in 1993. In 2018, a variant of the DOS version of "The Oregon Trail" was released as a physical handheld game by Basic Fun, initially as a Target exclusive.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: "The Oregon Trail" was extremely successful, and along with successive iterations of the game, which are often considered different versions of the game instead of different games, it sold over 65 million copies by 2011. In 1994, when MECC became a publicly traded company, the game was still the company's flagship product, with its sales comprising a third of MECC's in annual revenue.


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: The multiple versions of "The Oregon Trail" are often combined when discussing the game's legacy, though the 1985 release is considered the main version; Colin Campbell of "Polygon", for example, has described it collectively as one of the most successful games of all time and a cultural icon, but said that the 1985 version "is the one most people recall". Matt Smith of Kotaku called it "one of the most iconic and grueling games to hit the classroom computer", and said that the 1985 version was the one "that rose to stardom and eventually spawned countless memes" and "etched its legacy in the memory of a generation". Kevin Wong of "Vice" claimed that the collective game was "synonymous with edutainment". "The Oregon Trail" has been described in "Serious Games and Edutainment Applications" as "one of the most famous ancestors" of the serious game subgenre. "The Oregon Trail" was a hallmark in American elementary schools in the 1980s and 1990s. "Smithsonian" magazine observed in 2016 that ""The Oregon Trail" is still a cultural landmark for any school kid who came of age in the 1980s or after. Even now, there remains a constant pressure to revive the series, so that nostalgic Generation Xers and Millennials can amble westward with a dysentery-riddled party once again."


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: In 2016, "The Oregon Trail", viewed collectively as multiple versions of the same game from 1971 on, was inducted into the World Video Game Hall of Fame by The Strong and the International Center for the History of Electronic Games, the first educational game and the only one until "Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?" in 2021. Time named the game as one of the 100 greatest video games in 2012, and placed it 9th on its list of the 50 best games in 2016, claiming that it "helped introduce an entire generation (several, in fact) to video games".


title: The Oregon Trail (1985 video game)

text: Several further games have been released in "The Oregon Trail" series, many under the title "The Oregon Trail", beginning with "Oregon Trail II" in 1995, as well as a number of spinoffs such as "The Yukon Trail" and "The Amazon Trail". The first few of these were published by SoftKey, which purchased MECC in 1995, with later titles developed and published by numerous other companies; "The Oregon Trail 4th Edition" (1999) was the final game developed by MECC.


title: Twenty-fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution

text: The Twenty-fourth Amendment (Amendment XXIV) of the United States Constitution prohibits both Congress and the states from conditioning the right to vote in federal elections on payment of a poll tax or other types of tax. The amendment was proposed by Congress to the states on August 27, 1962, and was ratified by the states on January 23, 1964.


text: Southern states of the former Confederate States of America adopted poll taxes in laws of the late 19th century and new constitutions from 1890 to 1908, after the Democratic Party had generally regained control of state legislatures decades after the end of Reconstruction, as a measure to prevent African Americans and often poor whites (and following passage of the Nineteenth Amendment, women) from voting. Use of the poll taxes by states was held to be constitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States in the 1937 decision "Breedlove v. Suttles".


text: When the 24th Amendment was ratified in 1964, five states still retained a poll tax: Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas and Virginia. The amendment prohibited requiring a poll tax for voters in federal elections. But it was not until 1966 that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6–3 in "Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections" that poll taxes for any level of elections were unconstitutional. It said these violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Subsequent litigation related to potential discriminatory effects of voter registration requirements has generally been based on application of this clause.


text: Southern states had adopted the poll tax as a requirement for voting as part of a series of laws in the late 19th century intended to exclude black Americans from politics so far as practicable without violating the Fifteenth Amendment. This required that voting not be limited by "race, color, or previous condition of servitude". All voters were required to pay the poll tax, but in practice it most affected the poor. Notably this affected both African Americans and poor white voters, some of whom had voted with Populist and Fusionist candidates in the late 19th century, temporarily disturbing Democratic rule. Proponents of the poll tax downplayed this aspect and assured white voters they would not be affected. Passage of poll taxes began in earnest in the 1890s, as Democrats wanted to prevent another Populist-Republican coalition. Despite election violence and fraud, African Americans were still winning numerous local seats. By 1902, all eleven states of the former Confederacy had enacted a poll tax, many within new constitutions that contained other provisions as barriers to voter registration, such as literacy or comprehension tests administered subjectively by white workers. The poll tax was used together with other devices such as grandfather clauses and the "white primary" designed to exclude blacks, as well as threats and acts of violence. For example, potential voters had to be "assessed" in Arkansas, and blacks were utterly ignored in the assessment.


text: From 1900 to 1937, such use of the poll tax was nearly ignored by the federal government. Several state-level initiatives repealed poll taxes during this period for two reasons: firstly that they encouraged corruption since wealthy persons could and would pay other people's poll taxes; secondly, because they discouraged white voting more than many populist Southern politicians desired. The poll tax survived a legal challenge in the 1937 Supreme Court case "Breedlove v. Suttles", which unanimously ruled that


text: The issue remained prominent, as most African Americans in the South were disenfranchised. President Franklin D. Roosevelt spoke out against the tax. He publicly called it "a remnant of the Revolutionary period" that the country had moved past. However, Roosevelt's favored liberal Democrats in the South lost in the 1938 primaries to the reigning conservative Southern Democrats, and he backed off the issue. He felt that he needed Southern Democratic votes to pass New Deal programs and did not want to further antagonize them. Still, efforts at the Congressional level to abolish the poll tax continued. A 1939 bill to abolish the poll tax in federal elections was tied up by the Southern Block, lawmakers whose long tenure in office from a one-party region gave them seniority and command of numerous important committee chairmanships. A discharge petition was able to force the bill to be considered, and the House passed the bill 254–84. However, the bill was unable to defeat a filibuster in the Senate by Southern senators and a few Northern allies who valued the support of the powerful and senior Southern seats. This bill would be re-proposed in the next several Congresses. It came closest to passage during World War II, when opponents framed abolition as a means to help overseas soldiers vote. However, after learning that the US Supreme Court decision "Smith v. Allwright" (1944) banned the use of "white primary", the Southern block refused to approve abolition of the poll tax.


text: In 1946, the Senate came close to passing the bill. 24 Democrats and 15 Republicans approved an end to debate, while 7non-southern Democrats and 7Republicans joined the 19 Southern Democrats in opposition. The result was a 39–33 vote in favor of the bill, but a cloture vote to end the filibuster required a two-thirds supermajority of 48 votes at the time, and so the bill was not brought to a vote. Those in favor of abolition of the poll tax considered a constitutional amendment after the 1946 defeat, but that idea did not advance either.


text: The tenor of the debate changed in the 1940s. Southern politicians tried to re-frame the debate as a constitutional issue, but private correspondence indicates that black disenfranchisement was still the true concern. For instance, Mississippi Senator Theodore Bilbo declared, "If the poll tax bill passes, the next step will be an effort to remove the registration qualification, the educational qualification of Negroes. If that is done we will have no way of preventing the Negroes from voting." This fear explains why even Southern Senators from states that had abolished the poll tax still opposed the bill; they did not want to set a precedent that the federal government could interfere in state elections.


text: President Harry S. Truman established the President's Committee on Civil Rights, which among other issues investigated the poll tax. Considering that opposition to federal poll tax regulation in 1948 was claimed as based on the Constitution, the Committee noted that a constitutional amendment might be the best way to proceed. Still, little occurred during the 1950s. Members of the anti-poll tax movement laid low during the anti-Communist frenzy of the period; some of the main proponents of poll tax abolition, such as Joseph Gelders and Vito Marcantonio, had been committed Marxists.


text: President John F. Kennedy returned to this issue. His administration urged Congress to adopt and send such an amendment to the states for ratification. He considered the constitutional amendment the best way to avoid a filibuster, as the claim that federal abolition of the poll tax was unconstitutional would be moot. Still, some liberals opposed Kennedy's action, feeling that an amendment would be too slow compared to legislation. Spessard Holland, a conservative Democrat from Florida, introduced the amendment to the Senate. Holland had opposed most civil rights legislation during his career. Holland himself had tried several times ever since he entered the US Senate in 1946 to ban the poll tax but was unsuccessful.


text: Kennedy's gaining his support helped splinter the monolithic Southern opposition to the amendment. Ratification of the amendment was relatively quick, taking slightly more than a year; it was rapidly ratified by state legislatures across the country from August 1962 to January 1964.


text: President Lyndon B. Johnson called the amendment a "triumph of liberty over restriction" and "a verification of people's rights". States that had maintained the poll tax were more reserved. Mississippi's Attorney General, Joseph Turner Patterson, complained about the complexity of two sets of votersthose who had paid their poll tax and could vote in all elections, and those who had not and could vote only in federal elections. Additionally, non-payers could still be deterred by such requirements as having to register far in advance of the election and retain records of such registration. Some states also continued to exercise discrimination in the application of literacy tests.


text: Congress proposed the Twenty-fourth Amendment on August 27, 1962. The amendment was submitted to the states on September 24, 1962, after it passed with the requisite two-thirds majorities in the House and Senate. The final vote in the House was 295–86 (132–15 in the House Republican Conference and 163–71 in the House Democratic Caucus) with 54 members voting present or abstaining, while in the Senate the final vote was 77–16 (30–1 in the Senate Republican Conference and 47–15 in the Senate Democratic Caucus) with 7members voting present or abstaining. The following states ratified the amendment:


text: Ratification was completed on January 23, 1964. The Georgia legislature did make a last-second attempt to be the 38th state to ratify. This was a surprise as "no Southern help could be expected" for the amendment. The Georgia Senate quickly and unanimously passed it, but the House did not act in time. Georgia's ratification was apparently dropped after South Dakota's ratification.


text: Arkansas effectively repealed its poll tax for all elections with Amendment 51 to the Arkansas Constitution at the November 1964 general election, several months after this amendment was ratified. The poll-tax language was not completely stricken from its Constitution until Amendment 85 in 2008. Of the five states originally affected by this amendment, Arkansas was the only one to repeal its poll tax; the other four retained their taxes. These were struck down in 1966 by the US Supreme Court decision in "Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections" (1966), which ruled poll taxes unconstitutional even for state elections. Federal district courts in Alabama and Texas, respectively, struck down these states' poll taxes less than two months before the "Harper" ruling was issued.


text: The state of Virginia accommodated the amendment by providing an "escape clause" to the poll tax. In lieu of paying the poll tax, a prospective voter could file paperwork to gain a certificate establishing a place of residence in Virginia. The papers would have to be filed six months in advance of voting, and the voter had to provide a copy of that certificate at the time of voting. This measure was expected to decrease the number of legal voters. In the 1965 Supreme Court decision "Harman v. Forssenius", the Court unanimously found such measures unconstitutional. It declared that for federal elections, "the poll tax is abolished absolutely as a prerequisite to voting, and no equivalent or milder substitute may be imposed."


text: While not directly related to the Twenty-fourth Amendment, the "Harper" case held that the poll tax was unconstitutional at every level, not just for federal elections. The "Harper" decision relied upon the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, rather than the Twenty-Fourth Amendment. As such, issues related to whether burdens on voting are equivalent to poll taxes in discriminatory effect have usually been litigated on Equal Protection grounds since.


title: David Seville

text: David "Dave" Seville is a fictional character, the producer and manager of the fictional singing group "Alvin and the Chipmunks". The character was created by Ross Bagdasarian Sr., who had used the name "David Seville" as his stage name prior to the creation of the Chipmunks, while writing and recording novelty records in the 1950s. One of the records, recorded in 1958 under the David Seville stage name, was "Witch Doctor", featuring a sped-up high-pitched vocal technique. Bagdasarian would later use that technique in "The Chipmunk Song (Christmas Don't Be Late)", which would introduce both Alvin and the Chipmunks as a singing group and Bagdasarian's music producer "Dave". Bagdasarian would go on to create "The Alvin Show", based on the Alvin and the Chipmunks group, where he voiced the semi-fictional character David Seville, based largely on himself, with Alvin based on Ross's sometimes rebellious son Adam.


title: David Seville

text: Bagdasarian Sr. died in 1972, and his son (Adam's brother) Ross Bagdasarian Jr. took over ownership of Bagdasarian Productions. He reprised the David Seville character, first in a series of novelty albums beginning with 1980's "Chipmunk Punk". Bagdasarian Jr. subsequently assumed the role on the TV series "Alvin and the Chipmunks", which ran in original episodes from 1983–1990. Bagdasarian Jr. has voiced David Seville in all official animated and recorded incarnations of David Seville since taking over for his father in the 1970s, including TV series, animated specials, and direct-to-video productions. He most recently voiced the character in the 2015 reboot of the "Alvin and the Chipmunks" television show.


title: David Seville

text: Actor Jason Lee also portrays David Seville in live action/CGI films starring Alvin and the Chipmunks, which use a combination of live-action acting and computer animation. While Ross Bagdasarian Jr. does not do any voices for the film series, the films are all produced in association with Bagdasarian Productions, which owns the rights to all of the characters.


title: Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark

text: Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark (; born 26 April 1986) is the youngest child of Constantine II and Anne-Marie of Denmark, who were the last King and Queen of Greece, reigning from 1964 to 1973.


title: Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark

text: Philippos was born at St Mary's Hospital, London, on 26 April 1986, the son of King Constantine II and Queen Anne-Marie of Greece. His family had been living in exile since December 1967 His father was deposed in 1973 and the monarchy abolished 8 December 1974.


title: Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark

text: He was baptized in the Greek Orthodox Church at Saint Sophia Cathedral, London, on 10 July 1986, with King Juan Carlos I of Spain, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, Diana, Princess of Wales, Infanta Elena of Spain, Princess Benedikte of Denmark, Kyril, Prince of Preslav and Penelope, Lady Romsey serving as godparents.


title: Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark

text: He attended the Hellenic School at London and the United World Colleges in the US. Later on he studied at Georgetown University, graduating in 2008 with his bachelor's degree in foreign relations. As of 2018, he lives in New York City and works as an analyst for Ortelius Capital.


title: Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark

text: In 2018, Philippos began dating Nina Nastassja Flohr, the daughter of Swiss businessman Thomas Flohr, who founded the private jet rental company "VistaJet", and Katharina Flohr ("née" Konečný), former Creative Director of Fabergé and editor-in-chief of the Russian "Vogue". That same year, they appeared together in public at the wedding of Princess Eugenie of York and Jack Brooksbank. They made other appearances as a couple, including the wedding of Lord Edward Spencer-Churchill and Kimberly Hammerstroem in 2018 and the wedding of Jean-Christophe, Prince Napoléon and Countess Olympia von und zu Arco-Zinneberg in 2019. In 2020 while vacationing in Ithaca, Greece, Flohr and Prince Philippos became engaged. The engagement was announced by the former Greek royal family's press office on 1 September 2020. They were married civilly on 12 December 2020 in a private ceremony in St. Moritz, Switzerland. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Switzerland, the only guests at the wedding were the couple's fathers. A Greek Orthodox ceremony took place on 23 October 2021, at Metropolitan Cathedral of Athens.


title: Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark

text: Following the deposition of the Greek monarchy in 1973, the title "Prince of Greece" with the style of "Royal Highness" is no longer legally recognised by the government of the Hellenic Republic. Through his male-line descent from Christian IX of Denmark, he is also a Danish prince with the style of "Highness".


title: History of sexual slavery in the United States

text: The history of sexual slavery in the United States is the history of slavery for the purpose of sexual exploitation as it exists in the United States.


text: Enslaved African-Americans were systematically raped or forced to reproduce with other enslaved people. Early American colonists were mostly men, and some resorted to rape to procure wives. Native American women were often kidnapped to be traded, sold, or taken as wives. Currently, under federal law, a prostitute is considered a victim of human trafficking if they are under 18 and/or are being controlled through force, fraud, or coercion. However, this is not fully implemented, and in many states, prostitutes who are considered victims under federal law are still arrested and prosecuted under state law.


text: It is contended by some that as early as the 1490s Christopher Columbus had established trade in sex slaves on Hispaniola, which included sex slaves as young as nine years old. Within 25 years of being colonized, the Native population of Hispaniola drastically declined, due to the effects of enslavement, massacre, and infectious disease.


text: However, others consider this contention to have arisen from a misreading of primary documents. Columbus does mention the selling of slaves, but as atrocities of a rebelling faction. He continues with this comment, "I declare solemnly that a great number of men have been to the Indies, who did not deserve baptism in the eyes of God or men, and who are now returning thither.”


text: From the beginning of African slavery in the North American colonies, slaves were often viewed as property, rather than people. "Plaçage", a formalized system of concubinage among slave women or free people of color, developed in Louisiana and particularly New Orleans by the 18th century.


text: Slave breeding was the attempt by a slave-owner to increase the reproduction of his slaves for profit. It included forced sexual relations between male and female slaves, encouraging slave pregnancies, sexual relations between master and slave to produce slave children, and favoring female slaves who had many children. The historian E. Franklin Frazier, in his book "The Negro Family", stated that "there were masters who, without any regard for the preferences of their slaves, mated their human chattel as they did their stock." Ex-slave Maggie Stenhouse remarked, "Durin' slavery there were stockmen. They was weighed and tested. A man would rent the stockman and put him in a room with some young women he wanted to raise children from."


text: The plaçage system developed from the predominance of white men among early colonial populations, who took women as consorts from Native Americans and enslaved Africans. In this period there was a shortage of European women, as the colonies were dominated in the early day by male explorers and colonists. Given the harsh conditions in Louisiana, persuading women to follow the men was not easy. France sent females convicted along with their debtor husbands, and in 1719, deported 209 women felons "who were of a character to be sent to the French settlement in Louisiana." France also relocated young women and girls known as King's Daughters () to the colonies of Canada and Louisiana for marriage.


text: Through warfare and raids, Native American women were often captured to be traded, sold, or taken as wives. At first, the colony generally imported male Africans to use as slave labor because of the heavy work of clearing to develop plantations. Over time, it also imported African female slaves. Marriage between the races was forbidden according to the Code Noir of the eighteenth century, but interracial sex continued. The upper class European men during this period often did not marry until their late twenties or early thirties. Premarital sex with an intended white bride, especially if she was of high rank, was not permitted socially.


text: White male colonists, often the younger sons of noblemen, military men, and planters, who needed to accumulate some wealth before they could marry, took women of color as consorts before marriage. Merchants and administrators also followed this practice if they were wealthy enough.


text: After the enslaved people were emancipated, many states passed anti-miscegenation laws, which prohibited interracial marriage between whites and non-whites. But this did not stop some white men from taking sexual advantage of black women by using their social positions under the Jim Crow system and white supremacy, or in other parts of the country by ordinary power and wealth dynamics.


text: The Chinese Tanka females were sold from Guangzhou to work as prostitutes for the overseas Chinese male community in the United States. During the California Gold Rush in the late 1840s, Chinese merchants transported thousands of young Chinese girls, including babies, from China to the United States and sold them into sexual slavery within the red light district of San Francisco. Girls could be bought for as cheap as $40 (about $1104 in 2013 dollars) in Guangzhou, and sold for $400 (about $11,040 in 2013 dollars) in the United States. Many of these girls were forced into opium addiction and lived their entire lives as prostitutes. Anglo-American doctors claimed that opium smoking led to increased involvement in prostitution by young white women and to genetic contamination via miscegenation by Chinese men. Anti-Chinese advocates believed America faced a dual dilemma: opium smoking was ruining moral standards and Chinese labor was lowering wages and taking jobs away from European-Americans.


text: Slummers often frequented the brothels and opium dens of Chinatown in the late 1880s and early 1890s. However, by the mid-1890s, slummers rarely participated in Chinese brothels or opium smoking, but instead were shown fake opium joints where Chinese actors and their white wives staged illicit scenes for the benefit of their audiences.


text: A few captives from Native American tribes who were used as slaves were not freed, when African-American slaves were emancipated. "Ute Woman," a Ute captured by the Arapaho and later sold to a Cheyenne, was one example. Used as a prostitute for sale to American soldiers at Cantonment in the Indian Territory, she lived in slavery until about 1880 when she died of a hemorrhage resulting from "excessive sexual intercourse".


text: By the 19th century, most of America's cities had a designated, legally protected area of prostitution. Increased urbanization and young women entering the workforce led to greater flexibility in courtship without supervision. It is in this changing social sphere that the panic over "white slavery" began. This term referred to women being coerced, lured, or kidnapped for the purposes of prostitution.


text: Numerous communities appointed vice commissions to investigate the extent of local prostitution, whether prostitutes participated in it willingly or were forced into it and the degree to which it was organized by any cartel-type organizations. The second significant action at the local levels was to close the brothels and the red light districts. From 1910 to 1913, city after city withdrew this tolerance and forced the closing of their brothels. Opposition to openly practiced prostitution had been growing steadily throughout the last decades of the 19th century. The federal government's response to the moral panic was the Mann Act. The purpose of the act was to make it a crime to coerce transportation of unwilling women. The statute made it a crime to "transport or cause to be transported, or aid to assist in obtaining transportation for" or to "persuade, induce, entice or coerce" a woman to travel.


text: According to historian Mark Thomas Connelly, "a group of books and pamphlets appeared announcing a startling claim: a pervasive and depraved conspiracy was at large in the land, brutally trapping and seducing American girls into lives of enforced prostitution, or 'white slavery.' These white slave narratives, or white-slave tracts, began to circulate around 1909." Such narratives often portrayed innocent girls "victimized by a huge, secret and powerful conspiracy controlled by foreigners", as they were drugged or imprisoned and forced into prostitution.


text: This excerpt from "The War on the White Slave Trade" was written by the United States District Attorney in Chicago:


text: Suffrage activists, especially Harriet Burton Laidlaw and Rose Livingston, worked in New York City's Chinatown and in other cities to rescue young white and Chinese girls from forced prostitution, and helped pass the Mann Act to make interstate sex trafficking a federal crime. Livingston publicly discussed her past as a prostitute and claimed to have been abducted and developed a drug problem as a sex slave in a Chinese man's home, narrowly escaped and experienced a Christian conversion narrative. Other groups like the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and Hull House focused on children of prostitutes and poverty in community life while trying to pass protective legislation. The American Purity Alliance also supported the Mann Act. In New York City, the Travelers Aid Society of New York provided social services to women at train stations and piers in order to prevent trafficking.


text: In 1910, the US Congress passed the White Slave Traffic Act of 1910 (better known as the Mann Act), which made it a felony to transport women across state borders for the purpose of "prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose". Its primary stated intent was to address prostitution, immorality, and human trafficking particularly where it was trafficking for the purposes of prostitution, but the ambiguity of "immoral purpose" effectively criminalized interracial marriage and banned single women from crossing state borders for morally wrong acts. As more women were being trafficked from foreign countries, the US began passing immigration acts to curtail aliens from entering the country. Several acts such as the Emergency Quota Act of 1921 and Immigration Act of 1924 were passed to prevent emigrants from Europe and Asia from entering the United States. Following the banning of immigrants during the 1920s, human trafficking was not considered a major issue until the 1990s.


text: The 1921 Convention set new goals for international efforts to stem human trafficking, primarily by giving the anti-trafficking movement further official recognition, as well as a bureaucratic apparatus to research and fight the problem. The Advisory Committee on the Traffic of Women and Children was a permanent advisory committee of the League. Its members were nine countries, and several non-governmental organizations. An important development was the implementation of a system of annual reports of member countries. Member countries formed their own centralized offices to track and report on trafficking of women and children. The advisory committee also worked to expand its research and intervention program beyond the United States and Europe. In 1929, a need to expand into the Near East (Asia Minor), the Middle East and Asia was acknowledged. An international conference of central authorities in Asia was planned for 1937, but no further action was taken during the late 1930s.


text: Act 18 U.S.C. § 1591, or the Commercial Sex Act, the US makes it illegal to recruit, entice, obtain, provide, move or harbor a person or to benefit from such activities knowing that the person will be caused to engage in commercial sex acts where the person is under 18 or where force, fraud or coercion exists.


text: Under the Bush Administration, fighting sex slavery worldwide and domestically became a priority with an average of $100 million spent per year, which substantially outnumbers the amount spent by other countries. Before President Bush took office, Congress passed the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA). The TVPA strengthened services to victims of violence, law enforcements ability to reduce violence against women and children, and education against human trafficking. Also specified in the TVPA was a mandate to collect funds for the treatment of sex trafficking victims that provided them with shelter, food, education, and financial grants. Internationally, the TVPA set standards that governments of other countries must follow in order to receive aid from the U.S. to fight human trafficking. Once George W. Bush took office in 2001, restricting sex trafficking became one of his primary humanitarian efforts. The Attorney General under President Bush, John Ashcroft, strongly enforced the TVPA. The Act was subsequently renewed in 2004, 2006, and 2008. It established two stipulations an applicant has to meet in order to receive the benefits of a T-Visa. First, a trafficked victim must prove/admit to being trafficked and second must submit to prosecution of his or her trafficker. In 2011, Congress failed to re-authorize the Act. The State Department publishes an annual Trafficking in Persons Report, which examines the progress that the U.S. and other countries have made in destroying human trafficking businesses, arresting the kingpins, and rescuing the victims.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Ibrutinib, sold under the brand name Imbruvica among others, is a small molecule drug that inhibits B-cell proliferation and survival by irreversibly binding the protein Bruton's tyrosine kinase (BTK). Blocking BTK inhibits the B-cell receptor pathway, which is often aberrantly active in B cell cancers. Ibrutinib is therefore used to treat such cancers, including mantle cell lymphoma, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, and Waldenström's macroglobulinemia. Ibrutinib also binds to C-terminal Src Kinases. These are off-target receptors for the BTK inhibitor. Ibrutinib binds to these receptors and inhibits the kinase from promoting cell differentiation and growth. This leads to many different side effects like left atrial enlargement and atrial fibrillation during the treatment of Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Ibrutinib is indicated for the treatment of mantle cell lymphoma (MCL), chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL)/small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL), Waldenström's macroglobulinemia (WM), marginal zone lymphoma (MZL), and chronic graft versus host disease (cGVHD).


title: Ibrutinib

text: Very common (>10% frequency) adverse effects include pneumonia, upper respiratory tract infection, sinusitis, skin infection, low neutrophil count, low platelet counts, headache, bleeding, bruising, diarrhea, vomiting, inflammation of mouth and lips, nausea, constipation, rash, joint pain, muscle spasms, musculoskeletal pain, fever, and edema.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Common (1–10% frequency) adverse effects include sepsis, urinary tract infection, non-melanoma skin cancer (basal-cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma), low leukocyte count, low lymphocyte count, interstitial lung disease, tumor lysis syndrome, high uric acid levels, dizziness, blurred vision, atrial fibrillation, subdural hematoma, nosebleeds, small bruises from broken blood vessels, high blood pressure, hives, and skin redness or blushing.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Ibrutinib oral bioavailability is 3.9% in a fasting state, 8.4% in a fed state, and 15.9% after consumption of grapefruit juice.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Ibrutinib is a potent, irreversible inhibitor of Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK). It forms a covalent bond with the cysteine residue C481 in the BTK active site, leading to sustained inhibition of BTK enzymatic activity. BTK is an important signalling molecule of the B-cell antigen receptor (BCR) pathway, which is plays a role in the pathogenesis of several B-cell malignancies including mantle cell lymphoma (MCL), diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), follicular lymphoma, and chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). Preclinical studies have shown that ibrutinib effectively inhibits malignant B-cell proliferation and survival in vivo as well as cell migration and substrate adhesion in vitro.


title: Ibrutinib

text: In early clinical studies, the activity of ibrutinib has been described to include a rapid reduction in lymphadenopathy accompanied by a transient lymphocytosis, suggesting that the drug might have direct effects on cell homing or migration to factors in tissue microenvironments.


title: Ibrutinib

text: In preclinical studies on chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) cells, ibrutinib has been reported to promote apoptosis, inhibit proliferation, and also prevent CLL cells from responding to survival stimuli provided by the microenvironment. This also leads to a reduction of MCL1 levels (anti-apoptotic protein) in malignant B cells. Treatment of activated CLL cells with ibrutinib resulted in inhibition of BTK tyrosine phosphorylation and also effectively abrogated downstream survival pathways activated by this kinase including ERK1/2, PI3K, and NF-κB. Additionally, ibrutinib inhibited proliferation of CLL cells in vitro, effectively blocking survival signals provided externally to CLL cells from the microenvironment including soluble factors (BAFF, IL-6, IL-4, and TNF-α), fibronectin engagement and stromal cell contact.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Ibrutinib has also been reported to reduce chronic lymphocytic leukemia cell chemotaxis towards the chemokines CXCL12 and CXCL13, and inhibit cellular adhesion following stimulation at the B-cell receptor (BCR). Additionally, ibrutinib down-modulates the expression of CD20 (target of rituximab/ofatumumab) by targeting the CXCR4/SDF1 axis.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Together, these data are consistent with a mechanistic model whereby ibrutinib blocks BCR signaling, which drives cells into apoptosis and/or disrupts cell migration and adherence to protective tumour microenvironments.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Ibrutinib was created by scientists at Celera Genomics as a tool compound for studying BTK function; it covalently binds its target which is ideal for a reagent but generally not considered ideal for drugs.


title: Ibrutinib

text: In 2006, in the course of acquiring an HDAC-focused program from Celera after its own initial discovery program had failed, Pharmacyclics also picked up Celera's small molecule BTK inhibitor discovery program for $2M in cash and $1M in stock and named the tool compound PCI-32765. In 2011 after the drug had completed Phase II trials, Johnson & Johnson and Pharmacyclics agreed to co-develop the drug, and J&J paid Pharmacyclics $150 million upfront and $825 million in milestones. Pharmacyclics was acquired by AbbVie in May 2015, and Abbvie projected global sales of US$1 billion in 2016 and $5 billion in 2020.


title: Ibrutinib

text: It was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in November 2013, for the treatment of mantle cell lymphoma. In February 2014, the FDA expanded the approved use of ibrutinib to chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). It was approved for Waldenström's macroglobulinemia in 2015.


title: Ibrutinib

text: In March 2015, Pharmacyclics and AbbVie agreed that Abbvie would acquire Pharmacyclics for $21 billion; the deal was completed that May.


title: Ibrutinib

text: In March 2016, a new indication for ibrutinib was approved in the United States for patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL).


title: Ibrutinib

text: In May 2016, a new indication for ibrutinib was approved in the United States for chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL).


title: Ibrutinib

text: In January 2017, a new indication for ibrutinib was approved in the United States for the treatment of adults with relapsed/refractory (R/R) marginal zone lymphoma (MZL) who require systemic therapy and have received at least one prior anti-CD20-based therapy.


title: Ibrutinib

text: In August 2017, the FDA approved a new indication for ibrutinib to treat graft-versus-host disease. It was the first drug approved by the FDA for this condition.


title: Ibrutinib

text: In August 2018, ibrutinib in combination with rituximab was approved in the United States for the treatment of adults with Waldenström's macroglobulinemia (WM), a rare and incurable type of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL).


title: Ibrutinib

text: In January 2019, ibrutinib in combination with obinutuzumab was approved for the treatment of adults with previously untreated chronic lymphocytic leukemia/small lymphocytic lymphoma (CLL/SLL).


title: Ibrutinib

text: In April 2020, the FDA expanded the indication of ibrutinib to include its combination with rituximab for the initial treatment of adults with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) or small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL). Approval was based on the E1912 trial (NCT02048813), a 2:1 randomized, multicenter, open-label, actively controlled trial of ibrutinib with rituximab compared to fludarabine, cyclophosphamide, and rituximab (FCR) in 529 adult subjects 70 years or younger with previously untreated CLL or SLL requiring systemic therapy.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Janssen Pharmaceutica and Pharmacyclics introduced a new single dose tablet formulation with a flat pricing structure in the first half of 2018 and discontinued the capsule formulation. This caused an outcry as it was perceived to triple the cost of the drug to the average patient.


title: Ibrutinib

text: Janssen Pharmaceutica and Pharmacyclics have since reversed the decision to discontinue the capsule formulation with the drug currently available in both capsule and tablet forms.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Castile or Castille (; ) is a territory of imprecise limits located in Spain. The invention of the concept of Castile relies on the assimilation (via a metonymy) of a 19th-century determinist geographical notion, that of Castile as Spain's ("tableland core", connected to the Meseta Central) with a long-gone historical entity of diachronically variable territorial extension (the Kingdom of Castile).


title: Castile (historical region)

text: The proposals advocating for a particular semantic codification/closure of the concept (a "dialogical" construct) are connected to essentialist arguments relying on the reification of something that does not exist beyond the social action of those building Castile not only by identifiying with it as a homeland of any kind, but also "in opposition" to it. A hot topic concerning the concept of Castile is its relation with Spain, insofar intellectuals, politicians, writers, or historians have either endorsed, nuanced or rejected the idea of the "maternity" of Spain by Castile, thereby permeating non-scholar discourses about Castile.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Castile's name is generally thought to derive from "land of castles" ("castle" in Spanish is "castillo") in reference to the castles built in the area to consolidate the Christian Reconquest from the Moors.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: The Encyclopedia Britannica ascribes the concept to the sum of the regions of Old Castile and New Castile, as they were formally defined in the 1833 territorial division of Spain.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Originally an eastern county of the kingdom of León, in the 11th century, Castile became an independent realm with its capital at Burgos. The County of Castile, which originally included most of Burgos and parts of Vizcaya, Álava, Cantabria and La Rioja, became the leading force in the northern Christian states' 800-year Reconquista ("reconquest") of central and southern Spain from the Moorish rulers who had dominated most of the peninsula since the early 8th century.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: The capture of Toledo in 1085 added New Castile to the crown's territories, and the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212) heralded the Moors' loss of most of southern Spain. The kingdom of León was integratred in the Crown of Castile in 1230, and the following decades saw the capture of Córdoba (1236), Murcia (1243) and Seville (1248). By the Treaty of Alcaçovas with Portugal on March 6, 1460, the ownership of the Canary Islands was transferred to Castile.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: The dynastic union of Castile and Aragon in 1469, when Ferdinand II of Aragon wed Isabella I of Castile, would eventually lead to the formal creation of Spain as a single entity in 1516 when their grandson Charles V assumed both thrones. See List of Spanish monarchs and Kings of Spain family tree. The Muslim Kingdom of Granada (roughly encompassing the modern day provinces of Granada, Malaga and Almeria) was conquered in 1492, formally passing to the Crown of Castile in that year.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Since it lacks official recognition, Castile does not have clearly defined borders. Historically, the area consisted of the Kingdom of Castile. After the kingdom merged with its neighbours to become the Crown of Castile and later the Kingdom of Spain, when it united with the Crown of Aragon and the Kingdom of Navarre, the definition of what constituted "Castile" gradually began to change. Its historical capital was Burgos. In modern Spain, it is generally considered to comprise Castile and León and Castile–La Mancha, with Madrid as its centre. West Castile and León, Albacete, Cantabria and La Rioja are sometimes included in the definition (controversial for historical, political, and cultural reasons).


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Since 1982 there have been two nominally Castilian autonomous communities in Spain, incorporating the toponym in their own official names: Castile and Leon and Castile-La Mancha. A third, the Community of Madrid is also regarded as part of Castile, by dint of its geographic enclosure within the entity and, above all, by the statements of its Statute of Autonomy, since its autonomic process originated in national interest and not in popular disaffection with Castile.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Other territories in the former Crown of Castile are left out for different reasons. The territory of the Castilian Crown actually comprised all other autonomous communities within Spain with the exception of Aragon, Balearic Islands, Valencia and Catalonia, all belonging to the former Crown of Aragon, and Navarre, offshoot of the older Kingdom of the same name. Castile was divided between Old Castile in the north, so called because it was where the Kingdom of Castile was founded, and New Castile, called the Kingdom of Toledo in the Middle Ages. The Leonese region, part of the Crown of Castile from 1230, was from medieval times considered a region in its own right on a par with the two Castiles, and appeared on maps alongside Old Castile until the two joined as one region - Castile and Leon - in the 1980s. In 1833, Spain was further subdivided into administrative provinces.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Two non-administrative, nominally "Castilian" regions existed from 1833 to 1982: Old Castile, including Santander (autonomous community of Cantabria since 1981), Burgos, Logroño (autonomous community of La Rioja since 1982), Palencia, Valladolid, Soria, Segovia and Ávila, and New Castile consisting of Madrid (autonomous community of Madrid since 1983), Guadalajara, Cuenca, Toledo and Ciudad Real.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: The language of Castile emerged as the primary language of Spain—known to many of its speakers as "castellano" and in English sometimes as Castilian, but generally as Spanish. See Names given to the Spanish language.


title: Castile (historical region)

text: Historically, the Castilian Kingdom and people were considered to be the main architects of the Spanish State by a process of expansion to the South against the Moors and of marriages, wars, assimilation, and annexation of their smaller Eastern and Western neighbours. From the advent of the Bourbon Monarchy following the War of the Spanish Succession until the arrival of parliamentary democracy in 1977, the Castilian language was the only one with official status in the Spanish state.


title: MILF (2018 film)

text: MILF is a 2018 French comedy film directed by Axelle Laffont, written by Jérôme L'hotsky and Stéphane Kramer, and starring Marie-Josée Croze, Virginie Ledoyen, and Axelle Laffont. The film was released in France on 2 May 2018.


title: MILF (2018 film)

text: The film, directed by Axelle Laffont, who also plays Elise, follows a trio of forty-something women who begin dating younger men while on vacation. The trio, Sonia, Cécile, and Elise, are friends who go to the Côte d'Azur in the south of France to help Cécile prepare her vacation home to be sold.


title: MILF (2018 film)

text: During their vacation, they meet 3 men in their twenties – Julien, Paul, and Markus (a former family friend of Cécile's), who work at a local sailing club. The men are immediately interested in the women, who they have deemed "MILFs". The 6 of them spend a lot of time together as a summer fling; the movie ends on their last day of vacation.


title: MILF (2018 film)

text: The film also features Laffont's real-life daughter, Mitty Hazanavicius, who plays her daughter Nina, visiting her for a couple of days.


title: MILF (2018 film)

text: "MILF" was released in France on 2 May 2018. It made $417,231 from 249 theaters in its opening weekend, finishing 10th. The film went on to gross $961,745 in France and a combined $174,890 from Ukraine and Russia, for a worldwide gross of $1.1 million. The film was released on Netflix in the United States in July 2020.


title: MILF (2018 film)

text: On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of .


title: Love Exposure

text: Following its release, it won many awards and received acclaim from critics. At the Berlin International Film Festival, it won the Caligari Film Award and the FIPRESCI Prize.


title: Love Exposure

text: Yū Honda is a young teenager Catholic attempting to live his life faithfully. His father, Tetsu, has become a devout Catholic priest following the death of Yū's mother and operates his own church. Tetsu asks Yū to confess his sins, but Yū believes he is a good person who has little to confess. To appease his father, he makes up sins but his father sees right through him so Yū becomes obsessed with committing real sins. Yū befriends other boys and is taught to steal, fight, and take stealth photographs up women's skirts. Yū promptly becomes a skilled "panty shot" photographer. Though perceived as a pervert, he is never aroused by these photographs.


title: Love Exposure

text: After Yū loses a bet with his friends, he agrees to go into the city dressed as a woman and kiss a girl he likes. When they go into the city, Yū and his friends come across Yōko, his "Virgin Mary" who is surrounded by a group of thugs. Still dressed as a woman, he helps Yōko, a skilled fighter herself, beat up the gang. Afterwards he kisses Yōko and runs away. Yū falls in love with her – the first time he's been in love with a girl - but Yōko falls for his disguise and develops feelings for his alter ego Sasori, or "Miss Scorpion".


title: Love Exposure

text: Meanwhile, Yū is being followed by Aya Koike, a member of the cult "Zero Church", who has become infatuated with him after she catches him taking a picture of her panties. Aya, who turned violent after being sexually abused to the point of insanity, plans to bring Yū's entire family into the Zero Church and masquerades as Sasori to gain Yōko's favor.


title: Love Exposure

text: Aya manipulates those around Yū and Yōko and Yū's family become caught up in the Zero Church. Yū desperately tries to free Yōko from the cult by kidnapping her but fails to persuade her to leave as she does not trust him to be Miss Scorpion and is convinced he is a pervert. Armed with a sword, Yū breaks into the Zero Church's building and again tries to escape with Yōko. Aya, who is present along with Yū's family, fights back, but commits suicide by driving the sword through her stomach when she realizes Yū's love for Yōko.


title: Love Exposure

text: Yū is taken to a mental hospital, where he has forgotten all of his past and convinced himself that he is really Sasori. Yōko comes to visit, claiming that she now realises that she loves him as he was the one always trying to save her. Yū cannot remember who she is, so security escort the hysterical Yōko out of the building. Moments later, Yū remembers her and escapes from the hospital, running after the car driving Yōko away. Yū catches up, smashes open the car window, and joins hands with Yōko.


title: Love Exposure

text: On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, "Love Exposure" holds an approval rating of 91% based on 22 reviews, with an average rating of 7.74/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "An engagingly funny melodrama as well as an ambitious exploration of sexual behavior, Sion Sono's Love Exposure provides nearly four hours of extremely strange and entertaining cinema." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 78 out of 100 based on 11 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


title: Love Exposure

text: Jaime Grijalba of "Brooklyn Magazine" wrote that "nothing can prepare anyone for the madness of this profound work of love, perversion, religion, friendship and conspiracies. It’s the most bombastic work of Japanese Cinema of the past decade and maybe the only four-hour film you can watch more than three times[...] in a year." In 2015, Jasper Sharp of the British Film Institute listed it as one of the 10 great Japanese films of the 21st century. Freelance film critic Kenji Fujishima also voted "Love Exposure" the ninth greatest film of the century in BBC's 2016 poll.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Adeno-associated viruses (AAV) are small viruses that infect humans and some other primate species. They belong to the genus "Dependoparvovirus", which in turn belongs to the family "Parvoviridae". They are small (approximately 26 nm in diameter) replication-defective, nonenveloped viruses and have linear single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) genome of approximately 4.8 kilobases (kb).


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: AAV are not currently known to cause disease. The viruses cause a very mild immune response. Several additional features make AAV an attractive candidate for creating viral vectors for gene therapy, and for the creation of isogenic human disease models. Gene therapy vectors using AAV can infect both dividing and quiescent cells and persist in an extrachromosomal state without integrating into the genome of the host cell. In the native virus, however, integration of virally carried genes into the host genome does occur. Integration can be important for certain applications, but can also have unwanted consequences. Recent human clinical trials using AAV for gene therapy in the retina have shown promise.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The adeno-associated virus (AAV), previously thought to be a contaminant in adenovirus preparations, was first identified as a dependoparvovirus in the 1960s in the laboratories of Bob Atchison at Pittsburgh and Wallace Rowe at NIH. Serological studies in humans subsequently indicated that, despite being present in people infected by helper viruses such as adenovirus or herpes virus, AAV itself did not cause any disease.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Wild-type AAV has attracted considerable interest from gene therapy researchers due to a number of features. Chief amongst these is the virus's apparent lack of pathogenicity. It can also infect non-dividing cells and has the ability to stably integrate into the host cell genome at a specific site (designated AAVS1) in the human chromosome 19. This feature makes it somewhat more predictable than retroviruses, which present the threat of a random insertion and of mutagenesis, which is sometimes followed by development of a cancer. The AAV genome integrates most frequently into the site mentioned, while random incorporations into the genome take place with a negligible frequency. Development of AAVs as gene therapy vectors, however, has eliminated this integrative capacity by removal of the "rep" and "cap" from the DNA of the vector. The desired gene together with a promoter to drive transcription of the gene is inserted between the inverted terminal repeats (ITRs) that aid in concatemer formation in the nucleus after the single-stranded vector DNA is converted by host cell DNA polymerase complexes into double-stranded DNA. AAV-based gene therapy vectors form episomal concatemers in the host cell nucleus. In non-dividing cells, these concatemers remain intact for the life of the host cell. In dividing cells, AAV DNA is lost through cell division, since the episomal DNA is not replicated along with the host cell DNA. Random integration of AAV DNA into the host genome is detectable but occurs at very low frequency. AAVs also present very low immunogenicity, seemingly restricted to generation of neutralizing antibodies, while they induce no clearly defined cytotoxic response. This feature, along with the ability to infect quiescent cells present their dominance over adenoviruses as vectors for human gene therapy.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Use of the virus does present some disadvantages. The cloning capacity of the vector is relatively limited and most therapeutic genes require the complete replacement of the virus's 4.8 kilobase genome. Large genes are, therefore, not suitable for use in a standard AAV vector. Options are currently being explored to overcome the limited coding capacity. The AAV ITRs of two genomes can anneal to form head-to-tail concatemers, almost doubling the capacity of the vector. Insertion of splice sites allows for the removal of the ITRs from the transcript.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Because of AAV's specialized gene therapy advantages, researchers have created an altered version of AAV termed self-complementary adeno-associated virus (scAAV). Whereas AAV packages a single strand of DNA and must wait for its second strand to be synthesized, scAAV packages two shorter strands that are complementary to each other. By avoiding second-strand synthesis, scAAV can express more quickly, although as a caveat, scAAV can only encode half of the already limited capacity of AAV. Recent reports suggest that scAAV vectors are more immunogenic than single stranded adenovirus vectors, inducing a stronger activation of cytotoxic T lymphocytes.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Humoral immunity instigated by infection with the wild type is thought to be common. The associated neutralising activity limits the usefulness of the most commonly used serotype AAV2 in certain applications. Accordingly, the majority of clinical trials under way involve delivery of AAV2 into the brain, a relatively immunologically privileged organ. In the brain, AAV2 is strongly neuron-specific.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: As of 2019, AAV vectors have been used in over 250 clinical trials worldwide, approximately 8.3% of virus-vectored gene-therapy trials. Recently, promising results have been obtained from Phase 1 and Phase 2 trials for a number of diseases, including Leber's congenital amaurosis, hemophilia, congestive heart failure, spinal muscular atrophy, lipoprotein lipase deficiency, and Parkinson's disease.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The AAV genome is built of single-stranded deoxyribonucleic acid (ssDNA), either positive- or negative-sensed, which is about 4.7 kilobase long. The genome comprises ITRs at both ends of the DNA strand, and two open reading frames (ORFs): "rep" and "cap". The former is composed of four overlapping genes encoding Rep proteins required for the AAV life cycle, and the latter contains overlapping nucleotide sequences of capsid proteins: VP1, VP2 and VP3, which interact to form a capsid with icosahedral symmetry.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The inverted terminal repeat (ITR) sequences comprise 145 bases each. They were named so because of their symmetry, which was shown to be required for efficient multiplication of the AAV genome. The feature of these sequences that gives them this property is their ability to form a hairpin, which contributes to so-called self-priming that allows primase-independent synthesis of the second DNA strand. The ITRs were also shown to be required for both integration of the AAV DNA into the host cell genome (19th chromosome in humans) and rescue from it, as well as for efficient encapsidation of the AAV DNA combined with generation of a fully assembled, deoxyribonuclease-resistant AAV particles.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: With regard to gene therapy, ITRs seem to be the only sequences required "in cis" next to the therapeutic gene: structural ("cap") and packaging ("rep") proteins can be delivered "in trans". With this assumption many methods were established for efficient production of recombinant AAV (rAAV) vectors containing a reporter or therapeutic gene. However, it was also published that the ITRs are not the only elements required "in cis" for the effective replication and encapsidation. A few research groups have identified a sequence designated "cis-acting Rep-dependent element" (CARE) inside the coding sequence of the "rep" gene. CARE was shown to augment the replication and encapsidation when present "in cis".


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: On the "left side" of the genome there are two promoters called p5 and p19, from which two overlapping messenger ribonucleic acids (mRNAs) of different length can be produced. Each of these contains an intron which can be either spliced out or not. Given these possibilities, four various mRNAs, and consequently four various Rep proteins with overlapping sequence can be synthesized. Their names depict their sizes in kilodaltons (kDa): Rep78, Rep68, Rep52 and Rep40. Rep78 and 68 can specifically bind the hairpin formed by the ITR in the self-priming act and cleave at a specific region, designated terminal resolution site, within the hairpin. They were also shown to be necessary for the AAVS1-specific integration of the AAV genome. All four Rep proteins were shown to bind ATP and to possess helicase activity. It was also shown that they upregulate the transcription from the p40 promoter (mentioned below), but downregulate both p5 and p19 promoters.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The right side of a positive-sensed AAV genome encodes overlapping sequences of three capsid proteins, VP1, VP2 and VP3, which start from one promoter, designated p40. The molecular weights of these proteins are 87, 72 and 62 kiloDaltons, respectively. The AAV capsid is composed of a mixture of VP1, VP2, and VP3 totaling 60 monomers arranged in icosahedral symmetry in a ratio of 1:1:10, with an empty mass of approximately 3.8 MDa.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The "cap" gene produces an additional, non-structural protein called the Assembly-Activating Protein (AAP). This protein is produced from ORF2 and is essential for the capsid-assembly process. The exact function of this protein in the assembly process and its structure have not been solved to date.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: All three VPs are translated from one mRNA. After this mRNA is synthesized, it can be spliced in two different manners: either a longer or shorter intron can be excised resulting in the formation of two pools of mRNAs: a 2.3 kb- and a 2.6 kb-long mRNA pool. Usually, especially in the presence of adenovirus, the longer intron is preferred, so the 2.3-kb-long mRNA represents the so-called "major splice". In this form the first AUG codon, from which the synthesis of VP1 protein starts, is cut out, resulting in a reduced overall level of VP1 protein synthesis. The first AUG codon that remains in the major splice is the initiation codon for VP3 protein. However, upstream of that codon in the same open reading frame lies an ACG sequence (encoding threonine) which is surrounded by an optimal Kozak context. This contributes to a low level of synthesis of VP2 protein, which is actually VP3 protein with additional N terminal residues, as is VP1.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Since the bigger intron is preferred to be spliced out, and since in the major splice the ACG codon is a much weaker translation initiation signal, the ratio at which the AAV structural proteins are synthesized "in vivo" is about 1:1:20, which is the same as in the mature virus particle. The unique fragment at the N terminus of VP1 protein was shown to possess the phospholipase A2 (PLA2) activity, which is probably required for the releasing of AAV particles from late endosomes. Muralidhar "et al." reported that VP2 and VP3 are crucial for correct virion assembly. More recently, however, Warrington "et al." showed VP2 to be unnecessary for the complete virus particle formation and an efficient infectivity, and also presented that VP2 can tolerate large insertions in its N terminus, while VP1 can not, probably because of the PLA2 domain presence.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Recent discoveries made through use of high-throughput 'omics approaches include the fact that AAV capsids are post-translationally modified (PTM) during production such as acetylation, methylation, phosphorylation, deamidation, O-GlycNAcylation and SUMOylation throughout capsid proteins VP1, VP2 and VP3. These PTMs differ depending on the manufacturing production platform. Another such discovery is the fact that AAV genomes are epigenetically methylated during production. Besides price, these findings might affect expression kinetics, rAAV receptor binding, trafficking, vector immunogenicity, and expression durability.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Two species of AAV were recognised by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses in 2013: "adeno-associated dependoparvovirus A" (formerly AAV-1, -2, -3 and -4) and "adeno-associated dependoparvovirus B" (formerly AAV-5).


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Until the 1990s, virtually all AAV biology was studied using AAV serotype 2. However, AAV is highly prevalent in humans and other primates and several serotypes have been isolated from various tissue samples. Serotypes 2, 3, 5, and 6 were discovered in human cells, AAV serotypes 1, 4, and 7–11 in nonhuman primate samples. As of 2006 there have been 11 AAV serotypes described, the 11th in 2004. AAV capsid proteins contain 12 hypervariable surface regions, with most variability occurring in the threefold proximal peaks, but the parvovirus genome in general presents highly conserved replication and structural genes across serotypes. All of the known serotypes can infect cells from multiple diverse tissue types. Tissue specificity is determined by the capsid serotype and pseudotyping of AAV vectors to alter their tropism range will likely be important to their use in therapy.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Serotype 2 (AAV2) has been the most extensively examined so far. AAV2 presents natural tropism towards skeletal muscles, neurons, vascular smooth muscle cells and hepatocytes.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Three cell receptors have been described for AAV2: heparan sulfate proteoglycan (HSPG), aβ integrin and fibroblast growth factor receptor 1 (FGFR-1). The first functions as a primary receptor, while the latter two have a co-receptor activity and enable AAV to enter the cell by receptor-mediated endocytosis. These study results have been disputed by Qiu, Handa, "et al." HSPG functions as the primary receptor, though its abundance in the extracellular matrix can scavenge AAV particles and impair the infection efficiency.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Studies have shown that serotype 2 of the virus (AAV-2) apparently kills cancer cells without harming healthy ones. "Our results suggest that adeno-associated virus type 2, which infects the majority of the population but has no known ill effects, kills multiple types of cancer cells yet has no effect on healthy cells," said Craig Meyers, a professor of immunology and microbiology at the Penn State College of Medicine in Pennsylvania in 2005. This could lead to a new anti-cancer agent.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Although AAV2 is the most popular serotype in various AAV-based research, it has been shown that other serotypes can be more effective as gene delivery vectors. For instance AAV6 appears much better in infecting airway epithelial cells, AAV7 presents very high transduction rate of murine skeletal muscle cells (similar to AAV1 and AAV5), AAV8 is superb in transducing hepatocytes and AAV1 and 5 were shown to be very efficient in gene delivery to vascular endothelial cells. In the brain, most AAV serotypes show neuronal tropism, while AAV5 also transduces astrocytes. AAV6, a hybrid of AAV1 and AAV2, also shows lower immunogenicity than AAV2.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Serotypes can differ with the respect to the receptors they are bound to. For example, AAV4 and AAV5 transduction can be inhibited by soluble sialic acids (of different form for each of these serotypes), and AAV5 was shown to enter cells via the platelet-derived growth factor receptor.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: There have been many efforts to engineer and improve new AAV variants for both clinical and research purposes. Such modifications include new tropisms to target specific tissues, and modified surface residues to evade detection by the immune system. Beyond opting for particular strains of recombinant AAV (rAAV) to target particular cells, researchers have also explored AAV pseudotyping, the practice of creating hybrids of certain AAV strains to approach an even more refined target. The hybrid is created by taking a capsid from one strain and the genome from another strain. For example, research involving AAV2/5, a hybrid with the genome of AAV2 and the capsid of AAV5, was able to achieve more accuracy and range in brain cells than AAV2 would be able to achieve unhybridized. Researchers have continued to experiment with pseudotyping by creating strains with hybrid capsids. AAV-DJ has a hybrid capsid from eight different strains of AAV; as such, it can infect different cells throughout many areas of the body, a property which a single strain of AAV with a limited tropism would not have. Other efforts to engineer and improve new AAV variants have involved the ancestral reconstruction of virus variants to generate new vectors with enhanced properties for clinical applications and the study of AAV biology.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: AAV is of particular interest to gene therapists due to its apparent limited capacity to induce immune responses in humans, a factor which should positively influence vector transduction efficiency while reducing the risk of any immune-associated pathology.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: AAV is not considered to have any known role in disease. However, host immune system response and immune tolerance reduce the efficacy of AAV-mediated gene therapy. Host immune response has been shown to respond to the AAV vectors, the transduced cells, and the transduced proteins. The immune response can be subdivided into two categories: innate and adaptive, the latter of which is divided into humoral and cell-mediated.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The innate immune response to the AAV vectors has been characterised in animal models. Intravenous administration in mice causes transient production of pro-inflammatory cytokines and some infiltration of neutrophils and other leukocytes into the liver, which seems to sequester a large percentage of the injected viral particles. Both soluble factor levels and cell infiltration appear to return to baseline within six hours. By contrast, more aggressive viruses produce innate responses lasting 24 hours or longer.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: In-vivo studies indicate that AAV vectors interact with the Toll-like receptor (TLR)9- and TLR2-MyD88 pathways to trigger the innate immune response by stimulating the production of interferons. It's shown that mice deficient in TLR9 are more receptive to AAV treatment and demonstrate higher levels of transgene expression


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Due to previous natural infection, many people have preexisting neutralizing antibodies (NAbs) against AAV's, which can significantly hinder its application in gene therapy. Even though AAV's are highly variable among wild-type and synthetic variants, antibody recognition sites may be conserved evolutionarily.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The virus is known to instigate robust humoral immunity in animal models and in the human population, where up to 80% of individuals are thought to be seropositive for AAV2. Antibodies are known to be neutralising, and for gene therapy applications these do impact on vector transduction efficiency via some routes of administration. As well as persistent AAV specific antibody levels, it appears from both prime-boost studies in animals and from clinical trials that the B-cell memory is also strong. In seropositive humans, circulating IgG antibodies for AAV2 appear to be primarily composed of the IgG1 and IgG2 subclasses, with little or no IgG3 or IgG4 present.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The cell-mediated response to the virus and to vectors is poorly characterised, and has been largely ignored in the literature as recently as 2005. Clinical trials using an AAV2-based vector to treat haemophilia B seem to indicate that targeted destruction of transduced cells may be occurring. Combined with data that shows that CD8+ T-cells can recognise elements of the AAV capsid "in vitro", it appears that there may be a cytotoxic T lymphocyte response to AAV vectors. Cytotoxic responses would imply the involvement of CD4+ T helper cells in the response to AAV and "in vitro" data from human studies suggests that the virus may indeed induce such responses, including both Th1 and Th2 memory responses. A number of candidate T cell stimulating epitopes have been identified within the AAV capsid protein VP1, which may be attractive targets for modification of the capsid if the virus is to be used as a vector for gene therapy.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: There are several steps in the AAV infection cycle, from infecting a cell to producing new infectious particles:


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: Some of these steps may look different in various types of cells, which, in part, contributes to the defined and quite limited native tropism of AAV. Replication of the virus can also vary in one cell type, depending on the cell's current cell cycle phase.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The characteristic feature of the adeno-associated virus is a deficiency in replication and thus its inability to multiply in unaffected cells. Adeno-associated virus spreads by co-infecting a cell with a helper virus. The first helper virus that was described as providing successful generation of new AAV particles, was the adenovirus, from which the AAV name originated. It was then shown that AAV replication can be facilitated by selected proteins derived from the adenovirus genome, by other viruses such as HSV or vaccinia, or by genotoxic agents, such as UV irradiation or hydroxyurea. Depending on the presence or absence of a helper virus, the life cycle of AAV follows either a lytic or lysogenic pathway, respectively. If there is a helper virus, AAV's gene expression activates, allowing the virus to replicate using the host cell's polymerase. When the helper virus kills the host cell, the new AAV virions are released. If there is not a helper virus present, AAV exhibits lysogenic behavior. When AAV infects a cell alone, its gene expression is repressed (AAV does not replicate), and its genome is incorporated into the host genome (into human chromosome 19). In rare cases, lysis can occur without a helper virus, but usually AAV can not replicate and kill a cell on its own.


title: Adeno-associated virus

text: The minimal set of the adenoviral genes required for efficient generation, of progeny AAV particles, was discovered by Matsushita, Ellinger "et al." This discovery allowed for new production methods of recombinant AAV, which do not require adenoviral co-infection of the AAV-producing cells. In the absence of helper virus or genotoxic factors, AAV DNA can either integrate into the host genome or persist in episomal form. In the former case integration is mediated by Rep78 and Rep68 proteins and requires the presence of ITRs flanking the region being integrated. In mice, the AAV genome has been observed persisting for long periods of time in quiescent tissues, such as skeletal muscles, in episomal form (a circular head-to-tail conformation).


title: Edo Castle

text: Tokugawa Ieyasu established the Tokugawa shogunate there, and it was the residence of the "shōgun" and the headquarters of the military government during the Edo period (1603-1867) in Japanese history. After the resignation of the "shōgun" and the Meiji Restoration, it became the Tokyo Imperial Palace. Some moats, walls and ramparts of the castle survive to this day. However, the grounds were more extensive during the Edo period, with Tokyo Station and the Marunouchi section of the city lying within the outermost moat. It also encompassed Kitanomaru Park, the Nippon Budokan Hall and other current landmarks of the surrounding area.


title: Edo Castle

text: The warrior Edo Shigetsugu built his residence in what is now the "Honmaru" and "Ninomaru" part of Edo Castle, around the end of the Heian or beginning of the Kamakura period. The Edo clan left in the 15th century as a result of uprisings in the Kantō region, and Ōta Dōkan, a retainer of the Ogigayatsu Uesugi family, built Edo Castle in 1457.


title: Edo Castle

text: The castle later came under the control of the Later Hōjō clan in 1524 after the Siege of Edo. The castle was vacated in 1590 due to the Siege of Odawara. Tokugawa Ieyasu made Edo Castle his base after he was offered eight eastern provinces by Toyotomi Hideyoshi. He later defeated Toyotomi Hideyori, son of Hideyoshi, at the Siege of Osaka in 1615, and emerged as the political leader of Japan. Tokugawa Ieyasu received the title of "Sei-i Taishōgun" in 1603, and Edo became the center of Tokugawa's administration.


title: Edo Castle

text: Initially, parts of the area were lying under water. The sea reached the present "Nishinomaru" area of Edo Castle, and Hibiya was a beach. The landscape was changed for the construction of the castle. Most construction started in 1593 and was completed in 1636 under Ieyasu's grandson, Tokugawa Iemitsu. By this time, Edo had a population of 150,000.


title: Edo Castle

text: The existing "Honmaru", "Ninomaru", and "Sannomaru" areas were extended with the addition of the "Nishinomaru", "Nishinomaru-shita", "Fukiage", and "Kitanomaru" areas. The perimeter measured 16 km.


title: Edo Castle

text: The "shōgun" required the "daimyōs" to supply building materials or finances, a method shogunate used to keep the powers of the "daimyōs" in check. Large granite stones were moved from afar, the size and number of the stones depended on the wealth of the "daimyōs". The wealthier ones had to contribute more. Those who did not supply stones were required to contribute labor for such tasks as digging the large moats and flattening hills. The earth that was taken from the moats was used as landfill for sea-reclamation or to level the ground. Thus the construction of Edo Castle laid the foundation for parts of the city where merchants were able to settle.


title: Edo Castle

text: At least 10,000 men were involved in the first phase of the construction and more than 300,000 in the middle phase. When construction ended, the castle had 38 gates. The ramparts were almost high and the outer walls were high. Moats forming roughly concentric circles were dug for further protection. Some moats reached as far as Ichigaya and Yotsuya, and parts of the ramparts survive to this day. This area is bordered by either the sea or the Kanda River, allowing ships access.


title: Edo Castle

text: Various fires over the centuries damaged or destroyed parts of the castle, Edo and the majority of its buildings being made of timber.


title: Edo Castle

text: On April 21, 1701, in the Great Pine Corridor ("Matsu no Ōrōka") of Edo Castle, Asano Takumi-no-kami drew his short sword and attempted to kill Kira Kōzuke-no-suke for insulting him. This triggered the events involving the forty-seven "rōnin".


title: Edo Castle

text: After the capitulation of the shogunate in 1867, the inhabitants and "shōgun" had to vacate the premises. The castle compound was renamed in October, 1868, and then renamed in 1869. In the year Meiji 2 (1868), on the 23rd day of the 10th month of the Japanese calendar the emperor moved to Tokyo and Edo castle became an imperial palace.


title: Edo Castle

text: A fire consumed the old Edo Castle on the night of May 5, 1873. The area around the old keep, which burned in the 1657 Meireki fire, became the site of the new Imperial , built in 1888. Some Tokugawa-period buildings which were still standing were destroyed to make space for new structures for the imperial government. The imperial palace building itself, however, was constructed in "Nishinomaru" Ward, not in the same location as the "shōgun"s palace in "Honmaru" Ward.


title: Edo Castle

text: Today the site is part of the Tokyo Imperial Palace. The government declared the area an historic site and has undertaken steps to restore and preserve the remaining structures of Edo Castle.


title: Edo Castle

text: The plan of Edo Castle was not only large but elaborate. The grounds were divided into various wards, or citadels. The "Honmaru" was in the center, with the "Ninomaru" (second compound), "Sannomaru" (third compound) extending to the east; the "Nishinomaru" (west compound) flanked by "Nishinomaru-shita" (outer section) and "Fukiage" (firebreak compound); and the "Kitanomaru" (north compound). The different wards were divided by moats and large stone walls, on which various keeps, defense houses and towers were built. To the east, beyond the "Sannomaru" was an outer moat, enclosing the "Otomachi" and "Daimyō-Kōji" districts.


title: Edo Castle

text: "Ishigaki" stone walls were constructed around the "Honmaru" and the eastern side of the "Nishinomaru". Each ward could be reached via wooden bridges, which were buffered by gates on either side. The circumference is subject to debate, with estimates ranging from 6 to 10 miles.


title: Edo Castle

text: With the enforcement of the "sankin-kōtai" system in the 17th century, it became expedient for the "daimyōs" to set up residence in Edo close to the "shōgun". Surrounding the inner compounds of the castle were the residences of "daimyōs", most of which were concentrated at the Outer Sakurada Gate to the south-east and in the "Ōtemachi" and "Daimyō-Kōji" districts east of the castle inside the outer moat. Some residences were also within the inner moats in the outer "Nishinomaru".


title: Edo Castle

text: The mansions were large and very elaborate, with no expenses spared to construct palaces with Japanese gardens and multiple gates. Each block had four to six of the mansions, which were surrounded by ditches for drainage. "Daimyōs" with lesser wealth were allowed to set up their houses, called "banchō", to the north and west of the castle.


title: Edo Castle

text: To the east and south of the castle were sections that were set aside for merchants, since this area was considered unsuitable for residences. The entertainment district Yoshiwara was also there.


title: Edo Castle

text: The inner citadels of the castle were protected by multiple large and small wooden gates ("mon"), constructed in-between the gaps of the stone wall. Not many are left today. From south to southwest to north, the main gates are at "Nijūbashi", "Sakurada-mon", "Sakashita-mon", "Kikyō-mon", "Hanzō-mon", "Inui-mon", "Ōte-mon", "Hirakawa-mon" and "Kitahanebashi-mon". Only the stone foundations of the other gates (meaning the gap left in between the large stone walls for the wooden gates) are still preserved. Large gates, such as the "Ōte-mon", had a guard of 120 men, while the smaller gates were guarded by 30 to 70 armed men.


title: Edo Castle

text: An eye-witness account is given by the French director François Caron from the Dutch colony at Dejima. He described the gates and courts being laid out in such a manner as to confuse an outsider. Caron noted the gates were not placed in a straight line, but were staggered, forcing a person to make a 90 degree turn to pass on to the next gate. This style of construction for the main gates is called "masugata" (meaning "square"). As noted by Caron, the gate consisted of a square-shaped courtyard or enclosure and a two-story gatehouse which is entered via three roofed "kōrai-mon". The "watari-yagura-mon" was constructed at adjacent angles to each side within the gate. All major gates had large timbers that framed the main entry point and were constructed to impress and proclaim the might of the shogunate.


title: Edo Castle

text: Accounts of how many armed men served at Edo Castle vary. The Spanish Governor-General of the Philippines Rodrigo de Vivero y Velasco gave an eye-witness account in 1608–1609, describing the huge stones that made up the walls and a large number of people at the castle. He claimed to have seen 20,000 servants between the first gate and the "shōgun"s palace. He passed through two ranks of 1,000 soldiers armed with muskets, and by the second gate he was escorted by 400 armed men. He passed stables that apparently had room for 200 horses and an armory that stored enough weapons for 100,000 men.


title: Edo Castle

text: was the central, innermost part of the castle containing the keep and residence of the "shōgun". The stately and luxurious main buildings of the "Honmaru", consisting of the outer, central, and inner halls, were said to have covered an area of during the Kan-ei era (1624–1644). Surrounding the "Honmaru" were curtain walls, with 11 keeps, 15 defense houses and more than 20 gates.


title: Edo Castle

text: "Honmaru" was destroyed several times by fire and reconstructed after each fire. The keep and main palace were destroyed in 1657 and 1863, respectively, and not reconstructed. Some remains, such as the "Fujimi-yagura" keep and "Fujimi-tamon" defense house, still exist.


title: Edo Castle

text: The "Honmaru" was surrounded by moats on all sides. To the north separating "Honmaru" from the "Kitanomaru" were the "Inui-bori" and "Hirakawa-bori", to the east separating the "Ninomaru" was the "Hakuchō-bori", and to the west and south separating the "Nishinomaru" were the "Hasuike-bori" and "Hamaguri-bori".


title: Edo Castle

text: Most of these still exist, although the "Hakuchō-bori" has partly been filled in since the Meiji era.


title: Edo Castle

text: is the northern gate to the "Honmaru" ward, facing "Kitanomaru" ward across Daikan-cho street. It is also constructed as a "masu"-gate just like "Ōte-mon" and "Hirakawa-mon", and has a "watari-yagura-mon" in a left angle. The bridge in front of the gate, which was once a drawbridge during the Edo period, is now fixed to the ground. The metal clasps used to draw the bridge are still attached to the roof of the gate.


title: Edo Castle

text: The main keep or tower (known as the ) was in the northern corner of the "Honmaru" ward. "Kitahanebashi-mon" is right next to it and was one of the main gateways to this innermost part. The measurements are in width from east to west, in length from north to south, and in height. A five-storey keep used to stand on this base which was in height and was thus the highest castle tower in the whole of Japan, symbolizing the power of the "shōgun". The keep and its multiple roofs were constructed in 1607 and ornamented with gold. It was destroyed in the 1657 Fire of Meireki and not reconstructed. The foundations of the keep are all that is left.


title: Edo Castle

text: Despite this, "jidaigeki" movies (such as "Abarenbō Shōgun") set in Edo usually depict Edo Castle as having a keep, and substitute Himeji Castle for that purpose.


title: Edo Castle

text: A non-profit "Rebuilding Edo-jo Association" (NPO江戸城再建) was founded in 2004 with the aim of a historically correct reconstruction of at least the main keep. In March 2013 Naotaka Kotake, head of the group, said that "The capital city needs a symbolic building", and that the group planned to collect donations and signatures on a petition in the hope of having the tower rebuilt. A reconstruction blueprint had been made based on old documents. The Imperial Household Agency had not indicated whether it would support the project.


title: Edo Castle

text: The residential and the gardens of the "shōgun" and his court were constructed around the castle keep in the "Honmaru" area. It consisted of a series of low-level buildings, connected by corridors and congregating around various gardens, courtyards or lying detached, similar to the structures that can be seen in Nijō Castle in Kyoto today. These structures were used for either residential or governmental purposes such as audiences.


title: Edo Castle

text: Various fires destroyed the "Honmaru" Palace over time and was rebuilt after each fire. In the span from 1844 to 1863, "Honmaru" experienced three fires. After each fire, the "shōgun" moved to the "Nishinomaru" residences for the time being until reconstruction was complete. However, in 1853 both the "Honmaru" and "Nishinomaru" burned down, forcing the "shōgun" to move into a "daimyō" residence. The last fire occurred in 1873, after which the palace was not rebuilt by the new imperial government.


title: Edo Castle

text: Behind the "Honmaru" Palace was the main keep. Besides being the location of the keep and palace, the "Honmaru" was also the site of the treasury. Three storehouses that bordered on a rampart adjoined the palace on the other side. The entrance was small, made with thick lumber and heavily guarded. Behind the wall was a deep drop to the moat below, making the area secure.